I'm Really Struggling Eating Within Calorie Limit

Your target calorie intake seems very low to me, I'm a 41 yo female around 130lb and when I have 1500 cals per day I will lose although it will be slow.
If you're not losing on that but not logging properly I would imagine you may be not logging more than you think!

Perhaps introduce some healthy snacks between meals rather than have a couple of massive meals and up your calories a little, you shouldn't be feeling starving all the time. When I get to the point when I'm feeling really really hungry I always end up eating far more than I intended.

Are you set up to lose 2lbs a week or 1.5lbs? I think because you only have 25lbs to go, change your goal to 1lbs a week. You really need to fight through the munchies and have more control.

You have done so great already, do not ruin your hard work nor stop now when the goal line is so close.

Sorry you're having a tough time. I can only repeat what others have said.. (1) you shouldn't be hungry all the time, so try adding some snacks - my favorites are almonds, (2) your calorie goal seems low. I am a 5 foot 8 woman weighing 152 currently and at 1770 net I still loose 1/2 a pound a week as I'm working off the last couple of pounds before maintenance.

I think your calorie intake is too low.

I'm much shorter than you (5'3") and I weigh less (about 140 lbs) and I'm 40. I'd be permanently starving on the intake you're trying to limit yourself to.

If I'm doing a reasonable amount of exercise I can eat around 2000 calories a day.

Personally my attitude is if you're eating healthy food and you're still hungry (and I mean actually hungry rather than just peckish or wanting to eat) then your body is telling you to eat more.

i think there are a ton of factors jacking you up here. for me personally, i recently realized i eat a LOT out of boredom, or habit. im not currently working, so i tend to feel hungry throughout the day, but when i actually focus on that hunger it kind of goes away because im consciously thinking about how i just ate a few hours ago (granted, i eat high protein meals that fill me up). if that doesnt really fit what you're going through,

i'd recommend changing up your diet. i try to focus on paleo principles because it makes sense to me. now, it IS a fad diet, but the ideology behind it is solid. focus on eating ONLY natural foods (they say no grains/carbs, which is where i tend to disagree). but basically the diet says fill 3/4 of your plate with veggies and the remainder can be meat. veggies WILL fill you up for basically no calories and tons of nutrients so its a win all around. typically, you might give up by the time your halfway done with a (traditional american sized portioned) plate. sure, you will probably be able to continue eating to the end, when you feel "full". but you shouldnt be eating until you're full. eat until you dont feel hungry anymore, then save the rest for left overs. ultimately you'll have calories to spare and leftovers for weeks so your wallet stays full .

(another thing to note with all natural foods, is all natural drinks. which basically means ONLY water and tea. drinking calories is a HUGE problem for us. once i cut the drinks out i began struggling to even keep my calories in range without that pesky "starvation" message every day)... we're all different. im not saying you have to do this diet at all. but at the very least try looking at its principles and im sure you'll see a huge difference.

Since losing weight, my calorie allowance within MFP just keeps getting smaller and smaller. I do eat back "calories" that I earn from intense exercise but I still feel like it's not enough. I'm constantly hungry throughout the day. I already cut out almost all starchy foods so that meals would make me feel full longer but it doesn't seem to work. As soon as I wake up, I'm having pretty strong hunger pangs (even though I had a very large dinner night before). Sometimes I try to fast through breakfast to have more calories for the rest of the day but it leaves me feeling way too hungry.

Am I just lacking self control and motivation? No pain, no gain, right? My weight loss has hit a plateau and now I'm having the hardest time cutting back calories. It's gotten so bad that I'm playing mind games with myself like not logging everything in MFP so that it doesn't look as bad. I keep telling myself I'll do better tomorrow but tomorrow came today and I still ate too much.

About me:
Male, 27 years old, 5' 8"
Starting weight: 255 lb
Current weight: 170 lb
Goal weight: 155 lb
Calorie goal per day: 1400-1800 (latter with a lot of exercise)
Reality: 1900-2300 cal lately every day

Sigh. I'm really frustrated with myself. I did start doing HIIT sessions recently and I noticed that it has stimulated my appetite even more.

so glad to see you're eating 1900 - 2300 cals a day, because if you were eating what you try to eat you'd be an anorexic.

You're a guy. The less weight you have left to lose, the LESS weight you have to try to lose. Think of all your little fat cells like little taps... as your taps get fewer, the flow out of them gets less. You cannot release enough stored fat to serve the deficit and so you have 2 choices: eat muscle and organs (organs being most energy expensive), or over-ride the self-control systems in the brain of this bloody fool and make him eat something.

Good to see your safety-override system works. Just raise your calorie requirements back to something reasonable. You've done the hard stuff, now you have to smooth off that curve and raise calories as you go until you are eating maintenance calories at a time when you want to maintain.

Reality: 1900-2300 cal lately every day

Your TDEE minus 20% is in that range. You might consider using TDEE rather than NEAT (MFP uses NEAT) to determine your calorie goals.
Here' a thread on the subject.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1033629-to-those-of-you-who-really-understand-tdee-vs-neat

Here are a couple of TDEE calculators:

http://scoobysworkshop.com/accurate-calorie-calculator/

http://iifym.com/tdee-calculator/

The choice of TDEE vs NEAT is personal preference. I like using TDEE because I don't have to bother entering every activity. Some people prefer NEAT because if they put in a little extra work in the gym that day they have a treat (cake) at the end of the day because they earned it.

Am I just lacking self control and motivation? No pain, no gain, right? My weight loss has hit a plateau and now I'm having the hardest time cutting back calories. It's gotten so bad that I'm playing mind games with myself like not logging everything in MFP so that it doesn't look as bad. I keep telling myself I'll do better tomorrow but tomorrow came today and I still ate too much.

About me:
Male, 27 years old, 5' 8"
Starting weight: 255 lb
Current weight: 170 lb
Goal weight: 155 lb
Calorie goal per day: 1400-1800 (latter with a lot of exercise)
Reality: 1900-2300 cal lately every day

Sigh. I'm really frustrated with myself. I did start doing HIIT sessions recently and I noticed that it has stimulated my appetite even more.

First - breathe. Relax. You're beating yourself up but you've lost 85 pounds already based on what you posted above.

You do realize that there are lots and lots of people who wish they could accomplish this, don't you? Take a break from criticizing yourself and pat yourself on the back for a job well done. Do you have further to go? Yes, but it's a lot less than you've already accomplished. Being nice to yourself ought to become part of this process.

Ok, now for the second part. I love MFP. I really do. It's a fantastic tool and a wonderful, easy to use, online food diary. But the calorie needs calculation that MFP spits out if you use the tool here for calculating your needs is just awful. It makes no allowance for BMR (basel metabolic rate - or he number of calories you need to consume to maintain your current weight if all you did was lay in bed all day). Because of this MFP commonly miscalculates and has people grossly under-consuming and feeling pretty lousy. If you're 50 to 100 pounds overweight this is much less noticeable for most people than when you get within 20 or so pounds of your goal, which is where you are right now.

What I generally recommend for most people is rather than constantly adjusting their consumption as they lose weight, that you target the number of calories you need to eat to maintain your target weight. So, for you, your BMR for your goal weight of 155 pounds is 1712 calories. Now that's what you'd need to eat if you were immobilized to maintain that weight. No one lives like that, so you need to adjust that number for a factor that accounts for your daily activity level (before exercise). Most folks live a relatively sedentary life, composed mostly of sitting at a desk - the appropriate factor for that is 1.2 (as in, take the BMR number and multiply it by 1.2). For you that puts you at 2054 calories per day. This is the number of calories you should be consuming and never go below in order to maintain a body weight of 155 pounds.

Now, you'll note that I said this number does not account for exercise. Why? Because exercise is variable based upon effort, and ideally you should be taking a day off from exercise at least once a week to give your body a chance to recovery. In a perfect world you'd be involved in active recovery at least twice a week, and that will burn a lot fewer calories than the days you're doing a HIIT workout. If you don't have a heart rate monitor to get to a pretty good estimate of the number of calories you're burning on intense workout days I'd throw 400 at it. Should you be eating back those 400 calories? Yes, emphatically. Why? Because you're already at a deficit if you eat 2054 per day based on your current weight. Being at a steeper deficit (especially being as close to your goal as you are - did I mention you're really dang close to your goal and you should be proud of that?) will work against you. You're already feeling that.

Again, relax. You've already accomplished a lot. With a few little tweaks you'll get the rest of the way. Feel free to hit me up with you have any other questions.

-Tex

May I ask why you eat so much for dinner, compared to the rest of the day? Are you starving by then? Scared you will be hungry and saving calories? Could you add a snack a bit earlier? I would suggest you reconsider your meal plans completely to make your life at a lower weight easier: more veggies and fruit than you are currently doing, smaller meals (which means more snacks) and less processed things, including shakes. And, like everyone else said, readjust your goals to something more sustainable. Slower and steady weight loss is fine, no need to lose everything as fast as possible. You are almost at your goal, losing 2 lbs per month is more than fine at this point.

Since losing weight, my calorie allowance within MFP just keeps getting smaller and smaller. I do eat back "calories" that I earn from intense exercise but I still feel like it's not enough. I'm constantly hungry throughout the day. I already cut out almost all starchy foods so that meals would make me feel full longer but it doesn't seem to work. As soon as I wake up, I'm having pretty strong hunger pangs (even though I had a very large dinner night before). Sometimes I try to fast through breakfast to have more calories for the rest of the day but it leaves me feeling way too hungry.

Am I just lacking self control and motivation? No pain, no gain, right? My weight loss has hit a plateau and now I'm having the hardest time cutting back calories. It's gotten so bad that I'm playing mind games with myself like not logging everything in MFP so that it doesn't look as bad. I keep telling myself I'll do better tomorrow but tomorrow came today and I still ate too much.

About me:
Male, 27 years old, 5' 8"
Starting weight: 255 lb
Current weight: 170 lb
Goal weight: 155 lb
Calorie goal per day: 1400-1800 (latter with a lot of exercise)
Reality: 1900-2300 cal lately every day

Sigh. I'm really frustrated with myself. I did start doing HIIT sessions recently and I noticed that it has stimulated my appetite even more.

I know exactly how you feel. I am the same way. It is quite disappointing to see your calorie allowance go down as you lose weight based on past experience.