Diet Fatigue Study & Support

[Elastigirl]

3 hours ago, Harriet said:

Hmmm. For a few days after returning to maintenance I was super hungry and going well over (3000 instead of 2300) and now I am having trouble eating enough to hit the 2300, even including higher calorie foods. I am also really sick of protein and vegetables (not that I ever liked having a lot of vegetables) Not sure why or how to approach this. I guess my appetite will come back soon, but does it matter if I eat low protein for a while? Maybe I just need to think about how to make protein and veg more palatable. But it's work. It's a lot more work and care than just eating pasta. Especially without whey powder (avoiding cow milk for my skin's sake. Still eating sheep milk and yoghurt).

I think when you are eating at maintenance, it's less critical that you eat high protein.  Before refrigeration, people would eat protein when they had it, and other times less. Also, maybe try hitting a high protein for one meal (30-50 grams) and then maybe not worrying about it as much for other meals. Do you swap your protein types? I know I ate so much chicken when I was in a deficit, that I was really tired of it. Now I've added back in some fattier meats, and I like that. 

[Elastigirl]

4 hours ago, Harriet said:

Hmmm. For a few days after returning to maintenance I was super hungry and going well over (3000 instead of 2300) and now I am having trouble eating enough to hit the 2300, even including higher calorie foods. I am also really sick of protein and vegetables (not that I ever liked having a lot of vegetables) Not sure why or how to approach this. I guess my appetite will come back soon, but does it matter if I eat low protein for a while? Maybe I just need to think about how to make protein and veg more palatable. But it's work. It's a lot more work and care than just eating pasta. Especially without whey powder (avoiding cow milk for my skin's sake. Still eating sheep milk and yoghurt).

Pondering more while I was in the shower.?

Being in deficit requires you to have it really dialed in, and more focus.  Then , we have this tendency in maintenance to swing the way other way, and having no control. It seems like the goal of maintenance, should be to still have some control, but giving ourselves a bit more freedom. To try and live up to the " ideal" diet all the time  is really tough, and most of us don't. So, we need to find the line, where we still fuel our bodies well, but we ourselves give ourselves more freedom to say  things like today is a higher carb day because I want it, or that's what in the house. It's a skill that we just need to practice, and try different things until we find a good balance.

[Harriet]

17 hours ago, Elastigirl said:

I think when you are eating at maintenance, it's less critical that you eat high protein.  Before refrigeration, people would eat protein when they had it, and other times less. Also, maybe try hitting a high protein for one meal (30-50 grams) and then maybe not worrying about it as much for other meals. Do you swap your protein types? I know I ate so much chicken when I was in a deficit, that I was really tired of it. Now I've added back in some fattier meats, and I like that. 

 

Yeah I wouldn't mind some chicken legs maybe? And what did people do when they didn't have chicken every day? Our ancestors must have been pitiful weaklings who were terrible at bodybuilding ?

 

16 hours ago, Elastigirl said:

Pondering more while I was in the shower.?

Being in deficit requires you to have it really dialed in, and more focus.  Then , we have this tendency in maintenance to swing the way other way, and having no control. It seems like the goal of maintenance, should be to still have some control, but giving ourselves a bit more freedom. To try and live up to the " ideal" diet all the time  is really tough, and most of us don't. So, we need to find the line, where we still fuel our bodies well, but we ourselves give ourselves more freedom to say  things like today is a higher carb day because I want it, or that's what in the house. It's a skill that we just need to practice, and try different things until we find a good balance.

 

Thanks. Yeah. I think I'm also feeling the backlash of six years of trying to eat super healthy and not seeing any of the promised benefits. I guess I'm trying out eating more liberally from different types of foods, and hopefully I'll settle back into a balance of mostly fresh foods with some junk but not too much 

[Elastigirl]

2 hours ago, Harriet said:

Our ancestors must have been pitiful weaklings who were terrible at bodybuilding ?

Obviously?

[Jarric]

On 6/7/2024 at 6:27 PM, Harriet said:

does it matter if I eat low protein for a while?

 

It probably depends on what your goals are. If you're looking to get stronger through resistance training, or if you're looking to lose weight whilst maintaining muscle, then low protein probably isn't great (by which I mean sub-optimal, not harmful). But if you're just looking to be healthy and maintain weight, your protein needs are probably quite a lot lower. For example, the NHS recommends 0.8-1g of protein per kg of body weight for a normal healthy lifestyle, whereas a lot of bodybuilding/strength training guides will recommend 1g per pound of body weight, so 2.2 times as much.

 

Bearing in mind that your protein intake will also increase purely because you've increased your calories to maintenance, how low protein are we talking?

 

Personally I use a vegan protein blend and that seems to do the trick, if you're looking for non-dairy shakes. The company are Protein Works, though I don't know if they ship outside the UK.

[Jarric]

I've hit the end of my 6-month cut, and now I'm going into maintenance until October, which I'm very glad about as I'm a bit burned out on cutting (and on life to be honest, which is probably more the problem - when life isn't stressful I quite like calorie counting). 

 

I stopped counting calories just over a week ago, and I'm tempted to keep that going for a bit and see if I can find maintenance without it. I'm weighing in every day, so I'll soon know if I slip out of the maintenance band that I've set for myself (161lbs +/- 2lbs). Can't quite decide if this is a good idea right now, or if I'll suddenly see my weight spike as a result ?‍♂️

[Harriet]

2 hours ago, Jarric said:

 

It probably depends on what your goals are. If you're looking to get stronger through resistance training, or if you're looking to lose weight whilst maintaining muscle, then low protein probably isn't great (by which I mean sub-optimal, not harmful). But if you're just looking to be healthy and maintain weight, your protein needs are probably quite a lot lower. For example, the NHS recommends 0.8-1g of protein per kg of body weight for a normal healthy lifestyle, whereas a lot of bodybuilding/strength training guides will recommend 1g per pound of body weight, so 2.2 times as much.

 

Bearing in mind that your protein intake will also increase purely because you've increased your calories to maintenance, how low protein are we talking?

 

Personally I use a vegan protein blend and that seems to do the trick, if you're looking for non-dairy shakes. The company are Protein Works, though I don't know if they ship outside the UK.

 

It has been an average of 75g recently (though on one day I ate 22g). I know it's above the minimum RDA but also below optimal recommendations for muscle building/maintenance and satiety; I've read all the recommendations many times. I just don't know what it means for me practically. I would like to be strength training, but the truth is I'm not--I haven't done any for a couple of months because I've been too tired. I guess it's fine for now. I should be more worried about my non lifting, which is terrible. 

 

2 hours ago, Jarric said:

I've hit the end of my 6-month cut, and now I'm going into maintenance until October, which I'm very glad about as I'm a bit burned out on cutting (and on life to be honest, which is probably more the problem - when life isn't stressful I quite like calorie counting). 

 

Six months! That's pretty long. Did you lose a good chunk?

 

2 hours ago, Jarric said:

I stopped counting calories just over a week ago, and I'm tempted to keep that going for a bit and see if I can find maintenance without it. I'm weighing in every day, so I'll soon know if I slip out of the maintenance band that I've set for myself (161lbs +/- 2lbs). Can't quite decide if this is a good idea right now, or if I'll suddenly see my weight spike as a result ?‍♂️

 

If it spikes (other than the initial water weight rebound) you can eat less, but the main benefit of counting is just knowing the maintenance number, which I find very reassuring and useful. Up to you if you need the relief of not counting to bounce back from the psychological aspect of dieting fatigue. 

[Elastigirl]

3 hours ago, Jarric said:

I stopped counting calories just over a week ago, and I'm tempted to keep that going for a bit and see if I can find maintenance without it. I'm weighing in every day, so I'll soon know if I slip out of the maintenance band that I've set for myself (161lbs +/- 2lbs). Can't quite deci

Might be nice, just for the break. If you start noticing your weight is on an upward trend, then you can count. Or just do it a few days a week to check in with yourself.

[Jarric]

On 6/11/2024 at 4:13 PM, Harriet said:

I just don't know what it means for me practically.

 

That's an entirely fair point. Maybe it's worth just trying it to see - if you feel more hungry or tired, or less strong, then maybe you need to increase protein. If not, maybe you don't right now.

 

On 6/11/2024 at 4:13 PM, Harriet said:

Six months! That's pretty long. Did you lose a good chunk?

 

12.7lbs (about 5.75kg), which is about a 7.3% reduction in total body weight. I'd have liked a bit more, but I wasn't particularly overweight to begin with.

 

On 6/11/2024 at 4:13 PM, Harriet said:

 

If it spikes (other than the initial water weight rebound) you can eat less, but the main benefit of counting is just knowing the maintenance number, which I find very reassuring and useful. Up to you if you need the relief of not counting to bounce back from the psychological aspect of dieting fatigue. 

 

Yeah, that's a good point. I'll definitely get into tracking a good month before I start bulking, if not earlier, so that I know my maintenance number going into that.

 

On 6/11/2024 at 4:32 PM, Elastigirl said:

Might be nice, just for the break. If you start noticing your weight is on an upward trend, then you can count. Or just do it a few days a week to check in with yourself.

 

This is true - it's not an all or nothing thing, as much as I usually feel like it is.

[Harriet]

I managed to stop my maintenance-phase bingeing. Had to get rid of peanut butter and sugar, and stuff my day full of my "success meals" including some I'd forgotten about. I even looked up my log from a couple of months ago to see what I was eating when the cutting phase was going well. It's starting to look like there'S no miracle approach that prevents trouble in advance; only persistence and problem solving that is specific to the individual. 

[Elastigirl]

10 hours ago, Harriet said:

I managed to stop my maintenance-phase bingeing. Had to get rid of peanut butter and sugar, and stuff my day full of my "success meals" including some I'd forgotten about. I even looked up my log from a couple of months ago to see what I was eating when the cutting phase was going well. It's starting to look like there'S no miracle approach that prevents trouble in advance; only persistence and problem solving that is specific to the individual. 

Good for you for stopping the bingeing. It is super hard. You are right there is no miracle approach. Persistence and just practice and learning from your mistakes is the best plan.

 

I did better when I slowly eased my calories up. I did have one dinner, and then my birthday where I just ate whenever. I was planning to go into deficit in July. But, when I think about it, I start feeling like I better eat all the stuff now, because I won't later. Maybe I'm better off just staying in maintenance.

[Harriet]

13 hours ago, Elastigirl said:

I did better when I slowly eased my calories up. I did have one dinner, and then my birthday where I just ate whenever. I was planning to go into deficit in July. But, when I think about it, I start feeling like I better eat all the stuff now, because I won't later. Maybe I'm better off just staying in maintenance.

 

I think so... if you're already missing all the foods, it might not be time for a cutting phase. Can't hurt to do maintenance a little longer. It's good for us. When I think I should be cutting I just remind myself that this is keeping my BMR nice and fiery-high.