Not taking enough calories but not hungry

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I had a look at your diet for the last few days- looks like you are avoiding complex carbs in many of your meals.
This will explain both why you aren't getting enough calories and why you are losing weight.

What is likely to be happening is as you are doing a low carb diet you are utilising the glycogen in your muscles and liver.
For every gram of glycogen you are dumping 4g of water.
Over a few days you might see a 2-3lb drop but it will mostly be water.

If you were to have a big dose of sugar/carbs/salt you will draw back a load of water and technically 'weight more' even though you won't have put on any fat.

If you want to keep on low carbing then do it but be aware of the metabolic processes involved.
Otherwise maybe try more complex carbs- I like sweet potato, brown rice, cous cous, quinoa.

Awesome explanation!! Thanks!

If you are not hungry then eat less. I know people are going to proclaim the "starvation mode" but the bigger the calorie deficit you have the more weight you will lose. Now if you do this very extreme for months on end then yes your metabolism will start to slow a bit. This really doesn't start to happen that bad until you get lower body fat % though. If you keep up really low calorie though you will tend to feel like crap, have less energy and headaches a lot. I have tried the very low calorie and if can get past those problems make sure you still lift weights too greatly reduce the loss of lean muscle.

Are you seriously suggesting that OP eat less calories when she is ALREADY eating under 1200? :grumble:

OP can easily hit 1200 cal/day eating nuts, seeds, nut butters, avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, etc.

If you are not hungry then eat less. I know people are going to proclaim the "starvation mode" but the bigger the calorie deficit you have the more weight you will lose. Now if you do this very extreme for months on end then yes your metabolism will start to slow a bit. This really doesn't start to happen that bad until you get lower body fat % though. If you keep up really low calorie though you will tend to feel like crap, have less energy and headaches a lot. I have tried the very low calorie and if can get past those problems make sure you still lift weights too greatly reduce the loss of lean muscle.

Are you seriously suggesting that OP eat less calories when she is ALREADY eating under 1200? :grumble:

OP can easily hit 1200 cal/day eating nuts, seeds, nut butters, avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, etc.

Yes I am seriously suggesting that if the OP wants they can eat even less if they are not hungry and not force them self to eat more. I explained a few of the problems with doing so and even gave a suggestion about how to prevent one of the major problems with very low calorie diets.

OP should not be eating less than 1200 calories a day without approval from her doctor. People who follow a VLCD are on a wide variety of vitamins (via doctors orders) in order to ensure they are getting proper nutrition. You are not a doctor… Do not tell people it is okay for them to consume less than 1200 calories a day.

It is not hard to consume 1200 cal/day. OP did not become overweight from only eating < 1200 cal/day.

If you are not hungry then eat less. I know people are going to proclaim the "starvation mode" but the bigger the calorie deficit you have the more weight you will lose. Now if you do this very extreme for months on end then yes your metabolism will start to slow a bit. This really doesn't start to happen that bad until you get lower body fat % though. If you keep up really low calorie though you will tend to feel like crap, have less energy and headaches a lot. I have tried the very low calorie and if can get past those problems make sure you still lift weights too greatly reduce the loss of lean muscle.

Are you seriously suggesting that OP eat less calories when she is ALREADY eating under 1200? :grumble:

OP can easily hit 1200 cal/day eating nuts, seeds, nut butters, avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, etc.

Yes I am seriously suggesting that if the OP wants they can eat even less if they are not hungry and not force them self to eat more. I explained a few of the problems with doing so and even gave a suggestion about how to prevent one of the major problems with very low calorie diets.

OP should not be eating less than 1200 calories a day without approval from her doctor. People who follow a VLCD are on a wide variety of vitamins (via doctors orders) in order to ensure they are getting proper nutrition. You are not a doctor… Do not tell people it is okay for them to consume less than 1200 calories a day.

It is not hard to consume 1200 cal/day. OP did not become overweight from only eating < 1200 cal/day.

I talked to my doctor about a VLCD and he said no. I did it anyways, and I have lost 50 lbs in a little over 2 months. Now I know going to say that is unhealthy. I don't consider not having hypertension or prediabetic to be unhealthy though or losing 14% body fat while gaining 2 % lean muscle. I just went to the doctor for a check up and he was amazed and how much better I am am now. He even says maybe the VLCD was a good idea. I am going to continue it until I hit the high end of my ideal weight and then will titrate my calories up slowly so I don't gain all the weight back.

You did bring up the really good point that I forgot though, when you lower your calories you must make sure still getting proper vitamins and minerals.

I am not saying this is best for everyone just the OP sounded kind of like me where wasn't hungry and so I started to low my calories and noticed the weight melt off so thought it might help them as well.

If you are not hungry then eat less. I know people are going to proclaim the "starvation mode" but the bigger the calorie deficit you have the more weight you will lose. Now if you do this very extreme for months on end then yes your metabolism will start to slow a bit. This really doesn't start to happen that bad until you get lower body fat % though. If you keep up really low calorie though you will tend to feel like crap, have less energy and headaches a lot. I have tried the very low calorie and if can get past those problems make sure you still lift weights too greatly reduce the loss of lean muscle.

Are you seriously suggesting that OP eat less calories when she is ALREADY eating under 1200? :grumble:

OP can easily hit 1200 cal/day eating nuts, seeds, nut butters, avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, etc.

Yes I am seriously suggesting that if the OP wants they can eat even less if they are not hungry and not force them self to eat more. I explained a few of the problems with doing so and even gave a suggestion about how to prevent one of the major problems with very low calorie diets.

OP should not be eating less than 1200 calories a day without approval from her doctor. People who follow a VLCD are on a wide variety of vitamins (via doctors orders) in order to ensure they are getting proper nutrition. You are not a doctor… Do not tell people it is okay for them to consume less than 1200 calories a day.

It is not hard to consume 1200 cal/day. OP did not become overweight from only eating < 1200 cal/day.

I talked to my doctor about a VLCD and he said no. I did it anyways, and I have lost 50 lbs in a little over 2 months. Now I know going to say that is unhealthy. I don't consider not having hypertension or prediabetic to be unhealthy though or losing 14% body fat while gaining 2 % lean muscle. I just went to the doctor for a check up and he was amazed and how much better I am am now. He even says maybe the VLCD was a good idea. I am going to continue it until I hit the high end of my ideal weight and then will titrate my calories up slowly so I don't gain all the weight back.

You did bring up the really good point that I forgot though, when you lower your calories you must make sure still getting proper vitamins and minerals.

I am not saying this is best for everyone just the OP sounded kind of like me where wasn't hungry and so I started to low my calories and noticed the weight melt off so thought it might help them as well.

It was against your doctors orders.

It's against forum rules

But hey, recommend VLCD anyway. :noway:

If you are not hungry then eat less. I know people are going to proclaim the "starvation mode" but the bigger the calorie deficit you have the more weight you will lose. Now if you do this very extreme for months on end then yes your metabolism will start to slow a bit. This really doesn't start to happen that bad until you get lower body fat % though. If you keep up really low calorie though you will tend to feel like crap, have less energy and headaches a lot. I have tried the very low calorie and if can get past those problems make sure you still lift weights too greatly reduce the loss of lean muscle.

Are you seriously suggesting that OP eat less calories when she is ALREADY eating under 1200? :grumble:

OP can easily hit 1200 cal/day eating nuts, seeds, nut butters, avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, etc.

Yes I am seriously suggesting that if the OP wants they can eat even less if they are not hungry and not force them self to eat more. I explained a few of the problems with doing so and even gave a suggestion about how to prevent one of the major problems with very low calorie diets.

OP should not be eating less than 1200 calories a day without approval from her doctor. People who follow a VLCD are on a wide variety of vitamins (via doctors orders) in order to ensure they are getting proper nutrition. You are not a doctor… Do not tell people it is okay for them to consume less than 1200 calories a day.

It is not hard to consume 1200 cal/day. OP did not become overweight from only eating < 1200 cal/day.

I talked to my doctor about a VLCD and he said no. I did it anyways, and I have lost 50 lbs in a little over 2 months. Now I know going to say that is unhealthy. I don't consider not having hypertension or prediabetic to be unhealthy though or losing 14% body fat while gaining 2 % lean muscle. I just went to the doctor for a check up and he was amazed and how much better I am am now. He even says maybe the VLCD was a good idea. I am going to continue it until I hit the high end of my ideal weight and then will titrate my calories up slowly so I don't gain all the weight back.

You did bring up the really good point that I forgot though, when you lower your calories you must make sure still getting proper vitamins and minerals.

I am not saying this is best for everyone just the OP sounded kind of like me where wasn't hungry and so I started to low my calories and noticed the weight melt off so thought it might help them as well.

So that's smart. You ask your doctor if you should do VLCD, he says no, you do it anyway, then you promote it to others. That's very responsible of you.

Guess you missed the whole part about I am the healthiest I have ever been in my adult life..... Or that the doctor says maybe it was a good idea....

Low-carb is classified as anything under 130 g. OP was eating over 130 g for 2 days. On the days it said only 52 g and 108 g, I imagine she didn't finish filling out her diary.

By whom?
The American Academy of Family Physicians classifies Low Carb as under 60 grams a day.
Other government bodies and non-governmental organisations have different levels.
The thing is that you can call any lower-than-normal carb intake diet 'low carb'- it isn't a registered trademark ffs.

In any case, it is one small small phrase and people have been distracted by this word because the attention given to it by one tiny man.
Let's rename it lowish-carb- everyone happy now?
Glycogen would still be utilised, water would still be dumped, she would still weight less and it only takes a couple of days for it to happen, less if you are exercising hard, which I assumed she wasn't from her profile information.

Also I didn't definitely say that it did happen- I said it was likely, assuming all the information that was provided was correct.
I'm not a mind reader so if it wasn't then obviously the conclusion would be different.

CEOVERTURF I'm only going on what MFP tells me. I didn't say I burned 800-900 I said MFP give me an additional 800-900 calories to eat due to the work out that I have done. I thought my page was open I will open it now so you guys can see what I eat and what type of exercise I do what numbers MFP gives me based on that.

Yes...MFP "Gives" you 800-900 calories because that's what it assumes you burn off by logging whatever exercise you did.

MFP estimates are also NOTORIOUSLY overstated for calorie burns.

This. I wouldn't worry too much about eating back all your exercise calories because you likely aren't burning 800 - 900 calories. You logged some really high calorie burns for just a short amount of exercises.

Both of these!

If you are not hungry then eat less. I know people are going to proclaim the "starvation mode" but the bigger the calorie deficit you have the more weight you will lose. Now if you do this very extreme for months on end then yes your metabolism will start to slow a bit. This really doesn't start to happen that bad until you get lower body fat % though. If you keep up really low calorie though you will tend to feel like crap, have less energy and headaches a lot. I have tried the very low calorie and if can get past those problems make sure you still lift weights too greatly reduce the loss of lean muscle.

Are you seriously suggesting that OP eat less calories when she is ALREADY eating under 1200? :grumble:

OP can easily hit 1200 cal/day eating nuts, seeds, nut butters, avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, etc.

Yes I am seriously suggesting that if the OP wants they can eat even less if they are not hungry and not force them self to eat more. I explained a few of the problems with doing so and even gave a suggestion about how to prevent one of the major problems with very low calorie diets.

OP should not be eating less than 1200 calories a day without approval from her doctor. People who follow a VLCD are on a wide variety of vitamins (via doctors orders) in order to ensure they are getting proper nutrition. You are not a doctor… Do not tell people it is okay for them to consume less than 1200 calories a day.

It is not hard to consume 1200 cal/day. OP did not become overweight from only eating < 1200 cal/day.

I talked to my doctor about a VLCD and he said no. I did it anyways, and I have lost 50 lbs in a little over 2 months. Now I know going to say that is unhealthy. I don't consider not having hypertension or prediabetic to be unhealthy though or losing 14% body fat while gaining 2 % lean muscle. I just went to the doctor for a check up and he was amazed and how much better I am am now. He even says maybe the VLCD was a good idea. I am going to continue it until I hit the high end of my ideal weight and then will titrate my calories up slowly so I don't gain all the weight back.

You did bring up the really good point that I forgot though, when you lower your calories you must make sure still getting proper vitamins and minerals.

I am not saying this is best for everyone just the OP sounded kind of like me where wasn't hungry and so I started to low my calories and noticed the weight melt off so thought it might help them as well.

So that's smart. You ask your doctor if you should do VLCD, he says no, you do it anyway, then you promote it to others. That's very responsible of you.

Guess you missed the whole part about I am the healthiest I have ever been in my adult life..... Or that the doctor says maybe it was a good idea....

It's still irresponsible for you to promote something that your doctor was clearly against and even after said "maybe". Also promoting VLCD around here is against TOS and for good reason. Use some common sense.

If you could read carefully I never suggested the OP use a VLCD, I said if you are not hungry try and lower your calories a bit. I got jumped on right away and said I had use a VLCD and it has worked great for ME. I have said twice now that it isn't for everyone...

About the whole going against what my doctor says. I guess I am cocky because I often feel MD don't have a clue what they are talking about and more scared about getting sued. So I figured my PhD made me qualified to do a bit of research on this subject and found tons of primary literature that supports lower calorie diets and being fine and very effective.

I am going to stop now because I doubt any of this is helpful to the OP and people here just want to debate. I didn't mean to come off as advocating VLCD, I just wanted to point out you can drop below the magical 1200 calories and still safely lose calories a a bit faster rate.