menchi Member

Exactly. I wouldn't eat them all the time, but I have them in the freezer at work so that I can eat that instead of go grab something worse. On occasion when I'm being lazy at home, I add more protein (few cubes or tofu, dice up a boca patty) or fresh veggies (steamed broccoli, sauteed spinach, etc) so that I still have a…

It's kind of hard to judge without being able to also see what you ate in nutrition and also how your cal heavy days matched up with exercise days (I checked, your diary isn't public). For example, today I am just 50 Cal shy of using all my cals-- dinner was 936 Cal and I burned about 330 Cal in various cardio exercise.…

I agree that you need a deficit in order to lose weight. However, MFP already creates a deficit for you when it sets up your goals. If you click on the "MY HOME" tab and click "Goals", you'll see your deficit as one of the red numbers on the right. For me, my daily deficit is 430 Cal and that is true when my net cals say…

I second that. Drink more water and err on the side of more protein. I think it's also about timing. I do pretty well during the day with reasonable portions and not feeling hungry. But when I stay up late (past 1am), then I start to get the munchies and I want salty foods. Pay attention to when you get those hunger spikes…

I agree with the others. Measurements drop slowly. I've been at this since early December 2010 and while I've lost 17 lbs, the most inches I've lost are on my waist and that's only 3 inches. At first I almost didn't bother with measurements since they didn't seem to change while my weight was steadily going down. Then I…

You say "seems to be growing larger and fatter" but have you actually measured yourself? You might be getting smaller all around but more slowly around the middle so relative to the rest of your body, it seems larger. For me, I've always had the fluffiness around the middle, but it's become less pronounced since I've been…

I do it all the time, but I log it even after I click complete. Sometimes I want to click complete to see what the "prediction" is for my weight loss. Since it is often late night snacking, I do tend to redistribute the calories to the two days to make them both under. But I figure this 24hr span of time is arbitrary…

Thanks for the reminder! My Dad explained this to me long ago, but it's good to hear it again. Sometimes when I'm feeling munchy, I'll mumble to myself "I wonder if I'm hungry or thirsty..." and my BF finds it funny. So I get a glass of water for both of us and have a chugging contest :drinker: . He always wins... :grumble:

Huh really? Because MFP exercise calories are always lower than what the machine tells me. I regularly use the elliptical, arc trainer (cybex), and adaptive motion trainer (precor) from the database. The rest include running, walking, biking, ballroom dancing which I have no way of measuring so I use the MFP numbers. This…

I don't have a good answer for you, but I wanted to ask you a question. Have you actually been measuring your legs (calf and thigh)? I was worried about them getting too much muscle too, so I kept track and they have both decreased even though I do lots of elliptical work and recently started running. My calf looks bulky…

I eat mine back. I read a good post for this some time ago but I don't remember where it is anymore so I'll try to paraphrase. It's not as straightforward as "do you eat the exercise calories?" because it depends on how your intake and burn is calculated. Some personal trainers/nutritionists will say yes or no to that…

I get like that too! After a nice big workout, my brain seems to be so pleased with itself that it doesn't think much about eating. Whereas if I don't exercise, I seem to need to fill up the happiness meter with food. It does make meeting the goals a bit complicated. This is what I've figured out works for me. Those…

I don't know if it works for more mature skin or for lots of loose skin, but I've been using the sauna after my workouts and my skin feels rejuvenated and more firm afterwards. Granted I'm only aiming to lose 20 lbs, but I've not noticed any loose skin on me after losing 17 lbs so far. Initially I decided to use the sauna…

I take days off exercising when my body tells me it's darned tired. That usually happens about once a week on average. I seem to still do alright when I rest for a day since my metabolism doesn't just drop when I skip a day. Eating though, if I don't stay within my calories, I do gain even when I put in the exercise. When…

Do your friends know you are trying to lose weight? I don't tell many people b/c I'm a little self conscious and I also want to see if ppl will notice and say something w/o knowing (then you know they aren't just being nice). But if you are comfortable with it, it would help so they don't keep offering you food. Maybe hang…

Lol, women do notice. My bf is only down 5 lbs and he's already skinny to start with... I still notice that there is less torso to hug, there is tone in the muscles on his arm. And the other night I was idly poking his belly (where most of the bulk was before) and it was firm. I asked if he was flexing on purpose and he…

Yeeeahh! That's awesome. I'm 16 lbs down and I have not had any comments from people who don't know I'm dieting. I can see in the mirror and the fit of my clothes speak volumes, but no comments yet. On one hand, I think the winter clothes are hiding my changes. On the other hand, I do ballroom dancing once a week and I…

Get a kitchen scale-- then you don't have to estimate how much you are cooking/eating.

I only gained a pound from that and I think it's mostly gone now (getting exercise on my cheat day helped). I've been good this week. Another perk to not logging that day is that when I go to look at the graphs under reports, it's obvious which day was a cheat day, but it doesn't have to make me angry and depressed that it…

The gym can quickly get boring and dull. Maybe mix up your exercises? Try a different machine (I tried one I hadn't used before, found it interesting and switch to it occasionally... I still like the elliptical best), or do different cardio like swimming or running? I hate running but last week I thought what the heck,…

Holy crap that's awesome!! I thought it was amazing that I lost 2 inches all over at my weigh-in today (though no weight loss); you've totally got me beat! What parts do you measure? Where did you lose the most inches? And what exercises have you done this past 2.5 weeks? Share! :love:

I've been experimenting with soup since I started this diet. A little spicy something (sauce, pepper) goes a long way to slowing me down as I eat, which helps me feel fuller and also be more aware of when I get full. Rolled oats mixed in with the soup works great! It thickens the soup kind of like cornstarch but adds much…

I wonder if you can put in bbcode... link Ok I tried that and html. The bbcode link does show, which is weird b/c they let you use bbcode to put in your ticker. HTML didn't work and just looked like regular text. I dunno... sry I couldn't help.

That is an admirable goal! When you say no salt, you mean not adding salt or seasoning with salt right? Because salt is not the same as sodium and a lot of foods naturally have sodium (most meats, some veggies, etc). They have a lot less sodium than packaged foods and so it's actually a good thing because your body does…

I just my tape measure from my sewing kit and measure the relaxed length of whatever part I'm measuring. Relaxed means not squeezing out flesh but the tape is flush up against my skin. I measure waist, hip, thigh and calf. I measure all of that while standing up (or bent over, just not sitting down). I think you just need…

Just had a cheat day yesterday. I appear to have gained a pound as of weighing this morning but it remains to be seen if that stays or is temporary. I paid attention to how my body felt and ate what was comfortable-- I did have to remind myself that I wasn't going to count calories... I started to mentally estimate what…

I see your point but I guess it serves a different purpose for me. It's not so much about hiding the numbers as much as I get obsessive about the calories when I log and I think I want a day where I just don't worry about it. Especially since I've also try to avoid eating foods that I would have a hard time logging…

Thank you for all your responses. I feel more confident about trying this out and seeing how my body/mind responds. A few of you commented and I feel I should clarify. This cheat day is not about moderation or stuffing face until I hurt either. It's about putting the on the calorie blinders occasionally and go with what…

Cake needs to go, really. If you feel bad about wasting it, maybe donate it (homeless shelter or something like that)? As for the excersizing, you totally ran around and did lots of work burning calories. The MFP database has "housework" as a cardio exercise so you might want to add that in on days where you do more than…

Hahahahahaha... that is exactly the problem, and then multiply it by 3 hours of buffet time slowly savoring... Oh my.