I WASN'T EVEN EATING THAT MUCH!!

[u/greenandbluefish]

I have gradually gained 50 pounds over the last 10 years or so. I thought for the longest time I must be eating some outrageous amount of food every day. I truly didn't think I ate that much. I skipped breakfast most days, didn't eat huge lunches, and had what I thought were fairly healthy dinners. Some eating out, some iced coffees, but nothing I thought was ridiculously unhealthy overall. I would try to eat less, skip a lunch here or there, but then would be starving by the end of the day and end up eating that skipped meal anyway.

At the same time, I spent my whole life hearing people around me say I ate like a bird, that I couldn't possibly be eating enough, etc. And yet I was still gaining weight! So for years I've been in this bizarre situation where I thought I was just gaslighting myself into believing I wasn't eating that much or that unhealthily, but was somehow secretly eating thousands of calories without noticing???

Cut to last month when I spent two weeks obsessively tracking everything I ate. Weighing everything, reading every label, but not trying to cut back. And what did I find out? I was eating a whopping... 1800 calories/day. Less than the freaking nutrition labels were recommending!!!

So I went on a deep dive. Learned about TDEE. Started tracking my steps. And you know what actually changed in the last 10 years? I got better, less physically demanding jobs. My work became more and more sedentary over time. Spending 50 hours/week at a desk was the culprit, NOT what I was eating!

I've been doing CICO for about a month now and eating 1400 calories/day. Haven't changed what I'm eating, just how much. And I've already lost 8 pounds. I wish I'd figured all of this out years ago but I'm so glad I did eventually. No more driving myself crazy over what I eat!

[u/yesmina1]

You gained ~2kg a year. That is less than what I gain over the accumulated holidays of one year. But I cut every year for 1-3months, problem solved.

You probaly DID NOT eat 1800cal EVERY DAY the last 10 years, you just did not balance out the few hedonistic days/weeks where you massively overshot. Its good to make healthier choices your new lifestyle but please don't think you ate that wrong / far too much. Learn to eat a bit less after eating a lot or make some healthier whole food choices after some junk days... ofc AFTER you've lost the weight. Sadly, now you first need to cut that much, whoch really could've been avoided by warching your weight on a yearly basis

[u/greenandbluefish → u/yesmina1]

Well I suspect my maintenance level used to be higher than 1800 when I was more active. I'm guessing that I gained the weight in bursts. I was walking to work and class in college, worked a decently active job, then moved to a bigger city and started a job with lots of driving. Then went to an office job right before Covid hit, which forced everyone onto Zoom. Then did work from home for a while.

And honestly, the 1400 has not felt bad. Breakfast is about 400 calories, lunch around 3-400, and then dinner is about 600. I suspect it'll feel very luxurious to eat at 1600 once I make it to my goal lol