More calories?

H

hello_kitty

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This week I'm taking a break from excercise and calorie deficit. I decided to eat maintenance for a week to give my body a break from 5 months of dieting.

I have calculated that with no excercise I need to consume 1850 kcal per day. So far I stuck to this number for two days and yesterday probably had about 1900 but I was so hungry. More hungry than usually on calorie deficit and even had hungry dreams last night.

Now, my thinking was that maintenance level should keep you nicely full all the time. Am I consuming too little. Have I underestimated my calories?
 
Not enough info to go on.

Ht?
Wt?
Age?
 
26, 164cm (5'4), 55kg.

But this is beyond the point. What I'm asking is whether hunger = not enough food.

I should also say I'm not eating any junk. All calories I'm consuming are good. Lot's of lean protein, veggies and some fruit. Oats in the morning, etc. I also follow 3 P+C and 3 P+F meals a day.
 
If your eatting 1850cals and your still hungry then your eatting the wrong foods.

Try eatting bran flakes, wheat or muesli with milk to fill up.

remember that fat has twice the cals of carbs or protien so for every gram of fat you eat, you could be eatting twice as much in carbs or protien.

And how many cals are there in salad? there is always something to eat.
 
manofkent said:
If your eatting 1850cals and your still hungry then your eatting the wrong foods.

Try eatting bran flakes, wheat or muesli with milk to fill up.

remember that fat has twice the cals of carbs or protien so for every gram of fat you eat, you could be eatting twice as much in carbs or protien.

And how many cals are there in salad? there is always something to eat.
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I do eat oat bran porridge in the morning which I think would be superior to flakes or muesli.

It's not the volume of food that bothers me. I feel really stuffed after every meal as I do have loads of vegetables (2-3 servings with every meal). The problems start after about 1.5 hours. All the food I've consumed gets digested (I assume) and I start feeling hungry.
 
Are you a vegetarian? I thought you were, but then I see you eat lean meats. I might have some insight for you, but I need to know if you're a veggie or not :p
 
Lynn,

I'm very much non-vegetarian. 40% of my diet is protein. I eat egg whites, skinless chicken breast, salmon, tuna, lean beef, lean pork, white fish.
 
Just as an illustration.

Last night as my meal no 6 at 9pm I had a tub of cottage cheese (although I'm lactose intolerant to a degree) with some pumkin and sunflower seeds and 200g of steamed broccoli, around 350 kcal. 10.30 I started going hungry again.

For lunch today I had cod and sweet potato. Felt totally stuffed and hungry again in 1.5 hours.

So, it doesn't really matter whether I eat carbs or fat with my protein. I'm very confused.
 
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To answer your initial question, hunger doesn't always equal not enough food. It CAN mean that, but not always.

I would venture to say try to stick it out for a few days and see how you feel. I am wondering if this is a mental thing. Sort of like, "Well I'm not working out so my routine is broken and therefore I may be focusing on food/hunger more so than usual."

If that makes sense.

I'd caution "dieting" for 5 months though. You're 5'5" and 121 pounds. That's about right. What's your body fat percentage? I realize this is off-topic, but you may want to focus on eating a slight caloric surplus and lifting heavy. AKA, build lean muscle as opposed to focusing on a fat loss program.
 
My bf is probably about 23%. I'm not happy with my shape at all. I want to be leaner.

I'll stick it out this week at my maintenance and see what happens. Next week I'm planning to start a new training routine lifting twice a week and 2 HIIT sessions. I will also start carb cycling to make sure I'm eating surplus on my weight training days.
 
have some green tea or water when you feel hungry. i used to have this but i assumed that it wasnt actually hunger and it did actually go away. if the hunger doesnt hurt you and your consuming enough cals then maybe its not a problem and its just your body getting used to a new food routine
 
IMO, 23% and wanting to go lower means you need to focus on a Pyramid split routine, caloric surplus and protein dominant menu. Your entire mind should revolve around building lean muscle mass at this point.

It's one of the few ways I believe in reducing body fat lower than 23% for women. Dieting or calorie cutting usually leads to a muscle loss or a plateau around 23% BF.
 
Lynn,

Thanks. Thant will explain why I was in a plateau for about 3 months now. As I have mentioned earlier I wanted to try calorie cycling to ensure I eat in surplus for training days. Do you think its a good idea or should I do surplus every day? Also as I can only do two sessions a week should I stick to full body routine concentrating on compound excercise instead of splitting it between the two days? Do you think I should continue with HIIt twice a week as well?
 
Trainer Lynn said:
IMO, 23% and wanting to go lower means you need to focus on a Pyramid split routine, caloric surplus and protein dominant menu. Your entire mind should revolve around building lean muscle mass at this point.
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I don't agree on the pyramid split and I'm not quite making the leap from caloric surplus to losing body fat.

For lifting, I think any undulating periodization scheme will work just as well, so it's not a pyramid is not the way to go, more like it's not the definitive.
 
Cynic said:
I don't agree on the pyramid split and I'm not quite making the leap from caloric surplus to losing body fat.

For lifting, I think any undulating periodization scheme will work just as well, so it's not a pyramid is not the way to go, more like it's not the definitive.
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Not sure what you mean here, Cynic. Adding lean muscle mass is a basic way to reduce body fat. A pyramid routine is perfectly acceptable for strength training. It's a safe and easy way to change a routine as well.

hello_kitty said:
Do you think its a good idea or should I do surplus every day? Also as I can only do two sessions a week should I stick to full body routine concentrating on compound excercise instead of splitting it between the two days? Do you think I should continue with HIIt twice a week as well?
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It would depend on your fitness program. If you're doing a split routine then I would eat a caloric surplus most days. The goal is to build lean muscle. But you mention only being able to do 2 strength training sessions per week.

I'm not sure what your fitness program was like in the past. Where you doing 2 full body days before? You need to change something in your program every 4-6 weeks (which you already know).

HIIT is fine to do twice a week on non-weight training days. A day of rest is recommended as well. Provide more details on what you have been doing and then we can offer ways to change things up a bit.
 
So far I was doing 2 full body training sessions (45 min) per week, 3 cardio sessions (either 1 HIIT and 2 moderate or 2 HIIT and 1 moderate).
 
So staying with two full body sessions per week and 2 HIIT sessions isn't going to change things up for you.

If you have time to do the HIIT sessions, I would find time to do a split routine. I'd focus on weights over cardio right now.

Am I making sense? lol. So currently you are working out 5 days a week, correct? 2 weight days and 3 cardio days. So try changing it to 4 weight days (2 upper body days and 2 lower body/ab days). A split routine should only take about 20-30 minutes. On the three non-weight days, one day is rest and 2 days are 20 minute interval cardio sessions.

If you can, add in 10 minutes of interval cardio at the end of your weight sessions.
 
Trainer Lynn said:
Not sure what you mean here, Cynic. Adding lean muscle mass is a basic way to reduce body fat. A pyramid routine is perfectly acceptable for strength training. It's a safe and easy way to change a routine as well.
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If she's training for strength, then I would say wave loading will do more. Also, if she's trying to lose fat, shouldn't she be losing fat? It's not easy for a woman to put on mass, unless she is taking steroids. It woul make more sense to cut body fat than to add mass for a woman who's wanting to lean out.

Note: critical, but not flaming.

Kitty, have you looked into carb cycling? It's usually intended for those trying to go from an already low percent to competition shape, but it may work in making your caloric intake a moving target and keep you decently fed during the week.
 
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Cynic said:
Kitty, have you looked into carb cycling? It's usually intended for those trying to go from an already low percent to competition shape, but it may work in making your caloric intake a moving target and keep you decently fed during the week.
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Cynic,

I did consider calorie cycling and starting this week to see if this changes things for me.

Lynn,

I'll see if I can change things around like you suggested above.

Thanks guys.
 
Cynic said:
If she's training for strength, then I would say wave loading will do more. Also, if she's trying to lose fat, shouldn't she be losing fat? It's not easy for a woman to put on mass, unless she is taking steroids. It woul make more sense to cut body fat than to add mass for a woman who's wanting to lean out.
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The main goal of a pyramid routine does not have to be gaining mass. I have gone from 21% body fat to 17% body fat simply by changing to a Pyramid routine.

There are two different fat loss methods for MOST women: a fat loss program (eating a caloric deficit) and a lean muscle building program (slight caloric surplus). One is used more, but the other (caloric surplus) can be a briliant way to reduce body fat for those in lower BF% ranges.
 
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