Posts by brianadragon

I thought you were supposed to judge your activity level NOT counting exercise. I have a desk job and don't move from my desk too much during work hours, so I picked sedentary, because it seemed true. I figured exercise counter toward my needed deficit. I mostly work at a computer and watch TV, all the other stuff is added to try to burn off the weight, so I thought I picked correctly.

If I up it another level or two, it'll tell me to eat more, and I have a hard enough time eating 1200 calories in a day. I can't imagine eating much more. Even on a day when I splurge I'm lucky to hit 1500. I can't stand to eat that way, I'd be throwing up if I tried to consume that much!  (Or I'd be on the sofa crying from stomach pain.)

The question still stands though. If I'm supposedly not eating enough and I'm working out and burning calories, how can I possibly keep gaining weight? And won't shoving food into my body that I don't want just pack on even more pounds? I can't exercise if I'm bloated and in pain from too much eating.

I almost forgot the stuff everyone is going to ask...
5'1", 148.2, 34 y/o, female, sedentary calories are 1599/day, mixing up stationary bike, weights, walking, dancing. Will NOT go vegetarian, but eating a lot less meat & fat. other changes stated above.

Plugging along and praying to lose is not really an option, I need this weight off and back to at least a healthy weight of 130, though my ideal goal is 120-125, goal date 10/28/2011.

I'm going by what CC is telling me after I put in all my information. And 1200 is a lot more than I was eating before I started here. They say I need 1599 to live, and to lose it gave me 1200, so I'm going with it. It does feel like not enough, but I'm gaining weight, so I kinda wondered if it's too much.

I'm 5'1.5", currently 149 (cringes) 34, with a desk job (typing, graphic design, work from home). I exercise 30-60 mins a day now, sometimes more when my body will allow. I just put in my info and figured CC knew what they were talking about when they gave me that number.

Like I said, that can work for some of it, but what about home-made broth? How does one account for the end result of boiling 1 neck, 2 wings and a thigh with a bunch of herbs, then straining, cooling, scraping the fat...?

We also use a few tablespoons of homemade barbecue sauce in it, and I don't even know if hubby could log the amounts he uses for that.

I also didn't weigh the ingredients initially, nor did I measure most of the stuff that went in, I just eyeball it.

And that still leaves the marinade issue.

In the future I can be a lot more aware of measuring and such, annoying as it is, but what do I do for now? I want to eat that soup, but there isn't even anything like it on the market that I can guesstimate from.

Sorry to be difficult or anything, but I'm just starting with all this logging, and it's driving me up the wall because I keep running up on things I can't figure out. I've always made and stored food ahead as it saves us money, so now I have all this stuff and no bloody clue how to log it!

Thank you for your patience, and hopefully answers!

I'm so glad to have found this thread! I just made my super-fave Chipotle Chicken Salad, and had no idea 1 serving was 628 calories! I'm up for 7 more hours and I was starting to freak over being hungry for that long.

Nice to know I'll be okay and I can still eat a little something. Lesson learned too! Next time I make that meal I'll make a much smaller portion so I can get the enjoyment without the massive calorie hit.

Thank you all for the support. At least some of you understand how I'm feeling. I guess posting on the motivation forum really was a good idea. I'm still not happy, but I feel now like it's worth sticking with the plan, and that there is hope, thanks to you folks.

It actually hurts a lot that someone said I might need mental help. Doesn't every woman want to look good? I understand that there are some people who are big and happy, and that's great for them, but I'm not like that. I will never be happy at this size and I don't see that as a mental issue. I want to be healthy, of course, but how can I ever be healthy if I'm constantly depressed because I'm fat? I've lost all my muscle and it's pure flab, so it's really gross. If I was 130-135 and it was mostly muscle, then I wouldn't mind not being thin, but this is pure nasty flabbiness, and I think it's perfectly reasonable to want to have a better figure. I will admit that being willing to starve myself for it wasn't the healthiest or wisest thing, but desperate people do desperate things.

Overall, I do want to say thank you for the information and the help. I'll stick with it. I'm going to weigh myself every 3 days to keep myself from obsessing, and hopefully Wednesday's weigh-in will show progress. If any of you pray, feel free to pray that I don't go up anymore, because I don't know if I could handle it. I'm going to do my best to make sure that number comes up lower next time, and I promise not to starve to do it.

BTW, there's something that's puzzling me... I always thought that in order to lose weight you had to eat less calories. I have been doing my utmost to keep my foods to less than 1000 calories a day, averaging about 800-900 a day and I still don't lose weight. According to this site, I should eat 1200 calories a day to reach my goal. That sounds like it would cause me to gain weight if I eat more.

I was reading around the site and saw information about "starvation mode". Have I really been causing my weight gain by not eating enough? If it's true, I guess it would explain why all my past diets usually ended in me weighing more.

Should I really eat more than I have been? Does this mean I have to exercise a lot more? I'm currently doing stationary biking for 20 mins in the AM and 20 mins in the PM, every single day since I started on Tuesday. Should I do more? I'm pretty out of shape and weak, I don't want to end up in pain that might make me quit.