Calorie help

Where did you come up with 1800 as your TDEE? Are you a very short and sedentary person? I'm in my mid sixties, female, retired, 5'7" 142 and my TDEE is about 2200-2300...so yours seems low to me.

If you are confident of that number due to your past logging of food and exercise, then I would say give yourself a 250-300 calorie per day deficit from that. Stick to that and log religiously for long enough to spot a trend, so 4-6 weeks.

Have your tried meal prepping so you can plan out what you will eat throughout the week? If you are really up and down with how much you are eating the meal prepping might help.

It would also help to identify what is causing you to overeat - are you genuinely hungry, stress eating, or something else? Certainly if you were restricting too much you might end up overeating as a response to hunger. If that is the case then you may need to reduce your caloric deficit (increase net calories/day) so you can ensure you are eating enough to feel satiated.

The other thing you can look at is what kinds of foods you are eating and when. Try to identify whether they are foods that help you feel full and stay satisfied. Are you satisfied immediately after a meal? How about an hour or two later? What you experience may signal that you you need to adjust what foods you eat, or when to eat.

bf1068 wrote: »

What do you weigh? My coach said 10-12x body weight (in pounds) in calories. Start at the high end; adjust down as you stop losing. It likely sounds like a lot of calories if you are in an binge/overrestrict cycle usually (I always was). I am at just over 11x body weight, with three lifting sessions a week, no cardio. One gram of protein daily per pound of body weight. Losing fat. Slowly, but I am losing. I feel like i eat a lot somedays. Be consistent with this, and patient with yourself.

Just for clarification: If someone is still materially overweight, 1g protein daily per pound of current weight is going to be protein overkill, and punitively difficult for some women to get on what is still a sensibly moderate weight loss calorie level, while maintaining overall good nutritional balance. Since protein is needed to maintain lean mass (not fat mass), 1g per pound of lean body mass is adequate. Since many people have no good estimate of lean body mass, 0.6-0.8g protein per pound of a healthy goal weight is a reasonable approximation, for most people. If in doubt about goal weight, it should be fine to use midpoint of normal BMI range for current height.

FWIW, I'd lose too fast at 12x current body weight gross calories. For me, 14-16x current weight (gross calories) would be a sensible loss rate, or 13-14x current weight for net calories (i.e., eating back exercise on top of that). Why not just use MFP or a TDEE calculator, to get a research-based statistical estimate that takes more variables into account (activity level, most critically; but also age and other factors)?