To eat just 1200 calories a day...

[lostmyslippers]

I really really need to shift my flab!! Nothing fits me :-((
How many calories do you eat per day and what do you eat? I am trying to walk a bit more too as I hate the gym and never stick to it anyway. So I am trying to curb the calories...

What worries me more though that such a reliance on meat is just not healthy especially given the evidence that meat contains cancerous elements especially bacon.

I’ve been veggie for 28 years.

I still manage to low carb. It’s by far the healthiest diet for me.

And it’s brillibt not needing bread or milk when snowed in!

Apple cider vinegar isn't magic. But no doubt so disgusting that it will put you off food for hours. I suppose it could work.

At 5ft3 I generally get between 1200 and 1400 a day, but if I want to lose weight I need to stick around 800 (partly due to my underactive thyroid) I'm currently 9stone 11lbs, size 10- 12, but I have been 13stone.

People eat far to much meat in one sitting

A chicken curry will contain as much as one chicken breast per person, whereAs really the portion should be one chicken breast for 3/4 people.

It’s nit the eating of meat but the large quantities of meat people think is ‘normal’ in a portion

Thanks @Lanclain and @SkiGirl007 I will look into those recommendations!

At the end of the day, different things work for different people.

Skipping breakfast wouldn't work for me. Neither would 5:2, 16:8 or whatever.

Instead I lower carb. This means eating little bread, rice and pasta and replacing these with potatoes (sweet pots as well), lentils, chickpeas and squashes like butternut squash etc. Along with loads of veg and protein.

A 100 calorie baked potato fills me up far more than 100 cals worth of pasta.

You have to find what works for you, and avoid what doesn't.

FWIW I only eat meat usually once a day at dinner, lunches are usually soups and salads.

You might be able to stick to this if you eat mostly certain foods:

Lots (way more than you are probably used to) of green vegetables, some oils, some protein incl plain yogurt, pulses (these incl protein), some fruit, some nuts, a little very dark chocolate. Avoid diet drinks, avoid sugar as these can make you feel hungry. Avoid too much caffeine.

Breakfast - its all very well skipping it but I think research shows that slimmer people don't!

If you skip it you may then go and have latte and a cupcake sort of food later but if you are sure you won't then go ahead.

I’ve been trying to lose weight but I love my carbs. However I do eat mostly proper food. Like a few others I don’t strictly calorie count but aim for roughly 300 for breakfast, 350 for lunch & 450 for tea plus 200-250 for snacks.

Breakfast is either scrambled egg or beans on toast (no butter & around 2 tablespoons of beans)

Lunch is either a chicken salad bap or jacket potato & beans or occasionally a fish finger sandwich) again no butter as I don’t actually like it.

Tea is something like grilled chicken or baked fish with potatoes & veg or fish cakes with potatoes & peas/salad or lobby & a bread roll (I don’t like pasta or rice or quinoa but dd & do do so I sometimes substitute that.

Desserts are fruit (I don’t like yoghurt) or once a week a m & s shapers dessert.

Snacks (morning & afternoon are either a banana, couple of biscuits, mini chocolate muffin etc).

I drink water & tea & switched from skimmed to semi skimmed milk.

I would not make it to lunchtime without breakfast.

However once a week we have takeaway night & I have fish & chips.

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/nov/28/breakfast-health-america-kellog-food-lifestyle

I've lost just over 4 stone eating 1200 calories a day. It's not that hard IF you cut out naughty snacks and booze.

B: 300 Cals
L: 350 cals
D: 450 cals
S: 100 cals.

Breakfast means breaking the fast, there isn’t a rule to say you have to do this within an hour of waking...

I don’t have breakfast until 10.00 or 10.30

Just a simple breakfast of winter berries and a dessert spoon of Greek yogurt
But a couple of tablespoon of soaked oats and banana, or an egg boiled and chopped with tomato would be an alternative

Keeps the body ticking over until lunch around 1.30 - 2pm

Then dinner around 6.30

Well I lost weight but I'm definitely more unhealthy now! I'm a single mum working full time. My job is busy so I don't get time to eat lunch. Maybe once a week I'll get time. No breakfast as I'm not hungry until around 10/11 by which time I'm obviously at work. Then I my son has tea at nursery so I pick him up, get him home play for a bit, bath and bed and by the time I've made his pack up for the next day and done all the jobs I need to do I don't sit down til 9 which is too late for dinner. So I just snack when I can through the day. A mix of healthy and unhealthy food. I try and eat well on the weekends but do get called into work sometimes like yesterday I had to do a 17 hour shift.

I do 1200 when I’m losing weight. I find it much easier to accept being hungrier but for a shorter period of time. I have a small cup of oats soaked in apple juice, plenty of fruit but of low fat natural yoghurt at around 11. Loads of black tea/herbal tea/water. Vegetable/lentil soup for lunch. Fish/eggs with salad/veg for tea (no fruit in the evening). Meat on Sunday only. I can only do this for about a month and do it every couple of years to shift the inevitable spread!

I also follow BSD, not diabetic but seriously overweight and research shows (contrary to belief) that people who lose faster are more likely to stick with it(see results fast=motivating)
It’s actually very easy, because you are allowed full fat cheese, natural yogurts, oils and full fat milk, it helps you feel fuller for longer.

It isn’t specified as low carb but it is because you are not eating bread/grains, starchy veg etc, all my carbs come from veg, fish, meat and dairy.

I also do 16:8 as most days I would forget to eat bf till about 11 anyway, so I’ve just extended that to 12/1pm and drink plenty of water and stop eating around 7/8pm, it’s meant I’m in ketosis pretty much constantly since I started. I’ve been on this way of eating since veg of Feb and lost 18lbs so far, 6.2% of my bodyweight.

I do think it is sustainable long term, there are plenty of people that follow this woe and don’t eat breads etc anymore, I plan to stick to that until I’m at a healthy weight but instead of going back to old ways, have a piece of bread or a bowl of pasta but maybe once a week instead of every day a salad I was before I started.

You need to go onto a calculator and work it out properly. I am on a 1200 restriction and I'm finding it ok :)

Oh I have found my people :) I get so tired of people telling me I should eat more, but I eat the right amount for ME. Five years ago I went on 1200 cal diet, l lost 7.5 stone but when my weight gets more than four or five pounds over target I rein back again, but now to 1000.

My daily allowance is 1000 5 days a week, the other two days I will eat up 1500 and log everything with Fitbit. I know that if I eat more than 1200 I will gain and I don't want a slippery slope where I suddenly find myself obese again. I do not exercise because of a disability so therefore my activity levels are classed as sedentary. This is a selection of my daily consumption, I eat complex carbs, healthy fats and plant protein. The protein levels are entirely correct for my lifestyle. My BMI is 23.

73% from carbs, 11% from fat and 16% from protein
65% from carbs, 20% from fat and 15% from protein
66% from carbs, 22% from fat and 12% from protein
62% from carbs, 23% from fat and 15% from protein
66% from carbs, 14% from fat and 20% from protein

My daily food usually looks something like this.

B - small green smoothie @ 10am
B - overnight oats @ 11am
L - homemade soup @ 3pm
D - Vegan lasagne, loads of veg @ 6pm

I don't eat between 6pm and 10am so I do 16:8 and find this works for me, yet when I was overweight I was eating the minute I got up!

If 1200 works for you go for it, it does suit a lot of us.