To think you need to go hungry on a diet?

[username30473]

I didn't want to use the word diet it was just for the title. The last couple of years my diet has been appalling to say the least. I have always been a size 10 but now a size 12 touching 14. From the way I have eaten I actually think I could be a lot larger.
Anyway I am now trying to change my diet back to what it used to be and lose weight.

I actually started on Boxing Day so I am a week in and I am hungry all the time. I am not massively restricting myself either. Yesterday I have had yogurt/fruit for breakfast, beans and scrambled eggs on toast for lunch, fruit for afternoon snack and steak and chips for dinner with a couple of Jaffa cakes for dessert. I just think I am so use to eating so much now I just have to get use to be hungry until my body gets use to less food again.

Do others find this to be the case?

@EightWheelGirl I don't know buy it. We don't have trough a packet of biscuits after dinner because we're hungry, we do it because we fancy it. Not eating them wouldnt leave us with hunger pangs.

I'm very overweight, but even I can tell the difference between hunger pangs and wanting to eat unnecessarily. I fail, however, because I have no willpower.

I'm back on Slimming World (I know MN hates it, but I don't eat the yoghurts, try to cheat on portions by eating entire 5kg bags of potatoes made into chips etc) and with three decent meals a day, I can honestly say that I NEVER feel hungry. Never.

Proper portions, lots of veg, lots of lean protein, plenty of fruit, lots of water and so on - it is a fact that these things fill you up.

Threads about calories always make me realise how small many MNers must be. Don't take other people's 1200 kcal allowance too literally without doing your own BMR / TDEE calculator. I am 6' and my BMR if I didn't even get out of bed is just over 1500 kcal.

I lost three stone low carbing, and have kept it off for nearly three years now. I am never hungry - which is why it works for me, tbh, as due to childhood trauma I really can't cope with hunger.

On a low-carb WOE (way of eating - because to keep the weight off it needs to be a lifestyle change) you eat high fat instead, which is satiating, you feel full, and also really tasty, so you don't feel deprived.

There's a low-carb Bootcamp starting on 17th January if you want to join us.

There is a massive difference between hunger and satiety. It is very difficult for anyone who does not live in poverty to feel hungry. It, however, perfectly normal and heathy to not feel satiated, i.e. to not eat to that point where you feel full up but to stop short of that point. That's what I've had to learn. I crave satiety because I eat to satisfy emotional needs or out of boredom or as a reward or as a punishment. My biological need for food as fuel us much less than my emotional need for food. I've learnt to weigh myself daily, and not to miss those days when I know I've lost control of my appetite. I've learnt that I value being a normal weight so much that I just cannot go into binging on food. Christmas is very tough for me. Today is my second day of clawing back control. I've put on half a stone in a week! The other things I've learnt are dieting does not work. Eating normally is the answer- I spent a long time observing how slim people eat, what size portions etc and emulated that. And I've learnt, thankfully, I feel better as soon as I take back control and before any weight loss starts happening. And that's because I have chosen consciously to love myself and stop self harming with food.

I also echo what others have said about carbs- I've naturally found that I really don't want them when I'm slim, I want protein and vitamin rich food, I am lucky in that I genuinely love fruit and veg and make sure I have lots of them in the house.

You actually stop wanting to 'waste' your hunger by eating crap- you want more and more to nourish your body with real food. You can eat so much more actual food for the same calorific value as a small choc bar, for example.

@username30473

I didn't want to use the word diet it was just for the title. The last couple of years my diet has been appalling to say the least. I have always been a size 10 but now a size 12 touching 14. From the way I have eaten I actually think I could be a lot larger. Anyway I am now trying to change my diet back to what it used to be and lose weight.

I actually started on Boxing Day so I am a week in and I am hungry all the time. I am not massively restricting myself either. Yesterday I have had yogurt/fruit for breakfast, beans and scrambled eggs on toast for lunch, fruit for afternoon snack and steak and chips for dinner with a couple of Jaffa cakes for dessert. I just think I am so use to eating so much now I just have to get use to be hungry until my body gets use to less food again.

Do others find this to be the case?

I wouldn't eat chips or Jaffa cakes as a daily meal. Maybe as a once a week treat. That's probably 1000 calories a day right there.

A Jaffa cake is 46 calories, so two would be 92.

One ‘serving’ of oven chips is about 200 cals, so even if you had two servings, you’d still only be at about 500 cals for those bits.

One ‘serving’ of oven chips is about 200 cals

But one 'serving' of oven chips is about 9 chips. The amount that most people would normally expect as a portion would be about 3 times that. 'Serving' sizes are meaningless as they bear no relationship to the typical amount people eat.

This is 100g of cooked McCain oven chips, they are 208 calories. That is a decent amount of chips and definitely more than "about 9 chips". Even twice this amount would only be 416 calories and these are the standard chips, they also do a lighter range where you can have your 100g for 181 calories.

The photo is not mine, its from a calorie counting blog.

@BuanoKubiamVej

One ‘serving’ of oven chips is about 200 cals

But one 'serving' of oven chips is about 9 chips. The amount that most people would normally expect as a portion would be about 3 times that. 'Serving' sizes are meaningless as they bear no relationship to the typical amount people eat.

This is partly an unfortunate consequence of the traffic-light labelling on food packaging. Retailers have simply made the suggested portion size smaller to make the numbers look better. I saw a TikTok the other day where someone had noticed that the nutritional info on some Sainsbury's pies was based on one pie, the size of a standard mince pie, serving four people.

"Agree with this. I'm only hungry mid morning if I have breakfast. If I don't, I'm fine until 1pm (and sometimes fast until dinner). If I get into breakfast habits, I'm hungry all the time.
I'll be doing 16:8 mostly. "

I also do 16/8 during the week, but it's not a magic bullet that gets rid of hunger. Yes, you won't be hungry outside your 16-hour window because you're not used to eating at that time, but you can still get into the habit of snacking within the window and then your stomach gets used to eating at that time. I get it at 4-5.

People seem to think that calorie counting means titchy little portions when that's really not the case, once you start actually measuring it out they are surprisingly bigger than what you expected.

I'm trying to lose some weight now, about 10lbs or so, and I've dropped back to 1600 calories a day instead of my maintenance allowance of 1900-2000. I also do around 500 calories a day of walking (roughly 12000 steps) that I can add on if needed. There are days where I struggle to fill the 1600-1700 despite eating proper meals, it'll get to early evening and I'll still have 500+ left, not even including my additional calories from my steps. I usually get a snack because I need 1200 a day as my minimum, any lower and I start to feel like shit and my mental health deteriorates too.

Yesterday I had:

Breakfast - blueberry wheats and semi skimmed milk plus a banana (310 calories)

Lunch - ham sandwich, Pringles, and a Viscount (480 calories)

Dinner - homemade sweet potato soup and a wholemeal roll (454 calories)

Snacks - a brandy snap with squirty cream (88 calories)
Two After Eights (74 calories)

Total of 1406.

I also did 497 calories of steps and felt a bit peckish once the DC were in bed so had a small serving of pate (61 calories, it's the low fat one) some melba toast (76 calories for one sleeve which is around 5 slices), and 50g of redcurrants (35 calories).

Final total of 1578.

Final total of

I’ve always struggled but have lost just over 4st with intermittent fasting.

Nope, YABU.
I lost around a stone on the keto diet last year, and not once was I hungry.

@username30473

I didn't want to use the word diet it was just for the title. The last couple of years my diet has been appalling to say the least. I have always been a size 10 but now a size 12 touching 14. From the way I have eaten I actually think I could be a lot larger. Anyway I am now trying to change my diet back to what it used to be and lose weight.

I actually started on Boxing Day so I am a week in and I am hungry all the time. I am not massively restricting myself either. Yesterday I have had yogurt/fruit for breakfast, beans and scrambled eggs on toast for lunch, fruit for afternoon snack and steak and chips for dinner with a couple of Jaffa cakes for dessert. I just think I am so use to eating so much now I just have to get use to be hungry until my body gets use to less food again.

Do others find this to be the case?

Sounds like a fair bit of food to me. The problem is when you reduce your food your stomach needs to shrink, which is will in time. As it adjusts you will stop feeling hungry so often after eating. Increase your water intake, make sure you drink water before each meal. I have done IF to lose weight and it works well. It's mind over matter. We get into a habit of eating certain foods at certain times. The feeling of hunger passes if you distract yourself and drink some water. Most of the time it's your body craving sugar or your thirsty.

@Blossomtoes

That’s a diet? What on earth do you eat normally? Chips, toast, Jaffa Cakes all need to go.

I agree, eating food like this you're bound to be hungry, calorie rich but not filling. Perhaps try veg soup, more fruit/veg, definitely drop the chips and biscuits. I'm dieting at the moment and eating lean protein including eggs, and limited quantities of lower GI carbs such as oats, brown basmati and new potatoes

@BarkminsterBlue

Threads about calories always make me realise how small many MNers must be. Don't take other people's 1200 kcal allowance too literally without doing your own BMR / TDEE calculator. I am 6' and my BMR if I didn't even get out of bed is just over 1500 kcal.

True, my daughter is 5'10" and when she's dieting she eats more than my normal intake at 5'6". She loses weight very quickly too

Have salad with your meals. Replace meat with beans/pulses. Eat less meat/cheese/eggs. Try the Mediterranean diet. You'll lose weight slowly but you won't feel hungry. Eat pasta and wholegrains rather than normal bread and lots of potatoes.

I think you need to feel hunger at the start as you adjust to less food.

Snacking is my huge problem. I have stopped eating after my evening meal. I wake up starving! Ready for a healthy breakfast.

You can eat way more than you can and still be in calorie deficit which would help you feel fuller got longer. I have 2 turkey sausages, egg omelette (1 whole egg plus 2 whites), roasted tomatoes and a slice of toast for breakfast, lunch is jacket potato beans, a little cheese and lots of salad, dinner turkey mince stir fry with loads of veg and spices and soya sauce etc for flavour, snacks high protein Greek yogurt with frozen berries and rice cakes with jam & Greek yogurt (pretend it’s a scone!). That’s 1200 calories . I’m just doing this to lose half stone then will up to 1800 calories. You need to be smarter about what you eat. If you just have smaller portions of things like steak and chips you’ll be hungry and still have same calories

@DogCatBoysAndMe good luck! I’ve got about three stone to shift too. Seems very daunting but I’m not feeling well with it now.

I lost nearly 4 stone on Slimmimg World and have kept it off for over two years. I always put on a few pounds over Christmas, Holidays etc but I know I can lose the weight again which helps me enjoy the treats I have. I also have a diet of low carbs, but I can't live without bread so have WW wraps, WW bread. I go to excerise classes and use weights, dog walks. I used to blame my weight gain on having my children but couldn't use that excuse when my youngest turns 6.
For me it was a life time change, not a quick fix and I feel better for it. I am nearly 50 and have to work hard to keep my weight down not like when I was alot younger and always stayed the same what ever I had eaten/drunk.
I have one take-away a week plus a few gins and it keeps me focus in the week knowing I can look forward to having a treat one day over the weekend.

Totally agree! I used to eat so much less and not feel hungry but stress eating and steady weight gain of 2 and a half stone, plus a baby and breastfeeding still going on, has led to feeling hungry all the time!

I've had to retrain myself to feel genuine hunger and not panic hunger. It's easier now I'm a few weeks in. Down from 12s10 to 11s12 so far. End goal is 10s5 which will be slim size 10/12 for me at 5ft 4 and quite athletic/curvy frame. Just need to keep the momentum!

Good luck to you OP

You shouldn't feel hungry or as if you're going without. I'm on 1750 cals a day (to lose weight) I count my macros (fat, carbs, protein) and do regular exercise. Today I've had:
Breakfast - porridge with a teaspoon of jam
Snack - bagel thin with chicken sausages
Lunch - lentil soup
Snack - chicken and chickpea stew, mini twix
Tea - chicken breast, new potatoes, bubble and squeak bites and a chocolate protein pudding

This is combined with a PT session and 10k steps. I do measure my portions and keep a food diary which my PT checks. A healthy lifestyle should be about keeping you energised and feeling well, not feeling hungry and tired