convince me .... or not...to eat more?

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Replies

  • nordlead2005
    nordlead2005 Posts: 1,303 Member
    Tomk652015 wrote: »
    Thank you! Thank was great information. I'm ok with 20 to 25 weeks or even more. my desire is be healthy and for this to be for life.

    And that is the way you should want to do it. If your problem is consuming more foods because you feel full, try calorie dense foods as snacks or swapping them out for lower calorie foods. Since you got fat in the first place one strategy is just to eat more of what you used to eat and a tiny bit less of what you eat now. If you only used to eat fast food or nutritionally sparse food, then you could peruse the gaining weight section for more healthy ideas.
  • T0M_K
    T0M_K Posts: 7,526 Member
    nordlead2005 wrote: »
    Tomk652015 wrote: »
    Thank you! Thank was great information. I'm ok with 20 to 25 weeks or even more. my desire is be healthy and for this to be for life.

    And that is the way you should want to do it. If your problem is consuming more foods because you feel full, try calorie dense foods as snacks or swapping them out for lower calorie foods. Since you got fat in the first place one strategy is just to eat more of what you used to eat and a tiny bit less of what you eat now. If you only used to eat fast food or nutritionally sparse food, then you could peruse the gaining weight section for more healthy ideas.

    ya. i gotta give myself liberty to eat a little of the bad stuff. Just doing a little butter or sour cream on a baked potato or something simple can help get me there calorie wise without blowing the whole thing. kinda liberating.
  • VeryKatie
    VeryKatie Posts: 5,961 Member
    edited February 2016
    middlehaitch wrote: »
    Looking at the numbers you posted you are eating to the detriment of your health.

    Yes, you feel fine now, short term, but you are eating your muscles- that can include the heart, and not providing your body with enough nutrients for long term health. All the good proteins, veg, and fruit are great, but you are not eating enough of them.
    Eventhough you are hitting your protein goals and exercising a little, you are not protecting your muscles. The body can only burn so much fat in a day then, when it needs energy, it will turn to muscle.

    It is not a couple of hundred calories a day you are lacking, it is more like 400-500.
    A goal of .5-1 lbs a week would be suitable for you.

    Please eat a sustainable amount of food.

    Cheers, h.
    PS weigh even the pre packaged portions, they vary.

    Agreed, PLUS it's every single day that you're missing them. When eating at a deficit, yes people say work some treats into your goals to stave off binging and cravings. But that doesn't mean fill 300 calories below bare minimum with cookies everyday. Most days you need to fill voids with nutrient dense foods simply because you're at a deficit. Eating at maintenance would give far more leeway in terms of treat foods.

    Keep the treats a "treat", not a "standard".

    I sincerely hope you do intend to stick with your new plan of at least 1650 a day!
  • T0M_K
    T0M_K Posts: 7,526 Member
    VeryKatie wrote: »

    Agreed, PLUS it's every single day that you're missing them. When eating at a deficit, yes people say work some treats into your goals to stave off binging and cravings. But that doesn't mean fill 300 calories below bare minimum with cookies everyday. Most days you need to fill voids with nutrient dense foods simply because you're at a deficit. Eating at maintenance would give far more leeway in terms of treat foods.

    Keep the treats a "treat", not a "standard".

    I sincerely hope you do intend to stick with your new plan of at least 1650 a day!

    I'll do it. it won't be junk. it may lean towards protein or starchy carbs however, like a larger baked potato or more chicken. maybe an extra serving of almonds in the afternoon which i did today....something along those lines.

    Thanks
  • ames105
    ames105 Posts: 288 Member
    In my humble opinion, your calories are too low and your macros are off. You should up the fiber, lower the sugar and watch your carbs/proteins/fats. I'm not quite sure how you are getting over 100gms of carbs and protein, with high sugar and low fiber content while staying under 1400 calories. It seems off. Are your numbers estimated or actual?

    A sedentary male 30-50 should be eating 2200 calories a day (not sure of your height, if you are under 6' you might need a little less). If you exercise you should have more. To lose a pound a week, reduce each day by 500 calories, which works out to 1700. I try to aim for 45-50% carbs, 20-25% fat and 30-35% protein. You're at 1400. Its not off too much but if you are exercising, you need the fuel to keep going. Some people eat back their exercise calories, some don't. Not enough calories will catch up with you eventually, whether or not you believe it. Its not just about your energy level. Your hair may start falling out, you may have a sluggish digestive system, your thinking may become foggy, etc.

    For the sake of making the math easy, lets assume your 1400 calories, 50% carbs, 25% protein and 25% fat. You should then be having 700 calories (175g) of carbs, 350 calories (87g) of protein and 350 calories (38g) of fat. Yes, your macros seem off to me.

    I found that I need to stick close to my macros to make the weight come off. Some people can lose weight eating 1400 calories of fat, but not me. You may not be able to do that either.

    My suggestion is to just read all the information on this site and off of it to really educate yourself about what you are putting into your body, how much, the ratios. That's the only way to find out what works for you. We are all human but our bodies all work differently. It took me YEARS to find out what works but when I do it, the weight melts off me. Ultimately, its not about the scale and we all just want to be healthy. If people are on you for not eating enough, just know that it comes from a concern for your health and to avoid further complications from the side effects of losing weight too fast. Good luck!
  • bigbodybake
    bigbodybake Posts: 49 Member
    Tomk652015 wrote: »
    DonaldBlinks wrote: »
    You can lose muscle along with fat, your hair could thin, nails become brittle and your skin can suffer. You're more likely to suffer from loose skin.

    You don't have much to lose to get into a healthy weight range for your height. I think you should set your weight loss rate to .5 lb/week.

    ETA: At the absolute minimum, you should be netting 1500 calories.

    Also, I'm running, pushups, pullups and planks and eating alot of protein so i'm attempting to protect my muscle. What really does an extra 150 calories"ish" do for me nutrient wise?


    It's not necessarily the 150ish calories a day that will stop you, it's more the 1050 calories per week+calories you've burnt exercising. Gotta eat to keep energy built up, losing weight expels a lot of energy on its own and your energy stores are depleting.

    I have a hard time eating more than 1600 calls a day myself, just not hungry when I eat the way I'm supposed to.

    Keep up the good work and fuel the machine
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 14,260 Member
    nordlead2005 wrote: »
    Tomk652015 wrote: »
    first, I apologize for the cookie comment. it feels like though. like if i hit a magic number of calories despite the nutrient content..suddenly i'm healthy vs unhealthy with a boost of a couple cookies. Naturally if you look at my diary, you will see that isn't my intent.

    The funny thing is there is a "magic" number of calories you need to hit to stay healthy. Those calories could come from cookies if you want.

    Based on what you've posted you are losing 2.7lb/week eating 1350 calories/day. If we assume that is all fat loss, then that would be a daily deficit of 1350 calories/day for a grand total energy need of 2700 calories/day.

    Now, your body has a limit on how much energy it can take from fat per day. This maximum limit is ~31cal/day. If we assume that at you are at 25% BF (rough estimate based on BMI since that is all I have), then you have ~46lb of fat on you. That would equate to your body being able to sustain a deficit of up to 1426 calories/day. This is the maximum amount, which you are already based on the previous assumptions.

    Based on this calculation you are within spitting distance of the maximum. Fat estimation could be off, your personal maximum might be lower than that found in the study. The reality is it is too close for comfort since so many estimations are done for most people to recommend it as a healthy weight loss.

    If you limit your weight loss to 1% of your body weight per week it will in general keep you in the safe range. The 1-2lb guideline you often seen stated keeps most people in that safe range also. I feel that 1% does a better job of it.

    So, there is this magic number, and you are pretty close to it.

    And this is only one aspect of healthily losing weight. The other downside of eating such a low diet is lack of nutrition. Based on what you posted, while you think you eating everything you need, you probably need more fat in your diet. The recommended minimum is 0.35g/lb of body weight. You could get away with less if you target the specific fat minimums really carefully, but most people don't go to that level. So, for you to get more fat you'll have to cut either carbs or protein. Your protein levels are at 0.68g/lb which is perfect if you are trying to build/maintain muscle and lifting weights. So, you can't cut protein, you have to cut carbs. You now need to cut 50g of carbs to eat 22g more of fat. You are now essentially eating a keto diet, which many people can't handle and on top of that you probably had to cut nutritious vegetables that you liked out of your diet.

    So, which do you do? Manage to switch around your extreme diet to get all the nutrients you really need (and hopefully you didn't miss any and find out 3 months later when the damage is already done), or do you just eat another 400 calories/day and the extra nutrients greatly decreasing your chances of becoming malnourished or eating away at muscle mass that you didn't need to?

    You also have to weigh the psychological effects of fast weight loss. I know I did 2lb/week until I was 195 and it took a LOT of willpower the last week before vacation.

    Again, it comes down to, is the faster rate of loss worth the risks? It isn't guaranteed that you'll have any negative side effects, but as I said before, isn't the point to be healthy? There is no reason to risk it for the vast majority of people. I'm even advocating faster weight loss than anyone else in this thread and I think your rate is too high. Yes, it will take a few more weeks to lose all the weight, but you can easily get from 187lb to 160lb in 20-25 weeks while minimizing health risks. And in the grand scheme of things, 20-25 weeks isn't that long.

    You know, I am usually WAY slower than you as I think that 0.5% is more lean mass protecting that 1%; but, the above was really well said!

    OP, you are near a normal weight. Excluding the fact that BMI of 24 is the inflection point for males for longevity (26 for females) we can take as a given, I think, that you want to lose fat, and not lean mass.

    Your current rate of loss is leading to a 2:1 or worse fat to lean mass loss ratio. Slower loss MAY improve on that. As analysed you are way too close to the limit of calories that can be provided by fat.

    You should probably concentrate on eating more and engaging into a progressive strength building program.

    Having said that, you like data. Get a trending weight program (or duplicate such in your spreadsheet). Libra for android, happy scale for iphone, www.trendweight.com/www.weightgrapher.com with a supported scale, fitbit.com account (free even without a band), or manual entry for wg, not tw.

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