Maintenance meal planning/calories question....vets

 Do you ever experience a variation in your appetite from day to day?  Do you eat more on the days that you feel hungrier or do you only stick to what you planned in advance?  Do you have a fixed calorie amount that you plan your meals around day to day or do you have a calorie range that you plan for and allow yourself to eat to the high end of it on the days you have more of an appetitie or exercised more?

I definitely have days when I am hungrier then others.  I have been dealing with this maintenance thing for over a year now and I am still learning my way around it.  What I am finding is that it isn't necessarily how many calories I take in in a day but a cumulative amount over several days.  One day I may eat 1200, another 2000 and another 1800 but it all seems to even out on a weekly basis.  That is why I no longer freak out when I have a big food day, because I know that the next day I may hardly eat.
I tend to plan out my food every day and allow for more food then I probably will eat.  That way I am covered if I get hungry.  I try to plan ahead and have food with me if I am going to be gone for a long time.  When I go to work it looks like I am packing for a trip because I tend to get picky and if I only brought one or two things and I don't feel like them I might not have anything I want to eat with  me.

Yes I do. Some days I'm not hungry at all. I can barely eat an ounce. Others I can eatmy meal and still be hungry. But for the most part I stick to my meals. If I can't and I feel like I have to eat something I'll eat cheese or nuts.

I experience variations in my hunger. For the last 2 months I had been ravenous every day. I find if I eat something and wait 20 minutes, the ravenous hunger subsides to a manageable level. For the last 2 weeks I have not been so hunger driven.

 

I am a Lacto-Ovo Vegetarian. I eat a variety of beans, peas, low-fat dairy, eggs, whole grains, fruits and vegetables. 

 

All carbs are not created equal. I would definitely refrain from eating refined carbs. Eat simple carbs (dairy, fruit) and complex carbs (beans, vegetables, whole grains). I do not count daily carb grams. 

 

I eat every 2 to 3 hours. Every meal or snack includes protein. I count calories and allow myself 2000 calories a day times 7 days a week (14,000). If I eat less calories one day, I can eat more the following day/days during the week. 

 

I also have never introduced a food into my mouth that I have not planned to eat. I always consider the protein and nutritional value of each morsel. 

 

I do not participate in a formal exercise program due to Rheumatoid Arthritis and Osteoarthritis. I do move around a lot more and do a lot more walking.

 

I have been able to maintain my 200 pound weight loss eating this way since November 2011.

I definitely have days when I'm hungrier than others.  Mostly I don't worry about it.  It seems to balance out in the end for me.  I average around 1500 calories a day but probably range from about 1200 to 1800 on any given day.  I just try to make healthy choices.  If I notice I've been eating more than usual for a few days, I try to increase my protein and fluids.

For me, appetite and hunger are two different things. Yes, some days I have more of an appetite (desire to eat) than others, but that is no different than it was pre-op. As far as hunger, I am in the minority of post-ops in that -- even at 5 years out -- I still don't feel physical hunger unless I go a long time without eating (and even then, it is usually the low blood sugar symptoms that I notice before I get hungry). PART of that, though, is that I still eat as I did right after surgery: 6 (sometimes 7) times a day, 3 somewhat larger meals and 3 or 4 smaller protein snacks.

I still pretty much eat by the clock (although the are times when it is necessary to vary that because of schedule issues), and the people that I know IRL who also continue to do this (most of them are also my surgeon's patients and so they, too, started out eating 6 times a day) SEEM to have less trouble with overeating. That might be purely anecdotal, but I personally believe that it isn't... That when you eat smaller meals throughout the day, you have less chance to get hungry at all (and that then minimizes the hungrier days).

I don't count calories (just protein), and there definitely are days when I eat more than others, but -- as long as the scale doesn't move and I am making good choices 90+% of the time --I don't worry about it. It has worked for me for 5 years.

Lora