I don't know what it feels like to be thin.

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I've read that so many times, but I just can't seem to make sense of it considering those two tacos + chocolate and wine was a huuuge meal + dessert. I don't need to lose weight quickly, but It'd be a plus. I just want to get healthy, and I would have a hard time forcing myself to eat another 500-700 calories right now.
 
LaMaria said:
1300 kcal is very little for a grown man, even when you're trying to lose weight. I know we all want to get to goal as quickly as possible but going too low will make it harder to stick to your healthy changes long term (even if it feels like you're not depriving yourself). At a guess I'd say you should eat around 2000 kcal while trying to lose weight and anything under 1800 would make me nervous for your health. That said: great job on your food choices today!
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This. My daily is 2400, and that's still a 2000 calorie deficit if I work out that day.
 
larek said:
I've read that so many times, but I just can't seem to make sense of it considering those two tacos + chocolate and wine was a huuuge meal + dessert. I don't need to lose weight quickly, but It'd be a plus. I just want to get healthy, and I would have a hard time forcing myself to eat another 500-700 calories right now.
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Did you eat a 600 calorie breakfast?
 
0900: 1 medium banana for breakfast, around 120 calories

1300: the lunch I rounded up to 500, but it's more around 400.

2100: Dinner 660 calories, dessert 270 calories.

Total: 1450

I should probably eat a bigger breakfast, but I'm having trouble getting that banana down as is. I can't see myself eating 600 calories for breakfast anytime soon.
 
I barely move around these days, so I'm going to assume I would be a lot more hungry if I started working out again. 2, 3 years ago I tried eating healthy as well as jogging slowly for 45 minutes, and I remember being a lot hungrier then than I am now.
 
larek said:
I barely move around these days, so I'm going to assume I would be a lot more hungry if I started working out again. 2, 3 years ago I tried eating healthy as well as jogging slowly for 45 minutes, and I remember being a lot hungrier then than I am now.
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No shit. I'd start with adding a ten minute walk before breakfast and see if that gets your fires lit, literally. Then another tenner at night. Slow is fine. Fast is fine. Consistency is key. Invest in gear for shit weather. You have to be something of a soldier and not let any weather stop you (if an officer were out on duty, you could do your duty too).

In as little as a month you'll have significantly built more red blood cells and muscle tissue. I know when I'm doing it right when I'm hungry for my next meal about an hour to half hour before it's due. I shouldn't be ravenous, that means I didn't eat enough. Just stoked to eat.
 
The weather has stopped me, I won't deny that. it's cold and rainy basically all the time, but I'm going to try your advice and go for a ten minute walk starting tomorrow.
 
If the weather sucks, try jumping jacks. Or squats. Knee raises. Mountain climbers. Kettlebell swings. Burpees. Or swirling a hoop around. Doesn't really matter what it is as long as it wakes your body up. Might even add a bit of muscle in the long run.
 
......play some music & dance. Walk anywhere you can, take the stairs( even just one flight at a time), just increase what you do. Baby steps are better than no steps. You can do this!
 
Thank you for the suggestions! I'd easily just walk over to my pc and move around to some music if I already didn't walk try the morning walk. It was a peculiar feeling, because just one minute into the walk I started feeling some sense of hunger. Thankfully I had some leftover lasagna, so i coupled that with a decent portion of salad.

I won't calculate calories as much as I did yesterday, but rather find an approximate. The lasagna was 322g, googling gave me around 440 calories. I don't think the salad was more than .. 35-40, but I'm placing it at 50. That would effectively be a breakfast at almost 500 calories, in comparison to my the banana I'd normally force myself to eat on about 20 minutes (an hour after waking up.)
 
Lunchtime. 150g chicken, 100g potatoes and 60-70g brussels sprouts. Approximate 250 calories.

To be honest, I must either calculate calories entirely wrong, or there might be something wrong with me. I wasn't even hungry now because of that large breakfast almost 6 hours ago. If my body requires that much calories to maintain my weight, how am I overweight in the first place? It feels like I have to force myself to eat food if I ever want to reach 1500-2000 calories a day eating healthy. I'm now at about 700 calories in those two meals, as I've only drank water, so there's no added calories from liquids.

I really have to research all of this, cause I honestly can't see how this all works.
 
Could it be that you're used to eating very calorie-dense foods? I can easily eat a day's calories of chocolate or salami in one sitting but trying to do so with broccoli and lean meat would my stomach explode before I got halfway.
 
That seems like the most probable explanation, but I'm still having a hard time thinking I've gone over 2000 calories a day for a longer period of time, even before eating healthy. I'm on my way to check this right now. Oh, and also, I ate a date. 40-50 calories.

I can't really recall what I've usually been eating, either. Sometimes, two slices of bread for breakfast, with just a single piece of ham on each. For dinner, sometimes just lasagna with some salad, but then I had loads of lasagna and very little salad. I don't really drink soda either, so I honestly can't say for sure why I've slowly creeped up to my current weight.
 
Maybe that's your starting point for now: write down every bite you eat for a week or two and count calories as you go but don't worry about how many you ought to be eating. Two weeks aren't going to kill your metabolism and I'm sure it'd be helpful to have an idea of what you're doing. And on another page or using another color you note what you what have been likely to eat (and how much) if you weren't trying to lose weight. Of course there's a lot of difference in who's cooking as well; my mom's lasagne is very different affaire from the frozen stuff (with less than half the calories for the same amount, not to mention the sodium content). But don't worry too much for now; it can all be a little overwhelming if you've never given this stuff much thought before.
 
BMR: 2143
Harris Benedict: 2571

I just ate a slightly bigger taco dinner than I did yesterday, which I put at 660 calories. The tacos today had slightly more cheese, and had meat instead of chicken. Let's go hard and put it at 900 calories. From my two previous meals + the date, that puts me at about 1700 calories. I feel so full, I don't see any logic in how I can lose weight while eating this much.

It feels like I'm going to gain weight if I eat 1700 calories a day.
 
larek said:
BMR: 2143
Harris Benedict: 2571

It feels like I'm going to gain weight if I eat 1700 calories a day.
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But you see now that you won't. That's a low activity level, so just adding a 20 minute walk a day will likely boost you up to 3000 I'm guessing, possibly higher. Remember, it's not just the calories in the exercise, it's the "afterburner" effect of the exercise that boosts your metabolism for 24 hours. That's why you have to light the fire every day. Think of it that way, lighting a fire.

Then you need a 1000 calorie deficit 7 days a week to lose 7000 calories, or two pounds of actual fat, not water or muscle. This means you likely need I'm guessino 2300 calories a day with activity.

It's a lot of calories to spend. You can't feel deprived with that much of an energy budget to spend on foods you like. Homecooking is awesome because processing food adds 300 - 600 calories a serving it seems.
 
I don't know, maybe I do actually gain weight at around 2000 calories. Maybe that's what I've been eating these last year to slowly gain weight. This morning I tried just moving around a bit, stretching and listening to music, and I didn't find myself as hungry as yesterday. I'm not feeling like making a salad or cook something just to force myself to eat it, so I grabbed two clementines and a small handful of grapes. I'll see if I can eat something more around lunchtime.
 
I think I'm going to experiment with eating 5-6 smaller meals, instead of my usual 3. Basically, this all boils down to me trying to get to know my body.
 
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