Calories... Are They Kidding?!!!

I learned that all the little tastes & bites of things throughout the day really add up. MFP has been such a great tool

I've been tracking my calories now for several weeks. I've been stuck on 165/166 lbs. I dropped to 163...only to creep back, 1/2lb day to 166. I am just so discouraged. I've been working out HARD for a year and can't drop any weight. Even working w/ a nutritionist at the gym. I've mixed up my work out schedules/routines with no luck. I don't know what to do anymore. I've tried more calories/ less calories, more exercise/less exercise....nothing changes for me.

Same for me...I lost nothing for the first 3 months. Turns out, since I was a couch potato, I had lousy muscle tone. I went pretty hard with weights & cardio right from the start, I was losing weight & building muscle at the same time, so there was no difference on the scale. Then one day...boom! I've been losing 1lb/wk for 11 weeks, lost over 6 inches, and had my first 2lb loss this week. My new muscles have now become fat burning machines! Keep working hard on your muscles...not just cardio. Give your body the chance to get used to your new way of doing things & loss will happen for you. You can do this!:flowerforyou:

I'm curious if you all out there were as shocked as I was about how many calories you were consuming?

Thx,
Scott

Oh yes, very surprised. This site let you know when doing the calorie count. Eat a piece of grill chicken and keep it moving. NOT THE WHOLE CHICKEN!!!!! :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Ya know there were things that I thought were healthy until I found out how many calories were in them. At times 1 meal would be like 1100 calories wow that's my whole day in 1 meal...no wonder America is fat. lol.

This.
Keeping a dairy is an eyeopener.

" The "sigh" part, I know I'll need to watch this the rest of my life to keep the weight off... I think I'm ok with that. "

The truth is after awhile it becomes your lifestyle and you don't " worry or have to watch " ... it becomes " normal "

^^^ This Exercise becomes second nature, too, and you start feeling bad if you don't get up and move enough, because you actually MISS it

Its all the hidden calories, like finishing that half slice of toast off your child's plate, the slice of ham or nub of cheese whilst making the family sandwiches, or eating the broken biscuit (cookie for my friends in the US) when opening the packet (don'tcha know the calories all escape when the biscuit breaks! I wish!)... it goes on and on.

In fact there is a TV series in the UK called Secret Eaters each week it follows someone who can't lose weight even though they are restricting their calorie intake. Every time it is the bits & pieces or portion sizes that they are under estimating - it is eye opening.

Logging what I eat makes me think about what I am putting in my mouth, and MFP makes it easy to log.

Hello All! I am in my first week of using this site because a friend at work introduced me to it and " Calories... Are They Kidding?!!" was pretty much my first thought when I discovered what they wanted me to consume for calories in a day. I don't even get to dinner before I'm out of calories and I felt so guilty the first day I entered in my foods I decided to do 2 exercise videos and some crunches to make up for it and I was just barely in the green. I don't know if I can survive on so few calories. I feel terribly hungry by the end of the day and usually give into a snack after dinner that pushes me over my calories. Who would have thought Steak would have so many calories!!!!!!!! I need my beefy critter it's too yummy to give up. So moderation moderation moderation... the new mantra that will hopefully get me happy with my body.

If you're big on meat, look into Keto. More fat/meat. As with anything else, you must still count your calories. They just come from different foods. http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=132598293

Feel free to PM me if you have any questions.

I once went back and counted a "normal" day's caloric intake from before I had started counting. It was over 7000 without counting drinks. I'm pretty sure I should have been found legally insane. No wonder I ballooned to 372. Now I eat 1600 a day and I've lost 72lbs in 6 months!

I was totally shocked when I learned calories in everything. From time to time, I still get shocked. I was consuming a lot more calories than I should've and I could see why I am as heavy as I am and why i stayed at the same weight for more than a year. So far, this site is working for me. I feel much more positive, which is a huge thing for me because of my depression. I sleep a lot better, even though I don't really have sleeping problems, but I just feel the difference. Also, I feel lighter, like the thinner me that's hiding inside of me! With the help of this site and the lovely community, I'm sure the thinner me will come out. (:

I have to say when I first started (about 2 years ago) I was totally dismayed and surprised at how many calories, etc. was in everything I ate. I have to say that I am a bit of a cheater when it came to food in the past. I really thought exercise burned 2 to 3 times the amount of calories as it actually did. So I would "treat" myself to some high pleasure, high carb, high fat food and more than normal. Thus, even when exercising I never really saw much weight loss, although I would drop a size or two. Irregardless after first experimenting with myfitnesspal when I lost my initial 10 lbs, I realized quickly that I could no longer cheat my body anymore. My brain thought it could outsmart my metabolism. However, I learned within a week or two no matter how sophisticated my cheats were they didn't really work. So now I am fully committed to continuing my efforts for the remainder of my life. This basically means a firm commitment to logging what I eat, eating sensibly, and working out 4-5 times a week. So far I have maintained this and keep slowly losing weight/gaining muscle. I'm even okay when I plateau, because as it stands now I weigh pretty much what I did at age 14.

So while the reality is tough to swallow. I can realistically see what I have to do and without logging my food religiously I never would have been able to accept this reality.

Good luck on your hard work!

After being in this eating healthier watching my weight stuff for a whopping 3 weeks I can tell you a couple of things. I've tried this a number if times yet this time I feel I have the right mindset. No fads, no crazy goals, just a simple plan. Eat less, exercise more, lose weight. Like I said, simple...

The most surprising thing I have learned so far is that I had no idea how much I should be eating. The wacky diets that are all over that claim " ignore the calorie count, just take thus pill..." are nuts. If I refuse to to understand how much I Really Neec, I'll never manage my weight.

So, I have religiously post my calories and followed the guidelines and in less than a month I know I was eating
WAY TOO MUCH. it ain't easy kids. but logging these are teaching me to eat smarter. "wow, it's that many? Guess I'll eat 1/2 the serving..."

Three weeks and 8 pounds later, i feel it might be working. Course walking the dogs twice a day helps...

The "sigh" part, I know I'll need to watch this the rest of my life to keep the weight off... I think I'm ok with that.

I'm curious if you all out there were as shocked as I was about how many calories you were consuming?

Thx,
Scott

Holy Cow, YES! I am truly amazed at the amount of food I was eating, and the quality of it too- more like the bad quailty of the stuff I was eating. I'm on 1200 calories now, but I must've been eating two and half or three times that much. But keep up the good work! I bet the longer we do this the easier it will get, especially when we start really seeing and feeling the difference.

I have shocks while counting cals.. eg a oreo milk shake my son kindly brought me as a treat was lovely till I put it in my counter and it was 550 cals!!! Then I went to Costa and had a red berry cooler.. mm I thought it is flavouring and ice... that'll be ok! OH NO 330 cals... No wonder our children are getting bigger and bigger! hidden calories!

I hear what you're saying but an oreo milkshake doesn't really have hidden calories. It's a milkshake with oreos. LOL!

Yes, and still am!! Like the other day my Mother-in-law got a Bran muffin and a smoothie from Tim Hortons she thought it was healthy but it was close to 600 calories!!!! I think resturants should have all their food in calories and have smaller portions. I finally found one healthy option at Wendy's and that is their new chicken Berry salad for half size is only 270 calories!!! It fills me up!!!

For me it was drinks. I love coke; and would probably have a bottle 2/3 times a week. There is 200 calories in a coke. That's a kids size popcorn chicken at KFC! Same with my beloved energy drinks. Even stuff like orange juice, because juice is healthy right? Nope. Sadly not. So now I'm on flavoured water or diet coke/energy drinks if I have a drink while I'm out. True coke is saved for special occasions because I often look and think about all of the food I could have for the "cost" of the energy drink.

I know! It's totally shocking. I have always thought that I had a pretty good idea of what I was eating, but inputting things has really opened my eyes.

For example, one package of Welch's fruit snacks are 80 calories. WHAT.