FIT_Goat wrote: »

First, I hope you meant LCHF (Low Carb / High Fat) and not HCLF (High Carb / Low Fat). If you're getting enough carbs and protein, the fix is easy and delicious. You need to add more fat. And a lot more of it too. At a minimum, I would find a way to add 4 tablespoons (half a stick) worth of butter or other fats a day.

Frankly, to be blunt, it looks like you're trying to follow standard low-fat diet. The fact that you're paying attention to the macros could make it an IIFYM (If It Fits Your Macros) variation, but it's currently a low-fat and low-calorie diet. Swap out that chicken breast for thighs with the skin on. Or, cover them with cheese. The steak I saw (tip I believe) way too lean. Tons of boiled and steamed nonsense. Pan fry those veggies, or if you boil/steam cover them in butter when you're done. Do you hate cheese or are you trying to punish yourself with teasing? You ate 8g of cheese? That's just depressing. Eat reasonable amounts of food.

Beets, carrots, onions? There's room for these vegetables in a low-carb diet, but not much of one. So much high carb dairy, fruit, and vegetables. These things are fine in moderation, but they can't be the bulk of your diet when eating like this. Vegetables you eat should be 90% leafy green veggies (spinach, broccoli, etc.) and not root vegetables.

Next, even if you were meeting your calorie and macro goals, I still think you're probably under eating. Even at 46 with a history of abusing your metabolism trying to lose weight, there's really no need to eat 1,200 calories with 25 pounds left to lose. Reconsider upping it to 1600+ for a couple months and then reevaluating after consistently hitting that range based on the progress you're making.

Some of his wording is a bit harsh, but I second his suggestions.

For what it's worth, I love steamed vegetables and do that fairly often, especially broccoli and cauliflower. What I do now is drown them in butter or cheese.

Also, I'd drop the pre-flavored yogurt and pick up a plain, full fat variety, then doctor it to your tastes (adding berries is a popular one).

For another way to look at how to meet your macro spread, try to get your fat amount per meal higher than your protein and your protein higher than your carbs. Ideally, try to keep your fat higher than your protein and carbs combined. That will help keep you on point for your per day macros.

How to get your fats up? Add butter to everything. Get the fattier cuts of meat (ribeye instead of sirloin, 80/20 hamburger instead of 90/10, chicken with skin on, etc). If you fry anything, do it in lard, tallow, butter, or coconut oil.

Basically? Do everything you've always been told not to do. The more it seems like "heart attack on a plate," the better. And no, it's not actually a heart attack on a plate and may very well save your heart.

And seriously, don't be afraid of calories. You don't need to have 200 calorie "meals" (! my coffee this morning had more than that ). If you can stick to your macros, it's not possible to go over in calories (beyond the margin of error from labeling rounding), because the macro spread is based on percentages of your calories.

For specific foods:

Add cream to your glass of milk, seriously.
Eat more than 5 almonds when you eat nuts.
Eat more eggs. And fry them. In butter. No, it won't kill you.
Eat meat at every meal (your lunch Monday had 0 fat and 1g protein; don't do this).
Buy or make full-fat yogurt (making yogurt is a pretty fun project and quite easy)
Drop all pasta entirely, or trade them for spaghetti squash or vegetable noodles
Use 80/20 (or better yet 75/25) ground beef.
Trade all high-sugar fruits (banana, kiwi, etc) for low-sugar ones (berries, stone fruit) and reduce overall consumption of fruits, at least until you get used to eating LCHF.
Always favor skin-on poultry. If you have to eat skinless breasts, add butter or a cream sauce to it.
Eat more than 40g of meat per meal.
Eat all raw veggies with a dip and all fruits with cream (whipped or liquid).
Fry everything in butter, lard, tallow, or coconut oil (and don't forget to track what you eat of it)
Never buy "fat free" or "low fat" anything (that isn't naturally that way). Always buy full fat options.

Like I said, the more it looks like a heart attack on a plate, the better.

I probably could have been gentler. I guess steaming is ok. It's just hard to add fats unless you're drenching them afterwards. A good cheese sauce (heavy cream and cheddar is a good base) dumped over the veggies can help a lot as well.

But, I do stand by the eat more food. Really. Weight loss shouldn't be a punishment, painful, or more than slightly unpleasant. If you're feeling heavily deprived or starving all the time, you should probably evaluate your goals and methods.

ybell300 wrote: »

This post has helped me tremendously. I haven't started yet but i feel a little better now. Dragonwolf and Fit_Goat can you help me decide my macros? I have looked at the launch pad and tried the keto calculator but I don't seem to know what to input besides my height, weight, and gender.

Protein -- 1g/lb of lean body weight, or about 75-100g (depends partially on your goals and height). You can use the keto calculator's suggestions for body fat percentage and subsequently the protein recommendation to start.

Carbs -- 0-100g, depending on your goals (20-50g is the usual ketogenic range, <20g is the "carnivore" or "zero carb" range (not recommended for beginners), 50-100g is the lower carb but not necessarily keto range).

Fill in the rest with fat.

The percentages generally work out to about 60-80% fat, 5-10% carbs, and 15-20% protein.

FIT_Goat wrote: »

I probably could have been gentler. I guess steaming is ok. It's just hard to add fats unless you're drenching them afterwards. A good cheese sauce (heavy cream and cheddar is a good base) dumped over the veggies can help a lot as well.

But, I do stand by the eat more food. Really. Weight loss shouldn't be a punishment, painful, or more than slightly unpleasant. If you're feeling heavily deprived or starving all the time, you should probably evaluate your goals and methods.

Hey now, there is nothing wrong with broccoli butter soup.

But yeah, I wholeheartedly agree with the second paragraph here. The beauty of LCHF is that you don't have to feel starved and tired all the time.