Need help on getting the right amount of cals per day.

Lu_88
Lu_88 Posts: 36 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Ok i have a couple of questions, im sure they have been asked before but im fairly new here.

So last night after dinner i filled in my food diary and i was over 300 cals under what i should be eating but i wasn't hungry. I decided it was best to eat something to try and get myself up to 1200, I take it that's the right thing to do yes?
What sort of thing would you eat to get yourself up to the 1200? I had 2 slices of toast 1 with peanut butter and the other with marmite and it took me to just under 1200. Is that ok? The thing is i felt like a pig eating when i wasn't hungry...

I just need a little advise. Thanks :)

Replies

  • AngryDiet
    AngryDiet Posts: 1,349 Member
    Nuts are good for protein, calories, and small portions.
  • lorri68
    lorri68 Posts: 53 Member
    inm no doctor but you need to eat to keep you body working if you eat low cals your body will hold onto it and store it as fat and you wont lose wait because your body thinks its gone in to starvation mode.
  • Lu_88
    Lu_88 Posts: 36 Member
    inm no doctor but you need to eat to keep you body working if you eat low cals your body will hold onto it and store it as fat and you wont lose wait because your body thinks its gone in to starvation mode.

    Hence why i made myself toast. Im after suggestions for what i could eat to get myself up to 1200 cals if ive already had my 3 meals and im full.

    Nuts is a very good idea, thanks for that.
  • jacksonpt
    jacksonpt Posts: 10,413 Member
    You'll get better at this as you go... it can take some practice to figure out how to put together foods/meals so they meet your daily goals and you feel good (not too hungry, not too full) throughout the day.
  • jacksonpt
    jacksonpt Posts: 10,413 Member
    inm no doctor but you need to eat to keep you body working if you eat low cals your body will hold onto it and store it as fat and you wont lose wait because your body thinks its gone in to starvation mode.

    1 day at 1000 cals isn't going to put her into starvation mode.
  • AngryDiet
    AngryDiet Posts: 1,349 Member
    I find that my appetite varies. I'm not as hungry for a few days and then more hungry for the next few.

    You don't really need to worry about making daily caloric goals. Achieving your weekly goal is usually sufficient.

    The phone app version of MFP gives you a neat weekly summary you can use to track that. I haven't found it on the website version though.
  • jacksonpt
    jacksonpt Posts: 10,413 Member
    You don't really need to worry about making daily caloric goals. Achieving your weekly goal is usually sufficient.

    Just to clarify (because this is a good point that I don't want people to mis-interpret)... if you're under or over a little every now and again, that's fine... as long as your total cals at the end of the week are where they need to be.
  • AngryDiet
    AngryDiet Posts: 1,349 Member
    You don't really need to worry about making daily caloric goals. Achieving your weekly goal is usually sufficient.

    Just to clarify (because this is a good point that I don't want people to mis-interpret)... if you're under or over a little every now and again, that's fine... as long as your total cals at the end of the week are where they need to be.

    Yes, that's what I meant. Thanks for the clarification..
  • jwalworth
    jwalworth Posts: 32 Member
    The other thing to remember is that all of the tracking (exercise, goal number, calories for each item eaten) are all estimates. Many of them are very good estimates (e.g. exercise calories burned calculated based on weight and using a HRM), but they are still just estimates. So the bottom line as others have said is just try and stay in the ballpark -- particularly on a longer term scale.

    The other thing to remember is 1200 is not a magic number. The real goal is to find the number based upon your gender, height, weight, age and activity level that leads to a healthy sustainable change in diet and fitness. So if you are a short and not overly overweight , female in your mid-40s (by the way I have no idea about the statistics of the person who posted this question just using this as an example), your healthy calorie goal is going to be substantially different (and even perhaps below 1200) than say me who is significantly overweight, 6ft tall and in my late 30s and running for 60 minutes plus almost every day. Or in other words my 1980 per day might be the same as your 1150.
  • nphect
    nphect Posts: 474
    you did the right thing, if you didn't eat you most likely would have created a "pocket" of deficit where one day, you would say to yourself, "im starving!" and pig out. Always eat your calories if your at your minimum, which i think 1200 is for you. Now if you exercised 1000 calories and your net was 1200, but you had to eat 2200, i wouldn't of ate.
  • Lu_88
    Lu_88 Posts: 36 Member
    Thank you everyone for your advice.

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