[eratosthanes]

I posted this in the 20 Something's forum, but I thought you guys might like it too.

This is my trick to keep my calories in line. It doesn't always work, but that is because of eating in the middle of the night. If you are fine with that, and usually have problems during the day, this is your new friend.

Take the number of calories you are trying to stick to, and divide it by the number of hours you are awake. This gives you an estimate of how many calories you need an hour. For instance, I am trying to stick to 1800, and I sleep 8 hours a night, so, using that formula I can eat 113 calories every hour. It seems like a lot more to me when I view it like this, instead off trying to view it as how many I can't have, lol.

[Eliana]

That's sort of what I do, except I divided it by six and eat every 2-2.5 hours. It really helped at the beginning to know that no matter how hungry I was, my next meal was never more than two hours away. Now it's smooth sailing. It's ALMOST second nature. I say "almost" because I don't eat often enough on weekends.

[eratosthanes]

Yep! It can be adjusted however you like! Usually, I end up eating about every 2-3, but if I want to eat, and am not really hungry, just calculating what I have had, when I can eat next, and what I have left, is sometimes enough to keep me in line.

I am glad I am not the only one who thought of this, lol.