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My advise: (as someone who does a lot of working out and calorie control) Write down what you eat for a while and its calories. Weigh yourself daily as well an

My advise: (as someone who does a lot of working out and calorie control) Write down what you eat for a while and its calories. Weigh yourself daily as well and write that down too. If after a week your weight went up: Your calories are above your TDEE. If it went down: Your calories are under your TDEE. And that's basically it, once you know what your TDEE is, eat under it to create a caloric deficit and you will lose weight. Even if you don't exercise at all and just sit at home. Sure exercise will help putting your caloric deficit lower by burning some, but in the end it's always calories vs TDEE. Understanding that makes it very easy to go in either direction (gain weight vs lose weight), no matter what your metabolism is (The easy solution is of course to just eat less, like skipping a meal or reducing the amount. Since your average daily food is already what dictates your current weight, reducing it means you will lose weight)

rob74 5y ago
Of course, eating less is the ideal solution if you can muster the willpower to actually do it - but that's a big "if" for many people...
- ajuc 5y ago
  Counting calories is still very useful, because you learn what's "worth it". For example there are protein bars that are supposedly healthy, but they have 150-250 kcal per 50g bar. On the other hand there are these watery ice creams that have about 65 kcal per piece and feel just as indulgent if not more. Other things that are very much "not worth it" on the enjoyement/kcal scale is bread and other pastries. 2 buns with ham is 500 kcal and feels like nothing. A whole pan of hot vegetables with some meat is +- the same and feels like a proper dinner.
  - discordianfish 5y ago
    > these watery ice creams that have about 65 kcal per piece and feel just as indulgent if not more. that shows why it’s easier for some than for others :)
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- ddorian43 5y ago
  Just do keto diet or carnivore then. Will be a lot easier. You have to give up the cake.
  - pre63 5y ago
    I came here for this.
- dan00 5y ago
  You might try an other diet that‘s more filling and creates less cravings. So less carbs and more protein and fat. I don‘t think that willpower really works in this regard long term. It only creates frustrations.
- dahart 5y ago
  The big trick is figuring out mentally how to eat less without requiring willpower. It is possible. Depending on willpower is setting up for likely failure, IMO.
andyjohnson0 5y ago
TDEE = Total Daily Energy Expenditure
wcrossbow 5y ago
For me at least it's not that simple. My weight (healthy to low BMI) has been very stable over many years with vastly different amounts of exercising and quality of eating habits within that period. Fat to muscle ratio does move but total weight is stuck even with long runs of lots of junk food.
- artdigital 5y ago
  Hmm I have trouble believing that. If you eat less and put yourself into a caloric deficit, your body is going to start using up fat and to a certain degree muscle, that's just how it works and your body is no exception. If you work out during a deficit, your body will try to retain muscle and use more fat instead. Gaining muscle in a deficit is possible, but only in small amounts, if at all. > quality of eating habits within that period To me this sounds like you aren't actually changing the amount of calories that you eat, just the quality of them. Eating 2000 calories of McDonalds or 2000 calories of high quality food does not matter (or barely matters) for losing/gaining weight. If 2000 calories is under your TDEE, you can eat 2000 calories of cheesecake and would still lose weight (but very unhealthy). What I see often is people claiming stuff like "I can't lose weight" or "I have a slow metabolism", but they never actually bother counting how much they eat, and because of that have no understanding of what high-calorie and low-calorie food is. (For example if I'd ask how much calories an average hamburger or a glass of cola has, you'd likely have no idea if you haven't counted calories before). It was the same for me, once I started counting I realized that I was not eating according to the goals I had set at that time, and that the food I ate was actually much much less in calories than I thought it was.
  - curiousllama 5y ago
    The key is “fat to muscle ratio” It’s a body recomp from an untrained person. Pretty common for new lifters. You’re right though - if they lift better and eat better, that’ll change.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
> Write down what you eat for a while and its calories. Weigh yourself daily as well and write that down too. If after a week your weight went up: Your calories are above your TDEE. If it went down: Your calories are under your TDEE. Not necessarily. It is important to remember that water weighs ~1lb/pt and there are a lot of things that affect how much water your body is carrying at any given moment. Depending on your body mass, it is not unrealistic to see 5lbs of fluctuation in a single day. On a calorie restricted diet your body will tend to retain water (because it does this for pretty much any stressor), so you may actually see a slight increase in body weight at first even though your TDEE is above your caloric intake. A more reliable approach, in my opinion, is to do the TDEE calculation for your target weight and set that as your calorie limit.
- Tenoke 5y ago
  That's why they are telling you (as is common) to compare the results on a weekly basis which reduces the variance. TDEE calculations from scratch are much much more unreliable than empirically finding out and mostly good for a starting point.
  - artdigital 5y ago
    Yes, that’s why I suggested weekly You can of course calculate the TDEE of your target weight but like you implied, unless you know your own, based on your own metabolism and intake, the data is never going to be accurate For example I eat much less than my bodybuilder friends. When I went with the calories that they recommended to me I gained so much fat with a very active workout schedule and noone had a explanation why. Maybe it’s hormones, maybe medicine I take, maybe something else. I now eat much less than you’d expect from a person with my height and age, but I still gain weight, because my actual calculated TDEE is comparatively low Having that data on hand as a reference is incredibly helpful to plan my weight progress
mrleinad 5y ago
I'd love to count calories. I'm just too lazy to measure and research everything I eat, and the alternative is to have only processed foods that are labeled. It's too bad that we can't just live on Soylent (the actual beverage, not the thing from the book)
- jnsie 5y ago
  I was very excited about Soylent years ago...until I tried it. I really disliked the flavor, so wouldn't have stuck with it regardless, but what really surprised me was how much I enjoy the act of sitting down and eating a meal. Soylent filled me up, but it never satiated me. Regardless of the time savings and predictability, I missed the act of eating, if that makes sense.
  - bavell 5y ago
    Makes total sense to me - we are creatures of habit and eating is one of our most sacred rituals. It's deeply rooted in our psychology so no surprise to me that one would miss the ritual even if satiated.
  - mrleinad 5y ago
    I tried it while on a trip to the states, and had the same experience as you. It was barely ok, and the taste was not great. Also, saved time from not eating a regular meal is not that much, cooking it is. As with many things, that can be fixed just by throwing more money at it.
- xzel 5y ago
  With a 10 dollar scale and an App like Lose It, it is pretty easy. They have both things with UPC codes for easy look up and standard foods, for example brown rice or salmon. I keep track and probably spend less than 5 minutes a day getting everything down. Obviously it will be difficult at a restaurant unless you want to bring a scale with you or beg the wait staff but largely they won't mind and if you're order grilled chicken and veg most likely they won't mind measuring the chicken for you. Anyways, the stuff on labels are estimates so the whole process has some moderate error so as long as you estimate fairly you don't have to worry about being crazy accurate.

rob74 5y ago

Of course, eating less is the ideal solution if you can muster the willpower to actually do it - but that's a big "if" for many people...

ajuc 5y ago
Counting calories is still very useful, because you learn what's "worth it". For example there are protein bars that are supposedly healthy, but they have 150-250 kcal per 50g bar. On the other hand there are these watery ice creams that have about 65 kcal per piece and feel just as indulgent if not more. Other things that are very much "not worth it" on the enjoyement/kcal scale is bread and other pastries. 2 buns with ham is 500 kcal and feels like nothing. A whole pan of hot vegetables with some meat is +- the same and feels like a proper dinner.
- discordianfish 5y ago
  > these watery ice creams that have about 65 kcal per piece and feel just as indulgent if not more. that shows why it’s easier for some than for others :)
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
ddorian43 5y ago
Just do keto diet or carnivore then. Will be a lot easier. You have to give up the cake.
- pre63 5y ago
  I came here for this.
dan00 5y ago
You might try an other diet that‘s more filling and creates less cravings. So less carbs and more protein and fat. I don‘t think that willpower really works in this regard long term. It only creates frustrations.
dahart 5y ago
The big trick is figuring out mentally how to eat less without requiring willpower. It is possible. Depending on willpower is setting up for likely failure, IMO.

andyjohnson0 5y ago

TDEE = Total Daily Energy Expenditure

wcrossbow 5y ago

For me at least it's not that simple. My weight (healthy to low BMI) has been very stable over many years with vastly different amounts of exercising and quality of eating habits within that period. Fat to muscle ratio does move but total weight is stuck even with long runs of lots of junk food.

artdigital 5y ago
Hmm I have trouble believing that. If you eat less and put yourself into a caloric deficit, your body is going to start using up fat and to a certain degree muscle, that's just how it works and your body is no exception. If you work out during a deficit, your body will try to retain muscle and use more fat instead. Gaining muscle in a deficit is possible, but only in small amounts, if at all. > quality of eating habits within that period To me this sounds like you aren't actually changing the amount of calories that you eat, just the quality of them. Eating 2000 calories of McDonalds or 2000 calories of high quality food does not matter (or barely matters) for losing/gaining weight. If 2000 calories is under your TDEE, you can eat 2000 calories of cheesecake and would still lose weight (but very unhealthy). What I see often is people claiming stuff like "I can't lose weight" or "I have a slow metabolism", but they never actually bother counting how much they eat, and because of that have no understanding of what high-calorie and low-calorie food is. (For example if I'd ask how much calories an average hamburger or a glass of cola has, you'd likely have no idea if you haven't counted calories before). It was the same for me, once I started counting I realized that I was not eating according to the goals I had set at that time, and that the food I ate was actually much much less in calories than I thought it was.
- curiousllama 5y ago
  The key is “fat to muscle ratio” It’s a body recomp from an untrained person. Pretty common for new lifters. You’re right though - if they lift better and eat better, that’ll change.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago

> Write down what you eat for a while and its calories. Weigh yourself daily as well and write that down too. If after a week your weight went up: Your calories are above your TDEE. If it went down: Your calories are under your TDEE. Not necessarily. It is important to remember that water weighs ~1lb/pt and there are a lot of things that affect how much water your body is carrying at any given moment. Depending on your body mass, it is not unrealistic to see 5lbs of fluctuation in a single day. On a calorie restricted diet your body will tend to retain water (because it does this for pretty much any stressor), so you may actually see a slight increase in body weight at first even though your TDEE is above your caloric intake. A more reliable approach, in my opinion, is to do the TDEE calculation for your target weight and set that as your calorie limit.

Tenoke 5y ago
That's why they are telling you (as is common) to compare the results on a weekly basis which reduces the variance. TDEE calculations from scratch are much much more unreliable than empirically finding out and mostly good for a starting point.
- artdigital 5y ago
  Yes, that’s why I suggested weekly You can of course calculate the TDEE of your target weight but like you implied, unless you know your own, based on your own metabolism and intake, the data is never going to be accurate For example I eat much less than my bodybuilder friends. When I went with the calories that they recommended to me I gained so much fat with a very active workout schedule and noone had a explanation why. Maybe it’s hormones, maybe medicine I take, maybe something else. I now eat much less than you’d expect from a person with my height and age, but I still gain weight, because my actual calculated TDEE is comparatively low Having that data on hand as a reference is incredibly helpful to plan my weight progress

mrleinad 5y ago

I'd love to count calories. I'm just too lazy to measure and research everything I eat, and the alternative is to have only processed foods that are labeled. It's too bad that we can't just live on Soylent (the actual beverage, not the thing from the book)

jnsie 5y ago
I was very excited about Soylent years ago...until I tried it. I really disliked the flavor, so wouldn't have stuck with it regardless, but what really surprised me was how much I enjoy the act of sitting down and eating a meal. Soylent filled me up, but it never satiated me. Regardless of the time savings and predictability, I missed the act of eating, if that makes sense.
- bavell 5y ago
  Makes total sense to me - we are creatures of habit and eating is one of our most sacred rituals. It's deeply rooted in our psychology so no surprise to me that one would miss the ritual even if satiated.
- mrleinad 5y ago
  I tried it while on a trip to the states, and had the same experience as you. It was barely ok, and the taste was not great. Also, saved time from not eating a regular meal is not that much, cooking it is. As with many things, that can be fixed just by throwing more money at it.
xzel 5y ago
With a 10 dollar scale and an App like Lose It, it is pretty easy. They have both things with UPC codes for easy look up and standard foods, for example brown rice or salmon. I keep track and probably spend less than 5 minutes a day getting everything down. Obviously it will be difficult at a restaurant unless you want to bring a scale with you or beg the wait staff but largely they won't mind and if you're order grilled chicken and veg most likely they won't mind measuring the chicken for you. Anyways, the stuff on labels are estimates so the whole process has some moderate error so as long as you estimate fairly you don't have to worry about being crazy accurate.