Calorie Anxiety

I use MyFitnessPal to track my calories every day.  Every single day, otherwise my calories get away from me.  It's a truly perfect tool for me.  I love that it scans bar codes and imports nutritional info.  I love completing my diary every day and getting the evaluation, "If every day were like today, in 5 weeks you would weigh Xlbs".  Talk about keeping your eyes on the long term. 

But something I've noticed is what can only be called "calorie anxiety" and I'm a little worried that it might be interfering with my health.

Essentially, calorie anxiety (as defined by me, and I'm making it up) is skimping on breakfast and lunch calories out of fear of running out of calories later in the day, and ending up hungry.

It tends to be my general MO.  I'll eat a packet of oatmeal for breakfast--130-160 calories.  And then for lunch I'll limit my calories to around 320-350 calories.  What this often means is I've only eaten 500ish calories by dinner time, and I end up eating the bulk of my daily calories in the evening between dinner and bedtime.

So far I've been extremely lucky that this practice hasn't sent me into starvation mode and I've continued to lose weight.  But it's something I continue to work on, with some success lately.  I've left my breakfast routine alone most days, although I've added a glass of juice before I leave on work days.  I had to do this because I've had days so busy that the first time I've thought about eating has been about 2 in the afternoon.  At least with the juice I've had a few calories.  Lunches I've allowed myself more calories--500-550.  Choosing wisely allows for a great deal more food than before. 

I've continued to lose weight, so I can only assume that it's at least as effective, and probably more.  I think it's probably a more healthy approach both metabolically and mentally.  At times I could see how people might end up with an eating disorder...

Overall it's a lot less anxiety.

How do you break down your calorie intake through the day?

New Nutrition Plan

After some reading and drawing information from several sources (thanks Jackie!)  I've settled on a plan that I hope works.  And if it doesn't then I'll try something else.

I'm pretty sure that the treadmill and MFP are overestimating the calories I'm burning while running. And further, I want my workouts to help create that calorie deficit that's going to cause me to lose weight.  I'm pretty sure that replacing my calories burned during a run, calorie for calorie isn't an effective way to lose weight--especially if my workout calories are overestimated!

Currently on non-gym days I'm consuming between 1500 and 1600 calories/day.  This is what's helped me drop the 28lbs you see over there in the sidebar.  Since it's working, I'm going to continue that.  On run days however, I'm going to cap my calorie intake between 1700 and 1800.  This way I'll be getting extra calories to help fuel my runs, but won't be over eating either.

It's interesting the choices I find myself making while I'm restricting calories.  I try to eat nutritionally dense foods, and I keep an eye on the nutrients that MFP tracks.  When I only have a certain number of calories to eat per day, I make choices based on how much of my calorie budget it's going to cost me.  Almost always if a food is too "expensive" and not a good value of calories vs. nutrients, the choice to avoid it is also a nutritionally sound choice.  For example, there's no way I'm going waste 240 of my allotted calories on a soda.  I mean that's nearly a 1/6th of my daily calories! For the same 240 calories I can eat 6 oz. of greek yogurt, a plum (yum!) and a slice of my favorite cheese.

I think the key to long term weight loss and management lies in listening to your body and learning what's truly hunger, what's thirst, and what's boredom.  I thought I was doing a good job at this, but I simply wasn't hungry during the days, and calories started to dwindle more into the 1300-1400 cal/day range.  I stopped losing weight until I forced myself to eat at least 1500 cal/day. 

Overall, I hope this plan continues my weight loss and allows me to push my runs as well.  I can hardly wait to lose more weight, because I know that every pound I shed is one less pound to carry with me on my runs.  And I can hardly wait to run, because it helps me shed those pounds!

That's the new plan.

Calorie Intake Question

I've been a little confused lately with my diet--specifically calories. Maybe some of you nutritionally-minded people out there can give me an answer, if you'd be so gracious as to help.

As mentioned before, I'm trying to lose weight. So far the pounds have melted off relatively easy. Serious calorie tracking and a little bit of exercise has been just the thing apparently.

However, as I extend my runs and increase my pace, each workout is expending more and more calories. A little exercise is turning into a little more exercise.

And that's where the confusion is coming in.

When I input my exercise into MyFitnessPal, it gives me a "net calories" number, subtracting my workout calories expended from my calorie intake.  Before, when it was a just a few hundred calories, I kind of just split the difference.  But these days my workouts are burning 600+ calories (and rising).  When added into the equation, if I meet my net calorie goal, then I'm eating a much larger number of calories than my raw goal.

For example--MFP wants me to eat 1840 cal/day.  But when I add in my workouts I have to eat 2440 cal/day to reach my net goal, (2440-600=1840).  That's a great deal of calories comparatively!

And it leaves me with a conundrum.  I don't want to eat so many calories I stop losing weight.  But I really don't want to eat so few calories that I stop losing weight.

Help?