1210 calories and always hungry!

Think of it this way: you are already going over calories because you feel hungry on your current budget. this adds stress and frustration as well as more artificial hunger driven by a feeling of deprivation. You are effectively eating at a calorie level that does not allow you to lose 2 lbs per week due to adherence issues. If you lower your expectations you would have a larger budget, would feel more satisfied and less stressed, and you will be losing no slower than what you are already losing. There is a big difference between WANTING to lose at a certain rate and what is actually happening. Wanting to lose more and attempting to do it through stressing and white knuckling is not giving you any better results than if you set a more reasonable target.

As above definitely set to lightly active with the standing, you may not walk around much but you definitely burn at least 10 or 20% more cals standing during those 8 hours than a person sitting at a desk. You probably have an extra 200 cals to play with right there.

Change your weight loss goal. If you are still at 2 pounds per week, shift it to 1.5. You'll have more calories per day.

hazzaram wrote: »

When I first started MFP, I was allotted 1500-1600 calories. I can't quite remember but I had no problem staying in it and staying full. As I've lost 25 pounds, MFP changed my calories to 1240 and now 1210. I've been struggling to stay within my 1210 budget. I am always hungry now and I feel frustrated because of it. I've cheated a lot lately and I feel guilty over it.

I don't eat that many veggies (I don't like them), so I can't load my meals up with them. I'm also not working out, I'm just trying to get a handle on my food first. Once it warms up (I live in Ontario, Canada - brr!), I'm going to start long walks.

Any tips? I feel like this isn't a lot of calories and I hate feeling so frustrated

My stats:

Female, 28
5'3"
Currently 235 pounds
Activity level is sedentary (I work as a cashier, 8 hours of standing but not much movement)

You might want to explore your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) and your TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure), you are actually eating too few calories. If you use a BMR and TDEE your BMR is abvout 1800 calories - that means you would burn 1800 calories just lying in bed doing nothing. Your TDEE if you were actually sedentary, is around 2100 calories - and that is if you do no activity, it assumes sitting and working, sitting at home, no walking (aka less that 4000 steps a day). If you do even a little walking or regular housework and cooking that goes up to lightly active which is 2400 calories a day. Plus standing burns more than sitting even with no movement so standing for 8 hours a day puts you up into the lightly active range automatically.

So at 1400 calories you are eating at least 1000 calories a day deficit. No wonder you are hungry!

I would say go for the long haul and sustainability because what you are doing now is not sustainable!! Raise your calories up by 100 a week until you hit about 1800 hundred which still puts you at losing 1.5 lbs per week. As you lose weight - either recalculate these numbers regularly or up your exercise and keep eating the same (if you jump up all they way to 1800 at once you will gain back some weight as your body is still used to so few calories).

Also a little higher protein macro (30%) aka 40 carb/ 30 prot/ 30 fat will help you maintain muscle - especially if you stay above your BMR in calories eaten. Plus it takes more energy (calories) to digest protein that it takes to digest fat and carbs.

If you need more info you can check out http://eatmore2weighless.com/ good luck and feel free to friend me!!

Hi Hazzaram!

First congratulation on your resolutions!

I am a man and also on diet for 7months now and I went 240lb to 211lb, it's not the most impressive but I also did a lot of sports and waited to gain muscles and cardio. Starting from absolute zero, I would be exhausted just tying my shoes.. now I can run 15km.

Food did a lot in the process, because I had a sweet teeth and a love for coke that was very strong. It was really hard a the beginning, vegetables were not my thing, I was more into biscuits..

What really helped me to succeed was monitoring, I use a garmin scale so i just have to step on it when I wake up, everything is then on my phone. It helped me to stay on track and to avoid binging.
When you want to binge, you know you will see it the next day on the scale, then you know you are borrowing happiness over the big picture, that your goal is coming one day later than expected because of your attitude.

Sports are a good way to cheat on the 1210 cal. (which must be really hard!!) If you have something you like as a game (badminton or other it's the best). With an activity tracker, you will know how much you can add on your diet.
For example: run 30mn = 250cal = a bounty. Yes, sweet things are very unexpensive in money but expensive on cals.

What I did:
first week: walk every day 45minute as intense as I can (I could not run more than 5mn straight so I gave up running the first week)
second week: 8mn walk + 8mn run 3X
third week: 8mn walk + 10mn run 3X
...
Now i can run 1.5hours and even compete for triathlons, Spartans races etc. I never thought it was possible for me. it's a new life and I feel much more confident and just overall better.

The second good point of sport lays in the fact that you know what a box of chocolate represents in terms of calories and what you have to "suffer" to have it. This allowed me to eat a lot of different stuff the days I ran, and not impact too much the results of my diet. And also appreciate more vegetable because they become a lazier option. There are a lot of recipe on the internet, I rediscovered many things I hated as a kid.

Some people will say that when you do sports, you don't lose weight because you gain muscle, in a way it's true, the results on the "normal" scale will not move as fast as starving yourself, but on the body fat scale you will see it quickly. And at the end of the day, what really matters is not the lbs weight but feeling good and enjoy our own bodyshape transformation. Nobody cares how much you weight exactly to 1lbs precise, people care that you look good or not and if you are full of life or lazy...

Last thing, sport or not, I would advice to have a big breakfast and a big lunch and a very light dinner, simply because at night your body works less and much more is stocked. Proof is that you can even wait until lunch without being hungry because you did not burn it during the night and still have it on you.

The path is long, and today you have to "reimburse" all the cookies happiness you borrowed before and often it took long to put it on so it also takes long to remove it. But its definitely worth the pain. I hope you gonna make it and that my experience allows you to gain some time on your schedule.

Remember: we have to give up what we are to become what we want to be!

Oh my... I can RELATE! I was 235 lbs 5'3... And really struggled with wanting to lose super fast... And it made me HANGRY and it was not sustainable. I changed to 1 lb per week and it has been worth it. Got down to 190 and then stress came and I stopped mfp but by then eating reasonably felt normal and I have stayed around 190 for a year. Back now and ready to tackle these last 50 lbs but only at 0.5-1 lb per week cuz that works for me.
All the best to you... I am so happy that you have adjusted your goal. It will make the journey more enjoyable and the outcome just as achievable

You will feel hungry at 1200. Even at 1500. I was/(still am) anorectic and that is how much I eat. That will starve and emaciate you. You need to eat at least 1600-1800. Less than that is pure starvation (long-term).