April's CR Diary

Oh man, that dinner sounds heavenly. And you mean to tell me that it's doable to be CR AND still be a foodie? you're knocking down my internal objections one after another...:-)

Sounds like a FANTASTIC restaurant! If I were in Philly, I'd go there...

My birthday is also on August 2.

AND, I have been reading about CR (which is how I found your site) and I'm confused. I eat between 1200 - 1600 calories per day. I'm 5'7", but I weigh way, way, way more than I want to. I don't even know how much I weigh, because I can't do the weighing thing...long story. Anyway, if I had to guess, I'd say I weigh about 165, which is too much. I balance protein, fat and carbs and count calories. I'm a vegetarian. What am I doing wrong?

Hi Sarah!

Yes, you can do CR and be a foodie! And librarians are cool! My mommy is a college librarian. I grew up in libraries!

Hi Serena!

Thanks for your comment, and funny that we have the same birthday! My suspicion is that you're wrong about how many calories you're eating. People who don't weigh and measure most everything they eat usually are very, very far off about how much they eat. Now you are much taller than I am so you should be eating more. You can eat less for awhile if you have weight to burn off, but once you get down to a low weight, you can't do that anymore without getting very hungry or thinner than you may like. Of course, these are all very individual decisions. Do you eat out at all? Restaurant meals can add tremendously to one's average. Hence my 1200 days if I'm going out at all. I assume that a restaurant meal adds at least 1000 calories to the week, and that's even if I skip meals on either side.

Of course activity level and such play into calorie level... I have to eat quite a bit more when I'm exercising than when I'm not. But in general, people WAY underestimate how many calories they're eating unless they weigh and measure their food and count their calories rigorously.

a

There's a really nice BMR calculator by a CRONie here: It calculates the amount of "caloric restriction".

http://www.scientificpsychic.com/health/cron1.html

Your comment about eating 1/2 of MR while 5/6 of his size is misleading because 1. men have higher BMR than women and 2. his BMI is smaller.

For an approx. for you, I used 5'2", 105lbs, female, 32, lightly active. It spit out that your control twin would have a BMR of 1662, and that a caloric intake of 1600 results in 3.7& Caloric Restriction.

I particularly thought was interesting the "Case Study" (which I'm guessing is based on Lisa Walford) who is 5'7", 120 lbs, eats 1000 calories a day, weight stable. The observation that caloric restriction decreases BMR feels accurate to me (and to every dieter I've met). If I understand correctly, it's a part of the metabolic changes that happen with caloric restriction ("starvation mode") where the body becomes more efficient with the calories that are consumed.

Hi RG,

Lisa Walford is under five feet tall, so your info is a bit off.

I've seen Antonio Zamora's "Control Twin" calculator, and I think it's ridiculous.

Also, I'm not lightly active, I'm very active. When I was lightly active, I ate a lot less. I do 40 mins on the treadmill a day plus Pilates class twice a week and 20 minutes Pilates a day at home, in addition to a job for which I walk around much of the time.

Lisa Walford is probably 4'10" on a good day... and that would make sense to be eating about 1000. If someone who was 5'7" tried to do that, they'd waste away to nothing pretty darn quick.

I suggest you check out Robin's blog for further info.

a

Oooooooh... yes, Antonio's "Case Study!" I'm fairly sure that's Liza May, who openly admits that she does not weigh and measure her food. So she doesn't really know how much she's eating. She has no idea. The number she reports is wrong, misleading, and dangerous.

If I eat 1200 a day, I lose a pound a day until I hit 99 at which point I eat more. Robin and I actually know, because we actually weigh and measure, how much we eat. And we could be guessing low when we eat out.

Feel free to get fixated on insanely low numbers if you want, but I'm going to continue to point out that they're not realistic. And continuing to repeat them only leads people to eat dangerously low levels of calories and either lose weight too fast or conclude that CR is impossible.

a

Except for the occasional meal out, I weigh and measure all my meals. I've been keeping a detailed diary of what I eat and I can promise you, if I ate 1200 calories a day or less at this point, I would definitely weigh less than 90 pounds, which is just scary skinny in my book.

I'm eating close to 1700 calories a day and my weight is stable at about 94 pounds according to my scale, which could be up to 5 pounds off. I do not consider myself terribly active. Being in an urban environment, walking is a natural part of my day. However, I haven't been on any sort of exercise program (bad Robin!) for several months. Still, if I go below, say, 1600 calories a day, my weight starts to drop.

If you had told me 7 or 8 months ago that I would be able to maintain a weight below 100 on 1700 calories a day, I would have said you were nuts. But I can't deny what I'm seeing from one day to the next. Facts are facts, regardless of what Tony's calculator says.

And you can't tell me I'm not restricted. My current weight is a full 26 pounds (21.6%) less than my setpoint (what I weighed in college). I'm accomplishing this not by working out (which I really should do) but by restricting my calories. CRON is not about weight, but let's not pretend the two aren't connected. Clearly, I've reached some level of restriction and clearly, that level is more than just a few percent (Tony's calculator, incredibly, says I'm not restricted at all. I'd have to be nothing but skin and bones to achieve restriction by his estimates).

I kept a little diary (not on my blog) during those first few months when I was gradually changing my eating habits. In those early days, I estimated my calorie intake but did *not* measure. Today, I just laugh at those journal entries. It's now obvious to me that I was vastly underestimating the number of calories I was consuming. How do I know? Well, now that I have a lot of experience with weighing and measuring my food, I have a pretty good idea of what 1200 calories looks like. Back then, I had no idea. My salads were filled with feta cheese, nuts, dried fruit and tons of olive oil - all unmeasured - yet I was reporting impossibly low calorie estimates for them. I reported what I wanted to believe I was eating, not what I was truly eating. Even then, I was losing weight - it makes me wonder how many calories I must have been eating before I started CRON!

April is absolutely right that many people are getting the wrong idea about how low you have to go with your calorie levels in order to be restricted. One of the reasons I'm keeping a detailed diary of what I eat on my blog is that I want people to see how much I eat on a daily basis.

I also want people to note that I get 100% of my nutrition each and every day, even if it means I go over my calorie allowance. I've noticed some folks tend to fixate on the restriction part and then skimp on nutrition. This is not ok. It'll make you real sick real quick. If you want to practice CRON responsibly, you just can't compromise on nutrition. Doing so will not only negate the benefits of CR, it could actually kill you if you do it often enough.

CR + ON = life
CR + less than ON = sickness and possible death

This is serious business, folks. I don't want anyone hurting him/herself. If you're going to do this, do it right.

I agree with April, forget about that CRON calculator.

Love the restaurant info. I will be in Philly in August so I will be going to James for sure!

Hi April
Your letter reads like a report for Gourmet Magazine. Maybe there will be such a magazine in the future for CRONies.
Funny that Robin eats 1700 and weighs under 100. I eat between 1700 and 1800 and stay around 130lbs. I'm an active male and some of that weight must be in muscle mass.
Cheers,
Arturo

Arturo,

Yes, I'm quite astonished by how much food I can eat and still be so thin. Perhaps a little more muscle mass (and yes, I know I should be working to increase my muscle mass) would change things a bit. But I think the lesson here is that each person is unique in ways that no calculator (however well-intentioned the creator of that calculator may be) will ever be able to capture. And I think it's important for newbies to keep this in mind. Just because Tony's calculator tells you that you should be eating 1200 calories a day to achieve 15% restriction *in no way* means that you should really shoot for this goal. As my experience shows, the calculator just isn't all that accurate. It *can't* be, at least not in my case. Better to start out gently and pay attention to what your body is telling you than to dogmatically follow what some computer program tells you to do.

My two cents.
R

Hey, April!

Thanks for responding. In fact, I do weigh and/or calculate every bite of food that I take in. And every ounce of liquid. Every calorie, fat gram, protein and carbohydrate. I get teased by those around me. However, I do this because if I ate "normally," I am convinced I'd weigh much, much more than I do.

Also, I do not routinely eat out at restaurants. There is no fast food in my life at all! If I do dine out, it's once every two to three weeks. I eat lots of whole foods. I don't eat sweets.

Best I can tell, I'm a giant person who eats in the same calorie range as those who practice CR. And instead of being lean and small, I look like a solid, burly washer woman. I just don't see how this is possible...

But I love all the recipes and ideas I see here! And I appreciate all of your thoughts...very intelligent.

Best,
Serena

"You see folks, doing CR doesn't mean giving up fine dining."

That's good! Your food descriptions are also sublime. But if I had to wait between breakfast, until a night out at a restaurant before I could eat, with nothing in between, I'd surely be absolutely famished and would definately overeat. I don't know about you, April, but for me, (and I'm thinking this is also true of most people) that amount of time between meals would be an unnecessary stressor.

Garry,

I'm certain most people would agree with you... as I've said before, I'm not trying to convince anyone to do CR, or to do it my way. My own partner MR would never, ever skip a meal, and would consider it absurd to skip lunch in order to enjoy a meal out. We all make different choices... since I both want to practice fairly serious CR and also to enjoy the occasional fine dining experience, I do things the way I described. One could make many other choices, and I've experimented with a great many variations on my CR practice.

Glad you liked the food descriptions! I found out that the owner read the letter outloud to the entire staff!

a

"If I eat 1200 a day, I lose a pound a day until I hit 99 ..." -April Smith (above)

That was supposed to read that you lose a pound a "week", at 1200 calories a day, right? Can't possibly be a pound a day.

For me, a 5'8" male, I lose 1.6 pounds a week when I consume 1200 calories a day, which I have done for three months in a row last year, with extreme daily constancy.

"Also, I do not routinely eat out at restaurants. If I do dine out, it's once every two to three weeks. ... Best I can tell, I'm a giant person [5'7", 165 lbs est] who eats in the same calorie range as those who practice CR ["1200-1600" cals] And instead of being lean and small, I look like a solid, burly washer woman. I just don't see how this is possible..." -Serena (above)

It is not possible. Therefore, you are consuming more calories than you are accounting for.

Do you use "zero calorie" cooking spray? Well, are you aware that there are REALLY about 1000 calories in that can of "zero calorie" cooking spray! Do you use "zero calorie" sweeteners? Well, do you know that there are REALLY about 4 calories in every one of those "zero calorie" packets!

You don't eat out regularly, but maybe up to twice a month!? Lol, say what? That's regular enough to involve huge cumulative errors in the estimates of how many calories you consume from those trips to the restaurant. And the restaurants load huge amounts of high-calorie FAT on the innocent looking foods which they give you ... nearly impossible to accurately gauge.

And on, and on ... there are so many ways to underestimate the exact number of calories which you are actually consuming.

I have been eating around 1200 calories a day for about 6 weeks. I have lost around 5 1/2 lbs. I am 5'2" and my BMI is around 23. My goal weight is 120 lbs. I have a little more muscle then most of the females my size. I think that unless a person measures and weighs what they are consuming.....it is very easy to underestimate how many calories they have ate. 1200 calories is not a lot of food at the end of the day. I only exercize about 3 days a week as well. I am losing weight and I would recommend people diet within reason and be patient.