How many calories do you eat?

[blaisealex]

How many calories a day do you eat?

How old are you and what is your height and weight?

I'm 25 with a BMI of 37 at 15st 7. I was consuming at a guess 3000+ a day.
Currently dieting with calorie counting and reducing intake.

I'm having around 1000 calories a day now but really, I'm wondering, once I get to a weight I'm happy with, how many calories I should then be having to maintain.

So it would be interesting to hear how many calories people have daily.

Today has been my first failure. Well, last night technically. I was up all night with DS who has croup. At 2am, I was so bloody starving, I venture downstairs for two freddo bars and some glugs of milk. And today, I'm bloody exhausted, I've consumed 120g bar of cadbury caramel, half a big bag of onion rings and two tortilla wraps, without any filling. That's probably between 1000 and 1200 in total and it's only half 2 in the afternoon! Now I feel full and gross and my stomach hurts.

don't be hard on yourself alex
fill your fridge with carrots (or other crunchy veg ir fruit) to snack of if you get the munchies.

@blaisealex these things happen. You have 2 choices now

1. make better choices tomorrow
2. keep eating like this and gain weight

You will have days in any diet where you eat loads of junk, where you're feeling blue and feel like you need to eat a whole giant chocolate bar, or where you go out for a special occasion, eat till you need to undo your top button and have a few too many drinks. The trick is to not do it every day and try to let it even out over the week.

You have 2 choices now

1) make better choices tomorrow
2) keep eating like this and gain weight

Totally agree with this. It’s so important to be able to say “this is a one off blip. It doesn’t have to totally detail my healthy eating plans. It is finished. I do not need to feel guilty. It is done now and I am eating healthily again”.

Everyone has these moments. The trick is not to let them totally blow you off course.

@blaisealex that lightbulb moment when you realise if you have a blip or a binge, or a day off, and then just get back on with it straight after without guilt and over restriction because you feel like you have to ‘make up for it’, is the day you will be more successful in your weight loss.

These things happen, being up all night with a poorly child will do that to you. Accept it.

However what I will say is that if you up your calories to something more reasonable than 1,000, then you might find that you are able to cope/function a bit better when these things happen.

@blaisealex

Today has been my first failure. Well, last night technically. I was up all night with DS who has croup. At 2am, I was so bloody starving, I venture downstairs for two freddo bars and some glugs of milk. And today, I'm bloody exhausted, I've consumed 120g bar of cadbury caramel, half a big bag of onion rings and two tortilla wraps, without any filling. That's probably between 1000 and 1200 in total and it's only half 2 in the afternoon! Now I feel full and gross and my stomach hurts.

Don't see it as a failure as you will just go forward with that mindset! Just dust yourself off and make better choices today, there is absolutely NO failure in your choices, it's just what you needed at that particular time.

I allow myself a weekly allowance rather than a daily allowance and therefore some days I can have 2,200 calories and others I have 1,500 but overall across the week I aim for a total of 1800 x 7 days. In that calorie count I have what I want and don't consider anything off the agenda or bad/naughty or other such terms. I try to make reasonable choices 70% of the time, but the rest of the time there are crisps, chocolate and icecream thrown in, because I like them and I am going to be at this for a fairly long time so would rather have things that make it sustainable, that I enjoy and that mean I can keep this up for a long time, firstly to lose the weight and secondly to keep it off.

Yesterday I had a real craving for some fruit pastilles and a choc bar at about 9.30pm! I had them, enjoyed them, logged them and moved on. I will have a few less calories today and across the rest of my week.

I will still lose weight, still be positive and not feel like I have ruined everything because I haven't, just like you haven't

No doubt someone will be along in a minute to pick apart everything I have said, but this way of losing weight works for me

Not a clue

[quote BasinHaircut]@blaisealex that lightbulb moment when you realise if you have a blip or a binge, or a day off, and then just get back on with it straight after without guilt and over restriction because you feel like you have to ‘make up for it’, is the day you will be more successful in your weight loss.

These things happen, being up all night with a poorly child will do that to you. Accept it.

However what I will say is that if you up your calories to something more reasonable than 1,000, then you might find that you are able to cope/function a bit better when these things happen.[/quote]
Agree with this....

1,000 is very very low and I am not sure how long anyone can sustain eating that few calories.

If I ate that for a month or two, I would binge like crazy the minute I started eating "normally" again and would probably put the weight back on.

@blaisealex

I've found that the best way to make sure I don't eat too much junk is to make sure it's not in the house or included in the shopping list, I learnt the hard way after eating a family pack of mini rolls in one sitting instead of spreading it out over the week! It's been very out of sight out of mind and when I do give in it's never worth it

Binge/ comfort eating is difficult because you will find someway to get it (i.e delivery) so you may need to look at finding different coping mechanisms or see if it's the low calorie limit that is making you go to food first, if so best to set your limit to maintenance of a healthy weight at your height even if its slower weight loss it will be easier to keep up and you wont have an end to your diet after you reach your goal so no reason to put it back on

I’m calorie counting to lose weight.

I’ve been eating 1800 a day for 6 months. Have lost 3 stone. Down to 13st now.

I will need to lower my calories eventually but I’m going to stay at 1800 until I start loosing less than 5 lbs a month.
I’m trying to do it in a consistent way that I can stick to!

I used to wonder why I was fat, ok maybe my diet wasn't perfect but was it that bad, I thought. After I started counting calories I realised I can easily eat 3000-4000 calories in a day, and not even consider that I've eaten much. I lost weight and am now have bmi of 25, so borderline overweight but good enough for me. To maintain I eat about 1500 cals, plus have one day a week without counting.

I'm still working it all out. I starting loosing weight in January and it's slow and steady for me. I haven't cut any food types out but instead I eat around 1400 calories, observe an 8 hour eating window and weigh my food.

I have lost a stone and because my diet doesn't involve special recipes, rules, replacement food, it's become my new normal.

I think my maintenance might be somewhere around 1600-800 calories. Am 5ft 5 and in my forties though.

I am 30s, weigh 11st at 5ft 7 and find that eating more than 16-1800 results in weight gain. I don't lose any unless I drop below 1400.

I can eat a bit more if I significantly up the exercise but get away with far less than I did 10 years ago when I weighed 9st 10.

Mine is all over the place. I’m 5 ft 3, and just under 8 stone last week when I weighed myself. I usually eat about 1600 calories a day but some days I’m in such a state of anxiety I can’t face eating anything at all, other days I’m ravenous and it’s waaay over 1600 calories. I know this isn’t a very healthy way to maintain my weight but it stays roughly the same

"I've found that the best way to make sure I don't eat too much junk is to make sure it's not in the house or included in the shopping list, I learnt the hard way after eating a family pack of mini rolls in one sitting instead of spreading it out over the week! It's been very out of sight out of mind and when I do give in it's never worth it."

THIS! I have no restraint - if it's in the house I'll eat it. So I choose not to have it in the house, or if I do, a very small amount.

If I had Freddos, Cadbury Caramel and onion rings in the house - they'd be in my tummy within minutes.

I just can't / don't buy that stuff without accepting that I'll eat it all. Crisps and chocolate are my downfall.

2000-2500 a day I reckon but I don’t count calories as a habit. In 5ft 3 and 8 st 5

I'm 57, 5 ft 5.5 in tall and weigh 14 stone 3 lbs. 3 years ago I was 20 stone 10 lbs but have managed to lose 6 and a half stone by eating 1700 calories a day. It's been a very slow process,sometimes I've only lost one pound in a month,but I like my food too much to go any lower. As long as the weight is coming off,I'll stick to 1700 calories. When it comes to the point where I lose nothing in a month, I know I'll have to cut down a bit more. I reckon at my heaviest,I was putting away somewhere in the region of 3000 - 3500 calories per day.