Eating too little or too much

[jcup]

Hi. I am a 20 year old male that is 6' 0'' 200 lbs, and am having difficulty deciding on how much I should be eating to lose weight while maintaining muscle.

My workout schedule is lifting weights for an hour on MWF followed by 30-60minutes of elliptical training and continuing the elliptical training on Saturday and Sunday-with the elliptical trainer claiming i'll burn between 400-800 calories.

I've been doing practically the same amount of work, but with different eating habits for about the last 9 months, and not satisfied with results. I've read that counting calories could be a waste of time, so I try to just follow the food guide pyramid, while still allowing for occasional alcohol and desert. But what I'm wondering is, should I be eating til I'm full at every meal, or still hungry after eating, and how you guys have delt with this problem.

 

[San2]

I'm no expert by any means, but since the only way to lose weight is to burn more calories than you eat, there might not be any way around the calorie counting.

Feeling full is purely subjective and hasn't really got anything to do with the calories you eat...you can eat a pile of salad and be stuffed afterwards without having eaten too many calories, at the same time a desert might have twice the amount of calories, but leave you hungry.

I personally hate, hate, hate counting calories. It's a pain in the bum, it's time consuming, boring and annoying. But I do it anyway, because if I don't, I won't be able to eat properly, and won't lose weight. Simple as that.

 

[RJAZ520]

Hi. I am a 20 year old male that is 6' 0'' 200 lbs, and am having difficulty deciding on how much I should be eating to lose weight while maintaining muscle.

My workout schedule is lifting weights for an hour on MWF followed by 30-60minutes of elliptical training and continuing the elliptical training on Saturday and Sunday-with the elliptical trainer claiming i'll burn between 400-800 calories.

I've been doing practically the same amount of work, but with different eating habits for about the last 9 months, and not satisfied with results. I've read that counting calories could be a waste of time, so I try to just follow the food guide pyramid, while still allowing for occasional alcohol and desert. But what I'm wondering is, should I be eating til I'm full at every meal, or still hungry after eating, and how you guys have delt with this problem.

Welcome to the forum!

I hate feeling hungry! If you dont want to feel hungry and still want to make progress you need to start counting calories! Its not very hard at all. There are many modern day programs that take a lot of the work out of it. I personally stuck with the first one I tried which is at fitday.com. I bought the download version right away without trying the free online version but i heard its just as good, and possibly better since you can access it from anywhere.

the program figures your calories for you based on customer activities levels that you can feel out and tweak accordingly.

When you start counting calories you learn what foods have less calories but are more filling, and you know exactly how much you can have and still get your results. I did this from the jump with a digital scale and everything and ive made tremendous progress (not to toot my own horn)

But a quick answer on what to eat that helps keep you full at least based on my experience would be:

low calorie filler
Mushrooms
Broccoli
Carrots

high protein low carb low fat, more filling food that stays with you longer
Chicken Breast
Turkey Breast