Da'struggle...

toriann319
toriann319 Posts: 994 Member
edited September 2020 in Health and Weight Loss
So, apparently I'm a woman that can't be tamed. Who'da thunk it?
I started my journey for the *mumble*th time in my life, well, 65 days ago to be exact...
I decided that I wanted to try low carb/keto. I've seen SO many different success stories and the before and after pictures, within weeks of one another, are outrageous. I've been sticking to it with a few cheat days here and there but very rarely. My progress has been amazing and a total mental health booster, but I feel like I'm getting burnt out on feeling like I am only allowed certain foods. I live in Florida where there is nothing better than 'tater salad & macaroni and cheese at a BBQ and a bowl of nice cold fruit when you're skin is melting away in the sun. I love HEALTHY foods, but very few things are acceptable when you're counting carbs...

So, I guess the questions I'm trying to ask before I get too involved in rambling are:

Has anyone else done the same thing and felt the same way?
Has anyone switched from low carb/keto to healthy calorie counting?
What were some of the setbacks you experienced when/if doing so?

I just want to be able to enjoy ALL food and feel like a cheat day won't set me back to square one. In my jumbled head, I feel like it's easier to adjust meals according to calories than it is carbs. You can eat 300 calories worth of macaroni and cheese and just fix it later with a lower calorie meal later that day... But once you eat 78 grams of carbs in potato salad in one sitting... that's it... You're out for three days. LOL.........help.

Replies

  • toriann319
    toriann319 Posts: 994 Member
    NovusDies wrote: »
    toriann319 wrote: »
    So, apparently I'm a woman that can't be tamed. Who'da thunk it?
    I started my journey for the *mumble*th time in my life, well, 65 days ago to be exact...
    I decided that I wanted to try low carb/keto. I've seen SO many different success stories and the before and after pictures, within weeks of one another, are outrageous. I've been sticking to it with a few cheat days here and there but very rarely. My progress has been amazing and a total mental health booster, but I feel like I'm getting burnt out on feeling like I am only allowed certain foods. I live in Florida where there is nothing better than 'tater salad & macaroni and cheese at a BBQ and a bowl of nice cold fruit when you're skin is melting away in the sun. I love HEALTHY foods, but very few things are acceptable when you're counting carbs...

    So, I guess the questions I'm trying to ask before I get too involved in rambling are:

    Has anyone else done the same thing and felt the same way?
    Has anyone switched from low carb/keto to healthy calorie counting?
    What were some of the setbacks you experienced when/if doing so?

    I just want to be able to enjoy ALL food and feel like a cheat day won't set me back to square one. In my jumbled head, I feel like it's easier to adjust meals according to calories than it is carbs. You can eat 300 calories worth of macaroni and cheese and just fix it later with a lower calorie meal later that day... But once you eat 78 grams of carbs in potato salad in one sitting... that's it... You're out for three days. LOL.........help.

    You can find amazing success stories with before and after pictures with ANY way of eating that created a calorie deficit that a person found sustainable.

    Your answer is not with other people. Your answer is in experimenting to find what works best for you. I bet you would hate the way I have eaten over the last 2.5 years to lose my weight but you don't need to eat the way I have and that is great news.

    You can toss out the rule book if you want. Low carb is not required but if lower carbs works for you experiment with how high you can go. Maybe if you get up to 100ish you can have your carby treats on occasion. You can completely ignore ketosis. You can be in ketosis and gain weight.

    When you add carbs back to your diet your scale will go up. This is because your body will have a chance to replenish some of the glycogen you forced out of it when going keto. It is just water weight but it makes some people upset when they realize that some of the amazing keto powers were simply driving down water weight more than normal. It doesn't mean you didn't also lose fat. If you were in a deficit you lost both.

    Thank you so much for your feedback!
  • Dogmom1978
    Dogmom1978 Posts: 1,580 Member
    CICO is king. If it’s easier for you to eat at a calorie deficit on a keto diet, cool. I would last 1 day and then return to my yummy carbs.

    I eat what I want when I want at a calorie deficit. Sometimes I need to do more exercise to BE at a deficit if I know I want some particularly high calorie treat (like pizza). I weigh and check for accuracy in the mfp app and add in my exercise and eat back a portion of my exercise calories.

    So far, I’ve lost 25 lbs. I don’t count macros at all right now, just calories, so some days my carbs are really high. As long as I stick to that deficit though, I consistently lose weight.

    Find what works for YOU and what is sustainable for YOU. It sounds like it ISNT keto (so you stick with it and lose 30, 40, 50 etc lbs, but then you hit goal and stop and go back to eating all your carbs and whatever else and don’t track anything and BAM you gain it all back).
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,351 Member
    Yeah, I lost 80ish pounds many years ago just counting calories.

    With that said, 300 calories of macaroni salad are still 300 calories of macaroni salad. One of my favorite meals today is a smoked salmon pasta salad made with rotini and tons of vegetables and a ceasar/tartar dressing. It's about 500 calories for a serving but I get a good amount of protein with the whole grain rotini and the salmon and each serving has about 2 cups of vegetables. It's pretty delicious.


    When I was at the tail end of my weight loss I tried to keep carbs low-ish. On 1500 calories I tried to stay at 100-125g of carbs a day. That limited my amounts of starchy carbs but I still ate them in smaller quantities


    Find a happy medium that makes it tolerable. Take a long walk and earn an extra cookie. :)
  • nanastaci2020
    nanastaci2020 Posts: 1,072 Member
    Some people feel great doing low carb/high fat - and probably are not 'fond' of carb-y foods anyhow. (I imagine at least, as I am not one of them.)

    My personal motto is calories matter. I don't limit my carbs. Instead I make sure to get enough protein (70+ grams daily) and make sure not to cut my fat too low. The carbs fall where they fall. Generally lower than MFP's default recommendation, but not 'low' by any low-carb-diet standards.

    The losing weight process is not terribly different from the (to be reached down the road) maintaining weight process. You get some additional calories, sure, but we need to put some thought into how it all balances out. Otherwise, we'll just be back here - needing to lose weight again - at some point in the future. So if you're going bonkers and/or having to 'cheat' every so often, the keto/low-carb life is probably not for you. That is ok!!

    I look to calorie totals, and to eating foods based on type & quantity that I know will keep me satisfied and get me thru my day. I also go by the mantra that being more active increases my calorie allowance. There are times I put those factors together to plan for something special. For example, I planned to have a few alcoholic beverages this past Sunday. So I saved calories Friday & Saturday, and was super active Saturday & Sunday. Then instead of 3 drinks Mango-Vodka-Lemonades, I had 2 and also had a helping of homemade mac & cheese made by my husband and myself. No regrets, and still had a slight calorie deficit for each day.

    What to expect? Potentially a slight increase in water weight as you resume a normal carb load. Annoying perhaps, but if you're interested in losing weight then you're probably wanting real weight loss, not just a trick of the scale.
  • ALZ14
    ALZ14 Posts: 202 Member
    I love carbs way too much to ever do keto, my three gestational diabetes pregnancies were enough to prove I can never do full keto.

    I’ve lost 24 pounds since June 6. I eat chips and something sweet almost every day. I’ve had pizza, pasta, bbq sauce, birthday cake, ice cream and cookies.

    I only worry about calorie counts not carbs, so unless you have a medical condition that requires low carb, there is no reason to deprive yourself of Mac and cheese or potato salad. In the long run you will probably find you won’t need as many “cheat days” because you can eat the foods you want (within reason).
  • lgfrie
    lgfrie Posts: 1,449 Member
    As @novusdies notes, when you start a low-carb diet, you shed water, and when you reintroduce carbs, you retain some water. This leads to people both feeling ecstatic and thinking they've found the magic pill when they first start Atkins/Keto/low carb, and then getting doubly convinced that it was the only way to really lose weight when they start eating carbs again and suddenly gain 4-5 pounds. In both cases, it's just water rebalancing.

    It sound like at the moment you'd like to be eating things that aren't on the "approved list" and the solution is rather simple - put them on your approved list. Anything that fits within your calories for the day will get the job of weight loss done.

    In the end, Keto, Atkins, and other low-carb approaches offer no benefit (or penalty) beyond simple calorie counting.
  • Ddsb11
    Ddsb11 Posts: 607 Member
    I’ll keep it short and sweet. You can have an all carb diet and lose weight. Of course balance is ideal for nutrition and being satiated. Eat your normal diet just eat less calories than you burn. It really is that easy in terms of weight loss.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 28,053 Member
    Do you know the people with the crazy before and after pictures in real life and do you see them over time? I know people who are only vocal online about their successes, but since I see them IRL know that in fact they go up and down all year round.

    Sure, there are plenty of people here who are a good fit for keto and love it. Plenty of others just didn't find it suited them. Fortunately, all you need for weight loss is a calorie deficit. The key is finding the easiest way for YOU. Keto/LC may or may not be that.

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  • ReenieHJ
    ReenieHJ Posts: 9,724 Member
    Yep, the one that works for you is the one that truly does work for you. :) IOW, the plan you can stick with. I've tried so many different diet plans and fads in my lifetime. CICO is the only one that has kept me committed for this amount of time. It's versatile, I can eat anything I want as long as it fits within my numbers. I was never good at sticking with anything that was very restrictive in any way. :(
    Maybe that's your issue as well? Wanting that potato salad and mac n cheese, but not feeling like you're allowed to have it, will only result in you feeling resentful and craving it even more. I usually try to space my calories out throughout the day but sometimes, if I had a bigger than normal breakfast(or expect any other meal to be like that) I'll eat just veggies for a meal or 2 on that day. I'm not hungry by any means, have a pretty well balanced week, and can fulfill my cravings enough to not go crazy. (So far :()
    Sustainable balance. And good luck!!
  • age_is_just_a_number
    age_is_just_a_number Posts: 630 Member
    Calories in versus Calories out --> When at a deficit weight is lost. When at a surplus weight is gained. When equal weight stays the same.
    We are not machines. There are variations in what works for different people.
    The CICO methodology has been proven over and over again. Results take time and the CICO difference is on average over that period of time. We all have days when we come in with a larger deficit and days when we come in with a surplus. But if over the course of a week/month/year, you have an overall deficit, the number on the scale will go down.
    Good luck,
    P.S. If you are not feeling well on keto, then I'd switch to using MFP to track your food and eat toward a calories and macros goal.
  • Dogmom1978
    Dogmom1978 Posts: 1,580 Member
    tgillies003 wrote: »
    Calories in versus Calories out --> When at a deficit weight is lost. When at a surplus weight is gained. When equal weight stays the same.
    We are not machines. There are variations in what works for different people.
    The CICO methodology has been proven over and over again. Results take time and the CICO difference is on average over that period of time. We all have days when we come in with a larger deficit and days when we come in with a surplus. But if over the course of a week/month/year, you have an overall deficit, the number on the scale will go down.
    Good luck,
    P.S. If you are not feeling well on keto, then I'd switch to using MFP to track your food and eat toward a calories and macros goal.

    You don’t even need to eat toward the macros goal at first if that is too challenging. Just eating at or below the calorie goal will result in weight loss. You should try to eat sufficient protein and not just eat a diet of all cupcakes, but you can lose weight if you set it to a deficit and then eat your allotted daily calories in cupcakes.

    I do NOT recommend doing that; I’m simply pointing out that macros don’t matter for weight loss, only calories do. You would probably feel pretty crappy overall if you ate at a deficit and only ate cupcakes, but you would lose weight...
  • gewel321
    gewel321 Posts: 718 Member
    I am one of those people that would never succeed on keto. I know it works for others but no way for me. I live in the south too and yes BBQ mac and cheese hits you differently. I input the recipe and weigh it all. I make sure that everything I put in my mouth is tracked and fit into my daily goals. I have been on this (current) journey since October. I took a few months off when COVID hit but I have been back on it for a while. I don't look at any Macros. None at all. Maybe one day I will but right now I focus entirely on calories in vs calories out. I am down almost 50 lbs. I would be down more if I didn't take the COVID months but I needed those for my mental health.

    The point is do what works for you and won't make you miserable in the long run. Being miserable won't help anyone to succeed.
  • callsitlikeiseeit
    callsitlikeiseeit Posts: 8,626 Member
    i like carbs way too much to not eat them. my best friend lost a significant amount of weight doing keto. 30 pounds or so. she hated eating like that. she stopped and gained some weight back- not a whole lot- and is now simply monitoring her calorie intake.
  • nanastaci2020
    nanastaci2020 Posts: 1,072 Member
    I will confess:

    My first ever attempt at weight loss was low carb. Before that I had never dieted at all, though I had switched to 0 cal soda. Back in early 2003, my mother in law and a former coworker had both found success with it. And I'd not yet 'learned' about CICO. The idea of eating lots of cheese and meat was appealing. New Year's Day I started low carb and riding an exercise bike every morning before work. I did lose pounds (do not recall the specifics but know now it was likely most or all water weight) but I did not even make it 3 weeks. LIfe intervened - Jan 19 car accident and then dieting/losing weight was NOT a priority.

    Now, I think I could do sort of low carb if I really needed/wanted to. But I am glad that I do not have to. I like bread, and pasta. I don't have them constantly but I also cannot see myself giving them up FOR LIFE.

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