What would you have done?
Cheesy567
Posts: 1,186 Member
I was in a tough spot yesterday, and blew my carb goal (~100gm instead of my goal of 50-60gm.). I also logged way more exercise than usual, had plenty of calories to eat.
I was out of town and didn't pack enough food for dinner. In a rush, and the MG making me weak from the work, I choose to go through drive-thru fast food so I could rest until the meds kicked in, hoping to work a bit more before heading home late in the evening. I chose the only meal I can stomach at that place, but fried cheese curds instead of French fries, figuring they'd pack more protein and fat in addition to the carbs.
I needed up way over my protein goal, too, 174gm instead of 130-140. I was under my daily fat goal, not sure how that happened with the fried dinner but whatever. So, I stopped for a HWC breve on the way home. The 800cal of nearly all fat helped bring my macros such that the carbs were about 15%, which is my goal. Protein percentage was a bit under my goal, but I didn't sweat it since I had so much overall. I was under my calorie goal too. Today I feel good, not carb-craving or anything.
What would you have done, or what have you done, when you eat more carbs than planned? Was trying to rebalance the percentages the correct thing to do?
I was out of town and didn't pack enough food for dinner. In a rush, and the MG making me weak from the work, I choose to go through drive-thru fast food so I could rest until the meds kicked in, hoping to work a bit more before heading home late in the evening. I chose the only meal I can stomach at that place, but fried cheese curds instead of French fries, figuring they'd pack more protein and fat in addition to the carbs.
I needed up way over my protein goal, too, 174gm instead of 130-140. I was under my daily fat goal, not sure how that happened with the fried dinner but whatever. So, I stopped for a HWC breve on the way home. The 800cal of nearly all fat helped bring my macros such that the carbs were about 15%, which is my goal. Protein percentage was a bit under my goal, but I didn't sweat it since I had so much overall. I was under my calorie goal too. Today I feel good, not carb-craving or anything.
What would you have done, or what have you done, when you eat more carbs than planned? Was trying to rebalance the percentages the correct thing to do?
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If I have too many carbs, I skip the next meal and/or exercise (depending on how I feel). Or I simply live with it and try to go a little lower than average the next day or two.
No need to worry about a single step on such a long trip. But exercise with help burn off excess glucose (and fat).0 -
take macadamia nuts with you wherever you go!0
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Rebalancing the percentages is a deleterious thing to do. Adding fat and protein doesn't remove the fact that you went over on the carbs. By my, back of the napkin, calculations you were at almost 2,700 calories (15% = 100g carbs) when your typical goal would be around 1,600 (15% = 60g carbs). You say you were under your calorie goal?
Your body doesn't work on percentages anyway. You can eat 5% of your calories from carbs and not be in ketosis... if your absolute amount of carbs is too large.0 -
I did a similar thing over Memorial Day weekend. I spent the day gardening. I was in and out of garden stores, hauling dirt, and digging in the clay that is my property. I earned a good couple thousand calories on top of my normal daily burn rate.
I ended up eating 81g worth of carbs, because a rib platter that I got had sauce that I wasn't expecting. Like all restaurant rib sauces, it tends to have quite a bit of sugar added, plus the natural sugar in the milk portion of the latte I'd had that morning. My usual goal is as few as possible, generally less than about 20-25g.
I was okay with that, though, because I had been doing a lot of work and had more still ahead of me (since the vast bulk of them were consumed relatively early in the day). Those carbs were pretty much guaranteed to go straight to the brain and glycogen stores and would be burned off during the rest of the day, if they weren't getting burned off immediately.
It didn't affect my weight or rate of loss, if that's what you're afraid of. It didn't even go up like my weight is wont to do when I consume more carbs and sugar than my body prefers.
And no, I didn't really put forth effort into "correcting" my percentages. They naturally resulted in 10/20/70 (c/p/f), while my usual goal is <5/~25/~75, since I had a more on-plan dinner later that evening.0 -
I would have done nothing and started over the next day. But that is my personal lazy....i work fairly hard from morning to bedtime...i dont need any extra.
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Rebalancing the percentages is a deleterious thing to do. Adding fat and protein doesn't remove the fact that you went over on the carbs. By my, back of the napkin, calculations you were at almost 2,700 calories (15% = 100g carbs) when your typical goal would be around 1,600 (15% = 60g carbs). You say you were under your calorie goal?
Your body doesn't work on percentages anyway. You can eat 5% of your calories from carbs and not be in ketosis... if your absolute amount of carbs is too large.
This. Once you hit that many carbs, whatever else you ate was irrelevant. For me, I would've not gotten a meal option at all - no fries, no cheese curds, no side anything, just whatever the main sandwich was, without bread (most places will do lettuce wraps if you ask, or just give you the sandwich ingredients in a container without a bun).
My typical "emergency" drive through food is either bunless BK bacon double cheeseburgers, or bunless Wendy's double w/ cheese add bacon (same as a baconator, except you get some veggies with it). In your situation, you probably would've been better off with the baconator, mayo only.
Use the percentages to figure out your macros, but use the grams to figure out your goals. Also remember that if you're using MFP's extra calories for exercise, they are grossly inflated, and you shouldn't use more than half of what it gives you. It will also disproportionately increase your macros. Your original carb grams without exercise are an upper limit, but MFP will incorrectly increase your carbs for the day with exercise because it's not programmed to accommodate LC.0 -
I only pay attention to my carb intake. I don't worry about the rest. I just eat when I'm hungry. If I had a high carb day, I would just be more prepared the next day0
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Great advice, thanks everyone. My activity that day was high, cleaning like a mad-woman trying to get the rental unit ready to rent again, so even with the breve I was about 600 calories below goal. I think part of the problem was that I hadn't eaten enough for lunch and got overly hungry.
I haven't had any cravings, so I don't think I've lost the ketosis. I gained about 4lbs, but that's not uncommon after my weekly IgG infusion (actually 4lbs is a low amount for me to gain after it!). We'll see how the rest of the week goes, and I've been prepping meals this weekend so it won't happen again!
Lesson learned to not rebalance the macro %s!0
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