The amazing results of watching my carbs...
NovusDies
Posts: 8,940 Member
...enter my mouth.
For most of the 2 years I have been losing weight I have either been eating moderate or lowish carb. This is because it was easier for me to manage my reactive hypoglycemia.
However, lately I have added a substantial amount of activity and to better support the amount of calorie burn I am eating higher carbs... MUCH higher. During most of my moderate phase I have eaten around 80-120g carbs. I have gone through periods of lower not because I needed to just because it seems to happen during warmer months. During my lower carb period I would eat around 40-60g carbs. I am now eating an average of 400g of carbs a day.
That is my average. In the last 7 days one of my days was almost 600g.
So the results?
Today I saw a weight on the scale I have not experienced since I was a teen right before I was legal to vote.
Throughout my over 200 pounds of weight loss I have eaten different ways, including a brief keto experiment, and the results always come out to a predictable 3500ish calories per pound.
For most of the 2 years I have been losing weight I have either been eating moderate or lowish carb. This is because it was easier for me to manage my reactive hypoglycemia.
However, lately I have added a substantial amount of activity and to better support the amount of calorie burn I am eating higher carbs... MUCH higher. During most of my moderate phase I have eaten around 80-120g carbs. I have gone through periods of lower not because I needed to just because it seems to happen during warmer months. During my lower carb period I would eat around 40-60g carbs. I am now eating an average of 400g of carbs a day.
That is my average. In the last 7 days one of my days was almost 600g.
So the results?
Today I saw a weight on the scale I have not experienced since I was a teen right before I was legal to vote.
Throughout my over 200 pounds of weight loss I have eaten different ways, including a brief keto experiment, and the results always come out to a predictable 3500ish calories per pound.
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Replies
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Dont you know? Carbs are the devil!👿
🤣4 -
You probably look funny all cross-eyed
Congrats on seeing pre-voting-age weight! That's pretty damned impressive.5 -
I laugh when people try to tell me carbs are bad. Cucumbers are 80% carb. Congrats on finding what works for you and the great success!
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Oh, pre voting! Welcome to the club!5
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but but carbz are ebil!4
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Love me some carbs.1
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Hey, I'm pre-voting weight right now... but that is unfortunately still much higher than I need/want to be. Carbs, however, are delicious.
I know this, because when I was a young whipper-snapper just starting out on weight loss, I did what all the cool kids were doing and I went low carb. It was awesome, right until I fainted, then I decided that I'd never been a cool kid anyway, so I did my own research. Eating all the evil carbz didn't stop me losing 160 lbs, and I even ate (gosh-darn-it) refined sugars.
These days I eat less sugar because I get migraines from it, but mmmm carbs.5 -
deannalfisher wrote: »but but carbz are ebil!
Do not blaspheme!2 -
Interesting. My carbs run from mid 200’s to mid 400’s, and I’m constantly frustrated because I can’t meet the % recommended by the dietician.
It’s so hard to balance macros as suggested, yet stay within calories, so I focus on protein first (for satiation), then carbs. Unfortunately, fats are always half or less of the recommendation.
It always bothers my OCD perfectionist side to not meet the % goals, plus there’s the nagging worry I’m doing it all wrong and someday my arm will fall off or something.0 -
springlering62 wrote: »Interesting. My carbs run from mid 200’s to mid 400’s, and I’m constantly frustrated because I can’t meet the % recommended by the dietician.
It’s so hard to balance macros as suggested, yet stay within calories, so I focus on protein first (for satiation), then carbs. Unfortunately, fats are always half or less of the recommendation.
It always bothers my OCD perfectionist side to not meet the % goals, plus there’s the nagging worry I’m doing it all wrong and someday my arm will fall off or something.
LOL!! could you imagine?
Just wake up the next morning and your arm had fallen off during the night and was on the floor beside the bed? Doctor looks at your situation and they're like... "well you've been off by 4% of your fat goal, no wonder this happened" and then they claim they cant help you and hand you your arm and send you home.. all the while you're thinking "if I had just ignored calories and ate that damn avocado".. "why didnt I just drink olive oil from the bottle?"8 -
...enter my mouth.
For most of the 2 years I have been losing weight I have either been eating moderate or lowish carb. This is because it was easier for me to manage my reactive hypoglycemia.
However, lately I have added a substantial amount of activity and to better support the amount of calorie burn I am eating higher carbs... MUCH higher. During most of my moderate phase I have eaten around 80-120g carbs. I have gone through periods of lower not because I needed to just because it seems to happen during warmer months. During my lower carb period I would eat around 40-60g carbs. I am now eating an average of 400g of carbs a day.
That is my average. In the last 7 days one of my days was almost 600g.
So the results?
Today I saw a weight on the scale I have not experienced since I was a teen right before I was legal to vote.
Throughout my over 200 pounds of weight loss I have eaten different ways, including a brief keto experiment, and the results always come out to a predictable 3500ish calories per pound.
I'm sorry, I don't understand the point. You don't say how many calories you were eating or how much weight you lost at any given time.
Congratulations for losing 200 pounds, I'm just curious if you ate the same number of calories on both low-carb and high-carb, but lost more per-week on one method with calories and exercise the same?3 -
Slowfaster wrote: »...enter my mouth.
For most of the 2 years I have been losing weight I have either been eating moderate or lowish carb. This is because it was easier for me to manage my reactive hypoglycemia.
However, lately I have added a substantial amount of activity and to better support the amount of calorie burn I am eating higher carbs... MUCH higher. During most of my moderate phase I have eaten around 80-120g carbs. I have gone through periods of lower not because I needed to just because it seems to happen during warmer months. During my lower carb period I would eat around 40-60g carbs. I am now eating an average of 400g of carbs a day.
That is my average. In the last 7 days one of my days was almost 600g.
So the results?
Today I saw a weight on the scale I have not experienced since I was a teen right before I was legal to vote.
Throughout my over 200 pounds of weight loss I have eaten different ways, including a brief keto experiment, and the results always come out to a predictable 3500ish calories per pound.
I'm sorry, I don't understand the point. You don't say how many calories you were eating or how much weight you lost at any given time.
Congratulations for losing 200 pounds, I'm just curious if you ate the same number of calories on both low-carb and high-carb, but lost more per-week on one method with calories and exercise the same?
Their stories point was that no matter what type of diet they did beginning, middle and end the weight came off 1lbs at a time, every 3500 calories deficit created.
The point isnt supposed to be how fast they lost on low carb or how many calories they were eating because those things dont really matter, their calorie goal is their calorie goal.. it could of changed a lot based on needs at any given time.. nothing has to be 100% consistent across the board.. where all variables outside of calories eaten have to remain the same.
Less carbs doesnt mean they ate less calories. So in the end, the rate of loss, would be the same, 1lbs for every 3500 calories created by deficit, which is achieved in any method taken.10 -
I love carbs! Fats are my favorite, but carbs are a close second.4
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MFP just recently added the colored macro pie chart to the web version. I'm pretty good at getting within 5% of my macros, but then I've been working at this for 13 years now. It's kind of fun to see that colored chart.
In the beginning I was pretty much living on carbs and trying to get more protein was a difficult thing for me. Fat has never been a problem, when I was in weight loss mode I had my fats set at 45%-50%.
400g a day! I do that when I have an oops at the grocery store and buy cookies.
I think I need cookies.
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Strange thing (for me) is, if I focus on JUST my calorie and protein count, the rest of my macros seem to fall into place. Seems I instinctively (?) eat a proportional amount of carbs, fats, sugars, etc. the helped me lose, and later maintain my weight.3
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my goal is +/- 10g carbs on my daily goal and +/- 5g fat - but i've been doing this for several years
right now my carbs are high of about 390 and a low of 290 - but i'm been in the 4-500 range while training for races; i also use a TDEE calculator so don't eat back exercise calories until I go over 75min cardio0 -
Slowfaster wrote: »...enter my mouth.
For most of the 2 years I have been losing weight I have either been eating moderate or lowish carb. This is because it was easier for me to manage my reactive hypoglycemia.
However, lately I have added a substantial amount of activity and to better support the amount of calorie burn I am eating higher carbs... MUCH higher. During most of my moderate phase I have eaten around 80-120g carbs. I have gone through periods of lower not because I needed to just because it seems to happen during warmer months. During my lower carb period I would eat around 40-60g carbs. I am now eating an average of 400g of carbs a day.
That is my average. In the last 7 days one of my days was almost 600g.
So the results?
Today I saw a weight on the scale I have not experienced since I was a teen right before I was legal to vote.
Throughout my over 200 pounds of weight loss I have eaten different ways, including a brief keto experiment, and the results always come out to a predictable 3500ish calories per pound.
I'm sorry, I don't understand the point. You don't say how many calories you were eating or how much weight you lost at any given time.
Congratulations for losing 200 pounds, I'm just curious if you ate the same number of calories on both low-carb and high-carb, but lost more per-week on one method with calories and exercise the same?
@Slowfaster
The number of calories I ate kept going down as I lost weight. Also as I got lighter I kept decreasing my deficit to make sure I never lost more than 1 percent of my body weight per week, at least intentionally. At any point when I realized I was losing too fast I immediately slowed back down again.
The number of calories I ate started climbing back up when I improved my NEAT and added exercise. Right now I am eating more than I was at my heaviest and almost double what I was eating this time last year. So the answer is I ate less on moderate/low carb than I am now.
I lost weight each day I was in a deficit. It didn't always show up on the scale immediately but it always showed up. It has never mattered what macro percentages I have eaten or the type of food I have lost weight at around 3500 calories per pound.
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Strange thing (for me) is, if I focus on JUST my calorie and protein count, the rest of my macros seem to fall into place. Seems I instinctively (?) eat a proportional amount of carbs, fats, sugars, etc. the helped me lose, and later maintain my weight.
This is the same for me. After tracking for a long time, I realized that I am pretty much never under my fats target. If I hit cals and protein, the rest just falls into place. The range for carbs can be pretty broad and, as long as these are not foods that are trigger foods or ones that people have difficulty moderating, it really doesn't matter how much if the 2 primary targets are being hit.
I tend to be between 100 and 150 grams of carbs without really trying. Sometimes more, occasionally less. This is just the way I intuitively prefer to eat, focusing on protein and high fiber carbs and letting the rest take care of itself. It just is not that critical as long as calories and protein are good.3 -
Strange thing (for me) is, if I focus on JUST my calorie and protein count, the rest of my macros seem to fall into place. Seems I instinctively (?) eat a proportional amount of carbs, fats, sugars, etc. the helped me lose, and later maintain my weight.
This is the same for me. After tracking for a long time, I realized that I am pretty much never under my fats target. If I hit cals and protein, the rest just falls into place. The range for carbs can be pretty broad and, as long as these are not foods that are trigger foods or ones that people have difficulty moderating, it really doesn't matter how much if the 2 primary targets are being hit.
I tend to be between 100 and 150 grams of carbs without really trying. Sometimes more, occasionally less. This is just the way I intuitively prefer to eat, focusing on protein and high fiber carbs and letting the rest take care of itself. It just is not that critical as long as calories and protein are good.
At my current calorie level it was either way overload on protein which is what I was doing at first or go higher on carbs. My fat has gone higher but I do not find it as satiating to let it take the lead on filling the calorie gap. I just have to be more careful eating this way whereas before I never really had to consider blood sugar that often.3 -
Strange thing (for me) is, if I focus on JUST my calorie and protein count, the rest of my macros seem to fall into place. Seems I instinctively (?) eat a proportional amount of carbs, fats, sugars, etc. the helped me lose, and later maintain my weight.
This is the same for me. After tracking for a long time, I realized that I am pretty much never under my fats target. If I hit cals and protein, the rest just falls into place. The range for carbs can be pretty broad and, as long as these are not foods that are trigger foods or ones that people have difficulty moderating, it really doesn't matter how much if the 2 primary targets are being hit.
I tend to be between 100 and 150 grams of carbs without really trying. Sometimes more, occasionally less. This is just the way I intuitively prefer to eat, focusing on protein and high fiber carbs and letting the rest take care of itself. It just is not that critical as long as calories and protein are good.
At my current calorie level it was either way overload on protein which is what I was doing at first or go higher on carbs. My fat has gone higher but I do not find it as satiating to let it take the lead on filling the calorie gap. I just have to be more careful eating this way whereas before I never really had to consider blood sugar that often.
Yes, that makes total sense. I don't typically have a lot of extra calories. But if I do, I'll usually up carbs and maybe allow myself more sweets, although I don't have much of sweet tooth.
With the additional exercise, is blood sugar a concern? What kind of exercise is it? I'm guessing the exercise is burning off some of that additional blood sugar, yes?1 -
Strange thing (for me) is, if I focus on JUST my calorie and protein count, the rest of my macros seem to fall into place. Seems I instinctively (?) eat a proportional amount of carbs, fats, sugars, etc. the helped me lose, and later maintain my weight.
This is the same for me. After tracking for a long time, I realized that I am pretty much never under my fats target. If I hit cals and protein, the rest just falls into place. The range for carbs can be pretty broad and, as long as these are not foods that are trigger foods or ones that people have difficulty moderating, it really doesn't matter how much if the 2 primary targets are being hit.
I tend to be between 100 and 150 grams of carbs without really trying. Sometimes more, occasionally less. This is just the way I intuitively prefer to eat, focusing on protein and high fiber carbs and letting the rest take care of itself. It just is not that critical as long as calories and protein are good.
At my current calorie level it was either way overload on protein which is what I was doing at first or go higher on carbs. My fat has gone higher but I do not find it as satiating to let it take the lead on filling the calorie gap. I just have to be more careful eating this way whereas before I never really had to consider blood sugar that often.
Yes, that makes total sense. I don't typically have a lot of extra calories. But if I do, I'll usually up carbs and maybe allow myself more sweets, although I don't have much of sweet tooth.
With the additional exercise, is blood sugar a concern? What kind of exercise is it? I'm guessing the exercise is burning off some of that additional blood sugar, yes?
I need to get the monitor back out and start testing myself again because I am also curious to see what exercise and all the weight loss might be doing or have done for me. My particular issue is that my blood sugar can fall too low after eating. Usually this happens about 3 hours later if I eat carbs by themselves or mostly by themselves. A doughnut at 8am would normally have me at sub 50 BG by 11am. I keep telling myself I need to run an experiment to see where I am today but low blood sugar is so unpleasant I have kept putting it off. I know I can catch it before it happens if I monitor though so it is just a bit of irrational resistance at this point. Another reminder I am human I suppose.3 -
While I can't equal your carb counts (on any remotely typical day
), I can't imagine trying low-carb eating, personally. I tried it probably 40+ years ago when it was popular, and it made me pretty miserable. Now, especially as a vegetarian, it doesn't seem suitable at all, for me.
There are some in my demographic (post-menopausal, aging (64), female, severely hypothyroid) who find low-carb eating beneficial (usually for appetite), and I have no reason to doubt them. Certainly, low carb or keto eating can deliver adequate nutrition, so to each their own. I've even suggested certain people try low carb or keto to see if it helps them. I do dispute posts that occasionally (in threads here) portray low carb eating as a form of universal weight loss/satiation near-magic, especially if the claim is for my demographic, because it only takes one clear counter example to disprove a "universal solution" argument. (Classic logic, yes?)
I do wonder how much of the perceived benefit of low carb has to do with eating style. For decades, I've generally not been a person who's profoundly attracted to so-called "hyperpalatable" foods, including many of the specific foods many people mention when they talk about "cutting carbs" (bread, pasta, rice, baked goods, candy, etc. even chips/crisps, pizza, french fries, and things that many people seem to call "carbs", even though that latter set get more calories from fat than carbs). I ate whole wheat pasta somewhat frequently, and liked a veggie/cheese heavy pizza, and would eat some of those foods happily if presented, but otherwise didn't base my diet on that sort of thing.
Those foods tend to be not very nutrient dense, not very satiating, and for many difficult to moderate. The carbs I actually most eat and enjoy (veggies, fruits, dairy) are normally more nutrient dense, or filling for most people. (Somehow, I managed to dramatically overeat them anyway : Practice makes perfect?)
For example, beans (kidney, pinto, black, etc.) are very carb-y, but most people find them difficult to overeat, and I rarely see people here saying that they're a "carb addict" who binges on beans.
If someone initially eats a lot of low-nutrient-density, less satiating carbohydrate-heavy foods, and cuts those out, replacing them with more satiating foods (even low carb ones), I can see how that would have positive effects on calorie compliance. I'm very certain I reduced carbs initially to hit my calorie goal, because many of those common carb sources aren't my favorite foods in the first place.
I'm guessing, Novus, that your TDEE is higher than mine. On a typical 2000 plus or minus a couple of hundred calories eating schedule now (ultra-slow-loss maintenance), I'm usually getting in the mid-200s grams of carbs. I think that's around 50%, most days. (It was more like 150g +/- during loss.)
I literally pay no attention at all to macro percentages (I always have to look mine up, either target or historical-experience ones, when it comes up in a thread). I think in grams. I have a protein minimum (100g), a fat minimum (50g) and am moderately religious about hitting those (over is fine). Carbs? They're there for balancing calories, in my world, occasionally along with some moderate alcohol calories.
I find it so interesting that many (most?) people get enough fats without attention. Despite a love affair with cheese, that's the macro I'm most likely to be puzzlingly short on. When I was first remodeling my eating to lose weight, my protein minimum (which was a bit lower during the loss phase) was a little bit of a challenge (consider the vegetarian thing), but since having worked that out several years ago, protein only rarely needs a little calorie-Tetris to accomplish.
But, yes, to your core point: Once I dialed in my basic calorie requirements (higher than MFP predicted), it was generally true for me that most weight changes over a period of time were very predictable as 3500 calories = 1 pound, approximately.
The one exception - since I'm an occasional peak-y indulge-y eater - is that if I eat way over my TDEE for a day or two, I don't seem to see as much fat gain as I'd have expected. (Talking eating like 2-3 times my TDEE here, not just a few hundred extra calories). Perhaps there are limits to how much food my body can absorb, when it's not used to doing so, I don't know. (I do see just that little resting heart rate bump the next day, so there's probably some extra burn-off happening, too.)
But 3500 calories over maintenance = a pound, once the water weight weirdness has passed, is a pretty darned good practical estimate, for me, with that one exception.
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I am keto or low carb when not all the way keto. I am always confused when people argue that weight loss is easier because they don’t have to track calories on keto. They might not have to...... but it is all about satisfaction. You are satisfied with fewer calories. Therefore calories still count. When I eat this way I am fuller and satisfied faster. But I still track my calories to lose. I still feel hunger. But I feel less hunger than I do when my carbs are super high. Currently getting about 25-30gm fibre, and 15-1800 cal/day. And I am losing because of the calorie deficit not because my carbs are below 50gm/day.
And if it was not clear: I am in agreement with op. It is all about calories. I eat this way because it is what works for me. But when I fall off the wagon(adding carbs) it is completely unsustainable for me and I am starving, overeating, and carb crashing regularly. Sad but true. Easter sucked. And it will happen again.4 -
youngmomtaz wrote: »I am keto or low carb when not all the way keto. I am always confused when people argue that weight loss is easier because they don’t have to track calories on keto. They might not have to...... but it is all about satisfaction. You are satisfied with fewer calories. Therefore calories still count. When I eat this way I am fuller and satisfied faster. But I still track my calories to lose. I still feel hunger. But I feel less hunger than I do when my carbs are super high. Currently getting about 25-30gm fibre, and 15-1800 cal/day. And I am losing because of the calorie deficit not because my carbs are below 50gm/day.
And if it was not clear: I am in agreement with op. It is all about calories. I eat this way because it is what works for me. But when I fall off the wagon(adding carbs) it is completely unsustainable for me and I am starving, overeating, and carb crashing regularly. Sad but true. Easter sucked. And it will happen again.
So, fruit causes you to feel hungry and overeat? Just wondering...1 -
psychod787 wrote: »youngmomtaz wrote: »I am keto or low carb when not all the way keto. I am always confused when people argue that weight loss is easier because they don’t have to track calories on keto. They might not have to...... but it is all about satisfaction. You are satisfied with fewer calories. Therefore calories still count. When I eat this way I am fuller and satisfied faster. But I still track my calories to lose. I still feel hunger. But I feel less hunger than I do when my carbs are super high. Currently getting about 25-30gm fibre, and 15-1800 cal/day. And I am losing because of the calorie deficit not because my carbs are below 50gm/day.
And if it was not clear: I am in agreement with op. It is all about calories. I eat this way because it is what works for me. But when I fall off the wagon(adding carbs) it is completely unsustainable for me and I am starving, overeating, and carb crashing regularly. Sad but true. Easter sucked. And it will happen again.
So, fruit causes you to feel hungry and overeat? Just wondering...
Yup, I can eat a pear or an orange and end up triggering a binge in which I eat 5 pears, or a full bag of grapes or a bunch of bananas etc. But if I pair up way more protein and moderate fat with small amounts of high fibre carbs my appetite is more stable.5 -
youngmomtaz wrote: »psychod787 wrote: »youngmomtaz wrote: »I am keto or low carb when not all the way keto. I am always confused when people argue that weight loss is easier because they don’t have to track calories on keto. They might not have to...... but it is all about satisfaction. You are satisfied with fewer calories. Therefore calories still count. When I eat this way I am fuller and satisfied faster. But I still track my calories to lose. I still feel hunger. But I feel less hunger than I do when my carbs are super high. Currently getting about 25-30gm fibre, and 15-1800 cal/day. And I am losing because of the calorie deficit not because my carbs are below 50gm/day.
And if it was not clear: I am in agreement with op. It is all about calories. I eat this way because it is what works for me. But when I fall off the wagon(adding carbs) it is completely unsustainable for me and I am starving, overeating, and carb crashing regularly. Sad but true. Easter sucked. And it will happen again.
So, fruit causes you to feel hungry and overeat? Just wondering...
Yup, I can eat a pear or an orange and end up triggering a binge in which I eat 5 pears, or a full bag of grapes or a bunch of bananas etc. But if I pair up way more protein and moderate fat with small amounts of high fibre carbs my appetite is more stable.
Through some experimentation I have found my ratio to be 2:1 (2g carbs : 1g protein). It is obviously not that exactly and when fiber is in the mix it would certainly change things too but 2:1 is easy to manage. If I do not follow that rule and assuming I get by without low blood sugar it still causes me to have hunger problems within a couple of hours and then usually for the rest of the day. I always eat a high protein course or drink a protein shake before eating anything else. My biggest meal is bookended by protein.
When I had much less calories to eat my protein would chew up enough that I was naturally left with less for carbs. During those days I would also have to keep an eye on fat because mine often ran too low.2 -
I have that same reaction when I eat carrots by themselves, it's like i eat them and they disintegrate into dust as soon as they hit my stomach. Lol. Apples too if I eat them ever lol. And I agree with the protein thing, because I certainly dont have that problem eating them with my main meals.1
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I read the title, saw @AnnPT77 responded and was like 'here we go', but happy to see the full post hehepsychod787 wrote: »
So, granny sez ya oughta read threads @NovusDies starts, because ya know they're gonna be good . . . ya young whippersnappers, ya!:drinker: 6
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