The True Definition of Calories i.e. "Why what you believe is extremist BS" page 15

[magnolia1973]

I think a slower metabolism has a lot of benefits as well.

Yeah- hey 1200 calories of good food is cheaper than 3000 or 4000. I do get 3 meals out of a pound of ground beef. And 3 meals out of a giant sirloin steak.

[BestBetter]

That is all designed with a sugar burning metabolism in mind. If you are fat adapted, you can eat much less without the sky falling or anything.

I am fat adapted, and it still sucks to have to eat long term in a deficit. Not only does it suck, but when it doesn't produce any visual changes, it's pretty much suffering for nothing.

One place that we Grokelles often go wrong is in serving out equal portions to ourselves and or male SOs. We don't need that much. Once you have lived on less (without falling skies) this becomes clear. Then more intuitive portion control becomes possible.

Intuitive portion control does not exist for me. As a child (and a girl, at that), I ate the same sized meals my father did. I need volume to feel full. This doesn't mean I'm not capable of eating amounts that are appropriate to me; in fact I regularly serve myself less food than I'd want if calories were of no consequence. I end up feeling resentful and still hungry.

[ELizabeth826]

As a child (and a girl, at that), I ate the same sized meals my father did. I need volume to feel full. This doesn't mean I'm not capable of eating amounts that are appropriate to me; in fact I regularly serve myself less food than I'd want if calories were of no consequence. I end up feeling resentful and still hungry.

+1 The terms "Doggie Bag" or "To Go Box" were not in my vocabulary growing up. I ate my full meal, and since I stopped order off the kids menu around age 4 or 5, that was a lot of food.

I still only take food home from a restaurant on rare occasions and only when I am purposely trying to eat less. I have been known to chow down on a 16oz prime rib plus two sides of veggies and not feel over full afterwards but rather, perfectly satisfied. It's awkward/hilarious/awesome to out eat your date half the time...

[Paleobird]

I am fat adapted, and it still sucks to have to eat long term in a deficit. Not only does it suck, but when it doesn't produce any visual changes, it's pretty much suffering for nothing.

Intuitive portion control does not exist for me. As a child (and a girl, at that), I ate the same sized meals my father did. I need volume to feel full. This doesn't mean I'm not capable of eating amounts that are appropriate to me; in fact I regularly serve myself less food than I'd want if calories were of no consequence. I end up feeling resentful and still hungry.

I didn't say it was fun. I did five months at 1000/day (all high quality primal calories) and lost the last stubborn 35 lbs. Yes. it sucked. But now it's done and I am not yo-yo ing at all.

Intuitive portion control for me was something I had to learn by making myself do it. It's a choice that becomes a habit.

One thing we have to get over is the idea that feeling hungry is somehow a pathology. It's just a notification from your body that it would be a good idea to start hunting now. I'm sure the Groks spent a great deal of their time experiencing hunger. It's normal and natural.

Given that our idea of hunting is a walk to the fridge door, it's not like ignoring hunger signals is going to hurt us any. Somehow the sensation of hunger often gets tied up with so many emotional overlays.

[Lawyerchick12]

Human beings are truly the most stubborn animals. That is true. Any animal in nature adapts to its surroundings to survive. We fight it with all of our might and pray that the surroundings adapt to us.

If 1,000 people read this thread and one comes away with a grasp of reality, then at least that saves one person from themselves. That makes it worth it to me. You're right though, we all claim to want the truth, but when the truth doesn't agree with our preconceived notions we tend to ignore it.

Thanks for the post as well Choco! Being too busy at the office to read most of the comments, but from the volume of replies I see, you started a live one here

[magnolia1973]

I didn't say it was fun. I did five months at 1000/day (all high quality primal calories) and lost the last stubborn 35 lbs. Yes. it sucked. But now it's done and I am not yo-yo ing at all.

That's positive.... can you eat more now and maintain?

[camel]

That is what makes me want to crack you upside the head.


I weigh and measure foods. I get out the fucking tablespoon for my creamer. I measure the butter. I weigh the chicken. I track everything in Live Strong, even the 1/4 cup of measured blueberries and the 10 stalks of asparagus that go under my two LARGE eggs (tracked as large). I'm not alone.... as evidenced here.

I think one thing that maybe not all people have had to deal with is that some of us have been dieting since really young ages. Choco, I've been counting calories since I was 12. Journaling and measuring my food intake in hopes of losing weight. I guess you can call it yoyo dieting. I'd be interested to know the number of people who have had good success eating primal that have tried and failed more than 10 times on other diets. I'm willing to bet that about a third of women have tried to diet 10 or more times with very low caloric intakes.

I know I have read articles about how repetitive dieting- gaining and losing fat can make weightloss that much harder.

I guess for me, I don't know if it is worth it to lose more weight. For sure, I'll stay primal for life. But really at what point do you just say fuck it and eat like a normal (healthy, whole food eating) primal person and walk away from trying to eliminate one more otherwise healthy item that *might* be the silver bullet? And are we (meaning people who really restrict calories even on primal) just setting ourselves up to struggle more down the road?

That attitude- "Oh, you are just eating 2000 calories and added wrong" is what is frustrating. No, there is something else at play, but I have no clue what- because I feel great and am otherwise healthy. Just carry around excess fat.

+1 my thoughts exactly. Gosh do I ever know how to count calories! I've been on a diet since I was 10! There is something else going on for a lot of women, I think, judging from some of the replies to this thread.

[cori93437]

I didn't say it was fun. I did five months at 1000/day (all high quality primal calories) and lost the last stubborn 35 lbs. Yes. it sucked. But now it's done and I am not yo-yo ing at all.

Intuitive portion control for me was something I had to learn by making myself do it. It's a choice that becomes a habit.

One thing we have to get over is the idea that feeling hungry is somehow a pathology. It's just a notification from your body that it would be a good idea to start hunting now. I'm sure the Groks spent a great deal of their time experiencing hunger. It's normal and natural.

Given that our idea of hunting is a walk to the fridge door, it's not like ignoring hunger signals is going to hurt us any. Somehow the sensation of hunger often gets tied up with so many emotional overlays.

I think my issue with this, yes calories matter... but how sustainable is it to keep cutting them?
I have much more than the 'last stubborn 35lbs' to lose.
So when I stop losing weight completely at 1000-1200, then what? 800-900... stop losing again and go down further... 750?
I'm 5'9" not 5'... that really doesn't sound healthy at all.

How low can I go an not jack my already messed up metabolism up so badly that after losing the weight if I try and eat a normal maintenance amount of say 1200 cal a day... that I have real problems GAINing at that number?

Being hungry isn't an issue for me... which is a whole other issue. I know people who have said that they envy that I'm never hungry. But living with constant nausea so that chewing and eating is often repulsive is no fun at all. Most days I only manage to maintain 1200 cal by having caloric liquids...

[Paleobird]

That's positive.... can you eat more now and maintain?

Yes. Maintenance for me is about 1500 (what all the charts say would be blisteringly fast weight loss territory). Ignore all the charts and find your own numbers. I take a medication for epilepsy and a post-cancer drug that may be factors in why my metabolic rate is slower. "The charts" don't take things like that into consideration.

I counted for a while but have now moved to just "eyeball" portion control. So, counting doesn't have to mean shacking yourself to the food scale forever.

I totally agree with camel and magnolia that it is frustrating to have someone who has never needed to count calories tell you that you are "underreporting" your calories.

[camel]

I agree. The thing is Magnolia is not unique in her frustration; this is the plight of many people (most of them women) who are accurately reporting their calories. Even though I don't have much fat to lose, and I'm in a 'normal' range, I still have flab where it doesn't belong, and no matter what I do with the calorie games and heavy lifting, it will not budge. Like Magnolia, I track meticulously - I mentioned not even tasting food while cooking, but I have also weighed EVERYTHING to the gram on my scale - even sprigs of rosemary, which is really ridiculous. I cooked all my food without oil in the Forman grill, I went to lengths to accurately measure that probably bordered on OCD. Even if Fitday is off a bit, it wouldn't account for the lack of results I saw.

Sure, I'd bet a million dollars I have some devious hormonal highjacking behind the scenes type nonsense going on, but every blood test I've taken to figure out what comes back normal. You can write me off and say that I and Magnolia are some kind of outliers, but then there's another woman and another with the same story, who aren't underreporting, and after a while it's obvious that we're not outliers. We're probably the norm.
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Amen, sister!