Exasperation with meal planning...can someone tell me how to fit 3 meals into 1200 calories?
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You can see pictures in various places on the internet what 100 calories of different foods look like. You are going to get more volume if you choose certain foods over others. http://www.sparkpeople.com/resource/nutrition_articles.asp?id=1987
You might find this thread helpful.
http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10563959/volume-eaters-thread/p13 -
Have you tried IF. Eating in a shortened window might help. Normally I get two meals in a day plus a small snack. This allows me to have larger meals. I feel your pain, even coffee, eggs and avocado for breakfast can reach almost 400 cal.10
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I haven't been very good lately (friend visiting this weekend, V-day yesterday), but I typically don't have a problem sticking to 1200 during the week. I often skip breakfast in favor of IF or have a protein shake in the morning, have 3 hard boiled eggs with mustard for lunch, and then have the rest of my calories for dinner with maybe a little trail mix or yogurt as a snack. Drinking tea in the morning, as well as plenty of water and a protein rich lunch keeps me full until dinner rolls around.
On days I exercise, I eat back some or all of my exercise calories since 1200 is an aggressive goal. If you wanted to bulk up your lunch, you could throw in a salad with low calorie dressing, or just add in some veggies on the side like celery or green beans. 200-300 calories worth of eggs can easily be replaced by another protein source to keep that satiety up while adding more variety.2 -
I would definitely take a look at what foods you are eating and what you can swap it out for. For example, if you are eating bread in every meal, this is probably taking up a lot of calories. Maybe change to eating bread for one meal a day and add more fruits/vegetables to your other meals. I honestly think just going through the process of figuring out how to alter your meals is the biggest benefit of myfitnesspal. You might not hit your 1200 cal goal all the time at first, but work on how you can bulk your meals up with lower calorie options (e.g. veggies) if you are still hungry.2
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I am a 5ft female with about 30lbs left to lose I have MFP set to 1lb per week weight loss and it gives me 1210 calories a day. I eat a protein bar in the morning that is about 200 calories then for lunch I try to stay around 300ish calories usually I make a sandwich, eat leftovers, or eat a Lean Cuisine. then I eat a snack mid afternoon I try to stay within 250ish calories. Then the rest is dinner I don't eat past 7-8pm because of my acid re flux. I also have a Fitbit so that gives me extra exercise calories but I never eat more then 50% of them and I really only dip into them if I feel super hungry other then that I just feel better eating less due to my acid re flux and my IBS.3
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Here is another example. I just had two small fillets of Tilapia and a crapload of vegetables. The total was barely over 200 calories, and 31g protein, 5g fiber. It was very filling.3
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I like food. I've done the 1200 calorie thing, and I was miserable.
My solution? Exercise.
Right now, I exercise pretty hard (multiple reasons) and that gives me an extra 700-1000 calories a day. That's a huge difference, and I don't feel hungry or deprived on that. I can eat down to about 1600/day (with a less intense training program), any less than that and I start to feel hungry all the time and pretty miserable.
So, up the activity to match what I feel like I need "in the kitchen."7 -
Try adding a few friends who are also aiming for 1200 calories a day so you can view their food diaries for meal inspiration5
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In my case? Excercise more to give yourself a few more calories to play with.
I also suggest logging for a while, even before making any serious changes to your diet.
Weigh (with a scale is best) everything you eat, and write why you are eating it (i.e, lunchtime, hungry, kind of bored, out with friends, watching tv) and how you are feeling right before, right after and an hour after (hungry, comfortable, normal, full, very full bloated, drowsy).
This gives you a baseline pattern for your normal habits and routine. From there, it's just a matter of experimenting. Are you very full after dinner? Cut back on a few things. Does lunch leave you bloated and gassy after an hour, try less or no mayo, and see if there's something you don't mind dropping each meal (fries, or cheese, or maybe only 2 tacos instead of 3).It's amazing how quickly these small and easily sustainable changes will add up to big calorie cuts. Only cut one or two things at a time, until they become habit instead if trying to do everything at once. That way they become individual habits instead of one big "diet". So when you backslide you won't drop everything at once, just one or two habits, that you can fix again more easily.
I love this entire thought process! I have an internal war between my impatient/frightened thinking and my deeper wisdom that knows I need to make changes that last and are both sustainable and effective.
I think I am going to sit down and make a list of all the small changes I have made already, partly to acknowledge what I've done so far, but I will also rate them according to how hard or easy they have felt to me, so that when I hit my weight loss goal, I know what I can easily keep as maintenance habits and what I can let go of as a harder-to-maintain "diet-phase" restriction.
Thank you, Momepro, for taking the time to share your thinking!6 -
1,200 for me is a 200 calorie yoghurt, 400 lunch (a sandwich maybe, or beans on toast) and then 600 for a heartier dinner, maybe pasta. I usually split the yoghurt and have half for breakfast and half before bed.0
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I didn't read all the posts, but if you Google meal planning, there are several sites out there where you can enter the number of calories and meals and poof, it pops out a meal plan. I am working on Keto. This means I'm not really eating carbs, which in many cases are high in calories. While strict keto people don't count calories, I do use the food diary. I go many days with right around 1200 calories and I'm not hungry.
I'm not a breakfast eater, or a snacker however. So I use all my calories in two meals. I think this helps too because it gives insulin levels time to dip down. Also remember, hunger is fleeting. If you feel hungry between meals, have something to drink or distract yourself for 20 minutes or so. You may find the hunger goes away.
As for my 1200 calorie day, I'll have an entire can of tuna or chicken with mayo, lettuce, celery and onion, plus 1/2 an avocado for lunch and I'm full until dinner. Very low in calories. Had that today for 330 calories. So, I've got 870 left for dinner. That's a lot of chicken, beef, pork or fish with veggies and a salad!
I'm no stranger to going out for lunch with coworkers or family. I just plan ahead and again, stay away from the high calorie carbs. I've had a burger w/o the bun and blue cheese with veggies (not fries) on the side. Very filling and not too many calories! Also remember healthy fats help keep you satisfied.
Plan ahead and make good choices! Good luck.2 -
I don’t eat breakfast and have my first meal around 12.30-1pm. I’ll have something like a bowl of soup and fruit for lunch or some chicken breast with a big salad. For dinner I’ll have something like baked fish with veg and a small potion of bulgur wheat and quinoa. Boil in the bag fish is also really quick to do in the microwave.Tonight I had chicken stir fry with courgette noodles and full fat Greek yogurt for pud. Spiralised courgette and carrot are also good with meat bolognaise. Instead of eating a whole steak I’ll slice up half a steak and have it on a salads I know it’s not for everyone to miss breakfast but I don’t ever feel like breakfast and often don’t have time for it so I like to keep my calories for later. Here are some of the dinners I’ve been having. All around 400 calories.4 -
You can actually pack a lot of food into 1200 calories if you're eating the right stuff...
Also, I'd wager most woman can lose on more than 1200 calories, they just tend to pick the most aggressive rate of loss available. Also, if you exercise, you can eat more.9 -
BitofaState wrote: »sytchequeen wrote: »about 100g of a protein in a meal,
1g of protein is 4Kcal, so 100g of protein is 400Kcal.
Don't mix up macros with sources, perhaps you mean 100g of a lean protein source such as chicken (around 100Kcal).
1200 means a shift to vegetables if you want to feel full. 100g of
Lettuce, cos or romaine is 17Kcal of
rutabaga is 37Kcal,
carrot is 41Kcal,
potato is 76Kcal
You can eat quite a lot of greens and veg within a 400Kcal meal along with a smaller amount of an animal protein, feel full and get a decent quality of nutrition.
You misunderstand my post, I eat around 100g of “ A Protein “ (exactly as I worded it) , i.e. meat/fish/cheese etc, which does not itself contain 100g of protein. I am referring to portion size not protein content.
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If you insist on 1200, Try a protein shake (100) for breakfast and a decent lunch (500) and dinner (500) with tons of vegetables. Then a piece of fruit for dessert (100). Walk for an hour and buy yourself another 250 or so1
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Part of what helped me was labeling my meals #1-6. No more designations of breakfast, snacks. It helped snap me out of the mindset of what I thought I should be eating be based on the meal: breakfast foods for breakfast, meals larger then snacks, etc.
Now I eat what I want in quantities that suit my tastes and schedule. It was totally a mental thing, but it really helped me breakout out of what I thought traditional snacks, meals and meal timing.8 -
I'm currently at 1300 calories, my maintenance it just over 1400, so I don't have much choice but to eat 1300 if I want to lose weight. I did 1200 for around a year and I got used to it I guess.
At 1300, I don't have lunch. I have a small snack instead, usually a piece of fruit/some crackers/a rice cake/carrots and houmous. Then for dinner, I get to eat a bit more. I don't think 300 calorie meals are filling either.
My breakfast usually comes in around 300-350 cals, snack 100-200 cals, dinner 500-700 cals and then another small snack in the evening, of around 150-200 cals.0 -
I appreciate everything you all have noted.......i forgot to say I am vegan and have been, for some time, so my only really good source for high quality proteins, is shakes. The good news is I didn't gain anything the last couple of winters (1-2 lbs) so the fasting (shakes, only) for two weeks at a time, every 3 months, really helped keep things in check. That's maintenance, tho, not loss.......sigh.........I am also 57, and disabled, so can only do certain sustained exercises......such as hiking (walking really, as I hike about as fast as the average person can walk), dancing, stretching, etc.
The thing that sets me back is my feelings of resentment at not being able to eat whatever I want, anymore...........what does everybody do when they run into this?........if you run into it?
This thread is a bit long, so maybe I'll start a new thread about that!...8 -
I like you!
You can eat what you like, just not as much as you used to. If you can measure out a shake you can measure out other foods.
Tofu is a good vegan source of protein.
My favourite tofu recipe; highly versatile.
https://pin.it/wmm4qzkrx47byh1
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