Had a long day with lots of driving, very little sleep and too much food. Had a good breakfast but I was at a market all day that was serving lots of tasty food (mostly desserts) and I couldn't leave. Aaaand so I gave in and ate pinapple cake, orange cake, spanish omelette and some dumpling thing from Japan. Oh and then Chinese takeaway for dessert. I'm remembering even more things but sure I won't list them, haha, anyway the point is that I ate too much.

So my question is this; is it advisable to eat very little today and tomorrow? Will it level it out a bit? Not to the point of starving but what calorie range should I aim for? Planning on doing lots of exercise too.

Just go back to your NORMAL way of eating. Trying to undereat usually backfires. It's over, move on, dont punish yourself.

I do this all the time.... I reduce calories in preparation for something I know is coming up, or to offset the damage done from over eating. I don't know if it's the healthiest way to approach weight loss and calorie management, but this is what I do. It works for me.

I can't give you an exact calorie range number. If I fast, I fast...0 calories. But if I'm just looking at dropping my calories, I'll try to maintain a deficit of around 1000. Last week I had a 1000 deficit day (ate around 1000 calories) and a 900 deficit day (ate 1500 calories but exercised). I use a Bodybugg which is how I can look at my deficit and not how many calories I ate.

I also over ate yesterday. I'm up four pounds today! Unfortunately, today isn't' a good day for me to fast or drastically reduce calories. I have an IEP meeting for my son so I need to have my energy. I can't see a good day this week, at all, really. So instead of a couple of really low calorie days, I'll try to reduce just a little extra in the next few days, and plan on a couple of extra or longer work outs.

I'm keeping in mind that it's not the one day that matters, but what I do over the course of several days. And in my case, I realize my extra weight is just water, so if I can release that, I'll be fine.

And yes, I think burning a few extra calories exercising is a good idea too!

I focus on eating very clean after a day like that. Whole foods, veggies, low sodium, etc.

I think that you should eat normally for today, just like ennay said, and move on. I find that when I try to reduce my calories either in preparation or afterwards, it backfires and I end up bingeing - not good. You can't turn back the clock, so you have to accept it and move on. I would suggest that you take it as a learning experience and think about what you could've done differently, if anything.

I think it depends on the person. On some level, this is what 'naturally thin' people do - they self-regulate their intake, and if they eat excessively at one meal, they'll cut back at another. On the other hand, people with disordered eating will take this to an unhealthy extreme. I think it depends on how much you cut back and what your own reaction tendencies to restriction are. If you can make a moderate cut today or tomorrow and then resume eating without issue, it's fine. If you know you're likely to be too strict and it's only going to spur binging behavior, move on like others have suggested. Either way, examine your reactions with eyes wide open and it might help you further calibrate how you handle this type of thing in the future.

i did the same thing yesterday. For the first time in weeks, I went WAY over my calories for the day. I actually made a conscious decision to let myself enjoy all the food we had for our mother's day gathering but I definitely went overboard. I have no idea how many calories I consumed and don't really want to know. While I kind of wish I would have not eaten quite so much, I am glad that I allowed myself to relax and enjoy. Today I'm just back to my strict 1200 cals a day and hope that I'll maybe some weight loss for the week when I weigh on Saturday but I wouldn't be surprised if the scale doesn't budge!!

For me, since I started back to losing weight, I will eat on the lower end of my calorie range for a couple days prior to a planned splurge day/meal. If it is unplanned I will eat on the lower end a few days after. This has worked for me. But it really depends on what works for you. If you simply just go back to being on plan, that's still wonderful! You have to do what works best for you.

I had a big Saturday, food-wise. It was my birthday and I enjoyed all the treats with no counting, and was quite stuffed and sugared out by the end.

That was FINE. I do it once a year. And now I'm right back on plan and taking steps to correct the gain outside my maintenance window I experienced from the salt and overeating. For me, that is clean and ketogenic, your corrections may be different. Either way under eating isn't a great strategy, but restraining excess quantities and treating back into the groove of how you're eating is absolutely appropriate. For me, I take corrective steps until I'm back where I should be, then maintain again (or lose, depending on where I am in my food phases).

I am not a bad person deserving punishment for having a blowout fun day on my birthday. The movie, restaurant, and cakes were totally worth it, and I don't need to castigate myself in dietary penitence after the fact. Rather I just need to remember that things are back to normal and I can't eat like it is my birthday every day, or any day except the actual day. Now I'm back to my schedule and the losses will take care of themselves with a little diligence.

Happy Birthday Arctic Mama! It's good you enjoyed yourself, that's important.

Yeah the under eating didn't go so well. Shortly after I posted this I started to feel really bad, like I'm coming down with a cold or something. I didn't over eat though, I ate pretty normally so I think I'll try to stick with that. I was getting a bit obsessed with it and just wanted to eat Chinese again

I also didn't do any exercise because I was feeling so crappy, just feel really drained right now. Oh well, could be worse!

Healthy and balanced is a better way to go. You may be like me, and sugar/starch makes you crave more junk, so perhaps look into a lower carb plan and see if that helps control the binges? You can also generally get away with eating fairly low calories without hunger. Sometimes it isn't how much we eat, but the kinds of food we consume, that cause some of our dietary issues. I struggle much more with bingey feelings when my diet spikes my insulin too much. A program like Primal Blueprint, Perfect Health Diet, Atkins, and the like may be something to look into if you continue struggling. Calories matter, but some foods make eating large amounts of calories much easier than others.

GREAT attitude!

F.

I've been trying to eat less carbs and more protein lately but I really don't think I'd be able to stick to a plan as such. I eat good healthy food normally and now that I generally eat a really balanced diet I don't really crave rubbish very often. It's when I'm tired that all I want is fatty and sugary stuff and then also have very little willpower. Aaaand then once I've had a taste I'm a little obsessive but I feel a lot better right now. Did some exercise after all and drank lots of water. I just have to make sure I get enough sleep/have better food options if I don't. I guess I've learned something. Do you follow any of those diets?

Also I was on lots of antibiotics on and off for a weeks that were making me feel really sick and things I'd normally eat like tomatoes and salad (I'd eat salad with lunch and dinner) were making me feel sick just thinking about them. So I ate soup and icecream last week as that's all I could stomach, but I stayed under my calories for those days. It's nearly a week now since I've stopped taking them so my body should be getting back to normal now. I bought a bag of salad earlier and didn't feel like puking

Thanks for the advice!

Ahh I have tried every way to recover after an eating episode. What works for me is eating less the next day - at a small deficit (like maybe 100 cal deficit) That way I feel good that I am eating at a deficit and I feel more confident that I can continue reach a cal deficit, but its not so extreme that I feel terrible - since I crave even more refined carbs and sugar after eating a lot of them.