I don't think I can do it
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Sometimes, we put too much emphasis on a scale number. Maybe the body is saying 135 works. Go with maintenance and see how that works. As someone who arrived at maintenance in August, this is a lesson I'm learning.0
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Firstly, good job on your progress so far! Try to remember how far you've made it already.
Next, this may sound counterintuitive, but have you tried IF? I find that if I eat breakfast of any sort I'm ravenous all day but when I don't eat until lunch I find it to be no problem to stay within my goals for the day. I typically have my eating window between 1pm and 9pm because that works best with my schedule, but you can do it any way you like. If you look for the Intermittent Fasting group here, there are a lot of links to more information.0 -
Never going to try IF. I workout in the morning, and I'm starving by 8am so... no.0
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I workout at 5:30. I find it actually helps control the hunger. I was just offering another solution since you seem so frustrated. Obviously you will do what's best for you.0
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Feeling very down today. It seems I'm stuck in this cycle... I manage to keep a deficit for a couple days, then I get absolutely ravenous the next day and end up wiping my deficit. At the end of the week, I'm typically a couple hundreds calories over maintenance... which isn't a huge deal, but at this rate I'll end up gaining 6-10 pounds in a year.
How do I stop it? I mean, what I eat seems to have no impact whatsoever. I don't typically eat a lot of high calorie/low satiety foods anyway, but I can have a waffle some days and be totally fine and keep a 200 calorie deficit, then the next day I'll have 7 servings of veggies and I'll be starving (and yes, if I'm tired and hungry I might not end up making the best choices either, to make it worse). Exercise seems to make no difference either, I can do 45 minutes of HIITs one day and be just fine, then do a 30 minute walk or bike session the next day and be totally starving (and weights, typically, but that's at the end of the day, so it doesn't make much of a difference).
I just don't know what to do anymore. It was EASY for me to lose until I got to 135 pounds or so. My goal is 130 and I still haven't seen it. I've been stuck at 132-133 for 6 months because I just get so hungry. Heck I was eating more 'junk' before. My willpower is not that bad, it's just that when I get hungry (and get those carb cravings), it's much harder to resist (like last night - I mean yeah, I had a waffle and an English muffin with hazelnut butter, but those typically fill me up pretty well, and the day before I had a waffle, chocolate and a Clif bar and I was totally fine?).
My hunger has always been very subjective to hormonal changes, so it's not really new, but I just don't know what to do. I'm terrified of gaining the weight back, but that kind of hunger, it just seems to be nothing I can do about it. Plus I don't always sleep very well and I tend to wake up starving at 5am, which just makes things worse.
And before you ask, yes I drink a lot of water, pretty much all day.
(putting this in maintenance because at this point, I'd just like to be able to maintain, if anything)
- Are you insulin resistant?
-And maybe you need to rethink what your goals are.
If you want to loose more weight, dealing with hunger is part of the deal.
- Do you really want to pay what it costs to loose those last pounds?
- Have you recalculated your TDEE as you lost weight?
- Do you keep a detailed food diary with effects and feelings after each meal? (with macros) You think you don't have patterns, but there probably are.
- Recheck your micronutrients ?
- Ravenous/type of exercise/macros. Badly balanced macros combined with high intensity --> hungrier.
- When you were losing weight 6 months ago, what did you do then and did you change any habits since?
- How is your liver doing? Is it overloaded with intake it needs to work through, or do you give your liver space to churn through some fat loss as well?
- Bad sleep = less fat loss.
As is repeated numerous times on MFP, the closer you're to goal the smaller margins for error.
Clinical/medical definitions are typically within a "range". Just because your doc says "it's fine" does not automatically mean everything is sunshine. Your bloodwork could have borderline values, and some doctors will inform you of this, others won't. You need to take responsibility. Ask for specific tests, don't just agree to the standard screen. Get a second opinion?
My docs all say "You're fine". The bloodworks are within normal ranges.This month I'm maintaining at 1050 kcal a day, not sedentary. When I told doc that I couldn't shift scales at 1200 kcal and asked if I could be pre-diabetic or have metabolic syndrome, she gave me that professional look translating into: "I feel mildly sorry for you, but I don't have time to go deeper into this".
The solution for your body, only you can find out. Test different protocols and find what will work.
Frozen vegetables that you steam. Weigh them after you steamed them? It's only to shove them onto the plate on the scale. Find steamed entries.
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No I'm not insulin resistant. When I say that my bloodwork is fine, the numbers are all great except bad cholesterol, which is higher than before I lost weight, but the ratio is still normal. No blood sugar issue at all.
Yes I've recalculated my TDEE the whole way.
I don't mind being hungry most of the time, but sometimes I feel that I'm going to pass out if I don't eat. That's not something I can just 'deal with'... and on those days I will overeat. It's the reason I started this thread.
6 months ago is when my weight loss slowed down considerably... I exercise way more now (or at least it's more intense), and obviously keep a smaller deficit. If anything, I've been hungrier since I reduced my deficit. Go figure.
I have no idea how my liver is doing.0 -
It depends. I eat when I get hungry. I've tried eating bigger meals... I was still getting hungry faster than I wanted to.
think I found you're problem.
You're body will react as you teach it- if you feed it every time it gets hungry- and you feel good and satisfy feelings- guess what- you now are training your body to respond to being fed.
eat when you tell yourself you're going to eat- not when your body pitches a fit and throws a childish tantrum and says "feed me"
you tell you're body when it gets to eat- not the other way around. Hunger is a chemical/hormonal reaction- doing what it's been trained it to do. You can train it out of that habit.0 -
It depends. I eat when I get hungry. I've tried eating bigger meals... I was still getting hungry faster than I wanted to.
think I found you're problem.
You're body will react as you teach it- if you feed it every time it gets hungry- and you feel good and satisfy feelings- guess what- you now are training your body to respond to being fed.
eat when you tell yourself you're going to eat- not when your body pitches a fit and throws a childish tantrum and says "feed me"
you tell you're body when it gets to eat- not the other way around. Hunger is a chemical/hormonal reaction- doing what it's been trained it to do. You can train it out of that habit.
Sounds about right to me.
OP, I have no doubt you're doing everything you can and then some!
We're only trying to answer your post.
If you eat a bit more due to more and higher intensity workout, could it be that you overestimate your burns a tiny bit? Combined with eating a bit more than you used to.
I'd try lowering my eat back 10% and or up protein and good fats a little bit. See after 2 weeks, then adjust more if needed. Being "too" hungry is often too much carbs.
Keep asking yourself questions, test it and you will find answer.0 -
Ok I'm saying I'm hungry and people are telling me to eat less? I'm very confused... I don't really believe that you can 'train out of getting hungry' though. Just seems really odd to me. The reason I eat when I get hungry is so that it doesn't get out of hand and I don't end up binging because I'm too hungry.
I've been trying to increase my fat, I haven't noticed much of a difference from going from 50g to 65ish a day though, to be honest. For what it's worth, this morning I had breakfast a bit later than usual, had 2 scrambled eggs with a bit of butter, some breakfast sausage, and a small piece of toast with butter, and I still got hungry 2 hours later (after my workout). Although this hasn't turned into a 'hungry day' so far so it will probably be all good.
Bleh! I just don't know what to do anymore. Heck, yesterday I probably ate 8 servings of veggies and I managed to keep a good deficit, so maybe I just need to eat 3 bags of frozen veggies a day or something (which has pretty much no fat, by the way).
And because apparently people missed it - I eat at TDEE. I don't eat back exercise calories because they're included in my TDEE. I use Scooby and moderately active, do 20 minutes of weights (heavy for me but not 100 pounds heavy) and 30-45 minutes of steady cardio every other day (I just added the extra cardio this week), and 30 minutes of HIITs when I don't lift. The rest of the day I'm mostly sitting and doing errands/cooking/cleaning etc. Scooby gives me 2100 for that and I've been trying to eat around 1800-1900, but eating 2150 in average.
ETA: I know that you're all trying to help, and I'm grateful. It's just that it seems I've tried everything already (after almost 2 years of reading the forums you get a pretty good idea of what should help), and it's not working. That's why I posted... I'm frustrated, and not sure I can successfully maintain if I end up so miserable 2 weeks a month.0 -
Did you up your TDEE level when you started exercising more?
Those levels are very coarse. If you upped it and your burns are in between a bit? If you have very stable routines, doing exactly the same thing every day, then TDEE works well, I guess. If your burns are more variable, it's harder to know if your within limits, right?
I would experiment more with the macros. Just because you did one change, does not mean you hit the sweet spot. Like when taking medicine, dosage is sometimes the difference between effect and mild-no effect.
Keep experimenting and you will succeed.
You can train your body about eating habits. It won't be happy at first, so at that stage you need ignore it. There is an adjusting phase, be conscious.
I just had my first meal of the day. It's 24 hours since last meal.0 -
High sugar, high carb diets make you hungry. Your insulin levels go up, and then you "crash". If I eat waffles or even oatmeal for breakfast, I am STARVING all day just as you describe.
However, it does take a while to adjust to a lower carb diet. It gets worse before it gets better. After a low carb meal you don't get the "rush" of a blood sugar spike that you normally associate with being full. So for the first few weeks you feel like you haven't eaten at all after meals. That's normal. Stick with it and you WILL be more satisfied on less food.
I'd start by cutting out the high-sugar foods. Clif bars, chocolate, and syrup can all be eliminated. Don't eat high starch foods without protein to balance them. Try half the oatmeal PLUS a serving of eggs. Then you can start getting your insulin balance in check.
If you need fiber, add beans, lentils, artichokes, berries, cabbage, brocolli, and other high-fiber low-sugar foods. English muffins, oatmeal, and waffles are carby junk. I eat them too, occasionally, but then it's my own damn fault if I get hungry later in the day.
You're also eating too many high-calorie, low-volume foods. I know a lot of people swear by nuts, but I can't afford them in my budget. Check out "volumetrics". I've been known to eat a huge green salad as a post workout second breakfast at 9 AM. You can add more veggies than you can eat for under 100 calories. And why eat that english muffin with butter for 200 calories when that same amount of calories would buy you 8 CUPS of air-popped popcorn to feed your starch addiction?
You've had lots of good advice here and you're choosing to ignore it. No one can eat like that and not be hungry, because you're choosing the wrong foods.
I also agree that you've had phenomenal success. It could take a year to lose the last 5 lbs. Focus on long-term sustainability, healthy choices, and maintenance.0 -
And to answer your question about eating less to control hunger - yes, fewer carbs.
If I eat a huge low carb chicken salad for lunch, that could hold me til dinner. But if I have the same meal PLUS a huge bowl of rice, I'll be starving by 3 PM due to the insulin reaction. So yes, eating "more" of the wrong foods makes me feel more hungry, not less. Strange but true.0 -
I will keep it short! I discern that this is a mental attitude problem and not a physical problem. I will explain. Change your "focus" from a weight and food problem to a let me be "healthy physically and mentally." You have already been successful in losing weight and what is a pound or two to having a happy life with less worry about weight. Finally be thankful since you have lost weight where so many have failed in their efforts to do the same. Throw out the words "maintain and manage" and just focus on developing a daily fixed routine of balanced living. Congratulations on your past success.
I agree with this... People get stuck in the "will power" like it is some gift from above. It's all habits and focus. Folks don't get overweight eating good healthy food and taking care of their physical and mental health. They may have seasonal or monthly small fluctuations. I think a healthy way to maintain is to choose a weight that is "normal" and a weight on both sides of the "normal" that is natural fluctuation and then a "red zone" weight that triggers a deficit calorie need. Don't know, this is the first time I've been this weight in my yo-yo life, but this is my plan.
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And because apparently people missed it - I eat at TDEE. I don't eat back exercise calories because they're included in my TDEE. I use Scooby and moderately active, do 20 minutes of weights (heavy for me but not 100 pounds heavy) and 30-45 minutes of steady cardio every other day (I just added the extra cardio this week), and 30 minutes of HIITs when I don't lift. The rest of the day I'm mostly sitting and doing errands/cooking/cleaning etc. Scooby gives me 2100 for that and I've been trying to eat around 1800-1900, but eating 2150 in average.
Ok, I think that you maybe answered your own question here. You upped your TDEE when you started to exercise more. But even if you're blasting it out on the HIIT every other day (which is too often), the steady state at low intensity and lifting does not burn as much as you think, I think. Roughly 300-350 kcal, on HIIT day maybe you burn 500, but I wouldn't bet on that number. So TDEE at 2100 sounds a lot to me, even though you haven't provided your stats. All calculators are estimates based on averages.
This is one of the more conservative burn calculators. Compare with your current activity calc?
http://www.free-online-calculator-use.com/exercise-calorie-burn-calculator.html
Try stick to 1850-1900 as you said? Averaging 2150 means you eat more on some days. And that's cool if that's what you want. As you said, trying to loose those last few pounds is a real struggle.
Maybe you're an inbetweener as I suggested above. I think the moderately active is more active. Increasingly researchers are looking into activity level "living". They are using terms like "time spent not sedentary". I'm very active at the gym but I'm still a deskjockey, making me mainly sedentary.
So you can choose, either go for moderate active and reduce by 100 at a time until you find your balance. Or you can go back to sedentary TDEE and add by 100, using same method.
It's your body, only you know what works for you. So you must find it by searching for a change that is in balance with your goals.
Keep asking questions, and you will find your answers.0 -
Ok I get the high carb high sugar thing makes you hungry. I get it. I actually rarely eat stuff that has low fiber like those waffles. I was just craving waffles, and figured I'd be better off eating 200 calories of waffles (with some fat and/or protein on the side) and satisfy my craving than end up going to IHOP or something and have a 600 calorie one that wouldn't fill me up one bit. Plus when I eat more carbs is because I'm going to have an intense workout, and I do much, much better on those. Most days I eat less than 200g of carbs, and more than half of those are from fiber or veggies.
What I don't understand though is why oatmeal with nut butter fill me up for a week then the next time I'm hungry all day? And why is it that on days when I have meatloaf or only eggs for breakfast I also end up hungry all day? And a lunch of veggies and protein rarely make me full all day too. I know, I've tried. I made some chili last month and I was hungry all the time when I was eating that (and it was full of beans and turkey). I mean, I'm looking at my diary, and there are a ton of days when I had pancakes or oatmeal for breakfast and ended up well within my calories. So what's the logic there?
The reason I've been eating more nuts is because 1) I have high cholesterol, 2) I apparently need the fat. And by the way, I don't like popcorn lol.
Honestly all I get from this thread is that I can't even eat a 200 calorie waffle in my 2000 calories. And it makes me want to say 'screw it'. I see a ton of people eating at a 500 calorie deficit with a diet worse than mine and they don't seem to have any problem. And I had no problem eating 1700 when I was losing weight, it's since I reached 133 pounds that it's been a nightmare (and my diet hasn't changed one bit, if anything I eat less junk now - I've been phasing out the flavored yogurts, ice cream and chocolate, but I do need a treat from time to time, even if it's just a waffle or a tiny piece of chocolate).
(and to people who are telling me that the problem is that I'm eating too many calories, have you even read my posts? I'm not asking why I'm not losing weight. I know exactly why I'm not losing weight. I'm just ranting because I feel that my body is trying to screw me over now that my weight is much lower).
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If you truly want to lose weight you can't expect to ever be full, unless you IF and eat in a small eating window. Hunger is par for the corse! You have to decide if those few extra lbs are worth it!
Feeling full is not a feeling you should often have! Shoot for feeling not hungry. In fact even in maintenance you don't eat till full. Full should signal to you having over done it. Eating till full all the time is what gets you fat0 -
If I eat, even healthy options, so that I'm not hungry I either gain or stay at an unhealthy weight. I've exercised religiously for almost 20 years and change it up frequently so it's just the food that's doing it to me. Protein and veggies does not fill me up. Ever. I have come to the conclusion that if I am going to hit and maintain a healthy weight I have to be hungry. All the time. It has to be my life. I eat whole grain carbs, but sparingly. If I ate to fullness I'd stall and a weight more than 25 BMI is not good for me. So, I'm hungry. I'm sorry you're similar to me. In my case it's not hormones. It's just how I'm built. I know I can do it....so can you.0
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My goal is 130 and I still haven't seen it. I've been stuck at 132-133 for 6 months because I just get so hungry.
Ok, back to the top. You're freaking out cause you can't loose 3 pounds for 6 months? I agree with kkimpel and cwlsr. Focusing on health and maintenance is maybe better for your cortisol levels. If you expect to shift those 3 lbs, by doing exactly what you have been doing the past 6 months...then that's your choice to believe that or get frustrated with lack of results. Goodbye.0 -
If I eat, even healthy options, so that I'm not hungry I either gain or stay at an unhealthy weight. I've exercised religiously for almost 20 years and change it up frequently so it's just the food that's doing it to me. Protein and veggies does not fill me up. Ever. I have come to the conclusion that if I am going to hit and maintain a healthy weight I have to be hungry. All the time. It has to be my life. I eat whole grain carbs, but sparingly. If I ate to fullness I'd stall and a weight more than 25 BMI is not good for me. So, I'm hungry. I'm sorry you're similar to me. In my case it's not hormones. It's just how I'm built. I know I can do it....so can you.
Thanks, it's nice to know I'm not alone... even if it sucks! I knew I'd have to be hungry to lose weight, I didn't think I'd have to be hungry to maintain. I'm just not sure *I* can do it. If you can, good for you though!
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VerySpecialSnowflake wrote: »My goal is 130 and I still haven't seen it. I've been stuck at 132-133 for 6 months because I just get so hungry.
Ok, back to the top. You're freaking out cause you can't loose 3 pounds for 6 months? I agree with kkimpel and cwlsr. Focusing on health and maintenance is maybe better for your cortisol levels. If you expect to shift those 3 lbs, by doing exactly what you have been doing the past 6 months...then that's your choice to believe that or get frustrated with lack of results. Goodbye.
You really don't know how to read, do you? The struggle now is not to gain. I'm not even worrying about those 3 pounds at the moment.0
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