Keto macros and logging in diary

(Denise) #1

I’ve just updated my numbers (macros) for my logging diary to 70% Fats, 5% Carbs and 25% Proteins. What others use, that works for them I would love to hear ;), including the logging if you do so :slight_smile: I don’t plan to do it every day, although I eat so the same every day I can just copy on MFP, very handy :slight_smile:

That’s just a keto recommend I found again, but haven’t been following closely but want to now. Also, for my height/weight/age on a calculator (online) it recommended 75, 5, and 20, same order as above. I’m going with the first just because, for now :wink:

I feel I could do better at watching my food intake, and hitting atleast close to recommends and see how I do, I mean logging again. It might help me also in my workouts to log ball-park on what I am burning per day, how much. I have a Polar I can use when I do something aerobic, which I do that more for fun and enjoyment. Weights I am just hoping I form the habit that drives me to get there and work-out.

All of this I think will also get me out around people more with the same interests, because the people that live around me are sitting around waiting to die. I’m sorry, but that’s just my opinion. Most eat for enjoyment and for me, eating is fueling my body so I can enjoy life more, not just a “fix” like eating when I’m depressed etc. I’ve come a long wait but I want to go further. Maybe it’s Summer-time driving me forward but it’s raining today and very up for going to the gym :wink:

#2

I don’t track now but I did it very much in the last several years. It’s fun and sometimes informative. It’s merely tracking, I can’t stop at some fixed number. Just because my goal is, like, 120g fat (I don’t really have a target let alone limit but it sounds a nice number?), I may eat 250. If I am hungry, I am hungry and sometimes I just need to be a bit wild. I actually consider my higher-fat and high-cal days unavoidable, they regularly but rarely happen. I probably need those.

I don’t have targets or limits except for calories, not like it has much impact on my intake. I don’t really have control, I just choose my food, sometimes plan, track and hope for the best. (And it rarely happens but no way I will force myself.)

I know myself and I know 70% is tricky and 75% is plain impossible without overeating. Our fat percentage should be individual and if it’s 50% one day and 80% on the other, it still may be just perfect, surely some people are like this. My tastes and instincts makes straying from 65% pretty hard so I am there but it doesn’t matter anyway. All fat intake I am able to do is great - as long as I exercise enough to use it up :smiley: My protein is always in its good range so I don’t need to care much about it (though I try to keep it as low as possible as I don’t want to waste it and more protein brings more fat anyway).

I eat for nutrients and food joy, both are vital for me. And for other reasons, I suppose, like shutting up my body when it wants the food it could be without for another day but no, it wants it NOW… But eating is already welcomed and greatly enjoyed. Just not always.
Eating the tastiest food or eating healthy? Why not both? My inner hedonist doesn’t understand why they couldn’t go perfectly together most of the time. If my tastes must change a bit, so be it but not enjoying the hell out of my healthy food, that won’t do.

If you are interested, I can tell you what is a perfect day for me, I just can’t stick to it often. I need to learn to skip lunch first, I have some experience but it’s like drinking coffee, I don’t focus a bit and I am back.
I find percentages pretty much irrelevant, I focus on grams. But I rarely can escape my 65-70% (and it’s usually 65), it’s connected to my tastes and instincts but in the end, the grams are important. I had 55% days but I need to go for lean items and be very lucky. (And overdoing protein is a concern there. Nope, for my caloric need 65% is just superb, lucky me it’s the easiest.) Fat just appears in my life, no matter my woe, no matter if I deliberately try to keep it low unless I am SUPER curious and focus ALL DAY. I could go higher than 70% easily but that’s for a higher energy intake. If I stay close to carnivore, avoid/minimize too fatty items and don’t eat without a good reason, I should do well without tracking. But then I won’t KNOW it and I am curious. Too bad I can’t track fatty meat but I don’t need a big accuracy and protein is more important as that shows me if I will get hungry later or not.

I like my carbs low, 5% is a bit high but sometimes works. But my average should be lower. But I don’t care about it, my 20g carnivore-ish days feel just as okay as my 3g ones.

I look up what I put into my tracking place, not like I care if I am close or not. I never did. I care about calories more but not all days are the same…

Oh my, I set it to 130g fat, 30g carbs and 85g protein :smiley: It was ages ago. Well I should go for 120g protein, 20g or less carbs and 1600kcal, whatever amount of fat is that (not always the same, obviously). That’s my goal, my planned days are around that. I don’t follow plans well but it gives me an idea. And then I end up a 80g protein day following by a 160g one. And it even may be just perfect.
So I am all for nice plans but very much against fixed targets. They may be great for some people but definitely not for some of us.

I am sorry if I couldn’t grasp what exactly you were curious for but hopefully I wrote about that too? Even though we seem to be different. I can’t control my macros though tracking, I need to figure out what realistic and comfortable rules I should follow for them to fall into the right range (and I need big ranges for them).

(Denise) #3

Wow, I see by my numbers for today’s menu I need more protein and less fats. I ended up changing my settings but it still didn’t give me more protein and less fats.

That’s why logging at least once in awhile, is good for me. Here’s a snip, and you can also see I was way under my caloric needs too. Oh well, I’ll figure how to atleast be in the ball-park and I will really need to doing more weight’s now. I want to build some muscle, and lose the fat that loves to hang around my mid-section :joy:

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#4

Agreed, the fat could be dialed back, but protein needs to come up! Just override the macros and put your own in. Force 1g protein per your bodyweight, add in your carbs, and the rest can be fat. Then, depending on your goal at any given time you can throttle the fat/protein.

Works much better to go by grams, %'s don’t work in the end. If you under ate for a day, you could be over on things, if you ate a little extra, would you eat more carbs to keep the % in check?

(Denise) #5

I don’t have to eat all fatty meats do I?? I see white fish, Turkey, Chicken breasts all have low or not fat so I could just mix in some of that.

Also, do you mean dial back the fat % won’t work because I’m still eating the same as when I lost the 23 lbs so I’m a little befuddled :wink:

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #6

As long as you are getting all the energy you need, it doesn’t have to come from meat fat.

Protein provides structural elements for the repair of the body and the building of new tissues. It costs extra energy to metabolise protein for its energy, so the body prefers not to use it as an energy source. That’s what carbohydrate and fatty acids are for.

We need a reasonable amount of protein, but we also need to supply our body’s energy needs. Since we are giving our body no more than 80 calories (20 g) of carbohydrate, the rest of the energy we need has to come from fat.

Suppose someone on a 2000-calorie diet eats 60% of those calories as carbohydrate. But they decide to go keto. That means they are now eating only 20 g (80 cals) of carbohydrate, and are therefore missing 0.6 × 2000 - 80 = 1120 cals. To get that many calories from carbohydrate requires 280 g of carbohydrate, whereas that same number of calories is supplied by only 124 g of fat.

Most people can tell they’ve eaten enough fat at a meal, because they stop being hungry. I’ve had it happen from one mouthful to the next—boom, I’m done.

(Denise) #7

Thanks for that Paul I don’t know sometimes I just think it’s a bad idea to track my calories I think you’re right too about the facts because I’m not sometimes I’m just not hungry enough and like today I think I had 1000 or 1100 calories not even 1,200 calories but I’m not hungry and I’m not you know anorexic or anything like that so I’m texting this on my phone so sorry about no punctuation I just wanted to get back to you tonight

#8

It’s important to eat enough, hunger shouldn’t dictate how much we eat (only if it works as we don’t starve or overeat).
So many people say they aren’t hungry. Well, it’s not a good enough reason to starve…
We can make an educated guess about how much food we need, it may be off as we can’t possibly know our energy need (and it varies) or even fat percentage (unless we can measure it, I can’t) and it’s probably not so easy anyway BUT eventually we can figure it out and be at least vaguely okay anyway.
1000 kcal is too little for almost everyone but it matters how much fat we have, how long it lasts and other things. It’s easy for me as I know for a fact that I can’t function below 1600 kcal (I can’t eat below it, basically as I eat when I feel the need, it happened after too low-cal or otherwise not good enough days after midnight) and it’s a tiny deficit for me so perfect. But many people can easily starve on keto and then face the consequences. That’s not good and should be stopped.

IDK what is this about fat, it’s nowhere high… I would raise both protein and fat. BUT some people realize they should be quite low with it (<80g is low-fat to me) so there are exceptional cases. Some of us should be very careful with fat but I wouldn’t worry about it until it doesn’t balloon the calories too much (but if the body gives signs it wants the fat, I still would eat it. I have priorities and my body knows better its own needs than me with my numbers and unavoidable imperfect knowledge).

I wouldn’t go for no-fat meat unless I desire them. Almost all of us needs a decent amount of fat on keto, not a tiny amount so leaner but not super lean cuts should work. If one day becomes “too” fatty or whatever other number goes a bit (or more) too high, it’s not a big deal IMO, plan better the next day…? A single slightly off day doesn’t ruin the efforts and I consider them very normal too. So just because we see 83g and 1076 kcal, it doesn’t mean we should go no-fat for an extra meal or something. But yes, if we don’t need much fat and still need plenty of protein, we should choose some nice lower-fat protein source if we are fine with that. If we are super hungry and need the fat, well, there are higher-cal days, they never were a problem for me, I lost fat while having about one per week. They weren’t crazy, I ate mostly normal and I ate quite fine on the other 6 days…

(Marianne) #9

I tracked my macros for about 2-3 weeks when I first started. It was helpful because I was brand new to this WOE and prior to keto, all I knew about was counting calories, not fat/protein/carb grams. I had to familiarize myself with how many macros were in the foods I could eat. Once I got a feel for this, I stopped tracking because I was eating clean food, not snacking and eating to satiety.

I say do whatever you find helpful.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #10

This is the best advice.

(Denise) #11

That’s what I did to find out what my meals actually contained Marianne :wink: I was glad I was already familiar with an online diary that was easy for me to navigate. But yes, once I knew the basics, I quite logging. I haven’t worried about the amount of fat I was eating til lately on this lack of getting rid of what they call the “belly fat”. I’m not worried as I’ve now increased my exercise and I weighed in at 115 again so doesn’t seem I gained an actual 2 lbs.

I just don’t want things to get out of hand is all. I also have to consider the muscle I’m gaining and may end up weighing more from that, seems logical. I’ll be doing what you and someone else mentioned and that’s just basically listening to my body.

I made my Almond/Cinnamon bread, added blueberries and cream-cheese for a dessert, then checked my bg and it didn’t spike it at all after dinner for 2 nights in a row. But, my tummy didn’t feel so good, nothing bad, just not as good as I feel without a dessert. I just feel my best without that type of snack :wink: I can do nuts, olives, boiled egg, things like that if I really feel the need :wink: