[Mammy]

I'm meant to be eating about 1400 calories a day but I'm lucky to get 900
By no means am I starving at anypoint! I have satisfying meals breakfast lunch dinner and have 1 or 2 snacks.

To give you an idea of what I'm eating

Porridge for breakfast
Then apple for a snack
Tuna sandwich for lunch
baby spinah salad with mince capsicum and mushroom fordinner
then a mandarin after dinner

That's abot 890 calories

And then I burned about 500 of this at the gym tonight.


Is it okay to leave it at this if I'm not feeling hungry?
Or Do I need to up the calorie intake?

[kaplods]

When you eat very low calorie, especially low carb - you can lose the sensation of hunger. This sounds like "good news," but it really isn't - eventually you may find your metabolism dropping and/or will experience fatigue and other unpleasant symptoms.

You really need more nutrition, and even on 1200 to 1500 calories it can be difficult to get in adequate nutrition (especially with gym workouts).

Here's a link to several food plans to give you some idea of what a more balanced plan might include:

http://healthy.hillbillyhousewife.com/foodplans.htm

this site (under dieting on a budget) also has a lot of resources, including information on exchange plans, recipes, and sample meal plans (the meal plans are for 1000 calories, so even those are "bare bones").

I chose exchange plans, not because you have to be on one - but the advantage to exchange plans is that they force at least some minimal balance.

For example, in your dinner there's no protein and nearly no carbohydrates - no fat either. Since those three are the sources of calories - your dinner is basically "nothing." A mandarin or tangerine is only about 30 calories, and only half of a fruit serving. It looks like yo're taking in fewer than 100 calories after noon. Especially if you're going to exercise in the evenings, you probably need to not only eat more, but also distribute your calories more evenly through the day.

[Rosinante]

It is my understanding that the research shows that you are not eating nearly enough.
Apart from health concerns, your body really will get used to that low a number and start to slow down or even stop any weightloss you're having - your body is programmed NOT to lose weight, this is an inbuilt defence mechanism against starvation. So daft as it sounds, if you go too low too soon, this will hamper your weightloss.

From my own experience: I recently had a 2 week stall, when I was eating 1200-1300. I upped it to nearer 1500 and lost 3lbs.

[MindiV]

Same here, Ailidh....I was losing right along eating 1,300 calories then stalled out. I upped it a couple hundred and kept right on losing.

Like everyone else has said...gotta have more calories.