Eating extra calories!

Naokoheart

I am finding it quite hard to eat my exercise calories,
on top of my daily limit,
its not that I don't want to though.

Banks has re-educated me into realising
that is appropriate to consume your
daily limit and your exercise calories
whilst still having a healthy weight loss/deficit.

Do you struggle as well?
Do you eat all of your exercise calories?
How many hours should one stop eating before bedtime?

McFatterton

I also have a hard time eating all my calories - sometimes I even have a hard time getting to 1200 calories with or without exercise! I think my problem is that I'm always afraid I'll eat too much, so I keep them low from breakfast through dinner, but usually by the time I'm done cooking dinner, I don't have much of an appetite. Sometimes I find myself just eating something so that I eat enough calories in a day, which I absolutely hate doing. Since I've started being more healthy and more concious about what I eat I've found that I'm not nearly as hungry as I always thought I was - I was just bored!

I'm interested to hear what others have to say about this too.

Timothy2000

I too find it very hard to eat all my calories for the day, Little things add up to such as strawberry preserves, salad dressing, dijon mustard, honey. I eat three regulars meals with two snacks that is it. If I am not hungry I am not going to try and force myself to eat a lore more calories than I need to as long as I at least Make it 1200.

mystasia

A good thing to add would be nuts, they are very healthy, the right kind of fats and more protein. I love individual trail mix bags, the ones I get are under 200 calories and even has a few m&ms in the mix.

I've always heard to not eat about 3 hours before going to bed. To go easy on the carbs at night....so the nut mix would be a good evening snack for you!

lildebbie

i practically never eat my exercise cals....I am set at 1640 cals now and i usally stay around 1500, with my exercise cals it puts me like 2200 or so cals...i just can't eat that much doesn't seem right to me...after all I want toloose weight. I have been working out m-f every day and staying around 1200-1500 and have lost about 3lbs a week...so figure i stick with that for now

marujita

I was just thinking the same thing today as I look back at my week of food diary entries. I almost always have remaining calories, and I have a ton of remaining kcal today because I exercised a lot. I could easily find the calories to complete my goal (ice cream, candy bars, a sandwich, etc) however my problem is that I have a hard time completing the calories and still staying within the goals for protein, fat, carbs, etc. Nuts are a good idea (mystasia) but then my problem today would have been that I go over on my fat limit for the day, even if it is good fat.

I'm wondering if it might matter more the WEEKLY deficit than the daily. For example, if I eat a little over my limit one day during the week and then a little more under the next that it would even out. Or eat three consecutive under the limit, and then three days over....just a thought.

Thanks for the question, it's a good point to bring up, as I'm sure it is pretty important to not make a habit out of having too much of a deficit each day/week. What I've been reading and hearing everywhere is that you don't want to try to lose much more than 2 lbs per week, or else your body may go into starvation mode. I'm also curious to see what other's say about this