Feeling Weak at times from my diet, but still barely losing weight?

Are you a guy? 1500 is too low. I was that weak when I was on a VLCD diet (medically supervised).

According to your food diary, this past week you were under 1500 calories each day without even considering exercise - once you add in the exercise you logged, your net calories are way, way too low.

Of *course* you feel week. You need to NET at least 1500 daily.

I get you're maybe hedging because you have to estimate your calorie intake but your body is telling you loudly that you must eat more.

1 lb/week is a good rate of weight loss, IMO. 1500 is on the low end for someone your weight, especially if you exercise. Then again, it might not be a correct count, as you say.

It could also be the timing of the meals. Try to find some snacks to tide you over. I recognize the "have to buy a hotdog because it's the only food around" thing. Portion packs of beef jerky are great to have with you (Costco sells them fairly cheap).

I don't like cooking, and I do very, very little of it. I know lots of people frown on frozen meals and fast food restaurants, but for keeping track of calories they are great. When losing weight, I prefer eating at McDonald's, Wendy's, Subway etc, where they have some decent smaller meals with clearly marked calorie content. And when I eat at home, it's almost all Lean Cuisine and WeightWatchers meals, with added vegetables. You can find pre-cut vegetables at Costco too (they have a 3 lb bag of mixed vegetables for only $2.29 - just grab a handful and put on the plate, even I can do it ). Works great and is reliable for calorie content. YMMV as they say. Good luck!

_Justinian_ wrote: »

jdleanna wrote: »

According to your food diary, this past week you were under 1500 calories each day without even considering exercise - once you add in the exercise you logged, your net calories are way, way too low.

Of *course* you feel week. You need to NET at least 1500 daily.

Seriously? I thought as long as I ATE 1500 calories a day, I would be fine whether I exercised or not? (Don't laugh. I really didn't know.)

Yes - eating back calories is crucial. MFP is designed that way. Other programs (ones that use the TDEE method) will consider your exercise routines when they set your base calories, but not MFP. here, you pick a general activity level separate from how much you workout and that's what your calories are based on. So if you exercise, you need to eat back some of those exercise calories. Otherwise you aren't fueling yourself adequately. That's especially important when you're eating at the minimum healthy calorie level.

It is quite obvious that your weakness is caused by under eating. Glad that's out of the way

While Patttience's advice will help you increase your calories to a more healthy level, fast, I am not so sure you need to go that far. And I am not so sure you cannot count calories if you eat out.

Most chains do provide general information, and in many cases you can "deconstruct" your meal and estimate. Having said that... I've certainly brought my scale into more than one restaurant, especially if eating by myself.

It helps that it is flat and looks like a tablet and no one can really tell what I'm doing once there is a plate on top of it (and if they can tell, no one has had the balls to comment to date ;-)

And yes, at sit in and fast food restaurants I certainly specify how I want my meal prepared including no sauces or margarine or no seasoning or whatever the heck else I want. So far less than 1 in a 12 places has not accommodated me with zero to minimal fuss. And the solution, New Westminster IHOP, is that I am not showing up there to hand you money, which makes the other restaurants in your area richer by a good hundred bucks or so a month (cause my friends also go with me somewhere else)

I am assuming you're able to have a scale. And a small fridge. So really quite a few meals you can handle in house.

High fiber cereal, greek yoghurt, some 0% fat splenda or stevia sweetened flavoured yoghurts... there is a few nice 200-400 Cal "meals" at any time of the day.

Some pre-boiled eggs (if impossible to arrange boiling them, I've seen them sold that way pre-packaged, or pickled), and some cold cuts and a tomato, cucumber, onion, lettuce, salad and there goes another 300 Cal. Add cheese, or dressing, and you can add 50% to 100% Cals on top of that. An avocado would be better in my opinion as a way to add fat and calories. Or nuts such as almonds or walnuts or seeds such as pumpkins along the lines of what Patttience suggests.

And then your outside meal.

Generally the higher fat, deep fried meals have more calories. Not sure if they will fill you up more or not compared to a bulkier less fried up meal!

In terms of fruits apples are a real good "fill up" value. Most fruits are low calorie. Bananas are a bit higher comparatively.

Generally deficits ranging from 10% to 20% of TDEE (maybe 25% if you're obese) are considered safe bets for weight loss. Regardless, you should probably avoid eating below your BMR for an extended period of time to optimize your weight loss. When you fully parse out what this sentence means, you will realize that you can lose weight while eating a lot more than 1500 calories a day.

High sodium and water retention will be your enemy at being able to tell how much weight you're losing.

Just like Patttience, I strongly suggest apps such as Libra for android, Happy Scale for iphone, or www.trendweight.com or www.weighgrapher.com to help you figure out your underlying weight trend.