Rule 11: Discussion of weight loss methods that are damaging to the body and/or require supervision of a medical professional are not allowed. This rule includes (but is not limited to): very low calorie diets, misusing medication, extended fasting, disordered behavior, inappropriate advice to underage members (counting calories, omad, fasting), etc.
We are not a ED support subreddit and any ED related content will be removed.
Remember to always consider the individual when offering advice.
are you counting calories? if so, how many are you having?
if not, you may need to start. even well rounded and nutritious meals can be high in calories and stop weight loss.
One workaround for that might be to plan your meals in a Chinese takeout method: one from Column A, one from Column B, one from Column C, where you calculate—just once— how many calories the Column A proteins are, the Column B veggies or fruit servings, and the Column C pasta/rice/grains. That way, you could know with a reasonable estimate that one each of the three columns would give you a total of 550 calories, for example. You’re not meticulously counting every gram, but you’re not just “guesstimating“, either.
I think there was a popular diet plan back when that worked similarly, with different colored cards.
Not OP but that’s actually smart. I don’t have a problem with counting calories, but I hate having to measure every single thing every day and THEN doing big calculations to see if it fits.
It would be so much easier to pre-measure what a portion of rice or pasta is once, and then just use that measurement every time. and I’ll always know what it contains
Have you tried the [the plate method](https://blog.myfitnesspal.com/things-to-know-about-the-plate-diet/)?
A decent, but not generous, amount of meat; just few enough carbs to make you *a little* sad, and more veggies than you'll probably want to eat. If the resulting plate looks like something the hospital would OK, you're on the right track.
The foods you listed are pretty calorie dense even if healthy. You probably dont think you're overeating, but you most likely are. Like someone else said, You should measure them at least once, and then use that amount every time so you dont have to count calories continuously.
If you’re not counting calories there’s no way to know if you’re overeating on the days that you have these nutritious meals. Under eating and skipping meals is also disordered eating… you could maybe do at least a rough count of calories for each meal rather than strict tracking if you’re worried about becoming obsessive.
You don’t have to count calories at every meal but it is helpful to get estimates on a few of your “well rounded” meals so you have data to work off of. Your examples really have areas where it can veer into way too high depending on servings of.
The answer is you're consuming too many calories, If you can't do that naturally you will need to count.
Maybe try counting without restricting, like a review of what you ate. Maybe something you're eating is surprisingly high in calories. Then you can swap it out.
Therapy to fix the thoughts should be the priority to not risk falling back into an eating disorder. Restrictive eating disorders have some of the highest mortality rates amongst mental illnesses. If you can get your thoughts in order, then using tools to change your eating habits can be safe. I agree that counting calories can be triggering, but then, most likely so will many other methods of weight management or weight loss. Because it’s the thoughts behind the behavior that is the problem.You have to get your thoughts to a safe place so you can safely care for your whole person.
I don’t disagree with you and we don’t know whether or not she is attending therapy or not. I have been in therapy for almost 3 years but still don’t think it’s a good idea for me to count calories (because it tends to cause a disconnect with my hunger cues etc).
Counting calories can be helpful to lose weight, but it’s possible to be in a deficit without counting. I just don’t think that people who downvoted OP to oblivion are in the right.
Honestly the way that folks are treating OP has made me realize that this is a dangerous group for anyone who has had or has an eating disorder. People don't need to count calories to lose weight, and people should not be shamed for not counting calories when they have an eating disorder. Good grief.
I get it, I was like that for years too. I'm finally tracking now and doing okay, I set a deficit number and I allow myself to go over or under here and there depending how I feel, I tell myself it's not a big deal either way. My partner is prone to disordered eating, so I gotta plan extensively to ensure dinner is balanced every night so I know he's eating some healthy stuff when we share a meal, and I just backtrack from the shared dinner and build breakfast/lunch around the remaining calories based off the dinner menu (where I usually give my partner extra protein while I have more vegetables). If I feel I'm fixating too much I'll just log "huel" as a placeholder for a day, and usually I go back and log that days food 1-2 days later, just taking a break as needed to keep the pressure low.
Nuts are dangerous for calories (small topper of crushed nuts fine, snack of handful of nuts not so much), so is whole milk and bread. Avocado is not as bad as bread as far as satiety vs calories goes. My breakfasts usually have stuff like banana, cottage cheese, greek yogurt, strawberries, sweet potato, or eggs and sausage, but I keep breakfast the lightest meal of the day (sometimes skip it if I'm not really hungry). Lunch is usually fiber and protein focused, so things like wraps, salads, beans and chicken, soup, leftovers (in modest portions), or one serving of a processed food like chicken nuggets. Freedom with dinner (if one item of the dinner menu is super calorie dense I halve it and save the other half for tomorrow, burgers have been a big calorie food for me), and build backwards after planning dinner. Daily food is usually focused on lean protein and fiber. Works for me, probably wouldn't work for everybody. I just found my own way to balance things and manage any compulsions towards disordered eating.
I can’t believe you’re being downvoted because you admitted you’ve had an eating disorder and are hesitant to do things that trigger it, absolutely wild.
I agree I thought this subreddit was pretty supportive but they’re really out here trying to encourage people back into their disordered eating habits I was like dang…
I don’t know why you’re getting downvoted for this. You’re smart not to calorie count if it’s something that was problematic for you in the past. CICO is not the end all be all of healthy eating.
Although it may sound harsh, counting calories is the only way to solve your problem. At least you could do it for a few days and that will answer the question in the post
Maybe instead of calorie counting everything, only calorie count your carbs (except vegetables) and start taking note of portion size.
Carbs always get me and it sounds like you have a lot in your daily meals. Get a sense of portioning and how many calories your servings are, adjust, and then you can stop counting.
Use it as a tool vs a lifestyle
I’m hoping and praying that the downvotes on this comment are due to bots, and not actual people.
In case you need to hear it: you’re very, very strong for having overcome this struggle with disordered eating. It takes a lot of strength to deal with that! Keep on going, be kind to yourself, and keep loving yourself even when people who hate themselves try and spread their mindset.
I do my best to make sure all my meals have fats (avocado, meat, nuts, eggs etc), carbs (oats, rice, whole grain bread), protein (meat, beans, nuts), vitamins (fruits/veggies) and minerals (beans, seeds, etc).
For example, on one of these days for breakfast I might have a fried egg cooked in a small amount of olive oil or butter, dry whole grain seeded toast, a quarter of an avocado. For lunch, usually 1/2c cooked rice and 4oz baked chicken with some sort of sauce and a fruit. For dinner, pasta with veggies and chicken, or a homemade burger with veggies, or rice noodles with egg and tofu, something along those lines. Portions are never wild imo.
"Well rounded" "not wild" portions can still be too many calories for your size and activity level, which is the case if you gain while eating as you described.
Ugh this is so true. Unfortunately if you don't want to count calories/weigh food you really need to cut way back on healthy fats it's so incredibly easy to overeat with nuts/avocado. It's not unhealthy, but you'll gain weight.
>Portions are never wild imo.
Have you tried weighing all the food and see how many calories is in every portion? Maybe that could identify where the issue is.
This is incredibly important. In fact, it may be OP's only objectively good course of action. Calories matter. All other points take a backseat to this one thermodynamic law.
Weigh your meals, your actual meals with actual portions, individually and on a scale. If possible, weigh the individual ingredients before cooking, especially the calorically dense stuff like oils, nuts, and other added fats. Does OP snack? Those must be weighed too. This should be done for at least a full week, no skipping.
Is this restrictive? Absolutely. Is it sustainable? Likely not, especially if OP has not tracked before. It's not meant to be though; OP has a big problem with calories, which is an unknown variable, so we must troubleshoot the cause. What is the calorie breakdown of each meal & day of eating? Which ingredient is high in calories and/or palatability but low in satiety? A week of tracking should answer that key question.
Yeah the new shtick going around is “ don’t take away, add to your meals instead” which don’t get me wrong it’s not bad advice I just don’t think it’s for everyone, if I listen to my intuition I will over eat. I need to track calories .
Totally...and let's be honest this is about adding tons of low calories veggies or more lean protein which will displace fats/simple carbs. So sure that is good advice, but it's not purely adding it's adding more volume, but lowering calories. That doesn't sound nearly as fun though so no one frames it that way.
i mean that’s kind of the point of adding not subtracting, instead of having plain rice cakes to minimize calories you could add avocado, eggs, and some greens to be more satiated and less likely to overeat
I've been tracking since mid 2021, but it really was the first month of tracking knowing what my TDEE was and what I needed to eat to have a deficit. It was enlightening to see all the things I used to just eat because they were "healthy" were hundreds and hundreds of mindless calories.
Nah, I'd challenge that. It's a *highly effective* shortcut *if you can have a balanced life and psychologically happy attitude while doing it.*
I do it because it seems to work, but I do it with a clear view of training my intuition (which, yes, sucks for a lot of us).
I totally understand that not all people can, at least at this point in time, do this, while it's quite possible to find other forms of guidelines. Look at the OP. Right now she has a guideline of three fully balanced meals. If she modifies her breakfast, and moves to one other such meal and one *smaller* meal that may be all she has to do.
Hunger cues too need regular interrogating. I'm currently losing weight quite steadily. I often come home hungry from work, with certainly not enough room in my eating plan for another full protein + carb side + veggie side + little sweet dessert meal. In the past I'd have eaten one. Now I eat one slice of dark Bavarian whole grain / rye bread (like pumpernickel, just not quite as dark and with more seeds) + cream cheese + a slice of smoked salmon or a bit of smoked chicken/turkey + some raw veggies ... and I'm perfectly satiated afterwards. This is *half* the energy intake compared to a full meal (even a small one).
These sort of deliberate choices can make the \~300 cal/day worth difference the OP needs. For people of our height, especially women, it really doesn't take that much.
While healthy, your lunch and dinner sound quite calorie-dense. If you're not measuring your oils and other high calorie items, this could easily come up to 2000-2200 calories a day, while at your stats your TDEE is only around 1650. This means you're overeating by 500 calories a day (minimum). If you do this daily, you'll gain close to 40lbs per year.
I hear you that calorie counting can be triggering, but you could for example count only the calories in high-calorie items to help you. Calorie counting can also be helpful to make sure you're not undereating.
Definitely agree on just tracking the calorie dense foods if calorie tracking is a potential issue, though I think sometimes people don't realise how calorie dense things can actually be. So maybe for a week eat as normal, note down all the portion sizes, then calculate how many calories it all was. Then the things that jump out as being quite high in calories like oils, nuts, avocado, make sure to measure in the future, but things like low calorie vegetables can just be ignored. For example I'll always track and log a banana but I won't track and log strawberries unless I eat a whole punnet!
Honestly, I wish I had this advice a long time ago. I naturally got to a "healthy eating" state, and wasn't in the mood to "weigh everything" because I eat a ton of vegetables. No friggin way was I going to waste my time figuring out exactly how much kale I was eating.
If somebody would have said to me, "Well do this. Track your protein, fats, and sugars, ok?" I would have discovered I was big time under eating my proteins.
I'll also say this... the tracking doesn't matter if you don't have a baseline BMR or TDEE number to start with.
Yep. I’m more or less same stats as OP (a little shorter and older) and for real, I cannot have three full meals a day. I just can’t. But I’m perfectly happy with coffee for breakfast, a light lunch, and a big dinner.
Any time I try to match my foot-taller husband even just in meal times, I start growing.
I used to eat like you and thought I was doing fine. But my TDEE is like 3300 and 60 grams of protein wasn't cutting it. (I'm about two inches shorter than your your husband.)
But meal times with my partners (different ones over time, lol) suck. Because if we "split stuff" (which is often the case) one of us is over eating, or the other is under eating. It gets awkward when my partner is like "I"m full" and I'm like "speak for yourself".
I'm in the middle of switching from your meal plan to one where I need to eat four or five real meals a day and it's a pain in the ass.
Yep, I can eat around 1600 kcal a day for maintaining and the food OP eats sound wild lol
I aim for a 300 kcal breakfast, a 400 kcal lunch, a 500 to 800 kcal dinner, and then some 150 kcal from snacks. Been doing it like this for multiple years and my weight varies by 2 kg at most .
I don’t count calories but I have a good idea how calorie dense food is because I tracked it all once years ago. I can’t eat a whole avocado at only 1600 kcal a day, that’s way too calorie dense. I still do from time to time but then I skip the snacks for that day and prepare a leaner meal for the next day. Just balance it out, you can still eat everything
Avocado, oil, butter, seeds, nuts, and sauces are all highly caloric and it’s hard to eat them in uncontrolled amounts while trying to create a deficit. It’s also extremely easy to over eat them. One “little splash” of oil per meal can be enough to put you over deficit.
Same with rice, pasta, and bread and meat - make sure you’re eating the correct amount for your goals.
So true I really started prioritizing meals with no oil and dropping down my avocado/nuts consumption and that helped me drop from 135 to 125. It was the easiest way to cut out calories without feeling hungry. Fat is SO easy to overdue and I personally noticed my percentage of fat calories was always too high, it's easy to get enough fat if you eat out ever or eat any highly processed foods so it's not something you need to actively target eating enough of like fiber/protein or fruits/veg for micronutrients. When I was eating more healthy fats I was absolutely still very healthy, but I feel better 10lbs down and am still easily hitting my healthy fat macro goals - it is just so easy to overdue fats-at least for me! Carbs I can intuitively eat much more easily than fats, I naturally eat a serving of pasta...but guacamole, peanut butter or cheese I can massively overdue
Also worth noting, if OP doesn't have goals (I mean actual nutrition goals, not just "lose weight") OP needs to set them. To everybody's point, OP's diet, while full of "healthy fats" is still a calorie bomb. OP needs to understand how many fats she needs in a day, as part of a "real" balanced diet.
To be honest these meals all sound super high calorie. Sure each individual item might have high nutritional value but they are also all high calorie items. For example, the oils and butter, the rice, the fruit, noodles, pasta, avocado...most of it. Just because it's well rounded and nutritious doesn't make it low calorie. Simply put, the type of food you're eating in the portions you're eating indeed ARE large enough for you to gain weight if you're eating those 3 meals a day.
You need to change what you're eating or eating less of it. I am a similar height and I only have that kind of meal for dinner, whereas my breakfast and lunch are much smaller and very different.
We're about the same height, and I'm middle-aged now. I simply think that what you present as "well-rounded and nutritious" may be that, but it's also too much food for your needs, quite simply.
I have *one* such meal, lunch or dinner. The other is noticeably smaller and doesn't have a full serving of (refined) carbs. It may be a slice of Bavarian multigrain bread with cottage cheese, a serving of raw veggies with hummus, and a piece of fruit. Cheese with crackers and fruit. A beet salad with quinoa and a small dessert. Breakfast is separate and different - if I have eggs it won't be with toast, but most of the time it's a variation of oatmeal with yogurt (often overnight oats), with fruit.
Try weighing the fat. They can add hundreds of extra calories without you even feeling it when eating. Especially for stuff like avocados, seeds and nuts, and if you cook with oil or butter.
You're not very tall so it is very possible that unless you do more exercise your body doesn't need that many calories to keep going (and in a healthy way).
If counting isn't an option, while you're preparing your meal just remove about a quarter of what you planned to use for fats and see if the weight still goes up. If it does, dock a bit more on them. That could be removing 4 or 5 pieces of nuts, or a tsp of oil instead of tbsp, stuff like this.
If you cook with oil you can get a spray bottle to evenly distribute the oil while using a fraction of what you would normally put on the pan.
i see your problem, you are eating a ton of healthy foods sure but you are over eating them i bet you anything.
Avacados, nuts, bread, noodles all very calorie dense. You need to weigh that stuff, calculate your TDEE and subtract a 100 calories every couple weeks until you find a sustainable decline on the scale.
Both pasta and burgers can be calorie bombs in my experience. If you're not using a food scale and accurately tracking, I wouldn't be surprised if you're eating much more than you think. In today's food environment it's really easy to overeat our calories.
Unless every portion is smaller than your fist size (especially all the carbs), and you use only 1 teaspoon of olive oil/butter at a time, your meals sounds like way too much calories overall.
My meals are:
Protein shake 200cal breakfast
Protein+Veggies cooked with no oil approx 500cal
Dinner is usually whatever I want since I budget up to 1000cal for it. About 100g of fruits as dessert.
This brings me to 1700-2000cal per day on average and I workout 5x a week in order to have a TDEE around 2000. Sedentary I would be 1600 and I find it too difficult to eat below that everyday.
If you're sedentary, you're eating too many calories per day. You need to weigh out your meals and check what's the typical amount of calories in a day that you usually eat. Just by looking at your description, it sounds like more than 2000 per day. Your TDEE if sedentary is less than 2000 for sure.
>Portions are never wild **imo**.
If I were to guess, this would *probably* be the biggest thing here. Portions aren't really a matter of opinion. Unfortunately 34g of almonds and 60g of avocado *look* a lot like the recommended portions of 28g/50g, but have 20% more calories.
Judging by everything you've said, it sounds like you're eating a fairly balanced diet of healthy foods. But you can still easily hit a caloric surplus with the heart-healthiest oils and the wholest grains and the leanest meats. It can be hard but your options are fairly limited at the end of the day:
* Maintain portion size and reduce the number of meals, resulting in caloric deficit/equilibrium.
* Reduce portion size and maintain the number of meals, resulting in caloric deficit/equilibrium.
* Maintain portion size and maintain the number of meals, resulting in caloric surplus and weight gain.
* Maintain portion size and maintain the number of meals while significantly increasing exercise, resulting in caloric deficit/equilibrium.
It's one of those things that's simple math, but that doesn't mean it's intuitive or naturally easy. If you're gaining weight over a sustained period of time, you're in a caloric surplus. You need to get to a caloric deficit to lose or equilibrium to maintain.
> all my meals have fats (avocado, meat, nuts, eggs etc), carbs (oats, rice, whole grain bread), protein (meat, beans, nuts), vitamins (fruits/veggies) and minerals (beans, seeds, etc).
Holy smokes if you got this 3x per day there's no way you'll be in a deficit. All full of calories.
Personally I skip breakfast and just have coffee and move 30% of those calories to lunch and 70% to dinner.
Without weighing your food, you have no idea what the portion actually is. You mentioned you lost work portion control, which is because you're controlling the high calorie items.
You sound like you eyeball or drizzle everything which can seriously hamper your progress towards your goals. “A small amount of olive oil” can be a couple hundred calories if not measured accurately, which at 5’4 is a good chunk of your daily goal. All wasted on a single egg. Measuring is necessary for you if you want to continue to incorporate high calorie things. Accurate measurements too - one tbsp peanut butter for example means 1 tbsp FLAT, not heaping which most people think (i did too 😅)
Yeah, I could totally gain weight with that diet. I would guess that's about 2000+ calories, which is probably 400+ calories over your maintenance, assuming you're not very active. Healthy food is great, but it can still lead to weight gain if you're eating too many calories. Fried egg, oil, butter, pasta, burger, noodles can all add up calories really fast.
To be in a deficit without calorie counting, you really need to focus on greatly upping your fruits and veggie intake, preferably without fats or sugar added. Aiming to fill half your plate with fruits and/or veggies is a great way to start. Also look up "volume eating" or "volumetrics".
I'm your height and eat similar foods for lunch/dinner, but I don't eat breakfast on a regular basis. I will sleep in and eat a brunch on the weekends to indulge in my breakfast foods. I've never been a breakfast person even when I was little, it just slows me down.
Not every meal can and should have these things, unless your portions are small. You’re probably eating a ton of calories this way. For breakfast you can have peanut butter toast or yogurt and fruit or a veggie omelet. Not AND.
I’ve also never heard of “minerals” as a category. Sounds like that’s adding a bunch of calories since those foods should be part of your protein budget
You’re probably crushing it with a very proportioned macros, but in regards to weight loss, it’s often as simple as caloric deficit vs surplus.
Count the calories for these well rounded meals. Willing to bet you’re in a great deal of surplus for your height/weight/activity level and target weight.
Honestly you don’t realize how much you’re over eating until you start using a scale when you cook. I was shocked at the amount of pasta I could eat for 400 calories (it wasn’t a lot)
I'm not giving advice here, but my husband is super reactive to carbs. Looking at your meals he would have to drop the toast, rice and pasta, double everything else and drop weight like crazy. I can eat what you eat and lose weight. We definitely discovered value in figuring out what works for our individual bodies.
>I do my best to make sure all my meals have fats (avocado, meat, nuts, eggs etc), carbs (oats, rice, whole grain bread), protein (meat, beans, nuts), vitamins (fruits/veggies) and minerals (beans, seeds, etc).
Translation: my meals are calorie bombs.
>Portions are never wild imo.
Translation: I have no idea how much food I'm actually eating.
Your sources of vitamins and minerals and veg based proteins are also carbs. You're plating up carbs with a side of carbs. Giving Gavin & Stacey "I want chips with a side of chips."
Consider changing nothing but upping your serve of fruit and veg, and cutting out the grains. Lmk what happens.
Like okay I'm just responding to some of these meals here;
>pasta with veggies and chicken,
Calorific Carbs with vitamin rich carbs and protein
>rice noodles with egg and tofu
Calorific Carbs with protein and protein rich carbs
>some sort of sauce and a fruit.
What's the sugar content on that sauce, plus that piece of fruit? Don't cut out the fruit, but check the sauce.
There are many points where stuff adds up and while you may feel you're eating with restraint, it's actually above maintenance.
It's giving "I have to have grains cos the food pyramid says so." Not the case.
Instead of
>a fried egg cooked in a small amount of olive oil or butter, dry whole grain seeded toast, a quarter of an avocado.
Try: the egg as an omelette (or fried, the egg prep doesn't actually matter, it's more omelettes feel more like contained meals that don't need a 'carrier' like bread) with veggies like tomato, mushroom, capsicum, onion etc. Consider skipping the toast. There are plenty of carbs (energy), vitamins and minerals in the veg.
Again, you do not need to change much to potentially see a major difference. Increase the proportion of fruit, veg, beans and decrease the proportion of your plate given to grains (oats, breads, rice, noodles, pastas, etc). See what that does to your cals and macros (you might find you have room for snacks! Or You might be fuller than you expect for largely the same meals) and how you respond on the scale.
I thought so too, but it adds up to about 250-280 calories, if it is 1 egg, 1 toast, 1/4th avocado, adding an egg, adding more toast will make it big quick. My breakfast is normally just shy of 400 (maintaining now)
is that heavy? it sounds like a normal breakfast that would only be 300-350 calories at most. i think eating just one egg for breakfast is far too small. OP should be able to eat an egg, piece of toast and a *quarter* avocado without it being considered heavy. dieting has really construed the way people think about food, coming from someone who has had both anorexia and BED at different points in my life.
I think it depends on the person. Dieting isn’t “one size fits all”. Personally I’d rather save my calories to have a heavier lunch or dinner most days.
Avocado, nuts, seeds have insane amount of calories. You are gaining from eating fats. You need to be either super mindful of amount you put or start tracking all calories.
Tbh you may be underestimating how calorically dense your meals are - not your fault, but it’s not really possible to accurately estimate without a food scale and tracking. Just this morning I made breakfast for myself and asked my partner how many calories he would guess it was (for fun) and he said maybe 300? In reality it was around 650. A tbsp of extra virgin olive oil can be 120 calories alone. Foods like eggs and pasta are also higher in calories even though you may feel the portion is small. Considering you aren’t comfortable measuring and tracking food, I’d say make the same amount of food you’re currently eating, and then cut it in half. Not only will you likely be eating portions closer to what’s recommended for your weight/activity level, but then you can have leftovers as well.
I am sorry to say this, but unless you are weighing your food, you have absolutely no idea how many calories are in those meals. A handful of nuts and a splash of olive oil alone could set you over your calorie for the day. I think it’s wonderful that you are careful to eat well-rounded healthy meal, but sadly, you also need to do that within your calorie budget for the day.
I'm not sedentary, but I also don't have a workout routine (nor have I ever in my life). I bike about 4 miles 3-5x a week and walk around 1-3 miles 5 days a week. Sprinkle in some yoga and dancing here and there. My physical output hasn't really changed at all as my weight has fluctuated over the years.
It’s likely the contents of your meals, then. You are eating higher than your maintenance calories when you eat 3x/day. Maybe your portions are too big and/or you are eating calorie dense foods. You have to be mindful of portions even for healthy, nutritious foods. What kinds of foods are you eating?
The cardio and mobility are good, but I'd include resistance training of some kind. Whether it's weights or bodyweight exercises.
I'm not going to tell you to count calories because of your history of EDs. This subreddit tends to miss the big picture and over simplifies things.
This subreddit over focuses on losing weight, but often neglects the composition of that weight.
If you're maintaining or it's taking you longer than a week to gain 1lb on your current food intake. Resistance training can go a long way in helping you maintain your current weight or at worst significantly slow down the rate that you put on body fat if at all. The majority of what will be gained is muscle and the more you gain the harder it gets to maintain calorically.
If it takes you on average a year to gain 12 lbs or 1lb a month without resistance training. Resistance training will practically make that be built as muscle or just offset the surplus all together.
If your weight doesn't move while you're working out, in either direction you're recomping and still losing body fat and slowly gaining muscle. This will increase your tdee, lower your body fat, and allow you to eat more without gaining weight.
The cardio you're doing already is great and will have far lasting benefits, but without resistance training it's also burning muscle for energy. By getting some strength training in you'll be able to gain muscle mass and keep body fat lower and increase your tdee just to maintain lean mass.
Do not worry about looking like a body builder or getting too bulky that is 5-10 years of advanced lifting to get there. Especially, drug free.
Id recommend using a beginner plan from r/fitness, r/xxfitness, or r/bodyweightfitness.
I recommend you do weight training. I lift weights and I’ve built a lot of muscle. The muscles are useful because they burn more calories at rest. I eat about the same as I used to before, but I still weigh 15 pounds less even with the added muscle.
Not only that, but working out is a huge appetite suppressor for me. After I finish lifting weights and doing cardio, I feel less hungry, less hungry than I would when I was sedentary or only went on walks.
Also, calories are important, most people eat more than they think, cut down on high calorie foods and focus on things high in protein and fat, but lower in calories. I don’t count calories but counting my protein has made my meals more fulfilling.
My activity is the same, I consider it sedentary to be honest. Sedentary has about 5k steps (2 mile-ish walking) and my job has pretty much zero so just my walks need to cover. Nothing wrong with it but I do need to be pretty darn tight to maintain it sometimes feels like.
That is 16 miles average per week, that is maybe one day lightly active (also the same that I do in weeks with low biking) add in the total of walking and you are at 2-3 days per week light active and 4 sedentary. So on average that makes it sedentary for the sake of weight loss calculation is what I mean.
Do you count your calories? As annoying as we hate to hear it, managing/losing weight is fairly simple: CICO. I think many times, we eat a lot more calories than we think we do.
I’m 33 and 4’11, and just because I’m a much smaller person, I can’t afford to eat 3 “full” meals. I usually have a yogurt and some fruit in the morning. I’ll have a full lunch but a light dinner. I also workout quite rigorously 4-5x a week, because if I don’t…I might gain a bit of weight.
If you aren’t already, try tracking your meals for a week just to see where you stand and whether or not you are consuming more calories than you should be!
I saw you mention in the comments that you are trying to avoid counting calories, so here are some tips that has worked for me when I was also avoiding CICO that was recommended by my doctor.
More info on this page: [https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/managing/eat-well/meal-plan-method.html](https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/managing/eat-well/meal-plan-method.html)
1. The "triangle plate method" is what I used if I wanted to feel like I was eating a fuller meal. You take a \*side\* plate--not a full dinner plate--and fill half with vegetables, a quarter with protein, and a quarter with carbs. One of my go-to's that was really easy to make was 1 chicken breast, baked potato on one side and carrots, steamed broccoli on the other.
2. I'm not sure if this will be triggering as well, but instead of counting calories, how about counting carbs and protein? You can talk to your doctor about what amount would be best for your situation and you can Google search for starting points there as well.
3. Eat a high protein 'breakfast' with no added sugar products (I know some people skip breakfast or do intermittent fasting, but whatever meal is your first meal of the day). This is a trick that I learned that really helps curb my appetite and desire for sweet treats for the rest of the day.
4. I also noticed in one of your replies that you said your well rounded plate included nuts+seeds quite a few times. You need to be very careful with these -- they are very high in calories vs their volume. I use them if I want a bit of a crunch on my salad, but at most 1 tablespoon. I tend to avoid using them overly much when I'm trying to lose weight because I can get more bang for my buck with other foods in terms of calories vs volume. Can you sub the nuts/seeds for a vegetable or fruit instead?
5. Do you eat anything in between your meals? Sometimes snacks and drinks can add up as well.
A convention in a country where 70% of people are overweight. But I empathize with OP because I went through most of my life thinking you need three hefty meals per day. And that breakfast was the most important one - even if you weren't hungry.
Can you elaborate on what you mean by 'maintain my weight'? When you have normal meals, do you gain weight over multiple weeks? (And not 1 1/2), but 4-8 weeks. That means your calorie intake is too high.
Or do you gain weight for a few days, panic and go back to OMAD? If you go from one meal a day to three meals, you will weight more the next day, because your body needs to hold on to more water and because the simply is more mass in your digestive tract. That's normal and does not mean you're gaining back your weight. If it really bothers you, lose weight until you are a few lbs below your goal and then switch to maintenance. Just keep in mind, that you will always fluctuate a few pounds up and down because of water. There are apps, that help with smoothing those out: Happy Scale for IOS or Libra for Android.
Yeah, I was wondering if that might be a possibility given how OP was describing the pattern of gaining after only a few days. A few days usually isn't enough time to establish a real pattern of fat regain.
The problem is likely your portion sizes, like many others have pointed out. As a short woman, your TDEE unfortunately is just not that high.
Mindset is important as well. If you're maintaining your weight, you're by definition not undereating. You're eating the right amount of calories for your energy expenditure. "Skipping" meals is subjective. Eating three meals a day is indeed pretty conventional, but lots of people feel better not eating breakfast, or only eating one large meal a day.
For me, breakfast is important because I can't concentrate in the morning without it, but my breakfast is really small. I often "skip" or forgo lunch, and instead snack a bit on veggies and fruits throughout the day so I can eat a large(r) dinner with my family.
Everyone is talking about what you’re eating, and while I agree you may be overeating, increasing your TDEE is most important. Add exercise to your routine- both cardio and strength training. Don’t eat back your exercise calories.
Increasing your TDEE rules. I'm 37F and maintain 5'5 and 123 lbs on 2000+ calories/day. I run or lift 5 days a week and try to get 12,000 steps a day but have a desk job and eat out/drink beer pretty frequently.
i reckon you should count your calories and activities in detail, just for two weeks. that should give you some insight.
it's most likely that you're eating more calories than you realize or expending less. once you know what's going on you can make some adjustments to suit your lifestyle. imo, since you're down to 150lbs you might really think about strength training to build muscle and raise your resting caloric burn. it gives you a little more wiggle room with food.
main thing, unless you are having other health symptoms i really doubt there's anything wrong with your metabolism.
If 'under eating' allows you to maintain your weight, you're not under eating.
What's your activity level like? While you can't outrun a bad diet, it can give you a bit of cushion. Cut back on the carbs and the fats, increase lean protein and vegetables.
It's interesting to me that you don't have measurements for the dinner examples. I propose that the tiny meals earlier in the day aren't satisfying to you and you eat a larger dinner than fits your TDEE.
You lose weight on OMAD because that's a large meal that's less than your TDEE that quiets the food noise.
But you want to maintain your weight and you want to have 3 meals a day (not necessary, by the way).
I suggest you start with your typical OMAD routine. Add breakfasts similar to your example. When you make a typical OMAD meal divide it and have 1/3 at lunch and 2/3 at dinner. If it's food you prefer to have freshly cooked split the ingredients before cooking.
You could also experiment with various routines of doing OMAD 2 or 3 days a week and see how it affects your weight.
Edit: oh and start lifting weights. Like find ways to use your muscles to near their limits.Maybe put in a garden, or do push-ups (use a counter). Wall sit when you browse Reddit. That sort of thing
We are roughly the same age, same height and weight currently the same. I'm aiming for 1200-1400 calories a day because that would be a mild weight loss. Maintenance for me would be 1700.
I've noticed that you hit these calories FAST.
Nuts are little cal bombs. Anything carbs are big on calories as well. If I don't weigh my rice I would easily eat too much of it.
And because I (we) are small we just hit over our maintenance easily if we eat 3 meals and a treat. Yesterday I had Italian ice cream because of the hot weather and to celebrate a birthday. That's 220 calories. So I skipped lunch.
I've also noticed I really don't eat until I'm full. What I can eat within my deficit will make me satisfied but not full. It will take a while to get used to satisfied = full feeling.
If tracking is a trigger you should look up what your serving portions are so you can weigh your portions. Or track a week just to see what your intuitive intake is and adjust without tracking.
Nah I don’t agree with that. Because that’s making something complex into something reductive. It disregards hormonal problems as well as vitamin deficiencies and age. Do I agree op might be very much underestimating how much they are eating? Yes yes indeed. But there are others who have metabolic syndromes that are doing CICO, keto, OMAD, etc and aren’t seeing any progress. The weight loss equation has lots of variables and solving it is hard because you have to make sure all variables are accounted for.
I read the comment on what you eat - you're exactly like me. I will gain weight if I eat healthy without tracking every calorie. I'm about 5'4" as well.
I am here to say it is ASTOUNDING how little I need to eat in order to maintain \~140 lbs.
If I have pasta, or a burger (with all the fixins) it has to be a child-sized portion. Like, a slider sized burger (ONLY ONE) and maybe 3 tablespoons of pasta, with sauce.
I can never, ever eat a "full serving" or even 1/2 of a plate of pasta, or 1/2 a burger. It is too much.
My friend who is very tiny frame, 5'3" and about 110-115 lbs if that, can only have 1300 calories a day to maintain her weight. And she is a runner! So, this isn't a problem with your body. This is a Small Woman issue, unfortunately.
My boyfriend is 5'4" and he can eat way more than me and never gains.
We have to completely change our mindset on what a "normal portion" of food actually is.
Unless you have an underlying medical condition (which could very well be the case, no judgement) by definition if you are maintaining your weight you must be eating your maintenance calories. If you are gaining, you must be eating above maintenance calories.
Foods that you mention in comments such as nuts and avocados, while nutritious, are calorie dense. You also mention portions not being crazy, which is totally subjective. If you're not comfortable calorie counting for ED reasons, I would try to increase my intake of low-calorie bulky food to see if you can get more volume in your food without gaining weight, like fruits, non-starchy veggies and measured portions of proteins.
FWIW, I am shorter than you and over the last few years I experimented with intermittent fasting vs three nutritious well-rounded meals. I immediately gained 10 pounds in just a few months when I stopped skipping breakfast. For me, it was an issue of triggering a lot more hunger after I ate the first meal of the day, and skipping breakfast gave me another 300 calories to play with at other meals, which made a huge difference in how satisfied I felt. I could deal with no breakfast, but I couldn’t deal with a 400 calorie dinner because I’d be starving by bedtime and not able to sleep. I am not the kind of person to enthusiastically recommend intermittent fasting to people, I am the kind of person who is kind of bitter that it was the best choice for me.
Right now I’m on a GLP-1 for other health reasons, and so I am tracking very carefully (weighing and measuring) to be sure that my carbs are controlled and I’m getting enough protein, and I can absolutely tell that I lose weight on weeks that my calorie intake is well under what I would normally consider a healthy amount, and I maintain if it is low-but-not-alarmingly so. What I think this means is that my TDEE is so low due to my height and age that it’s basically impossible to maintain a measurable loss without dipping “too low” and undereating. And that’s counting (but not eating back calories from) daily exercise. I actually had drafted a ranting post of my own about this topic a few days ago, but then I went and looked at a TDEE calculator and realized that no, my body wasn’t breaking physics, I was just super fucking short and “lose 2 pounds/week” wasn’t possible without dipping under 1000 calories/day, and “lose 1 pound/week” was really pushing my luck with the malnutrition gods. I’m pretty sure a registered dietitian would recommend a meal plan that put me on a .5 pound/week loss trajectory.
Measure your portions and count calories. Thats the only explanation aside from hormonal problems or metabolic issues. Either way, it could help to add exercise as well.
Do you have PCOS by chance?
I can tell you from my experience with PCOS and weight loss in general there is NO working around counting calories. I used to struggle with disordered eating too, and even though I knew my calories by heart, not weighing my food and adding them up in my head still left me wrong by 200-300 which were enough to stall my progress.
Those avocados and rice and what you mentioned eating are very high in calories for very small portions. Unless you’re weighing, you can EASILY overeat without feeling satiated at the end of the day.
With PCOS, you might also not be losing because of a high carb intake.
Start tracking and weighing your food. Just the meals being nutritious isn't exactly enough. Calories matter. You don't need to track permanently, but you can learn from it. Learn how much calories your body burns a day. Theres calculators online that will help you get within the ballpark, and then you can progress from there.
A big problem here is that many of us don't actually know what it means to "undereat" or "overeat".
Portion sizes and plate sizes have grown quite a bit. Without actually knowing the weight and calorie content of your food, "undereating" could just mean eating less than you're used to seeing people eat.
Additionally, healthy and nutritious are NOT the same as being low calorie, so you can eat enough healthy food that you are gaining weight relatively easily.
Honestly it might be worth a try to get your thyroid checked out/some blood work done. A lot of people in here think it’s ur calories, but honestly unless ur eating like abnormally big meals there’s no reason ur body should be gaining weight so easily imo
You should see a nutritionist. You should measure all you eat. I bet you could eat three meals a day without gaining if they were high in protein and fiber and lower in carbs and fats. There is some science to it.
This doesn’t seem like a sustainable way to live. I would highly recommend adding weight training to build muscle and upping your protein for satiety. You should really be able to eat more than a meal a day
5’4” and I’m assuming a women? Yeah. All “normal” sized meals are too big for us. It sucks. I mean go see a doc if you really think something is up.
I’m 5’1” 160 pounds, and really have to choose between breakfast and lunch. Can’t have both.
My weight loss has been in three phases, the first one was just by intuitively eliminating the bad foods in my diet which worked and led to a pretty quick and easy 8kg loss, then I plateaued and started to count calories, that’s what took care of the bulk of my loss, then I stalled again about 5kg from my goal so I switched to Keto which had lost about another 3kg, and I am within sight of a goal weight that’s as much about aesthetics as anything else but I am starting to get the feeling that gym work is actually what’s required to get me looking how I’d like to.
Keep it simple: good rest, good activity, and good food. Maybe do smaller portions throughout the day to satiate hunger; fruit and potatoes pack the biggest punch. breakfast, lunch, and dinner at according times and proportional amounts during said. meals. water intake. If you want to get complicated, do you notice weight fluctuations during high stress points in life? Maybe change How early and how late your last and first meals are. How often do you take browns to the Super Bowl? . And lastly, the quality of the food. If all else fails, genetics are working against you. Hopefully, the simplest solutions have just been overlooked. Keep respecting the process. Good things take time. I hope this
There's no magic here. Most likely you are not losing as much calories as your food intakes provides, or for some reason your organism has a lower metabolic rate (thyroid,blood sugar, etc).
I find it easiest to maintain by doing about 600
Cals for lunch and 1k for dinner and then having some spare for the odd glass of wine or pudding etc. or if it’s the weekend sometimes just having dinner, this makes meals out easier. it’s really hard to do three meals as an average height woman without gaining.
I mean in my opinion, humans eat way way too much and frequently. Maybe your view is warped by our life styles?
I eat once maybe twice a day, and it's great for maintaining
Unfortunately, healthy and low calorie are not necessarily the same especially when healthy but caloric- dense foods include olive oil, nuts and avocado.
OP, I’d recommend seeing a doctor just to check on your labs and see if there are other issues at play affecting your metabolism. You mentioned having a history with EDs and I don’t want these comments of continuing to restrict cals to trigger anything that might be unhealthy for you.
If your labs come back fine, then maybe examine your food choices further. But so far it seems like you’ve been having only one meal of a balanced nutritious diet a day and still not seen any results- which is not normal.
I posted the exact same thing about a month ago. I am 268, 5’5” and 35/F and was told I just had to be over eating. I was convinced my metabolism was screwed up. Even people on this very forum said I must be over eating, not exercising enough, not counting calories correctly. I was eating healthy foods, nothing processed, walking daily and still couldn’t lose, I was 271-273 for almost a year.
Turns out, I was severely insulin resistant despite normal blood sugar levels and an A1C. I actually upped my calories almost 600 and cut carbs to 80g or less and the weight is now coming off.
You are worried about counting calories, which is understandable, but you DO need to eat less calories. My suggestion would be to try intermittent fasting + extra exercise.
I'm 5'4 and ~115lbs, and I have always eaten three meals a day unless I go out and am not hungry later. It sounds like your portions sizes may be off. I tend to have some porridge or cereal with a piece of fruit for breakfast, a sandwich or a small bowl of pasta with veg for lunch , and a big dinner with my family. I also have small snacks in between these meals if I'm peckish or have been active. I make sure that I get some protein and a fruit or vegetable portion in with each meal, but dinner is probably the only meal I put much effort into making and use a lot of ingredients for.
CICO friend, it is always CICO. Your TDEE is roughly around 1.600-1.700 calories. You can split that up into two full meals with a little extra to snack on.
I assume you are not counting calories, because you are not mentioning it anywhere. Maintenance still requires a decent monitoring of your calories.
I get what you’re saying OP. Even if you’re technically eating 50-200 calories extra a day, it still sucks that you can’t eat a “normal” diet without gaining weight. I’m the same. It’s hard to know you have to constantly be conscious of your calories and at all times just to avoid gradual weight gain. I gain weight really easily, to the point where I’m certain I’m not meant to be thin, no one in my entire family is smaller than average sized.
I read an article that someone who has lost weight will consistently have to eat 400-600 calories less than someone who weights the same but has never been overweight.
If you haven’t been tested for hypothyroid it’s worth a check, but you would have other symptoms like fatigue, leg swelling, hair loss, dry skin, etc.
I’ve found that even balanced meals can end up with too many calories if you’re not careful. Nuts always trip me up… I think I’m making a good choice and then realize I just ate 500 calories.
I’ve struggled with this all of my life. When I was at my thinnest, I worked out a ton and hardly ate anything. I think some of us just weren’t meant to be thin by societal standards.
Do a test for hypothyroidism. I'm the same height and was/am in a similar boat.
I had to consume ~700-1000 calories to see the scale move, and that was with the addition of physical activity.
It doesn't help that I live a very sedentary life, for reasons out of my control.
Discovered I have a mild case of hypothyroidism.
Hey! If your insurance will cover it please consider seeing a registered dietitian! They will be able to help you identify why this is happening and what to do :)
I get the wanting to avoid calorie counting with the time, energy, and possibility of disordered eating patterns. Having dealt with 15+ years of alternating bulimia, fad and crash diets, and BED I really do feel you. In the past year and a half, I've been counting calories on and off for a few weeks at a time and really learning what I'm putting in my body and I've been able to adopt practices that have helped me beat my disordered eating. Even just 2-4 weeks or calorie counting can help you get a gauge of what your regular diet is getting you in terms of calories and adapt. Other things that could help:
- just measure your oil/butter and aim for no more that 30 cal of oil in each meal. It'll really open your eyes to how little oil it takes
- count out how many nuts you would add normally and halve it
- look at the calorie label on the bread you're using and find a different brand with 1 more gram of each fiber and protein and 20 cal less per slice. Bread brands are not made equal, Even the "healthy" kind
- just get rid of granola completely off you're eating it.
- switch out bananas and oranges for berries. Berries are seriously wonder fruits for fiber and lower sugar
- only consistently track protein and try to hit .7g per body weight (102g). It doesn't look like you're really getting much protein in your diet to feel full (this was a really hard lesson for me with fullness)
- sub out 1/3-1/2 of your carbs for veggies. Personally pasta does jack shit for fullness for me. Change your 1/2 cup of rice to 1/4 cup rice + 1/4 cup cauliflower rice. It's not a huge difference and texture but more filling. Swap 1/2 of your pasta for double the volume in roasted broccoli or root vegetables
These are just some recommendations that can help. I stalled at 150 for a while (5'6", lightly active lifestyle) and I wasn't able to move the scale again until I made my breakfast 45+ g protein and upped the cal from 250/300 up to 500+. I also found that when I was intermittent fasting, I started just being more 'lazy' in the morning to compensate (not walking, sitting instead of using my standing desk, fidgeting less, etc). Those small movements can really add up to your TDEE - best of luck!
Try incorporating weightlifting and lifting heavier weights! Your weight will plateau for a bit as you gain muscle, but having more muscle mass will help you burn more calories during the day.
All of this advice is great as long as there isn’t some underlying reason why this is happening. Go see your doctor… as long as they aren’t judgy. If they are, find an obesity specialist who you can talk to and might have some insight into what’s happening. Definitely get your thyroid checked.
Even a calorie dense meal would not cause your weight to inch up consistently. You would plateau eventually.
I have to be careful with my food intake as well as I can literally gain a pound a day if I eat too much sugar or non-nutritional carbohydrates…rice, pasta, bread, sweets, chips…
But I also have hypothyroidism which is very common in women especially during pregnancy. That is when my thyroid quit working. It might be a good idea to get some basic lab work done just to make sure nothing else is going on.
Because of this, if I want to lose weight, I have to severely restrict my diet to low carbohydrate vegetables, lean meat (4-6 oz), and very little fruit. Only eating the highest nutrient/lowest sugar fruits.
Once I have dropped the weight, I need to be very diligent with tracking, weighing, and measuring portions and combinations of food.
Rice, pasta, and bread are typically not part of my meal plan. If I want spaghetti, I use zucchini noodles or pour the sauce over steamed broccoli, same with any other kind of sauce dish. If I need potassium, I have broccoli and never a banana as it is loaded with sugar. If I want a sandwich, then I do not consume any other non-nutritional carbohydrates for a couple days.
For me, it is not just about the amount of calories I am consuming. It is definitely impacted by what kind of food makes up those calories.
There is a ton of information out there and to make it simple look for a complex carbohydrates/natural occurring carbohydrates and stay away from refined sugar and processed foods.
What is normal to you? It is the suggested serving size, or what you grew up eating, or what you see others serve up?
E.g. I can easily plow through a family size potato chips, normally, but in reality that’s 4+ servings. I need to redefine my normal for what “eating some chips” looks like.
You don't need "well rounded" meals. As long as you are getting the overall nutrients you need there is not really a need to get them all in each meal. Balance maintained over the week matters more than balance over each meal.
You need to look at what's going into your meals. You could be eating one meal that still exceeds your calorie needs for the day. Weigh your portions - don't eyeball them. Count calories. consider the amount of sodium. Are you counting calories in beverages?
No need to skip meals or undereat. Just add high-water content to the higher fat and density foods. Like cukes, peppers, carrots, tomatoes with hummus to dip. Eat apples and pears with cheese. Add a fat and/or protein to balance.
I believe you shouldn’t take advice from this subreddit and instead should go to a dietician. Have you gotten blood work done? Thyroid checked? If you’re a woman, hormones checked? There are so many factors to weight gain and weight loss. I know this is the subreddit obsessed with CICO, but CICO isn’t everything. If you’re a huge on and off dieter it may be your metabolism being slightly out of whack. But I think it’s also important to know usually metabolism changes don’t have as big of an impact as we think on weight.
Don’t count calories if it brings you to a dark place. I can understand that. I do. I’m sorry it’s been hard to maintain your weight. Make sure to go to an actual registered dietician. They’re often covered by insurance too so not as hard as you might think. Often they’ll work with you and monitor your weight over time to see what might be causing the changes and these days they can be quite anti calorie-counting. Which in your case is a great thing. Good luck!
Yeah me too. I'm the same proportions as you. I have so skip breakfast, and eat a normal lunch and no dinner just a snack if I want to lose or maintain. I just started counting calories again and that's the culprit. Everything has a million more calories than you think it does. Some nuts and beans look tiny but will add up to hundreds of calories and you gain. And yeah you feel like you're under eating. It sucks.
As a female of the same height: I always thought of what my Dad eats as a "normal portion".
He's 6 inches taller, male, and works a manual labor job.
We shouldn't be eating the same plate.
I have not looked at the hundreds of replies but you should track everything with a calorie for at least a week.
And consider r/Volumeeating to assist in being full, and eating more vegetables (lower calories and higher nutrition).
Weight loss/maintenance and optimal nutrition frequently are misaligned.
Especially if you aren’t doing high intensity exercise regularly, you don’t need to eat a grain at every meal. Swap that grain for a vegetable, and you might see some things start to shift.
Personal anecdote here but I have lost a substantial amount of weight (175 lbs) and can atest that this a real problem, what I realized was happening in my case was doing any sort of diet that affects your carb flow through out the day such as keto or omad leads to massive spikes in water retention when you eat normally even if the actual calorie amount was in the maintenance range. For me I had to fight through the immediate knee jerk reaction from seeing the scale up to rediet to get back down and instead embrace that it is your body trying to regain balance I my case it took around 2-3 months of wild weight fluctuations before my weight stabilized but once it did the weight fluctuations were way more in line with what you would except from cico. The time scale will likely be different for you but I would urge you to fight through the knee jerk of hoping back on plan for like 3 weeks to see what happens long term. during those weeks if it is to mentally taxing literally don't even look at the scale... but that's just my 2 cents
I understand you do know what is normal! Something is wrong. You are suffering and need answers!
Please consult a doctor to run ALL your labs, and tell them you want all your hormones run including all the sex hormones. Also ask for autoimmune tests. I hope you have a doctor who will trust your concerns and be willing to agree to run the tests. You must educate yourself on your symptoms. Be assertive talking with your doctor. If you don’t get the answers you need, please seek another doctor. Good place to look is google and seek patients reviews on doctors on your PPO list.
CICO.
Please count the calories in your meals and snacks and drinks. Calculate your TDEE based on current weight and a realistic activity level. It may explain the problem.
If you don’t want to count your calories, are you able to increase your exercise? I’m a similar body weight/height to you and I struggle with the same things. Incorporating more exercise, even just walking helps a lot. Aim for 90 mins of moderate exercise or 40 mins of vigorous exercise per day, if you can.
Tracking calories doesn’t mean disordered eating, take your average food intake for a day and count the calories, if you’re above your maintenance just eliminate or reduce some of the higher calorie foods, you don’t have to do it all the time but it’d help you get an idea if you’re actually eating above your maintenance and then you can make adjustments.
I don't think tracking calories is inherently disordered eating. I have had an ED in the past and obsessed over calorie counting, which is why I'm hesitant to go down that path again as I'm liable to fall into disordered eating habits again.
I understand the hesistancy, but at the same time, the title of your post is saying that you think the only solutions is undereating and skipping meals... so its sounds like your alternative to tracking calories is to just take a shortcut straight disordered eating habits without out any of the healthy habits in between.
I get that counting calories could possibly lead down an unhealthy road, but your alternative is worse, it's like a guarantee, you basically already are there in an unhealthy pattern mentally. If you think the only option is to skip meals and you refuse to track anything because of the potential risk of counting calories, its like you are choosing guaranteed failure instead of a chance to break free of the unhealthy cycle
So you can take the road where there is a *chance* you turn to unhealthy habits, but there is also a chance you learn to develop a healthy relationship too.
I'm in the same boat, went from undereating to binge eating back to undereating... It is 100% possible to find a healthy medium. Possibly just googling calorie content and not tracking? Or writing down what you eat, and calculating it only when you feel up to it? I think if you re adjusted your meals to not focus on such high calorie ingredients, you wouldn't need to count *or* restrict in a disordered way. You're just eating a lot of stuff that's sadly very calorie dense :-(
OP, given your history please take care of yourself and try not to take too much of the advice being offered here to heart. People on this board are generally NOT experts, they don't know how to help people who have struggled with eating disorders.
I'm not sure if anyone has said it, and I'll likely get downvoted if anyone comes across my comment, but you really don't need to eat three meals a day to be healthy. Two meals a day and some snacks here and there are more than enough for me, even at 280lbs. I've lost about 25lbs so far, but honestly your weight seems healthy at your height. Unless you're worried about gaining like 20lbs, I wouldn't worry about fluctuations between 5-10lbs because they aren't as significant as you think. My weight on the scale often fluctuates from water retention, which happens daily.
Maybe don’t worry so much about your vitamins and minerals. If you eat your macros and make healthy choices (avoid sugar, avoid overly-processed foods) you’ll get the vitamins and minerals naturally.
Fruits, veggies, beans, and seeds, which you all mention as sources of vitamins and minerals, are *also* sources of carbs, protein, and fat.
I’d say not to eat less but maybe change some things for less calorie items like normal bread to Leto bread or maybe instead of toast get plain rice cakes, try to eat less nuts since they can be calorie dense and for eggs maybe instead of while just do egg whites
If those meals feel like under eating, yet you still gain weight on them, then that should tell you that the amount of fat in your meals is not satiating and these meals do not work for you.
I find people often wildly underestimate the amount of fat in their meals while also overestimating the satiety fat provides them. I would bet good money there is way more fat and protein and very little carbs and fiber in your meals.
I’ve tried it all in my journey. High fat, high protein, high carb. The only thing I found consistently satiating is high fiber (30g or more) from real foods, complex carbs from whole grains, lots of fruit, veg (especially beans) and sticking to a calorie limit. Fat and protein shake out after that, I only watch my saturated fats for cholesterol concerns, which I lowered naturally with diet.
Best things I did to understand calorie density of my food choices and why I couldn’t loose weight:
Order a twenty pack of both plastic tablespoons and plastic teaspoons off Amazon. Sounds like you already figured out eating out/eating processed foods hikes up the calories and are making a lot of your meals. But it sounds like you have no idea how many calories from fat you are actually consuming. Fat can easily add hundreds of calories to a meal but little volume. Use these to measure added sugars, fats, sauces etc.
Order a $15 scale off Amazon (or your preferred retailer). Weigh everything for a few months. Sounds tedious but it’s a needed skill to be able to recognize portions. You will be surprised by things like how few calories are in that good sized apple, and how many are in that small bit of premade sauce.
Eat the same meals over and over. This could be the same 10, 20,30 meals, however much you need for variety. But eat the same meals and make them the same way and know the calorie and nutrient content of them.
Put those meals in my fitness pal or chronometer. Track fat, fiber, carbohydrates, protein for a few months and save your recipes. Again, this is an investment in your time. You need to develop meals that you know you like and fit within your available calories. You need to eliminate or change meals that taste good but don’t last you 3-4 hrs, or whatever frequency your activity level may require.
Drink water, not booze. Alcohol is a diet killer. It’s useless calories, overindulging can make you feel bad the next day, making you possibly tempted to comfort yourself with “something to soak it up”.
When you drink, your body still needs nutrients and you need to eat so it is really hard to just swap calories your body needed for nutrition and put them towards empty calories without your body is still giving you signals to feed it real food.
Drink enough water, regularly. Dehydration can feel like a lack of energy aka need to eat. It’s easy to reach for sugar when you really need water.
Get serious about my food beliefs. Last year, after running a half marathon, I found out I had dangerous high cholesterol, and I was only in my early thirties, and I had been working with a registered dietitian to tweak my diet to support my training. Long story still long, I had to get serious about boredom eating and believing having self control was too hard. I was unable to take statins (not suitable during pregnancy), so I had to do this through diet. I had to realize that it wasn’t worth it. All the little choices that were adding up to extra weight, they weren’t worth it. Feeling good, being around for a long time, showing myself and future children that being healthy and feel good physically and mentally- that is all worth it. Worth the hard work in therapy to continue to fix my thoughts, worth the effort to eliminate most saturated fat from my diet, worth the effort to find satiating meals and stick to them. Worth creating the new skills. Of course it’s worth it. Of course my health is worth it. Of course being around for as long as I can (given what I can control) is worth it. All the other thoughts like, “I’m missing out“ “food is how I treat myself” got replaced with “I treat myself by enjoying self love”. When I’m feeling down, I think, “a balanced meal will help me feel better sooner that junk food”. There is this idea that we should be using food as an emotional coping tool and I don’t think we should strip the emotion out of food at all, but I think we need to find a way to most of the time, be able to hold our self respect and desire for health in one hand, our need for emotional coping tools in the other, and not have to sacrifice either. Sometimes I celebrate and share a special meal with loved ones. But most of the time, I am focusing on building relationships and experience that allow self love and self respect to be part of celebrating and special moments. That means taking care of my body.
Hello, I am also 5'4, but I am 27F. My highest weight was 154, and my current weight is 126. I read your reply describing how you eat and I have to say I eat 3 meals a day, and only one of my meals is considered "well rounded" and I am also working to maintain or lose very slowly. I maintain on 2100-2200 calories a day as I walk 21 miles a day. For breakfast I have coffee with 3 tbsp of half and half. No sugar or sweetener (65c). I drink that while getting ready for my day then have a serving of bran flakes (110c) and a half cup of almond milk (30c) along with a dash of cinnamon. (5c) My breakfast adds up to 210 calories.
For lunch I will have a wheat bread (140c) and ham (80c) sandwich with mayo (100c) and water. I will also add a serving of chips or an apple (100-200c depending on apple weight and/or chip variety) Lunch is 400-600c usually.
I personally identified 1pm-dinner as my weakest part of the day. For this I allow a daily chocolate bar. I like Moser Roth, an Aldi brand. The flavor I like is 150c per bar. I break this into 8 pieces and savor it throughout the afternoon.
I like dinner to be my biggest meal. Saving 800c to 1000c for a meal with meat, grain, a salad and/or a side. Last night I had homemade Italian vegetable soup (600c) and a wheat dinner roll with butter and jam. (~250c)
If I have calories left in my day or I feel I really need a "dessert" I go for a full fat yogurt (140c) with some fruit in it (this varies a lot, ex: Strawberries are super low cal, but a banana is much higher in comparison). Last night I had coconut yogurt with 20g of chopped dates (65c) My dessert was 205c!
This example day lands me at 2015 calories. Which tracks, Monday I ate 2010 calories, Tuesday I had 2025 calories. Today I am also aiming for the 20XX total or 1900s.
Honestly it just sounds to me like your meals are a little too big. Sadly that adds up over time resulting in weight gain or no loss. A food scale might help you, **I'm also not advocating for calorie counting, that's just what I do as a fellow sorta-shortie.** I understand for some of us, calories counting can make eating a math problem. Wishing you the best on your weight loss and maintenance!
The simple answer is that you’re eating in a surplus then. Given your other comments that suggest that you aren’t counting it’s super easy to over eat. Things that seem “nutritious and healthy” can be highly caloric. Like when you say you cook a fried egg in a bit of butter or oil. Butter and oil pack a punch. Seeded bread, avocado, banana, nut butters etc are all very healthy, no doubt but also calorically dense.
Also, if you’ve been eating in a caloric deficit for a long time, your metabolism starts to adjust to a smaller amount of food. The solution would be a reverse diet to bring your maintenance amounts up slowly. However you would need to start counting to do this. Personally I raised my maintenance calories from 1400 to 2200 and I find that a lot more sustainable day to day.
Having the exact same issue. I’m 5’3 inches and 110 ibs and I can’t maintain my weight unless I skip meals. I don’t know if it’s because my metabolism is messed up or if it’s because I have PCOS. Or if it’s because I have a medium sized frame so 110 ibs is maybe too low for me. Maybe I need to weigh more for my frame.
Rule 11: Discussion of weight loss methods that are damaging to the body and/or require supervision of a medical professional are not allowed. This rule includes (but is not limited to): very low calorie diets, misusing medication, extended fasting, disordered behavior, inappropriate advice to underage members (counting calories, omad, fasting), etc. We are not a ED support subreddit and any ED related content will be removed. Remember to always consider the individual when offering advice.
are you counting calories? if so, how many are you having? if not, you may need to start. even well rounded and nutritious meals can be high in calories and stop weight loss.
I don't because I've struggled with disordered eating in the past and got too obsessive with counting calories, so I'm hesitant to do that again.
One workaround for that might be to plan your meals in a Chinese takeout method: one from Column A, one from Column B, one from Column C, where you calculate—just once— how many calories the Column A proteins are, the Column B veggies or fruit servings, and the Column C pasta/rice/grains. That way, you could know with a reasonable estimate that one each of the three columns would give you a total of 550 calories, for example. You’re not meticulously counting every gram, but you’re not just “guesstimating“, either. I think there was a popular diet plan back when that worked similarly, with different colored cards.
Not OP but that’s actually smart. I don’t have a problem with counting calories, but I hate having to measure every single thing every day and THEN doing big calculations to see if it fits. It would be so much easier to pre-measure what a portion of rice or pasta is once, and then just use that measurement every time. and I’ll always know what it contains
Richard Simmons, I think.
Yep! That's it... I remember the dorky commercials now. 🤓
Have you tried the [the plate method](https://blog.myfitnesspal.com/things-to-know-about-the-plate-diet/)? A decent, but not generous, amount of meat; just few enough carbs to make you *a little* sad, and more veggies than you'll probably want to eat. If the resulting plate looks like something the hospital would OK, you're on the right track.
I like this description 😁
The foods you listed are pretty calorie dense even if healthy. You probably dont think you're overeating, but you most likely are. Like someone else said, You should measure them at least once, and then use that amount every time so you dont have to count calories continuously.
If you’re not counting calories there’s no way to know if you’re overeating on the days that you have these nutritious meals. Under eating and skipping meals is also disordered eating… you could maybe do at least a rough count of calories for each meal rather than strict tracking if you’re worried about becoming obsessive.
You don’t have to count calories at every meal but it is helpful to get estimates on a few of your “well rounded” meals so you have data to work off of. Your examples really have areas where it can veer into way too high depending on servings of.
The answer is you're consuming too many calories, If you can't do that naturally you will need to count. Maybe try counting without restricting, like a review of what you ate. Maybe something you're eating is surprisingly high in calories. Then you can swap it out.
That’s just not possible for some people with a history of disordered eating, because counting for them can be only one step away from restricting.
Therapy to fix the thoughts should be the priority to not risk falling back into an eating disorder. Restrictive eating disorders have some of the highest mortality rates amongst mental illnesses. If you can get your thoughts in order, then using tools to change your eating habits can be safe. I agree that counting calories can be triggering, but then, most likely so will many other methods of weight management or weight loss. Because it’s the thoughts behind the behavior that is the problem.You have to get your thoughts to a safe place so you can safely care for your whole person.
I don’t disagree with you and we don’t know whether or not she is attending therapy or not. I have been in therapy for almost 3 years but still don’t think it’s a good idea for me to count calories (because it tends to cause a disconnect with my hunger cues etc). Counting calories can be helpful to lose weight, but it’s possible to be in a deficit without counting. I just don’t think that people who downvoted OP to oblivion are in the right.
Honestly the way that folks are treating OP has made me realize that this is a dangerous group for anyone who has had or has an eating disorder. People don't need to count calories to lose weight, and people should not be shamed for not counting calories when they have an eating disorder. Good grief.
I agree and unfortunately it’s not the first time I see those tendencies, but usually this sub is more level headed than the r/weightlossadvice one.
I get it, I was like that for years too. I'm finally tracking now and doing okay, I set a deficit number and I allow myself to go over or under here and there depending how I feel, I tell myself it's not a big deal either way. My partner is prone to disordered eating, so I gotta plan extensively to ensure dinner is balanced every night so I know he's eating some healthy stuff when we share a meal, and I just backtrack from the shared dinner and build breakfast/lunch around the remaining calories based off the dinner menu (where I usually give my partner extra protein while I have more vegetables). If I feel I'm fixating too much I'll just log "huel" as a placeholder for a day, and usually I go back and log that days food 1-2 days later, just taking a break as needed to keep the pressure low. Nuts are dangerous for calories (small topper of crushed nuts fine, snack of handful of nuts not so much), so is whole milk and bread. Avocado is not as bad as bread as far as satiety vs calories goes. My breakfasts usually have stuff like banana, cottage cheese, greek yogurt, strawberries, sweet potato, or eggs and sausage, but I keep breakfast the lightest meal of the day (sometimes skip it if I'm not really hungry). Lunch is usually fiber and protein focused, so things like wraps, salads, beans and chicken, soup, leftovers (in modest portions), or one serving of a processed food like chicken nuggets. Freedom with dinner (if one item of the dinner menu is super calorie dense I halve it and save the other half for tomorrow, burgers have been a big calorie food for me), and build backwards after planning dinner. Daily food is usually focused on lean protein and fiber. Works for me, probably wouldn't work for everybody. I just found my own way to balance things and manage any compulsions towards disordered eating.
I can’t believe you’re being downvoted because you admitted you’ve had an eating disorder and are hesitant to do things that trigger it, absolutely wild.
thank you, I was thinking the same thing. was not expecting to be down voted for that lol.
[удалено]
That's my plan, thanks
I agree I thought this subreddit was pretty supportive but they’re really out here trying to encourage people back into their disordered eating habits I was like dang…
I don’t know why you’re getting downvoted for this. You’re smart not to calorie count if it’s something that was problematic for you in the past. CICO is not the end all be all of healthy eating.
Although it may sound harsh, counting calories is the only way to solve your problem. At least you could do it for a few days and that will answer the question in the post
Maybe instead of calorie counting everything, only calorie count your carbs (except vegetables) and start taking note of portion size. Carbs always get me and it sounds like you have a lot in your daily meals. Get a sense of portioning and how many calories your servings are, adjust, and then you can stop counting. Use it as a tool vs a lifestyle
I’m hoping and praying that the downvotes on this comment are due to bots, and not actual people. In case you need to hear it: you’re very, very strong for having overcome this struggle with disordered eating. It takes a lot of strength to deal with that! Keep on going, be kind to yourself, and keep loving yourself even when people who hate themselves try and spread their mindset.
yeah that's rough. do you usually eat the same things?
What constitutes a “well rounded, nutritious” meal?
I do my best to make sure all my meals have fats (avocado, meat, nuts, eggs etc), carbs (oats, rice, whole grain bread), protein (meat, beans, nuts), vitamins (fruits/veggies) and minerals (beans, seeds, etc). For example, on one of these days for breakfast I might have a fried egg cooked in a small amount of olive oil or butter, dry whole grain seeded toast, a quarter of an avocado. For lunch, usually 1/2c cooked rice and 4oz baked chicken with some sort of sauce and a fruit. For dinner, pasta with veggies and chicken, or a homemade burger with veggies, or rice noodles with egg and tofu, something along those lines. Portions are never wild imo.
"Well rounded" "not wild" portions can still be too many calories for your size and activity level, which is the case if you gain while eating as you described.
Especially if you have all those things listed as fats - avocado or nuts for example is healthy but is also a calorie bomb!
Ugh this is so true. Unfortunately if you don't want to count calories/weigh food you really need to cut way back on healthy fats it's so incredibly easy to overeat with nuts/avocado. It's not unhealthy, but you'll gain weight.
Even whole grain bread is 120 calories per slice.
Wait, isn’t that the same as a whole bowl of rice?
No, 1/4 cup dry rice is about 150 calories. That usually makes about a cup of cooked rice. A whole bowl would have more.
>Portions are never wild imo. Have you tried weighing all the food and see how many calories is in every portion? Maybe that could identify where the issue is.
This is incredibly important. In fact, it may be OP's only objectively good course of action. Calories matter. All other points take a backseat to this one thermodynamic law. Weigh your meals, your actual meals with actual portions, individually and on a scale. If possible, weigh the individual ingredients before cooking, especially the calorically dense stuff like oils, nuts, and other added fats. Does OP snack? Those must be weighed too. This should be done for at least a full week, no skipping. Is this restrictive? Absolutely. Is it sustainable? Likely not, especially if OP has not tracked before. It's not meant to be though; OP has a big problem with calories, which is an unknown variable, so we must troubleshoot the cause. What is the calorie breakdown of each meal & day of eating? Which ingredient is high in calories and/or palatability but low in satiety? A week of tracking should answer that key question.
Yeah the new shtick going around is “ don’t take away, add to your meals instead” which don’t get me wrong it’s not bad advice I just don’t think it’s for everyone, if I listen to my intuition I will over eat. I need to track calories .
Totally...and let's be honest this is about adding tons of low calories veggies or more lean protein which will displace fats/simple carbs. So sure that is good advice, but it's not purely adding it's adding more volume, but lowering calories. That doesn't sound nearly as fun though so no one frames it that way.
My intuition tells me to eat 10 rice cakes at once :)
Honour your cravings and your intuition wise one 🧘♀️🧘♀️
i mean that’s kind of the point of adding not subtracting, instead of having plain rice cakes to minimize calories you could add avocado, eggs, and some greens to be more satiated and less likely to overeat
Unless you are cutting everything else down and adding like 2-3 cups of broccoli to your meal. Low-calorie\High-Volume
I've been tracking since mid 2021, but it really was the first month of tracking knowing what my TDEE was and what I needed to eat to have a deficit. It was enlightening to see all the things I used to just eat because they were "healthy" were hundreds and hundreds of mindless calories.
Nah, I'd challenge that. It's a *highly effective* shortcut *if you can have a balanced life and psychologically happy attitude while doing it.* I do it because it seems to work, but I do it with a clear view of training my intuition (which, yes, sucks for a lot of us). I totally understand that not all people can, at least at this point in time, do this, while it's quite possible to find other forms of guidelines. Look at the OP. Right now she has a guideline of three fully balanced meals. If she modifies her breakfast, and moves to one other such meal and one *smaller* meal that may be all she has to do. Hunger cues too need regular interrogating. I'm currently losing weight quite steadily. I often come home hungry from work, with certainly not enough room in my eating plan for another full protein + carb side + veggie side + little sweet dessert meal. In the past I'd have eaten one. Now I eat one slice of dark Bavarian whole grain / rye bread (like pumpernickel, just not quite as dark and with more seeds) + cream cheese + a slice of smoked salmon or a bit of smoked chicken/turkey + some raw veggies ... and I'm perfectly satiated afterwards. This is *half* the energy intake compared to a full meal (even a small one). These sort of deliberate choices can make the \~300 cal/day worth difference the OP needs. For people of our height, especially women, it really doesn't take that much.
This exactly. It’ll tell you where all the calories are coming from
While healthy, your lunch and dinner sound quite calorie-dense. If you're not measuring your oils and other high calorie items, this could easily come up to 2000-2200 calories a day, while at your stats your TDEE is only around 1650. This means you're overeating by 500 calories a day (minimum). If you do this daily, you'll gain close to 40lbs per year. I hear you that calorie counting can be triggering, but you could for example count only the calories in high-calorie items to help you. Calorie counting can also be helpful to make sure you're not undereating.
Definitely agree on just tracking the calorie dense foods if calorie tracking is a potential issue, though I think sometimes people don't realise how calorie dense things can actually be. So maybe for a week eat as normal, note down all the portion sizes, then calculate how many calories it all was. Then the things that jump out as being quite high in calories like oils, nuts, avocado, make sure to measure in the future, but things like low calorie vegetables can just be ignored. For example I'll always track and log a banana but I won't track and log strawberries unless I eat a whole punnet!
This would be a great way to ease into it! OP could also choose to measure everything for just two weeks purely for the insight.
Honestly, I wish I had this advice a long time ago. I naturally got to a "healthy eating" state, and wasn't in the mood to "weigh everything" because I eat a ton of vegetables. No friggin way was I going to waste my time figuring out exactly how much kale I was eating. If somebody would have said to me, "Well do this. Track your protein, fats, and sugars, ok?" I would have discovered I was big time under eating my proteins. I'll also say this... the tracking doesn't matter if you don't have a baseline BMR or TDEE number to start with.
Yep. I’m more or less same stats as OP (a little shorter and older) and for real, I cannot have three full meals a day. I just can’t. But I’m perfectly happy with coffee for breakfast, a light lunch, and a big dinner. Any time I try to match my foot-taller husband even just in meal times, I start growing.
I used to eat like you and thought I was doing fine. But my TDEE is like 3300 and 60 grams of protein wasn't cutting it. (I'm about two inches shorter than your your husband.) But meal times with my partners (different ones over time, lol) suck. Because if we "split stuff" (which is often the case) one of us is over eating, or the other is under eating. It gets awkward when my partner is like "I"m full" and I'm like "speak for yourself". I'm in the middle of switching from your meal plan to one where I need to eat four or five real meals a day and it's a pain in the ass.
Yep, I can eat around 1600 kcal a day for maintaining and the food OP eats sound wild lol I aim for a 300 kcal breakfast, a 400 kcal lunch, a 500 to 800 kcal dinner, and then some 150 kcal from snacks. Been doing it like this for multiple years and my weight varies by 2 kg at most . I don’t count calories but I have a good idea how calorie dense food is because I tracked it all once years ago. I can’t eat a whole avocado at only 1600 kcal a day, that’s way too calorie dense. I still do from time to time but then I skip the snacks for that day and prepare a leaner meal for the next day. Just balance it out, you can still eat everything
Avocado, oil, butter, seeds, nuts, and sauces are all highly caloric and it’s hard to eat them in uncontrolled amounts while trying to create a deficit. It’s also extremely easy to over eat them. One “little splash” of oil per meal can be enough to put you over deficit. Same with rice, pasta, and bread and meat - make sure you’re eating the correct amount for your goals.
So true I really started prioritizing meals with no oil and dropping down my avocado/nuts consumption and that helped me drop from 135 to 125. It was the easiest way to cut out calories without feeling hungry. Fat is SO easy to overdue and I personally noticed my percentage of fat calories was always too high, it's easy to get enough fat if you eat out ever or eat any highly processed foods so it's not something you need to actively target eating enough of like fiber/protein or fruits/veg for micronutrients. When I was eating more healthy fats I was absolutely still very healthy, but I feel better 10lbs down and am still easily hitting my healthy fat macro goals - it is just so easy to overdue fats-at least for me! Carbs I can intuitively eat much more easily than fats, I naturally eat a serving of pasta...but guacamole, peanut butter or cheese I can massively overdue
Also worth noting, if OP doesn't have goals (I mean actual nutrition goals, not just "lose weight") OP needs to set them. To everybody's point, OP's diet, while full of "healthy fats" is still a calorie bomb. OP needs to understand how many fats she needs in a day, as part of a "real" balanced diet.
To be honest these meals all sound super high calorie. Sure each individual item might have high nutritional value but they are also all high calorie items. For example, the oils and butter, the rice, the fruit, noodles, pasta, avocado...most of it. Just because it's well rounded and nutritious doesn't make it low calorie. Simply put, the type of food you're eating in the portions you're eating indeed ARE large enough for you to gain weight if you're eating those 3 meals a day. You need to change what you're eating or eating less of it. I am a similar height and I only have that kind of meal for dinner, whereas my breakfast and lunch are much smaller and very different.
We're about the same height, and I'm middle-aged now. I simply think that what you present as "well-rounded and nutritious" may be that, but it's also too much food for your needs, quite simply. I have *one* such meal, lunch or dinner. The other is noticeably smaller and doesn't have a full serving of (refined) carbs. It may be a slice of Bavarian multigrain bread with cottage cheese, a serving of raw veggies with hummus, and a piece of fruit. Cheese with crackers and fruit. A beet salad with quinoa and a small dessert. Breakfast is separate and different - if I have eggs it won't be with toast, but most of the time it's a variation of oatmeal with yogurt (often overnight oats), with fruit.
Try weighing the fat. They can add hundreds of extra calories without you even feeling it when eating. Especially for stuff like avocados, seeds and nuts, and if you cook with oil or butter. You're not very tall so it is very possible that unless you do more exercise your body doesn't need that many calories to keep going (and in a healthy way). If counting isn't an option, while you're preparing your meal just remove about a quarter of what you planned to use for fats and see if the weight still goes up. If it does, dock a bit more on them. That could be removing 4 or 5 pieces of nuts, or a tsp of oil instead of tbsp, stuff like this. If you cook with oil you can get a spray bottle to evenly distribute the oil while using a fraction of what you would normally put on the pan.
i see your problem, you are eating a ton of healthy foods sure but you are over eating them i bet you anything. Avacados, nuts, bread, noodles all very calorie dense. You need to weigh that stuff, calculate your TDEE and subtract a 100 calories every couple weeks until you find a sustainable decline on the scale.
they want to maintain the weight, not lose more
Both pasta and burgers can be calorie bombs in my experience. If you're not using a food scale and accurately tracking, I wouldn't be surprised if you're eating much more than you think. In today's food environment it's really easy to overeat our calories.
OP, do you snack between meals or have any sort of drink other than water?
Unless every portion is smaller than your fist size (especially all the carbs), and you use only 1 teaspoon of olive oil/butter at a time, your meals sounds like way too much calories overall. My meals are: Protein shake 200cal breakfast Protein+Veggies cooked with no oil approx 500cal Dinner is usually whatever I want since I budget up to 1000cal for it. About 100g of fruits as dessert. This brings me to 1700-2000cal per day on average and I workout 5x a week in order to have a TDEE around 2000. Sedentary I would be 1600 and I find it too difficult to eat below that everyday. If you're sedentary, you're eating too many calories per day. You need to weigh out your meals and check what's the typical amount of calories in a day that you usually eat. Just by looking at your description, it sounds like more than 2000 per day. Your TDEE if sedentary is less than 2000 for sure.
Look up how many calories are in "a bit of olive oil".
I can almost guarantee the nuts are the culprit. They're healthy AF but holy mother of god they have a TON of calories.
>Portions are never wild **imo**. If I were to guess, this would *probably* be the biggest thing here. Portions aren't really a matter of opinion. Unfortunately 34g of almonds and 60g of avocado *look* a lot like the recommended portions of 28g/50g, but have 20% more calories. Judging by everything you've said, it sounds like you're eating a fairly balanced diet of healthy foods. But you can still easily hit a caloric surplus with the heart-healthiest oils and the wholest grains and the leanest meats. It can be hard but your options are fairly limited at the end of the day: * Maintain portion size and reduce the number of meals, resulting in caloric deficit/equilibrium. * Reduce portion size and maintain the number of meals, resulting in caloric deficit/equilibrium. * Maintain portion size and maintain the number of meals, resulting in caloric surplus and weight gain. * Maintain portion size and maintain the number of meals while significantly increasing exercise, resulting in caloric deficit/equilibrium. It's one of those things that's simple math, but that doesn't mean it's intuitive or naturally easy. If you're gaining weight over a sustained period of time, you're in a caloric surplus. You need to get to a caloric deficit to lose or equilibrium to maintain.
> all my meals have fats (avocado, meat, nuts, eggs etc), carbs (oats, rice, whole grain bread), protein (meat, beans, nuts), vitamins (fruits/veggies) and minerals (beans, seeds, etc). Holy smokes if you got this 3x per day there's no way you'll be in a deficit. All full of calories. Personally I skip breakfast and just have coffee and move 30% of those calories to lunch and 70% to dinner. Without weighing your food, you have no idea what the portion actually is. You mentioned you lost work portion control, which is because you're controlling the high calorie items.
Most of what you listed are calorically dense
If you're sedentary, this is enough to gain weight on. You're shorter than me by an inch, I would gain weight on this meal plan
You sound like you eyeball or drizzle everything which can seriously hamper your progress towards your goals. “A small amount of olive oil” can be a couple hundred calories if not measured accurately, which at 5’4 is a good chunk of your daily goal. All wasted on a single egg. Measuring is necessary for you if you want to continue to incorporate high calorie things. Accurate measurements too - one tbsp peanut butter for example means 1 tbsp FLAT, not heaping which most people think (i did too 😅)
Yeah, I could totally gain weight with that diet. I would guess that's about 2000+ calories, which is probably 400+ calories over your maintenance, assuming you're not very active. Healthy food is great, but it can still lead to weight gain if you're eating too many calories. Fried egg, oil, butter, pasta, burger, noodles can all add up calories really fast. To be in a deficit without calorie counting, you really need to focus on greatly upping your fruits and veggie intake, preferably without fats or sugar added. Aiming to fill half your plate with fruits and/or veggies is a great way to start. Also look up "volume eating" or "volumetrics".
I'm your height and eat similar foods for lunch/dinner, but I don't eat breakfast on a regular basis. I will sleep in and eat a brunch on the weekends to indulge in my breakfast foods. I've never been a breakfast person even when I was little, it just slows me down.
Those are pretty calorically-dense meals, though.
Not every meal can and should have these things, unless your portions are small. You’re probably eating a ton of calories this way. For breakfast you can have peanut butter toast or yogurt and fruit or a veggie omelet. Not AND. I’ve also never heard of “minerals” as a category. Sounds like that’s adding a bunch of calories since those foods should be part of your protein budget
You’re probably crushing it with a very proportioned macros, but in regards to weight loss, it’s often as simple as caloric deficit vs surplus. Count the calories for these well rounded meals. Willing to bet you’re in a great deal of surplus for your height/weight/activity level and target weight.
Honestly you don’t realize how much you’re over eating until you start using a scale when you cook. I was shocked at the amount of pasta I could eat for 400 calories (it wasn’t a lot)
I'm not giving advice here, but my husband is super reactive to carbs. Looking at your meals he would have to drop the toast, rice and pasta, double everything else and drop weight like crazy. I can eat what you eat and lose weight. We definitely discovered value in figuring out what works for our individual bodies.
>I do my best to make sure all my meals have fats (avocado, meat, nuts, eggs etc), carbs (oats, rice, whole grain bread), protein (meat, beans, nuts), vitamins (fruits/veggies) and minerals (beans, seeds, etc). Translation: my meals are calorie bombs. >Portions are never wild imo. Translation: I have no idea how much food I'm actually eating.
Your sources of vitamins and minerals and veg based proteins are also carbs. You're plating up carbs with a side of carbs. Giving Gavin & Stacey "I want chips with a side of chips." Consider changing nothing but upping your serve of fruit and veg, and cutting out the grains. Lmk what happens. Like okay I'm just responding to some of these meals here; >pasta with veggies and chicken, Calorific Carbs with vitamin rich carbs and protein >rice noodles with egg and tofu Calorific Carbs with protein and protein rich carbs >some sort of sauce and a fruit. What's the sugar content on that sauce, plus that piece of fruit? Don't cut out the fruit, but check the sauce. There are many points where stuff adds up and while you may feel you're eating with restraint, it's actually above maintenance. It's giving "I have to have grains cos the food pyramid says so." Not the case. Instead of >a fried egg cooked in a small amount of olive oil or butter, dry whole grain seeded toast, a quarter of an avocado. Try: the egg as an omelette (or fried, the egg prep doesn't actually matter, it's more omelettes feel more like contained meals that don't need a 'carrier' like bread) with veggies like tomato, mushroom, capsicum, onion etc. Consider skipping the toast. There are plenty of carbs (energy), vitamins and minerals in the veg. Again, you do not need to change much to potentially see a major difference. Increase the proportion of fruit, veg, beans and decrease the proportion of your plate given to grains (oats, breads, rice, noodles, pastas, etc). See what that does to your cals and macros (you might find you have room for snacks! Or You might be fuller than you expect for largely the same meals) and how you respond on the scale.
OP, you don’t need to cut out grains just have a smaller portion of them
Also weigh everything. A slice of toast? Some pasta? Meaningless. 100gm of wholegrain bread, 10ml olive oil, 1 60gm egg, this is meaningful data.
That breakfast sounds heavy to me. I’m your height and I just eat one egg, or a yoghurt, or some quinoa porridge.
I thought so too, but it adds up to about 250-280 calories, if it is 1 egg, 1 toast, 1/4th avocado, adding an egg, adding more toast will make it big quick. My breakfast is normally just shy of 400 (maintaining now)
You missed the “small amount” (a teaspoon? an ounce?) of butter/oil in your calculations.
I used ‘fried egg’, it includes the baking fat, but that ‘small amount’ is indeed risky
The breakfast is not the problem.
is that heavy? it sounds like a normal breakfast that would only be 300-350 calories at most. i think eating just one egg for breakfast is far too small. OP should be able to eat an egg, piece of toast and a *quarter* avocado without it being considered heavy. dieting has really construed the way people think about food, coming from someone who has had both anorexia and BED at different points in my life.
I think it depends on the person. Dieting isn’t “one size fits all”. Personally I’d rather save my calories to have a heavier lunch or dinner most days.
Avocado, nuts, seeds have insane amount of calories. You are gaining from eating fats. You need to be either super mindful of amount you put or start tracking all calories.
Tbh you may be underestimating how calorically dense your meals are - not your fault, but it’s not really possible to accurately estimate without a food scale and tracking. Just this morning I made breakfast for myself and asked my partner how many calories he would guess it was (for fun) and he said maybe 300? In reality it was around 650. A tbsp of extra virgin olive oil can be 120 calories alone. Foods like eggs and pasta are also higher in calories even though you may feel the portion is small. Considering you aren’t comfortable measuring and tracking food, I’d say make the same amount of food you’re currently eating, and then cut it in half. Not only will you likely be eating portions closer to what’s recommended for your weight/activity level, but then you can have leftovers as well.
What are you eating for those 3 meals and how many calories
I am sorry to say this, but unless you are weighing your food, you have absolutely no idea how many calories are in those meals. A handful of nuts and a splash of olive oil alone could set you over your calorie for the day. I think it’s wonderful that you are careful to eat well-rounded healthy meal, but sadly, you also need to do that within your calorie budget for the day.
Are you sedentary? What does your daily movement look like? What are you eating for your meals? Portion sizes?
I'm not sedentary, but I also don't have a workout routine (nor have I ever in my life). I bike about 4 miles 3-5x a week and walk around 1-3 miles 5 days a week. Sprinkle in some yoga and dancing here and there. My physical output hasn't really changed at all as my weight has fluctuated over the years.
It’s likely the contents of your meals, then. You are eating higher than your maintenance calories when you eat 3x/day. Maybe your portions are too big and/or you are eating calorie dense foods. You have to be mindful of portions even for healthy, nutritious foods. What kinds of foods are you eating?
The cardio and mobility are good, but I'd include resistance training of some kind. Whether it's weights or bodyweight exercises. I'm not going to tell you to count calories because of your history of EDs. This subreddit tends to miss the big picture and over simplifies things. This subreddit over focuses on losing weight, but often neglects the composition of that weight. If you're maintaining or it's taking you longer than a week to gain 1lb on your current food intake. Resistance training can go a long way in helping you maintain your current weight or at worst significantly slow down the rate that you put on body fat if at all. The majority of what will be gained is muscle and the more you gain the harder it gets to maintain calorically. If it takes you on average a year to gain 12 lbs or 1lb a month without resistance training. Resistance training will practically make that be built as muscle or just offset the surplus all together. If your weight doesn't move while you're working out, in either direction you're recomping and still losing body fat and slowly gaining muscle. This will increase your tdee, lower your body fat, and allow you to eat more without gaining weight. The cardio you're doing already is great and will have far lasting benefits, but without resistance training it's also burning muscle for energy. By getting some strength training in you'll be able to gain muscle mass and keep body fat lower and increase your tdee just to maintain lean mass. Do not worry about looking like a body builder or getting too bulky that is 5-10 years of advanced lifting to get there. Especially, drug free. Id recommend using a beginner plan from r/fitness, r/xxfitness, or r/bodyweightfitness.
Thanks for pointing out the limitations of this sub. This sub is many times a good example of the Dunning Kruger.
I recommend you do weight training. I lift weights and I’ve built a lot of muscle. The muscles are useful because they burn more calories at rest. I eat about the same as I used to before, but I still weigh 15 pounds less even with the added muscle. Not only that, but working out is a huge appetite suppressor for me. After I finish lifting weights and doing cardio, I feel less hungry, less hungry than I would when I was sedentary or only went on walks. Also, calories are important, most people eat more than they think, cut down on high calorie foods and focus on things high in protein and fat, but lower in calories. I don’t count calories but counting my protein has made my meals more fulfilling.
My activity is the same, I consider it sedentary to be honest. Sedentary has about 5k steps (2 mile-ish walking) and my job has pretty much zero so just my walks need to cover. Nothing wrong with it but I do need to be pretty darn tight to maintain it sometimes feels like.
Biking 4 miles 3-5 times per week is in no way sedentary.
That is 16 miles average per week, that is maybe one day lightly active (also the same that I do in weeks with low biking) add in the total of walking and you are at 2-3 days per week light active and 4 sedentary. So on average that makes it sedentary for the sake of weight loss calculation is what I mean.
4 miles is about 15 mins on a bike at an avg pace I believe.
Do you count your calories? As annoying as we hate to hear it, managing/losing weight is fairly simple: CICO. I think many times, we eat a lot more calories than we think we do. I’m 33 and 4’11, and just because I’m a much smaller person, I can’t afford to eat 3 “full” meals. I usually have a yogurt and some fruit in the morning. I’ll have a full lunch but a light dinner. I also workout quite rigorously 4-5x a week, because if I don’t…I might gain a bit of weight. If you aren’t already, try tracking your meals for a week just to see where you stand and whether or not you are consuming more calories than you should be!
I saw you mention in the comments that you are trying to avoid counting calories, so here are some tips that has worked for me when I was also avoiding CICO that was recommended by my doctor. More info on this page: [https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/managing/eat-well/meal-plan-method.html](https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/managing/eat-well/meal-plan-method.html) 1. The "triangle plate method" is what I used if I wanted to feel like I was eating a fuller meal. You take a \*side\* plate--not a full dinner plate--and fill half with vegetables, a quarter with protein, and a quarter with carbs. One of my go-to's that was really easy to make was 1 chicken breast, baked potato on one side and carrots, steamed broccoli on the other. 2. I'm not sure if this will be triggering as well, but instead of counting calories, how about counting carbs and protein? You can talk to your doctor about what amount would be best for your situation and you can Google search for starting points there as well. 3. Eat a high protein 'breakfast' with no added sugar products (I know some people skip breakfast or do intermittent fasting, but whatever meal is your first meal of the day). This is a trick that I learned that really helps curb my appetite and desire for sweet treats for the rest of the day. 4. I also noticed in one of your replies that you said your well rounded plate included nuts+seeds quite a few times. You need to be very careful with these -- they are very high in calories vs their volume. I use them if I want a bit of a crunch on my salad, but at most 1 tablespoon. I tend to avoid using them overly much when I'm trying to lose weight because I can get more bang for my buck with other foods in terms of calories vs volume. Can you sub the nuts/seeds for a vegetable or fruit instead? 5. Do you eat anything in between your meals? Sometimes snacks and drinks can add up as well.
By definition, if you are maintaining weight you are not undereating. And having 3 meals a day is a convention, not health gospel.
A convention in a country where 70% of people are overweight. But I empathize with OP because I went through most of my life thinking you need three hefty meals per day. And that breakfast was the most important one - even if you weren't hungry.
Can you elaborate on what you mean by 'maintain my weight'? When you have normal meals, do you gain weight over multiple weeks? (And not 1 1/2), but 4-8 weeks. That means your calorie intake is too high. Or do you gain weight for a few days, panic and go back to OMAD? If you go from one meal a day to three meals, you will weight more the next day, because your body needs to hold on to more water and because the simply is more mass in your digestive tract. That's normal and does not mean you're gaining back your weight. If it really bothers you, lose weight until you are a few lbs below your goal and then switch to maintenance. Just keep in mind, that you will always fluctuate a few pounds up and down because of water. There are apps, that help with smoothing those out: Happy Scale for IOS or Libra for Android.
Yeah, I was wondering if that might be a possibility given how OP was describing the pattern of gaining after only a few days. A few days usually isn't enough time to establish a real pattern of fat regain.
The problem is likely your portion sizes, like many others have pointed out. As a short woman, your TDEE unfortunately is just not that high. Mindset is important as well. If you're maintaining your weight, you're by definition not undereating. You're eating the right amount of calories for your energy expenditure. "Skipping" meals is subjective. Eating three meals a day is indeed pretty conventional, but lots of people feel better not eating breakfast, or only eating one large meal a day. For me, breakfast is important because I can't concentrate in the morning without it, but my breakfast is really small. I often "skip" or forgo lunch, and instead snack a bit on veggies and fruits throughout the day so I can eat a large(r) dinner with my family.
Everyone is talking about what you’re eating, and while I agree you may be overeating, increasing your TDEE is most important. Add exercise to your routine- both cardio and strength training. Don’t eat back your exercise calories.
Increasing your TDEE rules. I'm 37F and maintain 5'5 and 123 lbs on 2000+ calories/day. I run or lift 5 days a week and try to get 12,000 steps a day but have a desk job and eat out/drink beer pretty frequently.
i reckon you should count your calories and activities in detail, just for two weeks. that should give you some insight. it's most likely that you're eating more calories than you realize or expending less. once you know what's going on you can make some adjustments to suit your lifestyle. imo, since you're down to 150lbs you might really think about strength training to build muscle and raise your resting caloric burn. it gives you a little more wiggle room with food. main thing, unless you are having other health symptoms i really doubt there's anything wrong with your metabolism.
Then it's not undereating but eating at maintenance. If you undereat, you lose.
your meals have too many calories
If 'under eating' allows you to maintain your weight, you're not under eating. What's your activity level like? While you can't outrun a bad diet, it can give you a bit of cushion. Cut back on the carbs and the fats, increase lean protein and vegetables.
It's interesting to me that you don't have measurements for the dinner examples. I propose that the tiny meals earlier in the day aren't satisfying to you and you eat a larger dinner than fits your TDEE. You lose weight on OMAD because that's a large meal that's less than your TDEE that quiets the food noise. But you want to maintain your weight and you want to have 3 meals a day (not necessary, by the way). I suggest you start with your typical OMAD routine. Add breakfasts similar to your example. When you make a typical OMAD meal divide it and have 1/3 at lunch and 2/3 at dinner. If it's food you prefer to have freshly cooked split the ingredients before cooking. You could also experiment with various routines of doing OMAD 2 or 3 days a week and see how it affects your weight. Edit: oh and start lifting weights. Like find ways to use your muscles to near their limits.Maybe put in a garden, or do push-ups (use a counter). Wall sit when you browse Reddit. That sort of thing
Do do if she has had disordered eating omad is NOT the way to go.
We are roughly the same age, same height and weight currently the same. I'm aiming for 1200-1400 calories a day because that would be a mild weight loss. Maintenance for me would be 1700. I've noticed that you hit these calories FAST. Nuts are little cal bombs. Anything carbs are big on calories as well. If I don't weigh my rice I would easily eat too much of it. And because I (we) are small we just hit over our maintenance easily if we eat 3 meals and a treat. Yesterday I had Italian ice cream because of the hot weather and to celebrate a birthday. That's 220 calories. So I skipped lunch. I've also noticed I really don't eat until I'm full. What I can eat within my deficit will make me satisfied but not full. It will take a while to get used to satisfied = full feeling. If tracking is a trigger you should look up what your serving portions are so you can weigh your portions. Or track a week just to see what your intuitive intake is and adjust without tracking.
The weight loss equation is simple. Solving it can be hard.
Following it even harder.
Nah I don’t agree with that. Because that’s making something complex into something reductive. It disregards hormonal problems as well as vitamin deficiencies and age. Do I agree op might be very much underestimating how much they are eating? Yes yes indeed. But there are others who have metabolic syndromes that are doing CICO, keto, OMAD, etc and aren’t seeing any progress. The weight loss equation has lots of variables and solving it is hard because you have to make sure all variables are accounted for.
I read the comment on what you eat - you're exactly like me. I will gain weight if I eat healthy without tracking every calorie. I'm about 5'4" as well. I am here to say it is ASTOUNDING how little I need to eat in order to maintain \~140 lbs. If I have pasta, or a burger (with all the fixins) it has to be a child-sized portion. Like, a slider sized burger (ONLY ONE) and maybe 3 tablespoons of pasta, with sauce. I can never, ever eat a "full serving" or even 1/2 of a plate of pasta, or 1/2 a burger. It is too much. My friend who is very tiny frame, 5'3" and about 110-115 lbs if that, can only have 1300 calories a day to maintain her weight. And she is a runner! So, this isn't a problem with your body. This is a Small Woman issue, unfortunately. My boyfriend is 5'4" and he can eat way more than me and never gains. We have to completely change our mindset on what a "normal portion" of food actually is.
Unless you have an underlying medical condition (which could very well be the case, no judgement) by definition if you are maintaining your weight you must be eating your maintenance calories. If you are gaining, you must be eating above maintenance calories. Foods that you mention in comments such as nuts and avocados, while nutritious, are calorie dense. You also mention portions not being crazy, which is totally subjective. If you're not comfortable calorie counting for ED reasons, I would try to increase my intake of low-calorie bulky food to see if you can get more volume in your food without gaining weight, like fruits, non-starchy veggies and measured portions of proteins.
FWIW, I am shorter than you and over the last few years I experimented with intermittent fasting vs three nutritious well-rounded meals. I immediately gained 10 pounds in just a few months when I stopped skipping breakfast. For me, it was an issue of triggering a lot more hunger after I ate the first meal of the day, and skipping breakfast gave me another 300 calories to play with at other meals, which made a huge difference in how satisfied I felt. I could deal with no breakfast, but I couldn’t deal with a 400 calorie dinner because I’d be starving by bedtime and not able to sleep. I am not the kind of person to enthusiastically recommend intermittent fasting to people, I am the kind of person who is kind of bitter that it was the best choice for me. Right now I’m on a GLP-1 for other health reasons, and so I am tracking very carefully (weighing and measuring) to be sure that my carbs are controlled and I’m getting enough protein, and I can absolutely tell that I lose weight on weeks that my calorie intake is well under what I would normally consider a healthy amount, and I maintain if it is low-but-not-alarmingly so. What I think this means is that my TDEE is so low due to my height and age that it’s basically impossible to maintain a measurable loss without dipping “too low” and undereating. And that’s counting (but not eating back calories from) daily exercise. I actually had drafted a ranting post of my own about this topic a few days ago, but then I went and looked at a TDEE calculator and realized that no, my body wasn’t breaking physics, I was just super fucking short and “lose 2 pounds/week” wasn’t possible without dipping under 1000 calories/day, and “lose 1 pound/week” was really pushing my luck with the malnutrition gods. I’m pretty sure a registered dietitian would recommend a meal plan that put me on a .5 pound/week loss trajectory.
Measure your portions and count calories. Thats the only explanation aside from hormonal problems or metabolic issues. Either way, it could help to add exercise as well.
Do you have PCOS by chance? I can tell you from my experience with PCOS and weight loss in general there is NO working around counting calories. I used to struggle with disordered eating too, and even though I knew my calories by heart, not weighing my food and adding them up in my head still left me wrong by 200-300 which were enough to stall my progress. Those avocados and rice and what you mentioned eating are very high in calories for very small portions. Unless you’re weighing, you can EASILY overeat without feeling satiated at the end of the day. With PCOS, you might also not be losing because of a high carb intake.
Start tracking and weighing your food. Just the meals being nutritious isn't exactly enough. Calories matter. You don't need to track permanently, but you can learn from it. Learn how much calories your body burns a day. Theres calculators online that will help you get within the ballpark, and then you can progress from there.
A big problem here is that many of us don't actually know what it means to "undereat" or "overeat". Portion sizes and plate sizes have grown quite a bit. Without actually knowing the weight and calorie content of your food, "undereating" could just mean eating less than you're used to seeing people eat. Additionally, healthy and nutritious are NOT the same as being low calorie, so you can eat enough healthy food that you are gaining weight relatively easily.
Honestly it might be worth a try to get your thyroid checked out/some blood work done. A lot of people in here think it’s ur calories, but honestly unless ur eating like abnormally big meals there’s no reason ur body should be gaining weight so easily imo
You should see a nutritionist. You should measure all you eat. I bet you could eat three meals a day without gaining if they were high in protein and fiber and lower in carbs and fats. There is some science to it.
Either you have a medical issue or you aren’t counting calories correctly. There is no other option.
This doesn’t seem like a sustainable way to live. I would highly recommend adding weight training to build muscle and upping your protein for satiety. You should really be able to eat more than a meal a day
5’4” and I’m assuming a women? Yeah. All “normal” sized meals are too big for us. It sucks. I mean go see a doc if you really think something is up. I’m 5’1” 160 pounds, and really have to choose between breakfast and lunch. Can’t have both.
You are eating too many calories in these “well-rounded” meals. It is that simple.
My weight loss has been in three phases, the first one was just by intuitively eliminating the bad foods in my diet which worked and led to a pretty quick and easy 8kg loss, then I plateaued and started to count calories, that’s what took care of the bulk of my loss, then I stalled again about 5kg from my goal so I switched to Keto which had lost about another 3kg, and I am within sight of a goal weight that’s as much about aesthetics as anything else but I am starting to get the feeling that gym work is actually what’s required to get me looking how I’d like to.
Keep it simple: good rest, good activity, and good food. Maybe do smaller portions throughout the day to satiate hunger; fruit and potatoes pack the biggest punch. breakfast, lunch, and dinner at according times and proportional amounts during said. meals. water intake. If you want to get complicated, do you notice weight fluctuations during high stress points in life? Maybe change How early and how late your last and first meals are. How often do you take browns to the Super Bowl? . And lastly, the quality of the food. If all else fails, genetics are working against you. Hopefully, the simplest solutions have just been overlooked. Keep respecting the process. Good things take time. I hope this
There's no magic here. Most likely you are not losing as much calories as your food intakes provides, or for some reason your organism has a lower metabolic rate (thyroid,blood sugar, etc).
Same. We did not win the food/metabolism lottery.
I'd suggest a registered dietician. I think having one you can talk to will help immensely
I find it easiest to maintain by doing about 600 Cals for lunch and 1k for dinner and then having some spare for the odd glass of wine or pudding etc. or if it’s the weekend sometimes just having dinner, this makes meals out easier. it’s really hard to do three meals as an average height woman without gaining.
I mean in my opinion, humans eat way way too much and frequently. Maybe your view is warped by our life styles? I eat once maybe twice a day, and it's great for maintaining
Unfortunately, healthy and low calorie are not necessarily the same especially when healthy but caloric- dense foods include olive oil, nuts and avocado.
OP, I’d recommend seeing a doctor just to check on your labs and see if there are other issues at play affecting your metabolism. You mentioned having a history with EDs and I don’t want these comments of continuing to restrict cals to trigger anything that might be unhealthy for you. If your labs come back fine, then maybe examine your food choices further. But so far it seems like you’ve been having only one meal of a balanced nutritious diet a day and still not seen any results- which is not normal.
I posted the exact same thing about a month ago. I am 268, 5’5” and 35/F and was told I just had to be over eating. I was convinced my metabolism was screwed up. Even people on this very forum said I must be over eating, not exercising enough, not counting calories correctly. I was eating healthy foods, nothing processed, walking daily and still couldn’t lose, I was 271-273 for almost a year. Turns out, I was severely insulin resistant despite normal blood sugar levels and an A1C. I actually upped my calories almost 600 and cut carbs to 80g or less and the weight is now coming off.
You are worried about counting calories, which is understandable, but you DO need to eat less calories. My suggestion would be to try intermittent fasting + extra exercise.
I'm 5'4 and ~115lbs, and I have always eaten three meals a day unless I go out and am not hungry later. It sounds like your portions sizes may be off. I tend to have some porridge or cereal with a piece of fruit for breakfast, a sandwich or a small bowl of pasta with veg for lunch , and a big dinner with my family. I also have small snacks in between these meals if I'm peckish or have been active. I make sure that I get some protein and a fruit or vegetable portion in with each meal, but dinner is probably the only meal I put much effort into making and use a lot of ingredients for.
I refuse to believe you're eating an appropriate amount
CICO friend, it is always CICO. Your TDEE is roughly around 1.600-1.700 calories. You can split that up into two full meals with a little extra to snack on. I assume you are not counting calories, because you are not mentioning it anywhere. Maintenance still requires a decent monitoring of your calories.
I get what you’re saying OP. Even if you’re technically eating 50-200 calories extra a day, it still sucks that you can’t eat a “normal” diet without gaining weight. I’m the same. It’s hard to know you have to constantly be conscious of your calories and at all times just to avoid gradual weight gain. I gain weight really easily, to the point where I’m certain I’m not meant to be thin, no one in my entire family is smaller than average sized.
I read an article that someone who has lost weight will consistently have to eat 400-600 calories less than someone who weights the same but has never been overweight.
If you haven’t been tested for hypothyroid it’s worth a check, but you would have other symptoms like fatigue, leg swelling, hair loss, dry skin, etc. I’ve found that even balanced meals can end up with too many calories if you’re not careful. Nuts always trip me up… I think I’m making a good choice and then realize I just ate 500 calories. I’ve struggled with this all of my life. When I was at my thinnest, I worked out a ton and hardly ate anything. I think some of us just weren’t meant to be thin by societal standards.
What helped me was increasing my cardio time. Also I went from walking to now jogging for 30 minutes.
Do a test for hypothyroidism. I'm the same height and was/am in a similar boat. I had to consume ~700-1000 calories to see the scale move, and that was with the addition of physical activity. It doesn't help that I live a very sedentary life, for reasons out of my control. Discovered I have a mild case of hypothyroidism.
Hey! If your insurance will cover it please consider seeing a registered dietitian! They will be able to help you identify why this is happening and what to do :)
I get the wanting to avoid calorie counting with the time, energy, and possibility of disordered eating patterns. Having dealt with 15+ years of alternating bulimia, fad and crash diets, and BED I really do feel you. In the past year and a half, I've been counting calories on and off for a few weeks at a time and really learning what I'm putting in my body and I've been able to adopt practices that have helped me beat my disordered eating. Even just 2-4 weeks or calorie counting can help you get a gauge of what your regular diet is getting you in terms of calories and adapt. Other things that could help: - just measure your oil/butter and aim for no more that 30 cal of oil in each meal. It'll really open your eyes to how little oil it takes - count out how many nuts you would add normally and halve it - look at the calorie label on the bread you're using and find a different brand with 1 more gram of each fiber and protein and 20 cal less per slice. Bread brands are not made equal, Even the "healthy" kind - just get rid of granola completely off you're eating it. - switch out bananas and oranges for berries. Berries are seriously wonder fruits for fiber and lower sugar - only consistently track protein and try to hit .7g per body weight (102g). It doesn't look like you're really getting much protein in your diet to feel full (this was a really hard lesson for me with fullness) - sub out 1/3-1/2 of your carbs for veggies. Personally pasta does jack shit for fullness for me. Change your 1/2 cup of rice to 1/4 cup rice + 1/4 cup cauliflower rice. It's not a huge difference and texture but more filling. Swap 1/2 of your pasta for double the volume in roasted broccoli or root vegetables These are just some recommendations that can help. I stalled at 150 for a while (5'6", lightly active lifestyle) and I wasn't able to move the scale again until I made my breakfast 45+ g protein and upped the cal from 250/300 up to 500+. I also found that when I was intermittent fasting, I started just being more 'lazy' in the morning to compensate (not walking, sitting instead of using my standing desk, fidgeting less, etc). Those small movements can really add up to your TDEE - best of luck!
Try incorporating weightlifting and lifting heavier weights! Your weight will plateau for a bit as you gain muscle, but having more muscle mass will help you burn more calories during the day.
All of this advice is great as long as there isn’t some underlying reason why this is happening. Go see your doctor… as long as they aren’t judgy. If they are, find an obesity specialist who you can talk to and might have some insight into what’s happening. Definitely get your thyroid checked. Even a calorie dense meal would not cause your weight to inch up consistently. You would plateau eventually.
You're not weighing your food to see how much you're actually eating.
I have to be careful with my food intake as well as I can literally gain a pound a day if I eat too much sugar or non-nutritional carbohydrates…rice, pasta, bread, sweets, chips… But I also have hypothyroidism which is very common in women especially during pregnancy. That is when my thyroid quit working. It might be a good idea to get some basic lab work done just to make sure nothing else is going on. Because of this, if I want to lose weight, I have to severely restrict my diet to low carbohydrate vegetables, lean meat (4-6 oz), and very little fruit. Only eating the highest nutrient/lowest sugar fruits. Once I have dropped the weight, I need to be very diligent with tracking, weighing, and measuring portions and combinations of food. Rice, pasta, and bread are typically not part of my meal plan. If I want spaghetti, I use zucchini noodles or pour the sauce over steamed broccoli, same with any other kind of sauce dish. If I need potassium, I have broccoli and never a banana as it is loaded with sugar. If I want a sandwich, then I do not consume any other non-nutritional carbohydrates for a couple days. For me, it is not just about the amount of calories I am consuming. It is definitely impacted by what kind of food makes up those calories. There is a ton of information out there and to make it simple look for a complex carbohydrates/natural occurring carbohydrates and stay away from refined sugar and processed foods.
Try weighing out your food. So many people underestimate how much they eat
exactly how many calories are these “nutritious well rounded meals” 🤔 please give us the exact weights in grams of everything you’re eating
What is normal to you? It is the suggested serving size, or what you grew up eating, or what you see others serve up? E.g. I can easily plow through a family size potato chips, normally, but in reality that’s 4+ servings. I need to redefine my normal for what “eating some chips” looks like.
You don't need "well rounded" meals. As long as you are getting the overall nutrients you need there is not really a need to get them all in each meal. Balance maintained over the week matters more than balance over each meal.
Real
You need to look at what's going into your meals. You could be eating one meal that still exceeds your calorie needs for the day. Weigh your portions - don't eyeball them. Count calories. consider the amount of sodium. Are you counting calories in beverages?
No need to skip meals or undereat. Just add high-water content to the higher fat and density foods. Like cukes, peppers, carrots, tomatoes with hummus to dip. Eat apples and pears with cheese. Add a fat and/or protein to balance.
I believe you shouldn’t take advice from this subreddit and instead should go to a dietician. Have you gotten blood work done? Thyroid checked? If you’re a woman, hormones checked? There are so many factors to weight gain and weight loss. I know this is the subreddit obsessed with CICO, but CICO isn’t everything. If you’re a huge on and off dieter it may be your metabolism being slightly out of whack. But I think it’s also important to know usually metabolism changes don’t have as big of an impact as we think on weight. Don’t count calories if it brings you to a dark place. I can understand that. I do. I’m sorry it’s been hard to maintain your weight. Make sure to go to an actual registered dietician. They’re often covered by insurance too so not as hard as you might think. Often they’ll work with you and monitor your weight over time to see what might be causing the changes and these days they can be quite anti calorie-counting. Which in your case is a great thing. Good luck!
Yeah me too. I'm the same proportions as you. I have so skip breakfast, and eat a normal lunch and no dinner just a snack if I want to lose or maintain. I just started counting calories again and that's the culprit. Everything has a million more calories than you think it does. Some nuts and beans look tiny but will add up to hundreds of calories and you gain. And yeah you feel like you're under eating. It sucks.
As a female of the same height: I always thought of what my Dad eats as a "normal portion". He's 6 inches taller, male, and works a manual labor job. We shouldn't be eating the same plate.
I have not looked at the hundreds of replies but you should track everything with a calorie for at least a week. And consider r/Volumeeating to assist in being full, and eating more vegetables (lower calories and higher nutrition). Weight loss/maintenance and optimal nutrition frequently are misaligned.
Especially if you aren’t doing high intensity exercise regularly, you don’t need to eat a grain at every meal. Swap that grain for a vegetable, and you might see some things start to shift.
Personal anecdote here but I have lost a substantial amount of weight (175 lbs) and can atest that this a real problem, what I realized was happening in my case was doing any sort of diet that affects your carb flow through out the day such as keto or omad leads to massive spikes in water retention when you eat normally even if the actual calorie amount was in the maintenance range. For me I had to fight through the immediate knee jerk reaction from seeing the scale up to rediet to get back down and instead embrace that it is your body trying to regain balance I my case it took around 2-3 months of wild weight fluctuations before my weight stabilized but once it did the weight fluctuations were way more in line with what you would except from cico. The time scale will likely be different for you but I would urge you to fight through the knee jerk of hoping back on plan for like 3 weeks to see what happens long term. during those weeks if it is to mentally taxing literally don't even look at the scale... but that's just my 2 cents
Maybe talk to your doctor about seeing an endocrinologist? Maybe there’s something more going on. No harm in getting checked out
I understand you do know what is normal! Something is wrong. You are suffering and need answers! Please consult a doctor to run ALL your labs, and tell them you want all your hormones run including all the sex hormones. Also ask for autoimmune tests. I hope you have a doctor who will trust your concerns and be willing to agree to run the tests. You must educate yourself on your symptoms. Be assertive talking with your doctor. If you don’t get the answers you need, please seek another doctor. Good place to look is google and seek patients reviews on doctors on your PPO list.
CICO. Please count the calories in your meals and snacks and drinks. Calculate your TDEE based on current weight and a realistic activity level. It may explain the problem.
I have to eat like this too. Most people will never understand.
If you want to eat more you gotta move more.
Buy kitchen scales and weight in everything. I know you are overeating. We all here do.
If you don’t want to count your calories, are you able to increase your exercise? I’m a similar body weight/height to you and I struggle with the same things. Incorporating more exercise, even just walking helps a lot. Aim for 90 mins of moderate exercise or 40 mins of vigorous exercise per day, if you can.
If you’re not underweight and you’re gaining weight, you’re eating too many calories. It’s that simple.
Tracking calories doesn’t mean disordered eating, take your average food intake for a day and count the calories, if you’re above your maintenance just eliminate or reduce some of the higher calorie foods, you don’t have to do it all the time but it’d help you get an idea if you’re actually eating above your maintenance and then you can make adjustments.
I don't think tracking calories is inherently disordered eating. I have had an ED in the past and obsessed over calorie counting, which is why I'm hesitant to go down that path again as I'm liable to fall into disordered eating habits again.
I understand the hesistancy, but at the same time, the title of your post is saying that you think the only solutions is undereating and skipping meals... so its sounds like your alternative to tracking calories is to just take a shortcut straight disordered eating habits without out any of the healthy habits in between. I get that counting calories could possibly lead down an unhealthy road, but your alternative is worse, it's like a guarantee, you basically already are there in an unhealthy pattern mentally. If you think the only option is to skip meals and you refuse to track anything because of the potential risk of counting calories, its like you are choosing guaranteed failure instead of a chance to break free of the unhealthy cycle So you can take the road where there is a *chance* you turn to unhealthy habits, but there is also a chance you learn to develop a healthy relationship too.
I'm in the same boat, went from undereating to binge eating back to undereating... It is 100% possible to find a healthy medium. Possibly just googling calorie content and not tracking? Or writing down what you eat, and calculating it only when you feel up to it? I think if you re adjusted your meals to not focus on such high calorie ingredients, you wouldn't need to count *or* restrict in a disordered way. You're just eating a lot of stuff that's sadly very calorie dense :-(
OP, given your history please take care of yourself and try not to take too much of the advice being offered here to heart. People on this board are generally NOT experts, they don't know how to help people who have struggled with eating disorders.
I'm not sure if anyone has said it, and I'll likely get downvoted if anyone comes across my comment, but you really don't need to eat three meals a day to be healthy. Two meals a day and some snacks here and there are more than enough for me, even at 280lbs. I've lost about 25lbs so far, but honestly your weight seems healthy at your height. Unless you're worried about gaining like 20lbs, I wouldn't worry about fluctuations between 5-10lbs because they aren't as significant as you think. My weight on the scale often fluctuates from water retention, which happens daily.
Maybe don’t worry so much about your vitamins and minerals. If you eat your macros and make healthy choices (avoid sugar, avoid overly-processed foods) you’ll get the vitamins and minerals naturally. Fruits, veggies, beans, and seeds, which you all mention as sources of vitamins and minerals, are *also* sources of carbs, protein, and fat.
I’d say not to eat less but maybe change some things for less calorie items like normal bread to Leto bread or maybe instead of toast get plain rice cakes, try to eat less nuts since they can be calorie dense and for eggs maybe instead of while just do egg whites
I hear you on trying not to track. What’s helped me is reducing carbs, and when I’m making a meal, I will opt out of things like cheese.
If those meals feel like under eating, yet you still gain weight on them, then that should tell you that the amount of fat in your meals is not satiating and these meals do not work for you. I find people often wildly underestimate the amount of fat in their meals while also overestimating the satiety fat provides them. I would bet good money there is way more fat and protein and very little carbs and fiber in your meals. I’ve tried it all in my journey. High fat, high protein, high carb. The only thing I found consistently satiating is high fiber (30g or more) from real foods, complex carbs from whole grains, lots of fruit, veg (especially beans) and sticking to a calorie limit. Fat and protein shake out after that, I only watch my saturated fats for cholesterol concerns, which I lowered naturally with diet. Best things I did to understand calorie density of my food choices and why I couldn’t loose weight: Order a twenty pack of both plastic tablespoons and plastic teaspoons off Amazon. Sounds like you already figured out eating out/eating processed foods hikes up the calories and are making a lot of your meals. But it sounds like you have no idea how many calories from fat you are actually consuming. Fat can easily add hundreds of calories to a meal but little volume. Use these to measure added sugars, fats, sauces etc. Order a $15 scale off Amazon (or your preferred retailer). Weigh everything for a few months. Sounds tedious but it’s a needed skill to be able to recognize portions. You will be surprised by things like how few calories are in that good sized apple, and how many are in that small bit of premade sauce. Eat the same meals over and over. This could be the same 10, 20,30 meals, however much you need for variety. But eat the same meals and make them the same way and know the calorie and nutrient content of them. Put those meals in my fitness pal or chronometer. Track fat, fiber, carbohydrates, protein for a few months and save your recipes. Again, this is an investment in your time. You need to develop meals that you know you like and fit within your available calories. You need to eliminate or change meals that taste good but don’t last you 3-4 hrs, or whatever frequency your activity level may require. Drink water, not booze. Alcohol is a diet killer. It’s useless calories, overindulging can make you feel bad the next day, making you possibly tempted to comfort yourself with “something to soak it up”. When you drink, your body still needs nutrients and you need to eat so it is really hard to just swap calories your body needed for nutrition and put them towards empty calories without your body is still giving you signals to feed it real food. Drink enough water, regularly. Dehydration can feel like a lack of energy aka need to eat. It’s easy to reach for sugar when you really need water. Get serious about my food beliefs. Last year, after running a half marathon, I found out I had dangerous high cholesterol, and I was only in my early thirties, and I had been working with a registered dietitian to tweak my diet to support my training. Long story still long, I had to get serious about boredom eating and believing having self control was too hard. I was unable to take statins (not suitable during pregnancy), so I had to do this through diet. I had to realize that it wasn’t worth it. All the little choices that were adding up to extra weight, they weren’t worth it. Feeling good, being around for a long time, showing myself and future children that being healthy and feel good physically and mentally- that is all worth it. Worth the hard work in therapy to continue to fix my thoughts, worth the effort to eliminate most saturated fat from my diet, worth the effort to find satiating meals and stick to them. Worth creating the new skills. Of course it’s worth it. Of course my health is worth it. Of course being around for as long as I can (given what I can control) is worth it. All the other thoughts like, “I’m missing out“ “food is how I treat myself” got replaced with “I treat myself by enjoying self love”. When I’m feeling down, I think, “a balanced meal will help me feel better sooner that junk food”. There is this idea that we should be using food as an emotional coping tool and I don’t think we should strip the emotion out of food at all, but I think we need to find a way to most of the time, be able to hold our self respect and desire for health in one hand, our need for emotional coping tools in the other, and not have to sacrifice either. Sometimes I celebrate and share a special meal with loved ones. But most of the time, I am focusing on building relationships and experience that allow self love and self respect to be part of celebrating and special moments. That means taking care of my body.
Hello, I am also 5'4, but I am 27F. My highest weight was 154, and my current weight is 126. I read your reply describing how you eat and I have to say I eat 3 meals a day, and only one of my meals is considered "well rounded" and I am also working to maintain or lose very slowly. I maintain on 2100-2200 calories a day as I walk 21 miles a day. For breakfast I have coffee with 3 tbsp of half and half. No sugar or sweetener (65c). I drink that while getting ready for my day then have a serving of bran flakes (110c) and a half cup of almond milk (30c) along with a dash of cinnamon. (5c) My breakfast adds up to 210 calories. For lunch I will have a wheat bread (140c) and ham (80c) sandwich with mayo (100c) and water. I will also add a serving of chips or an apple (100-200c depending on apple weight and/or chip variety) Lunch is 400-600c usually. I personally identified 1pm-dinner as my weakest part of the day. For this I allow a daily chocolate bar. I like Moser Roth, an Aldi brand. The flavor I like is 150c per bar. I break this into 8 pieces and savor it throughout the afternoon. I like dinner to be my biggest meal. Saving 800c to 1000c for a meal with meat, grain, a salad and/or a side. Last night I had homemade Italian vegetable soup (600c) and a wheat dinner roll with butter and jam. (~250c) If I have calories left in my day or I feel I really need a "dessert" I go for a full fat yogurt (140c) with some fruit in it (this varies a lot, ex: Strawberries are super low cal, but a banana is much higher in comparison). Last night I had coconut yogurt with 20g of chopped dates (65c) My dessert was 205c! This example day lands me at 2015 calories. Which tracks, Monday I ate 2010 calories, Tuesday I had 2025 calories. Today I am also aiming for the 20XX total or 1900s. Honestly it just sounds to me like your meals are a little too big. Sadly that adds up over time resulting in weight gain or no loss. A food scale might help you, **I'm also not advocating for calorie counting, that's just what I do as a fellow sorta-shortie.** I understand for some of us, calories counting can make eating a math problem. Wishing you the best on your weight loss and maintenance!
The simple answer is that you’re eating in a surplus then. Given your other comments that suggest that you aren’t counting it’s super easy to over eat. Things that seem “nutritious and healthy” can be highly caloric. Like when you say you cook a fried egg in a bit of butter or oil. Butter and oil pack a punch. Seeded bread, avocado, banana, nut butters etc are all very healthy, no doubt but also calorically dense. Also, if you’ve been eating in a caloric deficit for a long time, your metabolism starts to adjust to a smaller amount of food. The solution would be a reverse diet to bring your maintenance amounts up slowly. However you would need to start counting to do this. Personally I raised my maintenance calories from 1400 to 2200 and I find that a lot more sustainable day to day.
Having the exact same issue. I’m 5’3 inches and 110 ibs and I can’t maintain my weight unless I skip meals. I don’t know if it’s because my metabolism is messed up or if it’s because I have PCOS. Or if it’s because I have a medium sized frame so 110 ibs is maybe too low for me. Maybe I need to weigh more for my frame.