Recovering from a very high cal day

I have always tried to lose by eating 1200 a day. Always failed and ended up binge eating. This time I increased mine to 1450, and I am amazed by how much easier it has been. My opinion, which isn't near as knowledgeable as many posters on here is maybe try increasing your calories and see how you do. As far as the overeating, I would just write it off and start fresh the next day.

At this point, it's best to just try to continue with your normal calorie amount. Cutting further will only work to perpetuate a binge/restrict cycle of overeating, which you don't want to get caught up in.

How much weight are you trying to lose, and what rate of loss did you set? 1200 may be too low and aggressive for you. If you shift to a slower pace and a higher calorie goal, you may find less temptation to overindulge.

yep, just carry on...as long as you don't make it a routine

julanig612 wrote: »

I am trying to lose 25 kgs (55 pounds). I do have it set to fast as that was my allowance when I was on Noom. I am coping on the allowance on a normal day. Today's misstep was more cause I was weak minded at a birthday party. I'm just trying to get to my first goal of reaching the 70's before December and then I will up my intake and exercise. At least that is the thought. When I was on MFP before I had it set to 0.5 kgs/wk and the slow loss was very demotivating

Set your rate of loss to 1 lb per week. You would rather lose slowly than be miserable on an overly aggressive deficit.

I am solidly in the "log it, forget it, move on" camp. Make-up fasting starts a punishment cycle that's best avoided. Occasional excessive binging is just part of dieting, for everyone.

julanig612 wrote: »

I am trying to lose 25 kgs (55 pounds). I do have it set to fast as that was my allowance when I was on Noom. I am coping on the allowance on a normal day. Today's misstep was more cause I was weak minded at a birthday party. I'm just trying to get to my first goal of reaching the 70's before December and then I will up my intake and exercise. At least that is the thought. When I was on MFP before I had it set to 0.5 kgs/wk and the slow loss was very demotivating

You were "weak minded" at a birthday party? Personally, I wouldn't look at it entirely that way: You celebrated someone's birthday at a birthday party, and - for most of us here - our culture uses special foods ("treats") to underscore special occasions and share social connections.

Achieving and maintaining a healthy weight is a lifelong endeavor. Will you never again eat treat foods at a birthday again? Celebrate holidays with shared feasting?

If your answer to those is "no", then I'd argue that it's a good plan to be practicing now, learning, testing and adjusting new rules and habits that will allow you to be happy, satisfied, well-nourished, socially-connected and at a healthy weight for the rest of your life.

So: What can you learn from this? What would you do in the future? Since you say you ate around 3x your current calorie goal, it's possible that that was a little bit in excess of your maintenance calories (the number of calories that would have you neither gain nor lose). You haven't given us your details, but if you're female, 30, sedentary, 5' 4" and you were already at 70kg (I gather you're heavier), your total daily calorie requirement would be a bit above 2000. At that level, 1200 calories is an 800 calorie deficit daily. If you ate 3600 calories, that would put you about 1600 calories above maintenance (at that lower weight).

That's equivalent to delaying goal weight by 3 days (eating at maintenance one day, and eating up your deficit from the previous 2 days). Since 1600 calories over maintenance is less than half a pound of fat, that's another way to think of it. Again, it's probably really a smaller effect than that if you're over 70kg now. Is that really such a big deal?

So: One option is that you can decide this delay in reaching goal weight is OK, and that you'd do it again. (I would, under some circumstances, and I'm now in year 4 of maintenance after literally decades of obesity before that!) Or, you can decide that you'd like to indulge a bit to celebrate birthdays in the future, but not quite this much. Maybe you could eat at maintenance calories? Have some cake or ice cream or wine (whatever the treat foods were), but not quite as much? If you ate a bit of unplanned food, did you think "well, I've blown it now, might as well go all the way" (as many of us, including me, sometimes do), is there a more moderate way to think about it? If you'd like to be able to indulge/celebrate at future birthday parties, would it be an option to eat 50-100 calories under a reasonable calorie goal for a few days before the event, or be a little more active than usual beforehand, and eat more lightly the other meals that day to "bank" some calories to "spend" at the celebration?

There are a bunch of different ways to think about this in the future. What would work for you?

Please don't think of yourself as "weak minded". Think about making your future decisions be effective for you: What can you learn from this, that you can apply to achieve a happy, balanced life permanently? My advice: Spend about 10 minutes thinking about that sort of thing, make a new script in your head to follow at the next party, then let it go and get back on a sensible weight loss track. It'll all be fine.

Celebrating someone's birthday, even with a little extra food, is not a sin; it doesn't require expiation. You're fine.

Oh, and: You might want to read the link below, just for fun.

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10603949/big-overfeed-ruins-everything-nope

P.S. I agree with the other folks suggesting that you consider a slower, less punitive weight loss rate and calorie goal. Slow but consistent can result in overall faster weight loss than over-restrict-then-oops repeatedly.

Best wishes :flowerforyou: