I can't figure out food balancing

CaliforniaRower wrote: »

I tried 1.5 lbs and felt TOO cranky and hungry. Now I'm at 1 lb and it may not be ideal.

You need to lose at a rate that you can sustain. If you cannot sustain 1lb a week then you should cut your deficit down to.5lb.

The more likely options would be to look at what you are eating or let other people look at your diary. You are on the right track by allocating calories to a different part of the day as needed. You should also be considering what you eat, fruit and veg, complex carbs and lean proteins. Many people favour eating higher protein as that increases their satiety, If you open your diary then people cna have a look.

Your final get out is to exercise to earn calories which you can eat. The first point is that you need to make sure the burns are accurate. MFP has a tendencu to overstate burns and people overstate their effort, which means burns can be inflated. You do not wnat to be eating back calories you havent in fact burned.

My rule is that I dont eat back exercise calories if im not hungry or the burns are very low.
If I burn over a certain amount then I will eat back a % c50%. If im hungry I will eat back the calories I need up to what I believe is an accurate burn limit. Im not a big fan of hunger, its dull.

My other points are drink plenty of water as thurst is often mistaken for hunger. Wait 15 minutes after drinking and see if that makes a difference.

Finally your body will feel a bit of hunger as you adjust, but you do adjust. Just use some common sense and good luck.

Keep a food journal/ diary so that you can spot foods that don't work for you. I found that bananas just don't work for me, and if I eat one I can feel the blood sugar crash as if I ate a candy bar. I don't mean to dis the banana, but some foods won't work for some people and the trick is finding out what is making you crash. I also found that combining things to make sure I get carbs, proteins and fats makes me much happier. So if I "need" something like a bagel or an english muffin I make sure to spread some peanut butter on it. It sounds simple, but it took me a while to figure out that I was making dieting much worse by loading too much similar foods together at once.
Also, I can't stress enough the importance of water. Drink at least 9 glasses a day as it will help you to lose weight. People often don't know that the body sends the exact same signal for hunger as thirst. Most times people eat, and then keep eating because they don't realize their body actually wants/craves water.

I've found that going to bed a little hungry is not a bad thing. When I'm asleep, I don't notice I'm hungry!! :disagree:

That being said, I make sure to eat a good breakfast (about 15% of my daily calories; something I did poorly before starting MFP), protein for lunch (about 20%), and then I have about 55% of my calories after 5pm (dinner and snack). I go to bed late.

I have to be sharp and functional at work, but not as sharp after 5pm. I've found this balance works for me as long as I eat protein (tuna, chicken) at lunch. Before sticking to a protein-rich lunch, there was a lot of hangry going on in the afternoon!

I save more then half of my calories for dinner and after, because that's when I eat the most. I have a protein shake for breakfast, a healthy high protein lunch under 500 cals. But my worst time of the day for eating is dinner and after, so I make sure I have room to be flexible here.