I can already guess what the responses to this post will likely be. After all, I don't expect any of you chicks to say "why, of course it's ok that you are eating cookies! You should just eat cookies for every meal all day long, in fact! You'll lose a million pounds!"
Even so, I'd like to reach out and see if anyone has ever been in the same boat, or if my situation really is as devastating as it feels.
I have gone back to Calorie Counting. I don't know why I ever stopped (well, yes I do, but that is neither here nor there right now.) This time around, however, I'm using Dailyplate with Mypyramid to back up the more suspect figures. DP is a godsend! I have it set to keep me at 1300 calories a day. Generally, I try to moderate my diet close to 1300, and then work off whatever I go over each day, plus a little more, if I feel the need to. I never go below 1200/day. I feel that I can lose on a 1300 calorie/day intake alone, but using exercise to get down to it when I 'overeat' keeps me from feeling deprived in regards to food, and I still am able to work my muscles and get that nice physical rush.
This process has worked well for me. I've gotten out of my plateau and I've lost a pound and am on my way to seeing 148 on the scale quite soon.
There is a problem, however, in that I am more than willing to work off even as much as 600 calories in a workout to get down to 1300 on those days when I just REALLY screw up.
I find myself happily indulging in things that are bad for me (most especially...peanut butter cookies!), knowing that it is in my count...and even if I go 100-600 over, all mistakes can be confessed and reversed during nightly workout.
Mentally, it can be somewhat taxing once I breech the "over 300" mark. 30 minutes of rapid walking on full incline on the treadmill is NOT exactly a picnic, although it burns quickly and burns nearly as much as running (an activity I cannot do, as the last time I ran I severely overtaxed myself and was ordered to lay off for at least two weeks.)
I think the worse was an evening when I'd discovered that I'd been mindlessly snacking on junk food all night out of sheer boredom at a school sports event. When I'd roughly totaled my count for that night, I'd gone over by AT LEAST 800 calories. I walked for 60mins that night, and cried the whole time. (It was not a good day, anyway, even without that monumental screw up...)
My point (yes, I have one!) is...how badly am I doing? I understand that this insane cookie eating has got to stop. And I will work on it, slowly but surely.
However...is the concept at least acceptable? Most BMR calculators I have used in the past have put me at around 1500-1600, meaning that by staying at 1300 calories a day, I think I have plenty of a deficient.
I don't feel like I am doomed to fail, anymore. I am not going to quit. Everyday is a new day, and I am doing my best to learn as I go.
I'm not sure what I wish to ask. Just some general feedback or support would be GREATLY appreciated.
Anyone else out there use Dailyplate?
Anyone out there also "burn back" to their desired range? I understand that isn't typical. Most people merely create their deficient half by diet and the other half by exercise. I...have yet to be that comfortable with food denial. Besides, I quite enjoy my 'intense' workouts. As long as they aren't driven by self-punishment.
Thanks, chicks, for listening to me ramble. I'm sorry if it's all a little strange and muddled. My loud dorm mates kept me up very late last night and I'm running on four or so hours of sleep.
First, how are you determining calories burned in a workout? If you're relying on the machine readout, it's probably overestimating your burn, and you may not have the deficit you expect. So keep that in mind. BMR calculators, too, can be very inaccurate.
For me, it has never worked to overeat and try to exercise it off. Even when wearing a heart rate monitor 24/7 for 3 months, it said I was burning at least 3000 to sometimes over 4000 calories a day. If I ate over 1800, I gained. This is likely an issue of the monitor calculating me against some average that my body just doesn't adhere to. Regardless, I learned not to trust it when machines said I could eat more. Instead, I trust my body - if it loses weight over time, I am eating at a deficit. Gains weight? I'm eating a surplus. And if it stays the same, I'm eating at maintenance level.
The cookie isn't necessarily a problem, if you're losing, you're still creating a deficit. Obviously it's not the best nutritional choice, but in terms of calories, you're doing OK. But don't rely on calculators to tell you what you can eat and burn in a day...rely on your body instead.
I totally agree with mandalinn82...I too would workout like a madwoman, trying to burn off the extra hundreds of calories due to binge eating, or over eating, or any time when I felt fat. when it comes down to it, weight loss is a result of 70-80% what you are putting in your body and 20-30% what you are burning. of course you may indulge and workout a little harder to burn it off but if you are doing this on a day to day basis it is NOT sustainable and your body will burn out. exercise is meant to help your body not hurt it. if you are doing over an hour of cardio more every time you workout, several times a week, you are just setting yourself up for overeating again...if you get into that mindset of "oh i can just burn it off tonight" you are not fixing the original problem. i am on weight watchers now and it has helped me be accountable for the NOW and the exercise that I do may accelerate the weight loss but I still have to fuel my body properly and not screw up every day. you will feel a lot less guilty when you start being able to limit yourself to one cookie. if you can't control it, you should consider eliminating them completely...i am getting really good at portion control myself...it is a struggle constantly but i find that if i measure it out and know that i am having a set portion, i really savor it. good luck and keep us updated!
It seems that you have very easy access to unhealthy foods at home. I don't know if you have children, junk-obsessed husband, or what. Maybe you would consider not having those things around, or if they are, put them in an area that is difficult to reach within just seconds. I find that if the food isn't around or it is hard to get to, I have time to consider my choice before actually making it. Good luck!
I know it may seem too philosophical, but why are you eating the cookies? Are you unhappy without them? Do you really want them that badly? I don't know those answers for you, but it is something I am trying to figure out in myself right now. I know that my skinny friends don't view food the same way I do. They don't eat the whole plate of food just because it is there. They don't feel compelled to eat when they are not hungry. My skinny friend who LOVES cookies will ony eat one or two cookies once or twice a month. I am not making any conjectures about why you eat the cookies, but maybe that you think about it. I don't know why I eat what I do yet, so its been on my mind...
I'm going to tell you a cookie or two here or there is just fine. We've all heard "everything in moderation" and at one point in my life I didn't believe it could happen. Until I did it myself. BUT first I had to get rid of everything I shouldn't have and refuse to eat those foods for awhile. I read the labels of everything I buy, and I always try to buy clean foods.
Now although I still keep to that same basic principle, I let one thing by. I read in a health magazine that 5 dark chocolate Hershey's kisses is 100 calories. So I started having 5 per day. (And I still lost weight, and nothing else had changed other than I substituted my evening snack with the kisses) I took the time to really savor each one. It took me 20 or 30 minutes to eat all five of those. And that satisfied my sweet cravings for the day. Now I don't even have that. If I have a sweet craving, I get some frozen strawberries, bananas, and peaches and put them in the food processor with a BIT of honey and vanilla soymilk and eat that. And I don't even have that every day.
So far, this has worked for me. So I would suggest finding something simple like that that may work for you. What about the cookies do you really like?Think about that and figure out a better way of eating that thing. Is it the sugar? eat some fruit... The peanut butter? Have Ants on a log. ALSO-- on another weight loss forum, in someone's signiture, they had the following quote "A year from now, you'll have wished you had started today" and I stole that and printed it out, and whenever I feel the need to eat something I shouldn't, I say this to myself and it keeps me on track.
Good Luck to you-- and remember not to beat yourself up over anything.
gatorgirl 6 - I like your questions and have, in fact, thought about a philosophical/psychoanalytic response.
My theory at the moment is that those who overeat - they realize they are overeating, but cannot stop - experienced multiple times, as an infant, that they were denied food for too long.
The mother has control over the food (she has the nipple) and the baby is helpless as far as acquiring it on its own - the baby must rely on the mother.
Perhaps the mothers (while still being a good mother), tends to leave the baby feeling hungry for too long (this could be 5 minutes or 15 minutes or even 1 hour, I don't know). The baby, feeling helpless and powerless, must endure the painful feeling of hunger until she comes back. This is a traumatic experience. It leaves the baby "wounded" per se.
As the baby grows up, it is able to start controlling its food intake - it feels the tiniest bit of hunger and SWOOSH, runs to comforting food and eats and eats.
As adults, we still repeat experiences we had as small infants. We repeat a traumatic experience and "make it better", as we now have the control.
Our compulsion to repeat, I believe, is one of the main reasons why losing weight and keeping it off can be the battle of a lifetime.
This is just a little Freudian rant.
Also, it has been scientifically proven that cheap, refined foods, such as cookies, have substances that keep your body addicted and always wanting more.....
I think there are many factors as to why Shifftered feels she cannot stop eating cookies.
What's also interesting is that she realizes she has been a "bad girl" and proceeds to regularly punish herself with too much exercise. She seems to be playing the part of the bad child AND the adult at the same time - not just once, but regularly.
IMO it doesn't work for long to do what you're doing. As you found on that day when you had been mindlessly snacking, a person isn't really in the mood for an hour workout late at night all the time. So then what? 2 hours the next day to make up for it? I don't think so...
If you are someone who has been a binge eater, it's best just to forego foods you used to binge on for awhile to break the pattern. You could limit cookie consumption to once a week--or just drop them indefinitely.
If you haven't been a binge eater, then you're probably eating the cookies "because you can" according to your calculations. That's not a good reason to eat, and again, IMO it could backfire on you.
I'm not saying you can't ever have "a" peanut butter cookie--just not every day, and not with the expectation that you can work it off and things will be fine.
As for Freud, I'd like to point out that not a single Freudian theory has ever been proved scientifically. And to me, the idea that someone "has" to overeat because they didn't get enough nipple time as a baby seems questionable. How come no one is bingeing on lean chicken breasts or extra helpings of green vegetables? It seems more likely that the behavior is simply an addictive process involving carbohydrates.
I totally hear you on this one! I loveee cookies! I'm not a big cake/cupcake, brownie(okay so they aren't terrible! lol) or ice cream person but I lovee my cookies! I switched to eating the 100 calorie packs, chips deluxe and grasshopper ones (they taste like thin mint girl scout cookies!) and any time I have a craving I can simply eat one of those bags and know I'm not getting way too many calories
You say you are a college student on a meal plan and from what I know of college cafeterias those cookies are probably not the highest quality. You could make a deal with yourself--skip the cookies in the cafeteria and once in a while (whatever time frame you choose) go get a SMALL cookie from a really good bakery and savor it. That's what I do with chocolate--very small portions of the very good stuff keeps me away from run-of-the-mill chocolate temptations. A little acquired food snobbery can work in your benefit.
I'm not a gotta have it cookie girl. I was the chip addict. I ate chips by the big family size bags in a sitting or during an 8 hour work day. I wouldn't buy them when we went grocery shopping in hopes I could do without them. Didn't happen. I would get them on the way to work or send my husband out close to midnight to get them. I didn't have the concept of burning them off, I just ate them and ate them. When I decided to change my eating habits that was the first thing to go. I told my husband NO MORE CHIPS because I'm the Lays poster child because I can't eat just one. So he held me accountable. The first time I had chips it was tortilla chips that I don't crave as much. I ate a few and stopped. I was so proud of myself. So make a comfortable adjustment.
As for the workout, that sounds dangerous for your body. Even though you are trying to make adjustments in your eating for your body, you damage your body with the workouts. Working out to the point of tears sounds bad.
Don't punish your body because of decisions your head / emotions made.
My feeling is this: We are never really going to be thin unless we start THINKING like a thin person. Thin people eat cookies! They just don't eat a bag of Milanos.
I'm going to suggest the opposite approach...just my $.02. Some people are addicted to carbs, I'm one of them. The ONLY thing that works for me is none. Ever. It's a scary scary thought while you're still eating carbs. But...once you get through the detox, the farther out you get from things like cookies, the less you miss them. Most people don't need to be as extreme as I do, fortunately. But a few of us have to give up things like cookies forever--or virtually forever. Like, in October I went to a party and had like 14 cupcakes. But I knew beforehand I was going to do that, and gave myself permission to have as many cupcakes as I wanted, that one time. (You would die for these cupcakes, I promise.) But other than that, I just don't do carbs other than those in green vegetables and almonds. I'm not suggesting you take it to that extreme, but you may want to do some research on carb addiction to see if going to something like Atkins induction might help you break your cookie addiction. Low carb is a lifestyle, it's not for everyone, but spending some time on it can break a carb addiction if indeed that is what you have.
Help, new plan and a cookie addiction!
