Help this girl out before she goes nuts!

Amanda82691
Amanda82691 Posts: 298 Member
edited January 7 in Motivation and Support
I need help everyone! I'm kind of having a mental break down. I am in a weird place right now with my weight loss and get fit journey. I guess you can almost say I'm a little scared lol. I love MFP and everything that it offers however, I don't want to have to count calories the rest of my life nor do I really even want to count calories period. But I feel like I have been so brain washed into thinking that the only way to successfully lose weight is to count calories. But I know in all reality that counting calories is only something I can do for so long. It is not something that I will be able to do the rest of my life. I also feel like by counting calories I am in a way depriving myself of the freedom that you are suppose to have with eating food. Like I know what clean eating is. I know and now after all this time learning about food and health I know even better then ever what is and what is not good for me. I understand portion control and everything that goes along with clean eating and healthy foods. I just want to be able to live my life and not have to feel like I'm ruled by logging every bite I take to make sure I hit a certain target daily. Also I feel like in there is no middle, like its all or nothing. I love the way clean eating makes me feel mentally and physically however If my parents make pasta for dinner I don't want to consistenly make my own meal always and feel like I can't eat what my family is having for dinner. I just don't want this to TAKE OVER my life to a point that I lose who I am and I am really afraid of that happening. I do want more then anything to be, look, and feel healthy! And eventually I will succeed in doing so. I am not someone who wants to compete in fitness competions or have a six pack abs or anything fancy like that. I just want to be healthy, and love my body. I guess I just don't know how to go about doing this in a way that I am comfortable with but will also be successful. If anyone has any ideas, or tips please I am all ears to any suggestions. I know that in the end I have to find what works for me but I need some guidance in some sort of direction at this point because I'm lost. :/

Replies

  • Bobby__Clerici
    Bobby__Clerici Posts: 741 Member
    I feel you.
    Some folks work with portion control with success.
    To each his or her own.
    Do whatever works.
    I enjoy logging in food and researching nutritional information. Not so much at first.
    It was a work in progress but became a habit.
    I wish you well, and surely others are in your boat.
    Good Luck ..:flowerforyou:
  • kdeaux1959
    kdeaux1959 Posts: 2,675 Member
    It is ok if you go over periodically. If you can "eat clean" and not log and lose weight, by all means do so. Just watch the scale and if it starts edging the wrong way make a change. The other day I went to a seafood buffet and ate a meal that had 2500+ calories... I ate it. I enjoyed it. I gained a little that day. But it was not a lifestyle change -- it was a one day treat... yesterday? I was back on track and all is good. If your parents bring a dish you want to eat? EAT IT... Enjoy it. Don't make a lifestyle out of it... It is ok. Don't sweat it. And if you go over one day? Fine. No problem... Just don't make a habit of it. If you have been doing this for a while, you know about what you can consume so if you don't want to log daily.. don't... Just watch and if you start losing ground, quickly come back and log in a few meals and see what is going on. RELAX.. It is going to be ok.
  • ElliieMental
    ElliieMental Posts: 189
    Have you tried slimming world? It's clean eating with certain rules. Once you get your head around it you'll never have to count or measure again really and there are a lot of foods which are unlimited (within reason).

    I didn't get along with it but I know loads of people who did really well with it. It's also the sort of eating plan that you can stick to for the rest of your life really, plus there are groups.
  • MaraDiaz
    MaraDiaz Posts: 4,604 Member
    You could try low carb. A lot of people on Atkins don't count calories, they just stay under 20-30 ish carbs. It's easy to do that once you know what foods to eat and which ones to eat rarely or not at all.

    I do count calories on low carb, but then again, years of yo-yo dieting means I don't have a lot of wiggle room when it comes to my metabolism.
  • NCchar130
    NCchar130 Posts: 955 Member
    I completely understand, OP. It has been eye-opening to see how the holidays have affected my weight loss, which is to say, not at all. I mean, possibly having two 'free days' at Thanksgiving and four of them at Christmas slowed me down some, but basically I was able to eat whatever and skip workouts without any massive weight gain. In fact, from 11/30 to 12/30 I lost about 5 pounds. As of this morning, I'm up 0.4 from my previous lowest weight recorded right before Christmas.

    I've been wondering lately if I will need to log my food forever once I get to goal. I hope not. I don't want to be so obsessive, if possible. Maybe stepping away from time to time and seeing how that affects your weight would be helpful. I think that getting to and then maintaining a healthy weight is about making the right choices MOST of the time, not ALL the time.
  • larryc0923
    larryc0923 Posts: 557 Member
    Amanda - I guess one way to view keeping track of what you eat and subsequent calories could be viewed as reducing your freedom but I do not think so. In fact by being able to easily keep track of the number of calories I have found it providing more freedom because now I am not only free to eat whatever I want (and do) but I now know the impact of this decision. One analogy I make is to my car. Just because every time I fill up my car I keep track of the amount of gasoline dies not make me any less free to drive where I want to go but now I know how far I can go. Keep up your great progress and have a happy new year.
  • busywaterbending
    busywaterbending Posts: 844 Member
    Amanda

    I hear ya. I want to assure you that when you have your macros right and are getting the right nutrition, you DONT have to count calories.

    You are not crazy for wanting a care free diet life for maintence. It can happen.

    Good diet = good hormone health, add exercise daily to maintain your maintence mode.

    message me if you want to be friends.
  • Amanda82691
    Amanda82691 Posts: 298 Member
    You could try low carb. A lot of people on Atkins don't count calories, they just stay under 20-30 ish carbs. It's easy to do that once you know what foods to eat and which ones to eat rarely or not at all.

    I do count calories on low carb, but then again, years of yo-yo dieting means I don't have a lot of wiggle room when it comes to my metabolism.

    I try to stay low on carbs and its impossible lol.
  • ambrosdm
    ambrosdm Posts: 21 Member
    I know that counting calories seems like a big pain -- and it is, but you don't have to do it every day for the rest of your life. I've been doing my fitness pal for over a year now (I reached my goal after about 10 months). At first, I had to painstakingly log in every morsel I put in my mouth, otherwise I over-ate. It was really shocking to see how many calories I ate mindlessly and how many calories were in certain foods that I ate (almost) with abandon. The logging in everything I ate gave me an idea of how much I should eat and the types of food that were real calorie-bombs (and should be avoided or at least planned for). Now, although I log in almost everyday, I don't log in every bite. I use the food database to look up foods I'm unsure of before eating, and kind of keep track of my rate of consumption. If the scale starts to creep up (like it did this past week), I know I can just log in everything I eat for a little while until I get back in control and lose the weight. So far, I've been able to keep off the weight I lost last year with this method. Good Luck!!!
  • Amanda82691
    Amanda82691 Posts: 298 Member
    Amanda

    I hear ya. I want to assure you that when you have your macros right and are getting the right nutrition, you DONT have to count calories.

    You are not crazy for wanting a care free diet life for maintence. It can happen.

    Good diet = good hormone health, add exercise daily to maintain your maintence mode.

    message me if you want to be friends.

    Thats what I hear that if you eat clean and you keep your carbs and protien and such on track then you don't have to worry about calories! I just think its the worse! And this all this came to me when I looked a mild cheddar cheese stick that I looked at and it was almost 200 calories and I thought to myself its healthy food its cheese! Does the fat that it is almost 200 calories mean its not healthy! And its like ever since the cheese incident I am horrified by counting calories. Plus I love potatos and a lot of carb filled food I know I can't give up!
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