What were you eating habits before MFP?

I would eat pretty much the same things when I cooked for myself. The biggest change is lunch because I now make my own lunch and do run to the pizza place or the sandwich shop or whatever. Also portion control on the stuff I make myself, instead of 2 huge pork chops I now eat one smaller one, with loads of steamed kale and a baked sweet potato.

I work at a cupcake shop so alot of sweets.. and also huge portions of everything. i can eat like a 300lb man!

Cheese became a problem...

I'm stunned by some of these responses.. it always used to bug me when you'd buy a magazine because it said 'I lost a stone in a month' or similar and I'd buy it, thinking, 'I'll do what they did'...well no wonder they lost so much weight when they ate such utter rubbish in the first place! I have always been frustrated by the belief that I didn't know what I was doing wrong as I never ate the crap everyone else did... BUT then I found MFP and discovered portion control.

So daytime (work lunch) I have swapped shop-bought sandwiches (even thought they were from low fat range - who knew they were so high calorie !!)... for larger and more filling shop-bought salads or 'lighter' microwave meals (in effect portion-controlled), or chunky canned soup with brown roll. If I feel the need to be naughty, what was previously a cake or pastry snack is now a freddo chocolate bar or jelly tots (low kcal treats), and what was previously crisps is now different crisps or popcorn or rice cakes! So my daytime habits have been about dumping shop-bought sandwiches and changing my snack choices.

I always and still do eat a lot of fruit as a snack and on intensive exercise days I now graze on nuts, granola, dried fruit rather than eat massively larger carb portions for lunch or dinner. Particularly important as I train late at night, straight from work, so my larger carb dinner was very late at night before bedtime...

And at home I have reduced the meat/carb portion on my plate (not significantly as wasn't that bad) and increased the vegetables on my plate. Or in a salad I chose a carb OR protein side or a little of both, previously I had a lot of both. So my evening habits have been about portion control.

How did you eat before? What was your downfall? Did you even look at calorie content in things?

I work at a major grocery store, and while doing price change overs I was looking at calorie content of things I used to eat. NO WONDER I gained so much weight so quickly - 490 calories for a french bread pizza and I would eat two in a sitting, as well as a "snack" size bag of chips, and a full calorie pop or two. Multiple Hot Pockets as a snack. I also used to make something to eat while cooking. Making a pizza? Chips and salsa while waiting. Somethings in the oven or being delivered? I'll make a sandwich.

Same here!
I used to eat SO MUCH and never really thought about calorie intake.

Breakfast (if I was at work) 2 toasted bagels with LOTS of butter and strawberry jam
Breakfast (if I was at home) 4x toast with marmite and margarine, + a bowl of toasted muesli, milk and yoghurt. (sometimes with canned peaches/apricots)

Lunch (work) - 1 mince pie or filled roll, + sultana cake + hot chocolate
Lunch (home) - 2 ham/salad sandwiches [nothing has changed here... I still have ham or chicken + salad sandwiches most days]

Dinner - Much the same as now, although my portion sizes were considerably larger before MFP

Snacks - and THIS IS WHERE I WENT WRONG..........
Snacks - up to 9 hot chocolates per day, usually about 2 most days
- up to 20 cookies per day
- up to 200gm chocolate
- up to 1 bag of crisps (potato chips)
- chocolate muesli bars
- 100gm of crackers, then margarine, tomato and cheese added

Overall, my snacks really let me down.
I ate way too much sugary and fatty foods and way too much of them.

I have always struggled to control HOW MUCH I ate.... I find it much easier to say NO and not start, not have any, than have 1 or 2,... then TRY and stop.
So saying NO is easiest for me.

Portion sizes are also a biggie.. not so big now!

Since starting MFP I have learnt, real fast, where all the calories are hiding... and why I got so big!
But now I know whats'what, I can manage my eating better.

Hope this helps someone else out there.

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Cheers

I found I either ate wayyyyyyy too little or wayyyyyyyyy too much. Some days would be 800-900 calories, others 3000+. I used to drink nearly my whole days worth in soda.

I ate anything within reach that tasted good. Breakfast would be cereal or something quick but there would be a bag of chips and a footlong sandwich for lunch, or mcdonalds, or a pizza or hotpockets, and BAGS of chips daily. I mean whole huge bags, with loads of dip. Cheese on everything, tons of mayo and ranch. I literally would just eat because the food was there. Probably tons of calories and tons of sodium.

I didn't know ANYTHING about sodium or even what a proper serving size was for pretty much everything I ate.

Getting into a serious car accident last year really pushed me over. I was bedridden and in PT for months and couldn't really move, not to mention tired all the time and feeling bad and with the meds...I just ate McDonalds almost every day. I gained probably a good 20 of the lbs just in that year alone.

Pizza pop and tacos.....everyday