I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

[Julie in CA]

Over the weekend we had company and I ate some things I hadn't planned to. I'm back on plan today, but I'm veerrry hungry! Do you go with it on the days when you're hungrier than you ought to be, or do you force yourself to hold back? I could eat a cheeseburger, for instance, and it would help to ease the craving for more carbs, but I'm probably going to end up with over 2000 calories today if I do.

[Shrew2u]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

If I'm hungry between meals, I eat, but keep it fairly small - a thin slice of lean ham with a dill pickle and half a slice of cheese. A scoop of tuna salad in a cabbage leaf (makes a nice, crunchy cup). Chase it with water and wait 10 minutes, see if I'm still hungry. Usually, that bit of protein and fat will take the edge off and I can get back to whatever I was doing.

[TaylorMac]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

While you're getting yourself back on track after your eating off-plan weekend, I would listen to your body and feed it good, healthy legal food until you're satisfied but not stuffed. Good quality protein foods with liberal amounts of fat should put you right back in ketosis. Go back to the calorie counting after that.

[Aways2Go]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

High carb foods make me starving crazy hungry. Two or three days of low carb, lots of proteins and fats knocks that hunger in the head.

I ate well over 2k calories a day the first several weeks I was on Atkins and I still lost. Not that I am advising that, but it wasn't a problem for me. After that first few weeks, it gradually came down to where now I usually take in something like 1600 to 1800 a day and still stay plenty full.

I think it's better to stay full (not stuffed, but full) on proteins and fats for a few days until your hunger gets back in control and not crucify yourself over every calorie.

[chinadoll]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

I find the first day or so I have to forget the calories and just eat if I am hungry so that at least stay within my 20 gr of carbs. Thats OK. After that I start paying a lot closer attention to my body signals. First climbing back on the wagon is tough enough sometimes without worrying about calories too.

[iamran]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

Hi Julie, I too fell off the wagon this past weekend and I am paying dearly for it now. The past 2 days I have been famished. Yesterday I ate 3000 calories. Yikes! Today I am doing better at 1300 but I could eat a horse! I can't wait till dinner!

[jimmyolsenblues]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

yep i been bad lately and i am hungry...that is the problem with a little cheating...or a lot of cheating...hunger comes back fierce.

[atkinsgal08]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

>>I'm probably going to end up with over 2000 calories today if I do.>>

Using the "rule of thumb" that you should eat at 10-12 times your current body weight, being over 2000 calories shouldn't be a problem for you.

[mission to lose]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

Hi,
I am reading posts here of people around the 250# and up, keeping their calories at 1300-1800. I have read posts from moderators suggesting eating around 10X your current weight. Can't eating too few calories be hurting you as well as eating too many? Some of these calories totals seem quite low for weights of 250#. What do you think?

[atkinsgal08]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

>>an't eating too few calories be hurting you as well as eating too many?>>

Yes, it can. It's called putting your body in famine mode.

>> am reading posts here of people around the 250# and up, keeping their calories at 1300-1800.>>

In my experiences, that's undereating ...

Do those posters do well at that level of calories?

[Aways2Go]

Re: I'm getting back on the wagon, but I'm very hungry!

Lots of folks say lots of things about calories - eat more, eat less. Different people report success with different things. I have no doubt that consistently eating too low on the calories might slow your metabolism down. I also have no doubt that consistently eating abnormally high on the calories would also slow your weight loss down. What is too high or too low for any given person seems to be the real question.

Without counting calories specifically, I find I am normally full throughout the day eating somewhere around 1800 calories these days. I have no intention of specifically going back and eating more after that amount of calories just to increase my calorie count for the day if I don't want anything else. Now if I had only eaten say, 800 calories, that might be a different story. In that case, I might add some mayo or extra butter to some snack towards the end of the day to try to up it to 1500 or so. But if I was eating 10x my weight in calories per day, that would be 2800 calories a day for me right now. I don't want that much food, nor do I have any intention of going about TRYING to make myself eat that many calories. Just seems like bad training for the future in my opinion.

Maybe my metabolism would speed up if I ate more. Maybe it would just reinforce teaching me to eat without any regards to whether I am already full or not. Maybe it would slow my weight loss down to eat that much more. Who knows. I choose what I consider a reasonable amount of food, eat until I am satisfied, and as long as it is a reasonable amount of calories on a daily basis also, I don't concern myself with it too much. At my size, I consider anything between maybe 1500 and 2000 fairly reasonable, and it does vary from day to day somewhat within that range. If I am not much over 1000 by early evening, I do eat a little extra to try to raise it. If I go over 2000 by a little, I shrug my shoulders and say 'oh well'. Life is too short for me to wear myself out worrying about whether I ate 1425 cals or 2250 or whatever as long as I am happy with my weight loss at the current rate of about 10 pounds a month and happily going about my business without feeling stuffed or starving at any point. I am pretty happy that 1800 calories, on average, fills me up and keeps me going without my making much efforts at keeping it at that level most of the time. Simplicity is a beautiful thing.

I'm not in a race, although I would like to lose quickly as we all would. I'm mostly interested in retraining myself to eat good food in normal amounts for the rest of my life. If eating 1800 calories a day instead of 2800 (10x my current weight) is slowing that down by a few pounds a month, well that's okay by me. I'll live.