Not hungry. page

[noncommital]

I'm finding that I'm less hungry/have less desire to eat since I've started PB. Sometimes I make myself eat because I want to make sure I get enough protein/fat. Can you consume too few calories/protein/fat for weight loss on PB? I think if I went by my hunger and desire to eat, I'd eat twice a day, tops, and then not as much as I have been.

The other (typical) day I ate:

two eggs and 1 sausage patty (if I went by hunger I would skip breakfast)

a couple of glasses of whole milk (which I may end up eliminating because of digestive issues)

large romaine salad with some shredded carrot, homemade ranch and viniagrette dressings, shredded cheddar cheese, chicken breast fried in coconut oil

about 8 oz homemade full-fat yogurt with frozen raspberries

a small Granny Smith apple

half of a 10oz ribeye steak (I got full), medium, a small salad (like the above, about half the size and minus the chicken), and a medium baked potato with 4-6 tablespoons butter.

If I went with hunger and eliminated breakfast, and eliminated the milk due to digestive issues, that would take around 640 calories out of my daily eating and cut my fat/protein total for the day. Maybe I'm consuming more calories than I thought. I really don't want to have to do a lot of tracking (ie fitday), as one of the reasons I'm making the switch to PB is that you aren't supposed to need to count stuff, or at least that's the idea I got from reading Mark's blogs and the book (though it's been a while since I read the book, so maybe I'm remembering wrong)--it seems on the forums there are opposing views.

I'm 5'6" tall, weigh 157 lbs (haven't lost anything yet, not even "water weight"). Female. 41 years old. My exercise is walking at a relaxed pace for about an hour 4-5 times a week. How much fat and protein should I be consuming per day? If I can't get enough protein through meat/eggs/dairy, should I use protein powder?

[O_O]

That looks like a lot of food to me. Reduce your carbs if you want the initial water weight loss.

4-6 Tbsp of butter on a potato? I know fat is our friend but that seems excessive to me. I eat about 4 Tbsp of butter calories in a meal so I can't imagine how you can eat that much with a meal.

A 10 ounce steak is pretty big for a larger male. With your age/sex/fitness level you may be eating too much for weight loss.

I shoot for about 140g raw weight as a serving with veg and whatever amount of fat makes my meal work. I don't like it swimming in fat.

5' 2.5", 122 lbs, 46, female and an outdoor runner, walker and strength trng exercise most days of the week.

[LJH]

I wouldn't be hungry either, if I ate that much in one day!

[noncommital]

Thanks. Glad to hear I'm eating too much rather than not enough. That's easy enough to fix. I'll cut back on the butter and cut out breakfast (which I'm not hungry for anyway), and cut out the milk drinking and see where that gets me. I have to have a decent amount of carbs (the potato?) with fat or I get nauseous. I know milk has carbs too so that's the easiest thing to cut out.

Is 5 oz of steak and about 5 oz of chicken enough protein or should I supplement?

[O_O]

The milk has about 24g carbs for the two glasses. Why not try fautatoes (cauliflower mash) topped with some butter? You can get rid of some more carbs and cauliflower provides a good nutrition bang for its buck.

With a couple of eggs and a couple of 5 ounce portions that should be enough protein.

[O_O]

Another idea after baking the potato scoop out the meat and then fill with cauliflower mash. Top with some cheese and broil. The skin is where most of the nutrients are. The meat is mostly just starch.

[noncommital]

Cauliflower--blech! Can't deal with the smell; I've tried. I'd rather drop the potato altogether, and since I don't need as much fat as I thought, I'll just do that.

And for the record, it was only 5 oz of steak that I ate (half of a 10 oz.)

I was hoping I wouldn't have to drop fruit, and potatoes, and milk along with the grains sugar and legumes, but I guess I do. Oh well.

Thanks for your help!

[O_O]

It's okay to have fruit and potatoes. It was just a suggestion to reduce the overall carbs.

[NicoleP]

Cauliflower--blech! Can't deal with the smell; I've tried. I'd rather drop the potato altogether, and since I don't need as much fat as I thought, I'll just do that.

And for the record, it was only 5 oz of steak that I ate (half of a 10 oz.)

I was hoping I wouldn't have to drop fruit, and potatoes, and milk along with the grains sugar and legumes, but I guess I do. Oh well.

Thanks for your help!

I don't like Cauliflower as a sub for potatos either so I use Jicima. Just shred it up and cook in olive oil with sweet onions or chives. They are better than hashbrowns in my opinion.

[noncommital]

No, I totally get that, but reducing carbs is what I want. I thought dropping grain and sugar would be enough of a carb reduction (I consumed quite a bit), but it doesn't seem to be enough for weight loss. I'll try the milk this week (like you say that's 24 grams right there), and if that doesn't do the trick, with the overall calorie reduction of eliminating breakfast too, I'll move to other things. I'm just hoping I don't have to move to other things. I'll try to be more optimistic!