Moms with open diaries eating 1200 calories

kshama2001 wrote: »

@mntnwmn477 how tall are you and how much weight do you want to lose? Unless you are short, 1200 could be an overly aggressive goal. Lots of women get 1200 fixed into their brain when they could easily eat more and still lose weight.

This^

OP - if 1200 makes you cranky, hungry (whathaveyou) bump up your calories. It's more important to stay the course, than it is to lose quickly.

If you want to double check your numbers....try these (reasonable) weekly weight loss goals:
Pound per week goals
75+ lbs set to lose 2 lb range
Between 40 - 75 lbs set to lose 1.5 lb range
Between 25-40 lbs set to lose 1 lb range
Between 15-25 lbs set to lose 1 -.50 lb range
Less than 15 lbs set to lose 0.5 lbs range

I ate 1200 when I was younger. It was popular back in the day too. My only snacks were veggies & sugar free "desserts."

mntnwmn477 wrote: »

kshama2001 wrote: »

@mntnwmn477 how tall are you and how much weight do you want to lose? Unless you are short, 1200 could be an overly aggressive goal. Lots of women get 1200 fixed into their brain when they could easily eat more and still lose weight.

@kshama2001 I'm about 5'2" and started at 196 lbs and I'm currently 170....trying to get to around 130. MFP is what set my calories to 1200 because I wanted to lose about 2 pounds a week....I was on 1350 for a while, but the loss just felt so slow and I'm trying to "speed it up" a bit, that's why I adjusted it. And I don't get hungry, 1200 seems to be ok for me, I just like to know what kind of variety of foods I can eat that are lower in calories all that I can eat here and there without going over...I'm a snacker lol.

What weight loss per week did you pick to get 1350 calories?

MFP has me at 1520 calories/ day but you can add me if u want. Lol.

OP as @kshama2001 said, 2 lbs/week and 1200 cals may be too aggressive of a loss goal for you, as the stats that @TeaBea pointed out, 1 lb - 1.5lb/week may be more realistic for you. Also, are you eating back at least a portion of any exercise calories you earn? Because your original post indicated you were eating 1200 cals, if that's all you are eating and then you are exercising as well, you would be netting below 1200 which isn't advisable.

For what it's worth - I'm a bit older than you, but same height (5'2) and started on MFP at 153 lbs with a goal weight of 125. I also have two small kids, but work outside the home at a desk job. MFP initially set me at 1200 to lose 1 lb/week, but I found it unsustainable for me as I was always over, even with eating back exercise calories. I was still losing though, so I started reading the forums about how 1200 is often too aggressive of a goal, even for petite women.

I changed my goal first to 1400, then to 1500, and that was net cals - so I was eating more like 1600-1800 and still losing a pound/week. That was with only walking a few times a week for exercise. Then I got a FitBit, and realized that as a busy working mom of two kids, I was much more active than I had thought, and was averaging about 10K steps a day. I was only about 15 lbs from my goal at that point, so I changed my settings to lose 0.5lb/week, and kept increasing my activity. I lost the weight I set out to lose, and am now maintaining below my original goal weight, around 120 lbs, and my TDEE is about 2200 cals/day.

So long story short - it is definitely possible to lose weight eating more, and as a busy mom, you really don't want to burn out because you are tired, hungry, etc.

Good luck!

mntnwmn477 wrote: »

@WinoGelato Congrats on reaching your goal, that's awesome!! I too work outside the home, in an office, at a desk all day but I DO exercise at home in the evenings....it's not much, but it's something. And no, I don't eat back my exercise calories. I typically reach my 1200, then I get in 200-350 of exercise that night. Surprisingly, even at 1200, I'm not hungry or tired or burnt out. And I can always switch back to 1350, like I've had it the past few months, but I really don't see the need to do that right now. My goal was to lose a little faster than I have been, so that's why I dropped it down to 1200. My issue isn't about my calorie goal being so low, I'm just wanting to get more ideas of what other ladies with that calorie amount are eating, so that maybe I can switch up my foods a bit

Losing weight faster isn't always for the best, you risk loss of lean body mass, fatigue, hair loss, brittle nails, etc. You may not be experiencing them yet as it seems this is a new process for you but often people who have too large of a deficit end up dissatisfied with the end results (skinny fat) or find the deficit unsustainable.

You are very motivated and that's great but taking a bit of a slower approach may yield higher chances of long term success.

Good luck.

I'm not a mum, but I am on 1200 per day and have an open diary if you want to add me as a friend