How Many Calories Should I eat a Day?

Knowing how many Calories to Eliminate

Because there are 3,500 calories in a pound and 7 days in a week, you can cut your daily calorie intake by 500 to lose 1 pound a week (3,500 divided by 7 = 500). With this formula then you know that to lose a 1 1/2 a week you need to eliminate 750 calories a day and to lose 2 pounds a week you need to cut 1,000 calories a day.

Using the 20% Rule

If cutting between 500 and 1000 calories a day would bring you below 800 to 1,000 calories a day then I would suggest using the 20% rule. Remember, if you eat too few calories you could be sabotaging your diet…. you body will go into survival mode and keep you from losing weight. Instead try the 20% rule. The 20% rule is a much healthier way to lose weight.

First, figure out the average number of calories you eat now. In order to do this you will need to keep a Food Journal for a week to keep track of the food and calories you ate all week.

After you determine the average number of calories you consume in a day, simply subtract 20%. Here is an example:

2,200 Calories X 0.20 = 440 calories

2,200 Calories – 440 calories = 1,760 calories

Now, that you have the information on how many calories to eat in a day…… get to work. Good luck!!

Top image by admiller

I know how hard you have been working to lose weight. It has been a challenge, but you have been doing such a good job. And, with Valentine’s Day fast approaching I know how nervous you are that all your hard work will be going down the drain. Well, stop your worrying.

I have searched the internet for some awesome information on How to Have a Low Fat Valentine’s Day …. and their are tons of tips for you. So, keep up all your hard work during Valentine’s Day. And, good luck reaching your weight loss goals.

How to have a Low Fat Valentine’s Day

Fruitfully Yours Valentine Box

Make your Valentine the "Apple" of your eye with this gorgeous red box full of fresh fruit and snacks! It’s called a Fruitfully Yours Valentine Box…. and rightfully so.

This Valentine’s Day, Cook From the Heart With Healthy, Low-Fat Recipes

Devin Alexander, the chef for TV’s "The Biggest Loser" shares her secrets for cooking up all the love, with half the calories.

Sugar-Free Chocolates for Your Valentine

Valentine’s Day is the single biggest day for chocolate sales. Among the many kinds of chocolate now available for gift giving are sugar-free as well as dairy-free varieties. Today, sugar-free chocolates may also be labeled “lower carb.”

Diet Valentine Gifts

Some ideas for Low Calorie, Low Carb, Sugar Free…Even Everything Free Valentine’s Day Gifts.

How to Stay on Your Diet During Valentine’s Day

Here are some tips to help you stick to your guns, stay on your diet during Valentine’s Day and keep your hands out of the candy dish.

Going Healthy for Your Valentine’s Day Dinner

Who says you have to go out to a fancy restaurant and spend a lot of money for your Valentine’s Day dinner? While the experience is fun, try something new by staying in and making dinner from scratch.

Top image by Esparta

• Realize there are extras you are eating. Do you nibble off your kids plate or while you are cooking dinner? Record these.
• Be aware of when you are eating. Are you eating when you are hungry or are you eating when you are bored, angry or sad. You could be an emotional eater.
• Treat Yourself. Once you have journaled for a while and have improved on the above you will see it on your body and in your journal. If its working it is time to treat yourself.

There are many other reasons to keep a Food Journal. But, keeping a food journal can be a little bit overwhelming. Here are some tips on how to keep a food journal.

How to Keep a Food Journal

How to Keep a Food Diary – Keeping a food diary is an excellent first step in assessing how you eat now and why you eat the way you do. It will help you target your current problems and look into the root of them. In the end, it will also help you to design the eating plan that is best for you. Here are some things you can track with a food diary:

Why You Should Keep a Food Diary – A food journal is a very effective tool, because you can use it to help you determine if your current eating habits are healthy. A food journal will help you understand where your diet goes wrong and can reveal your calorie intake, so you know if you are getting too many or too few calories. Find out more in this article.

How to keep a food diary (with templates) – If you’re aiming to lose weight, you need to keep track of calories. Writing down what you eat all day shows you were you need improvements. Find out how in this Food Journal article.

How to Keep a Food Journal – eHow explains how keeping a journal of your eating habits can help you determine which habits need breaking – and how you can get back on the path of eating right.

12 Tips on How to Keep a Food Journal … – Katie at AllWomensTalk explains how keeping a food journal is a great way to lose weight, but it can be complicated. Here are her top twelve tips for keeping a food journal.

Six Reasons to Keep a Food Diary - Here are top 6 reasons why keeping a food journal is so important…. in case you still don’t know the reasons.

How to Keep a Food Diary – WikiHow writes how you may have to keep a food diary for medical reasons or you may just be interested in tracking your eating habits. Whatever the reason, here’s how to take the hassle out of doing it.

Keep a Food Diary and Lose Weight – Sci/Tech writes on how keeping a food journal could be your best weight loss move yet. Find out why Sci/Tech feels that way.

Keep a Food Diary, Lose Twice as Much Weight – ABC News writes that not only could a Food Journal aid in our weight loss, but it could actually double our weight loss. Wow!! That’s enough to get me motivated!!

How to keep a Food Diary in Microsoft Excel – DCole of Bukisa shows you how to easily create a Food Journal using Excel. Sure, you can use a paper and pencil, but having a food journal on Excel is a great way to keep track of your food.

Why you should keep a food diary – Did you know that most nutritionists and dietitians agree that a food diary is critical to weight loss success? Its true. This post will show you why.

Why you should keep a Food Diary – TopEndSports gives you some awesome reasons why you should keep a food journal….. Read this post for the reasons why it is important to keep a food journal.

Keep a Food Diary to Build Muscle – Are you trying to build muscle? If you are and it just isn’t working the way you had hoped it could be what you are eating. In this article the author explains how and why to keep a food journal to build the muscles you want.

What Makes up Calories

Protein, Carbohydrates, fat and even alcohol provide calories. Here is the breakdown:

one (1) gram of:

• Protein contains 4 calories
• Carbohydrate contains 4 calories
• Fat contains 9 calories
• Alcohol contains 7 calories.

Water, minerals, vitamin, fiber or cholesterol provide no calories.

Most foods are a combination of these things…. protein, fat, and carbohydrate, etc. So, a food’s calorie count is the sum of the calories provided by each ingredient.

Need an example of how to figure out how calories are made up? Let’s take a look at a bowl of Chicken Noodle Soup. This bowl contain 3 grams of protein, 7 grams of carbohydrates and 2 grams of for for a total of 58 calories:

• 3 grams protein x 4 calories/gram = 12 Calories
• 7 grams carbs x 4 calories/gram = 28 Calories
• 2 grams fat x 9 calories/gram = 18 calories
• TOTAL = 58 Calories

Well, you might wonder if a food is made up of multiple parts then how come people call food items a carb or a protein if it is made up of multiple parts.

The answer is that they pick the predominant nutrient. Another words, a bagel or a bowl of cereal are considered carbohydrate foods even thought they also contain protein and sometimes fat. The predominant nutrient is a carb, so that is what people tend to call it.

Now you understand how a calorie is made up. Keep an eye out for my next post when I show you how track the calories you eat.

Believe it or not, if you are an emotional eater it can be keeping you from reaching your Weight Loss goals. Here in this post, I will be listing some reasons why you might be eating emotionally and some tips on not eating when you are feeling emotional, but to eat only when you are hungry.

The first step to discovering how emotions affect your eating is to understand your relationship with food.

I’m an Emotional Eater

Do you…..

Eat when you’re not Hungry

If you do this then you are not alone…. many people eat when they are not hungry. Many people eat because the clock tells them it is time for a meal. Or, maybe because someone else is eating. Or, simply because a food looks or smells good. They key is to pinpoint when this is the case and realize that you are not hungry. Of course, if you ARE hungry then you should EAT.

Always Clean your Plate

I remember as a child that my grandmother would say, "Who is going to be a member of the Clean Plate Club?" I would hurry to finish my plate because not only did I want to be a member of the "Clean Plate Club", but I also loved making my grandmother happy. And, me eating ALL of her food made her VERY happy.

Whether you were trained to clean your plate as a child or whether you are afraid of not having a meal that good again… you have to retrain yourself to knowing when you are full. Many times when we are always cleaning our plate it is because we were conditioned to do so as a child. We no longer know what it feels like to feel full. We have to retrain ourselves to know when we ARE full and stop eating at that point.

Emotional Eating Tip – We will do a whole post shortly on learning when we are truly full. In the meantime, if you go to a restaurant order a kids size meal or an appetizer… that way even when you eat the entire plate you will not be overeating. And, chances are…. you WILL be actually full when you finish.

Eat Instead of Working

I am totally guilty of this one. It is known that when a dieter is bored or is procrastinating on an important or cumbersome task they have a tendency to nosh.

How many times have you had planned on cleaning your house and instead found yourself fist first in a bag of chips or a box of cookies. Or, perhaps you were bored and you couldn’t come up with anything else to do, so instead of grabbing a book to read you grabbed a container of chocolate. I know I have many times.

Emotional Eating Tip – Again, this is when you have to be in tune of your emotions. If you realize you are putting an important task off instead of grabbing food…. get to the task and finish it. If you find you are still hungry…. grab some carrot sticks. Or, if you find you are bored… have a back-up plan for this. Start a book and always grab it when you are bored. Or, run to the movie rental store and stock up on the movies you have been dying to see.

Crave Favorite Foods

Emotional Eating Tip – Here are a couple of Craving Tips that might help…

• Substitute Foods – Try a glass of low fat chocolate milk instead of a chocolate bar.
• Use Portion Control – Buy smaller servings of your favorite foods.

Eat when Stressed, Angry, Lonely, or Tired

This category of emotional eating is probably the biggest downfall for many overeaters…me included. It is sometimes easier to distract yourself with eating yummy food than to deal with these emotions. But, after overeating the feeling of guilt can make the underlying terrible feelings even worse. Knowing when you are feeling stressed, angry, lonely or tired and dealing with these feelings is the best scenario and it might keep you from overeating. But, how do you do this…. how do you stop yourself from eating and to deal with the real problem instead? That’s tough… and we will spend an entire post on it soon. But, in the mean time… here are some tips to help you not eat and to deal instead.

Emotional Eating Tip – Deal with the real underlying problem

• Cry if you need to.
• Practice breathing exercises to calm yourself.
• Talk with a friend.
• Release anger by pounding your fist into a pillow…. or even scream into a pillow if that works.
• Go for a walk.
• Confront the person who is making you angry.
• Ask for time out or help on a project.

Feel Unworthy to Eat or Feel Guilty about Eating

This is a classic way for dieters to think. Eating and hunger are part of the human condition…. "you have to eat to live". But, for many of us eating and food is a moral issue. But, this shouldn’t be the case.

Emotional Eating Tip – Instead of letting the inner voices say, "Do I deserve this?" instead ask yourself, "Am I truly hungry?". If the answer is, "yes"… then please eat.

Eat Healthy Around Others, but Splurge Alone

It’s that inner voice again that is causing this to happen. You know what voice I’m talking about…. the voice that says, "You shouldn’t eat that!". What happens is that you are so good (probably restricting too many calorie) when you are with others. And, when you restrict too many calories you will snap eventually…. usually when you are alone so that nobody is there to judge you. It is during this time alone that you dig into everything that is around you because you over-restricted yourself when you were with others. Allowing yourself to splurge occasionally with others is a good thing. It keeps you happy and it won’t damage your diet. Don’t listen to those negative thoughts telling you that you shouldn’t have that piece of chocolate cake. Have that slice of cake…. just watch yourself the rest of the day.

Emotional Eating Tip – You need to replace negative, irrational thoughts with positive, rational ones. One way is to get away from all-or-nothing thinking. Pull back from the extremes and stay moderate. Get rid of should and shouldn’t. No food is all good or all bad, and neither are you.

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What I’m trying to show you with this post is that you have many options when it comes to dieting on Thanksgiving. You don’t have to feel that you will gain weight during this Thanksgiving Holiday. Because as you will read….. you don’t have to.

How to stick to your Diet on Thanksgiving

How to Survive Thanksgiving on a Diet – Thanksgiving is one meal. One meal won’t derail your weight loss goals. What will derail them is using a minor holiday indulgence as an excuse to binge until New Year’s. Here are some tips on how to keep things in perspective.

Avoid blowing your diet at Thanksgiving – Experts say it is all about the portion size…. nothing new there. But, do you know what the portion size is? Read this article to find out.

Sticking to a Diet During Thanksgiving Events and Celebrations – You’ve been diligent about your diet, and you don’t want to regain the weight you’ve lost during Thanksgiving events and celebrations. Here’s how to fight temptation without insulting your host.

How to Stick to a Diet on Thanksgiving – Dieting on Thanksgiving may seem impossible. It’s not. With the variety of food available at most Thanksgiving feasts, you are sure to find enough to fill you up without breaking your waistline. With the right choices and a few strategic steps, you’ll be able to stick to a diet on Thanksgiving.

10 Ways to Prevent Thanksgiving Day Weight Gain – Ten steps you can take that will allow you to enjoy the holiday and still keep your waist line in check.

Five Best Thanksgiving Foods - Here are five Thanksgiving foods that you can enjoy to your heart’s content without worrying about your waistline!

Healthy Holiday Eating Tips for Thanksgiving – Do you know that the average Thanksgiving dinner has over 2000 calories? It can be a real challenge if you are watching your waistline. The following are some eating tips so that you can still look good and be healthy after the Thanksgiving dinner without having to deprive yourself.

How To Survive Thanksgiving Dinner While On A Diet - Debbie Breneman says it is possible to continue losing weight during Thanksgiving….. it’s all about the choices.

What Fergie Plans to Eat This Thanksgiving – Fergie who recently gained wait for a movie role (13 pounds to be exact) is in the process of losing that weight now. She says she will continue dieting during the Thanksgiving Holiday. Find out how she is going to do it.

Low-Fat Thanksgiving Ideas – Is it possible to make a delicious Thanksgiving Feast even if you are using Low-Fat items?! The answer is yes. Check this out.

Exercise Tips For Thanksgiving and the Holiday Season – It might be very, very difficult to lose weight during the Thanksgiving Holiday….. but you should be able to MAINTAIN your weight. One way to limit the weight gain during Thanksgiving and Christmas is to get active and do some exercise.

Sticking to a Low Calorie Thanksgiving Diet – Here are some tips that may help you stick to a low calorie Thanksgiving diet and avoid those extra pounds this holiday season.

Healthy Habits Tips – Staying In Control at Thanksgiving – It’s probably not realistic to think you are going to stick with a strict diet over the Thanksgiving holiday, and that’s fine. So what can you do to offset that overindulgence? Two things: burn extra calories before Thanksgiving to give you a cushion and keep things in check just a bit during the Thanksgiving feast.

How to Prevent Holiday Pounds – Armed with a few savvy strategies, you’ll be able to eat well and still fend off those unwanted holiday pounds. Here’s your guide to healthy holiday eating.

Thanksgiving Dinner Diet Tips – Here are 5 tips that will help you shave 1000 calories off your Thanksgiving dinner without deprivation.

Thanksgiving Calories, Without the Guilt – Just Have a Plan for Getting Your Diet Back on Track, Experts Say.

Top image by *clairity*

• Eat Slowly – Your brain needs 20 minutes to get the message that you are full. Eat too fast and you will not know you are full until you have already overeaten.
  
  

  .Don’t wait until you are starving to Eat – You are more apt to overeat when you wait until you are absolutely starving to eat. Eating every few hours smaller meals is one way to insure that you don’t overeat once your do eat. Keep in mind it’s not how often you eat that counts…. instead it is the total calories consumed throughout the day.

  
  
• Pay attention to How you Feel – Many of us struggle with knowing what are real hunger pains…. I know I do. You need to pay attention to even the vaguest feelings that you are full. Stop wearing sweat pants and wear jeans…. or something more fitting. When you are starting to feel your waste band feel snug you have had enough for sure. When you aren’t sure how feeling full feels then keeping an eye on outside clues (such as the snug waste band) might be your only method of figuring it out. Over time knowing when you are actually hungry and full will come easier.
  
  Eating 3 meals and 2 snacks a day plus eating slowly will definitely help. Waiting too long in between meals will cause you to be famished and eat too quickly to realize you are full until you have overate.
  
  Hunger Body Signals
  • Difficult concentrating
  • Feeling faint
  • Headache
  • Irritability
  • Lightheadness
  • Mild gurgling or gnawing in the stomach
  • Stomach Talking

   

• Buy Single Serving Foods – This is especially helpful when you are trying to re-teach yourself what it feels like to be full. If you have a single serving bag of something you are more apt to stop eating once that single serving is done. However, without a item made into a single serving you might eat several servings before you even realize that you are full.

In Conclusion

Knowing your body’s hunger signals is very important in your weight loss success….so is knowing when you are full. Using the above techniques should help you become more alert to your body’s messages and get you one step closer to meeting your weight loss goals.

Top image by Oisin Mulvihill

In my last post I wrote about 3 important steps you should do to start a diet the right way. Once you have completed those three things there is another thing I would suggestion doing….. figuring out what your healthy weight is.

Knowing what is your proper weight is going to make it easier for you to achieve your goals. After all, if you are setting your goals too high achieving your goal is going to not only be very, very difficult, but it will also be unhealthy and frustrating. Knowing your ideal weight will halp you focus on what is healthy for you.

The Reason the Scale is Not Enough

Fat Measurement

When you start an exercise plan seeing the numbers on the scale stay the same or go up is not unusual. Muscle weighs more than fat. So, as you work-out and your fat turns to muscle you could see your weight actually go up. This can be frustrating to people who are working out to "lose" weight. But, they shouldn’t be disappointed.

Why?

Because fat takes up more room than muscle. Which means once fat turns to muscle you will appear to be thinner… your clothes size will diminish, but the scale might not go down. But, taking your measurements will prove to you that your muscle mass is more and your fat is less.

How?

Well, one way is to Calculate your Body Mass Index (BMI)

BMI is a calculation that determines how much fat is on your body. You can calculate your BMI yourself or have your BMI figured out using more technical means. For right now we will talk about calculating your BMI yourself.

There is an easy formula to figure out your BMI….. here it is:

BMI Formula – English Version

BMI Formula – Metric Version

For example, if you weigh 140 pounds and you are 5 Foot 6 Inches tall then your BMI would be 23.

Using a BMI Calculator

Another method is to use an online calculator to Calculate Body Mass Index. Simply punch in your information and it will spit out your BMI automatically. No need to pull out your handheld calculator.

What is a Good BMI?

Okay, so you know what your BMI is now. Now what? What is a good BMI?

Underwater Weighing

This is the most accurate method for determining your body fat percentage. But, it is almost the least practical.

Fat floats….. so you can determine how lean your body is by submerging it in water. But, it must be done by a trained technician. Your body would need to be submerged in water. Once your body is totally submerged you force all the air out of your lungs. You remain underwater for about 10 seconds and the technician can record your weight. You have to do this like 10 more times so the technician can get an accurate average. This method is not very practical, but very accurate.

Skin-fold Thickness

This is another accurate method, however, the measurements need to be taken by an experienced practitioner. The practitioner measures the fat just under the skin by pinching the skin with a skin-fold caliper at the upper arm, upper back, lower back, stomach and upper thigh. The practitioner will take two sets of measurements and takes the average. Using a special formula they should arrive at the percent body fat of your entire body.

Okay, so I told you about Body Mass Index (BMI), but what do the numbers mean?

Let’s say you figured out your BMI was 23. Remember this information from above:

Healthy Weight: BMI of 19 to 24.9

Overweight: BMI of 25 to 29.9

Obese: BMI of 30 and above

From the above information we know that 23 falls within the Healthy Weight range. So, what this means is you probably don’t need to lose any weight. However, if your BMI was 27 then it falls within the Overweight Range and it would be a good idea to lose a bit of weight until your BMI falls within the Healthy Range.

In Conclusion

There you have it. Now you have the means to figure out what YOUR healthy weight is. Bottom line, it is nice to "look" good, but what is most important is health. Find out your BMI and you are one step closer in knowing what your weight needs to be to be healthy.

Top Photo by a.drian

You’ve decided to lose weight? Good for you….. But, where do you start?

Losing weight can be a difficult thing to do. But, what can be even more difficult is coming up with a way to do it.

There are so many choices out there for losing weight. It can be a difficult thing to figure out what is a healthy weight loss plan for you. What plans out there are a joke and what is determined to actually work. Where on earth do you begin.

Well, first thing first…. you need to see your doctor. Let your doctor know you would like to lose weight. Your doctor will offer suggestions and make sure you are healthy to go forward with your weight loss plan.

But, before you begin any weight loss plan there are three things you should do first:

Get Motivated

Bottom line, find something to motivate you…. motivation in itself could be enough to get you through some of the difficult days.

Find Support

Some people forget how important having suppor is. Without the support of someone you will have a more difficult time reaching your weight loss goals.

We all think we are tough. We all hate sharing our weaknesses with others. We feel that having to diet and needing help might mean that we lack self control and that we are weak. Well, get over that….. that is absolutely not the case!! Dieting and losing weight is a difficult thing to do….. and those that love you want to help you. Let them help you…. let them offer you some support.

If that is not going to happen…. if you are totally against asking your loved ones for support then you are going to have to get it from somewhere else. There are plenty of places you can get your support from. There are online forums and support groups to lend their support. Or, there are support groups you can find locally. To find local weight loss support groups in your area simply look that up in your local phone book. You are sure to find at least a few. I will write more on support groups in the near future.

Set your Goals

This isn’t an area you want to skip. Some people think that losing weight is the goal so what other goals are needed to be done. Well, being more specific than just "losing weight" is important. Without the specifics how can you reward yourself when you achieve your goal? Without rewards you might lose your motivation. (Remember how important motivation is?)

Set small goals working up to the larger goals. Each time you reach a small goal reward yourself with something. And, remember to set your rewards at the same time you set your goals. You will be reminded of what you will receive when you reach your goals.

An example of what a small goal would be….. 5 pounds. If your ultimate goals is to lose 20 pounds then make the small goals 5 pounds and reward yourself each time you lose 5 pounds.

In Conclusion

So as you see, before you should start any weight loss plan you need to get motivated, find support and set your goals. Once you do that you will be able to see what weight loss plans will work best for you. You will be stronger and more able to achieve your goals. Yes, when you decide to lose weight you want to get started right away, but take a moment and do these three things. You will be that much closer to reaching your ultimate goal….. whatever you decide that is.

Top Image by Pink Sherbet Photography