Unhappy while on diet - Unhappy when I feel like I'm getting fat

Ever since I started counting calories on MFP, I have created bad habits and eating problems. Any advice on getting over it?
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Replies

  • Fuzzipeg
    Fuzzipeg Posts: 2,297 Member
    I agree is best not to look at this as a "temporary" diet. If you are significantly over weight the changes you will need to build up are different to those with only a little to loose.

    May be, try eating as you regularly did for two weeks and log your intake honestly forgetting creating a deficit. You will see how the pattern you are eating fits the mfp suggestions to follow. If you were to find you were over on sugar and salt say by a very long way try cutting back on the foods which keep these levels really high, make different choices.

    Then be honest about your activity levels. If exercise is part of your daily life add it in to the calculator if not you need to eat back, some if not all of your "eared" calories because the level mfp sets is what you need just to function, doing exercise in that situation increases your calorific deficit.

    All the best, relax and take care of yourself.
  • tinkerbellang83
    tinkerbellang83 Posts: 9,122 Member
    anewell28 wrote: »
    Binge eating for multiple days in a row after several weeks of calorie deficit. I am heavier than I was a year ago before I started counting calories. I wish I had never started this. It’s created extremely unhealthy habits. I eat now when I’m not hungry or I don’t eat enough when I’m hungry.

    Are you perhaps unnecessarily restricting yourself when you're on a calorie deficit

    How much do you have to lose and what rate of loss did you choose?
  • PokeyBug
    PokeyBug Posts: 482 Member
    PAV8888 wrote: »
    PokeyBug wrote: »
    an hour on the treadmill at a decent pace and incline, and it's like it never happened.

    As with many other things the above works when you're doing it in moderation. But it can become a serious problem in the "right" circumstances!

    You left out the beginning of my example, so I don't think you're talking about the same thing I was talking about. What are the "right circumstances"?
  • PokeyBug
    PokeyBug Posts: 482 Member
    I can see that, never looked at it from that perspective. Thanks for pointing that out.
  • tinkerbellang83
    tinkerbellang83 Posts: 9,122 Member
    5lambert wrote: »
    I am the same. If I "take a break" I gain, if I diet I lose super slow, feel deprived, obsess. And I need to lose weight for health not just looks. Anyway, in the past week I ordered 310 shakes/supplements (yuck, but low calorie and do control my appetite, which apparently isn't the problem as I'm not satisfied) and order on kindle last night Intuitive Eating. So- a pound down, not happy, and still searching.

    What period of time are you giving it to see how fast/slow you're losing sounds like maybe patience/expectation might be what's holding you back?
  • IsabeausRose
    IsabeausRose Posts: 129 Member
    edited September 2018
    I appreciate everyone’s advice on here even though I’m not the OP. I kept hearing that the only way to stop binging was to practice intuitive eating and basically eat whatever, whenever your body tells you and now I need to lose 18 pounds. If I hadn’t been so restrictive at 1200 calories I never would have developed a problem. I found out I can lose weight just as fast on 2k a day, and not feel starving and so deprived that I want to binge.
  • Silentpadna
    Silentpadna Posts: 1,306 Member
    anewell28 wrote: »
    Ever since I started counting calories on MFP, I have created bad habits and eating problems. Any advice on getting over it?

    There is some great advice here. I'll add just another suggestion. It may or may not fit you (that covers all the bases right?)....

    Since you are working on tracking, why not start back with just eating at maintenance while tracking? The habits you gain while tracking will be invaluable, you won't be hungry (or shouldn't be - if you are it'll be temporary), and you won't be gaining weight while you do it. To get good at this, like anything else, you have to learn how and then practice. If you look at this long-term, you will be doing it this way for a much longer than the time you'll spend losing weight because I assume you'll want to keep it off once you've done it.

    Once you've gotten comfortable tracking and maintaining (give yourself a month or so, don't rush), then gradually create a deficit. Start slow. Maybe replace the mayo in your sandwich with light mayo. For one tablespoon, you'll save 65 calories. Eat 2 cookies instead of 3. Another 50 calories. Find one or two more like that and just like that, you've got a 250 calorie per day deficit. That's 1/2 pound per week. (Note: I picked mayo and cookies because I eat those almost every day. Even while losing I still ate my chocolate chip cookies. Pick what works for you). As you "ease into your deficit", it won't feel much different and you won't feel the sudden deprivation that comes with dramatic change. You might find that 1/2 pound to 1 pound per week suits you.

    If you do this, you might delay your goal by a few months. But do sudden deprivation and go into restrict/binge cycle, it'll take longer or never happen at all.

    This is isn't an exercise in punishing yourself for putting on weight. Think of improved health as a reward for informing yourself how to do this and taking it on and for patience in a process that is guaranteed to work - if you do it right and stick with it over the long term. If you eat less than you burn, you will lose fat.

    One last benefit to staring with the "eating at maintenance" I mentioned above: when you need to "take a diet break", you'll know how and you won't stress out. Diet breaks are great of ridding the body of the stress created by eating in a deficit long-term. Then ease back into your deficit. No matter how you decide to work this out, you will be in control. So get the tracking and counting part down before you try to change your body overnight. That puts you in control. Then control the deficit/maintenance/surplus or whatever suits you at a given time.

    I hope for the best for you.