What can you eat?

I guess you could eat whatever you want and stick to your calorie goal but you would really want all the food you eat to really count. If you want McDonald's sure you can have it but it would be so much better for you to have a homemade turkey burger on a whole wheat bun with a low calorie cheese and some baked sweet potato fries and a side salad. You'll get more nutrition and a whole lot less fat which is better for you. Also since it will be lower in calories you'll have more calories left to eat more food, so just try and make every calorie you eat be a beneficial as you can but it is ok to treat yourself once and a while.

I don't rule any foods out because it's too fattening..... but I do stop and ask myself how this treat is going to affect my whole program.....how much can I have without putting myself off track, have I treated myself lately? and am I going to be ok if I go up a little as a result......

Seems like a big process but once you get the hang of it you've worked it all out even before your hand is reaching for the plate and it feels great to both allow myself a treat some days.... or to say no thank you.... and know that it really was MY choice

I love to cook and I love to eat. I eat alot of the "healthy stuff" but I see nothing wrong with eating some of the other stuff every now and again. I like what the previous poster said about finding alternatives like the sweet potato fries and turkey burgers. Substitutions like that can really help fight a craving and be more nuritious as well.

It's been a while since I have eaten pizza and hot chips, because they don't fill me up very much for the calories.

Nearly everything else, including cheesecake, is fair game. I just make sure I fit the bad stuff into my calories and macros.

Yes, do not limit your food. Just make better choices, and portion size is important. Never let food have power over you.

I pretty much eat whatever I want. I figure this is a lifestyle change not a diet so I try to eat things I can keep up for the rest of my life.

We did cut out most red meat and switched to turkey...ground turkey or ground chicken instead of beef. We do still have the occasional hamburger or steak but we've discovered that it now just feels too heavy and uncomfortable. We also cut out boxed dinners (like hamburger helper and stuff that was pre-made). We cut down on bread and buy the 45cal/slice sara lee when we do get bread.

However, all of the things we cut out, we don't really miss. We've gotten a little more creative with our meals and tend to do small variations on the same few meals but it works for us. We still go out for pizza when we feel like it, we still buy chicken strips but we check the nutrition and get the lowest cal avail and pay attention to the serving size. We still buy chips (not often but maybe a bag every few weeks) and we still have "sweets" every night...switching from ice cream to frozen yogurt and 90 calorie brownies/granola bars.

Nothing that we've changed is hard to keep up in the future so we never really feel like we're on a diet. Yeah, there are some days that are better than others but I think our total loss together just proves that it's working. Both of us have a general idea of what our calories are and can pretty much stay at our goal without logging every now and then.

Feel free to hit me up if you have any ?'s