I’m disappointed because I’m over my calorie limit according to MFP. I’m still losing, just very slowly (4 pounds in a month).
So regarding MFP, it mentions on the front page something about being able to specialize in certain types of diets, is there some way to switch it over for being more useful for low carb?
For instance, it counts fiber as carbs, which, while technically correct, is not how low carb dieters handle it, so it inflates my carb numbers.
The real power of MFP is its food database, it contains so many pre-entered foods that it’s easy to count your calories. Most people I know use it as a calorie counter, not a carb counter.
Well, that’s true, but it’s still useful to track carbs anyway as long as it’s tracking your food intake.
I figured out how to change up the goals though - my home->goals->change goals, you can change your target macronutrients. Nothing about fiber there though unfortunately. Or rather you can set a target amount of fiber, but not subtract it from effective carbs.
It also doesn’t seem to let you change your goal lost per week to anything beyond 2 pounds, so that makes its projections kind of useless for me. I’m not going to get into bear-raping shape with some 2 pounds a week bullshit.
MFP is good for low carb to help you track carbs and calories. I use it to see that I’m at a good level of both. If I need more to eat in the evening I can see if I can have a high carb snack (like berries) or just something high calorie, or if I see I’ve had enough cals for the day I can see why I’m still hungry.
For low carb, first set it up to show fiber: My Home (tab) - Settings - Diary Settings - Nutrients tracked. There’s actually a Greasemonkey script out there that will calculate your net carbs (carbs minus fiber) but I just do that myself. Duh.
When you enter foods with sugar alcohols, make sure the doofus that entered the food did it right - total carbs minus sugar alcohols, but leaving in the fiber. People tend to enter stuff with net carbs AND fiber, and you end up with a lot of “negative carbs” foods and that’s annoying. Just make sure you check everything before you enter it, or enter the food yourself.
As for making the macronutrients (carbs, fat, protein) match up for low carb, go to My Home (tab) - Goals - Change Goals - Custom and change the percentages of carbs/fat/protein until they give you the ratios you want.
Join us in the Low Carb group on MFP! 
Also don’t miss the Success Stories forum because it’s awesome to see.
You can friend me there if you want. You can figure out the name
You do realize that anything more than 2 lbs per week would be medically irresponsible right?
The projections are silly anyway.
I sent you a friend request and identified myself with my SDMB name.
Duh what? Yes, I’m capable of doing basic subtraction. But their tracking and charts and all that aren’t. I don’t want to dig into every food item to double check the net carbs, so it would be useful to have that data available. Since, you know, having useful data available is the entire point of this thing.
No. There’s nothing wrong with losing more than 2 pounds per week. If you’re starving yourself to get there, then yes, it’s detrimental and dangerous, but if you get there because you’re eating lots of protein and building lean body mass in the process, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it.
When I did it before, my doctor didn’t like what I was doing, and she was set out to prove to me that it was going to hurt me. So she did a whole battery of tests. Then I lost at a rate of roughly 8 pounds a week for 2-3 months, settling in to about 5-6 for a few more. She ran all the tests again, and couldn’t find a metric by which I wasn’t in ideal health.
If you’re calorie counting and eating low fat garbage and dicking around on a treadmill, yeah, losing weight is hard on your body and if you’re losing that much it’s because you’re losing lean body mass which is counterproductive. But if you’re doing it right, it’s the healthiest thing you can do.
What’s the scoop on “sugar alcohol”? The doc is after me to dring tons of water, and I just don’t like it, so I bought some 0-cal flavored water. 0 everthing, except 6g sugar alcohol.
Sugar alcohols are something that trigger the sweetness taste in your tastebuds, but won’t get absorbed by your digestive tract as effectively as sugar. However, a lot of people count them as freebie carbs and that’s not right. Look at the chart on this page. Maltitol is a common one and it has 50-75% the glycemic impact of a similar amount of sugar (although sugar alcohols are generally used in lesser amounts). Other ones really are nearly freebies.
The downside is that if you have too much of them you’ll have some digestive distress and diarrhea. You’ll have to feel out your own personal tolerances, but I wouldn’t recommend starting out at more than 8-10g at a time.
Calm down, I’m not trying to say you are dumb. I am saying that if you display carbs and you display fiber, then you can do the subtraction yourself and you don’t need a Greasemonkey script. “Duh” is for the people who can’t figure out how to subtract on the fly and need the script.
As for double-checking net carbs, don’t know what to tell you…it’s user-entered data. Users are stupid. There will be like 7 listings for each food, take 2 seconds to find the ones with the right data (carbs minus sugar alcohols, with fiber listed) and once you find that right one you can easily find it again in your “Recent” list.
Tomorrow is supposed to be a walking day but it’s supposed to be icy. It was 80 today.
MFP has worked wonders for me. I have some kickass supportive friends there. That’s the other component that makes it worthwhile. Oh, and I never pay attention to macros. Eight and half months and 90 pounds later I’m still doing ok. I’m sure eventually once I get closer to my goal I’ll probably have to pay closer attention. Anyone that wants to add me on MFP can send me a PM and I’ll tell you my top secret username. 
I have a hard time figuring out serving sizes, especially by the teaspoon or tablespoon. Is that with it just filled to the rim like this? Or overflowing like this? I guess I find it easier to say “well there’s 40 of them in here, and I ate about 1/10th of this thing, so 4 I guess” but even that’s fairly imprecise.
Turns out that mayo has way more calories than I’d anticipated. Depending on how it’s supposed to be measured I think I may be using more than 2 tablespoons per wrap, and at 100 calories per tablespoon, that’s quite a bit.
Also, I put in that I ate half a cup of grilled yellow onions today. It says that’s 21 calories. Okay, seems kinda low, but whatever. But then it also says 11g of carbs. Carbs are 4 calories per gram, right? So it’s impossible for something to have 11g of carbs and 21 calories. How much can you trust the numbers on here?
I wasn’t specifically low-carbing so who knows. I feel a hell of a lot better this time around. 4.5km walk in to work this morning. Autumn in Canberra is a beautiful time of year so it’s perfect for getting out.
Last time I went to seem my Doc he told me the following:
[ul]
[li]Don’t count calories: it makes what can already be a crappy task into a thankless one.[/li][li]Only jump on the scales every 2 or three weeks (and try to do it at the same time every day): weight can flutuate naturally with muscle gain from exercise, weight loss from diet, amount eaten that day etc. Better to take a longer term view than get on the scales a lot and get discouraged by a increase oo smaller loss than expected.[/li][li]Portion size’s: meat/protien about as round and thick as your palm.[/li][li]Fruit: in moderation - 1 or two small pieces per day[/li][li]‘Loose’ snacks (nuts, dried fruit) a closed handful once a day[/li][li]Vegetables: go for it.[/li][/ul]
I also use an iPhone app called *Paleo Central *which is just a yes/no/in moderation list for foods.
It’s usually “filled to the rim” like in your first picture. When in doubt, measure with the scale – nutrition labels always have a gram weight next to a volume measurement, e.g., this one for peanut butter, where two tablespoons = 32 g. That’s especially useful when you’re eating things that are hard to contain in a volume container, like the shaved parmesan cheese I eat – one serving is one tablespoon, but how do you fit long strips of cheese in a tablespoon? Easier to measure 5 g on a scale.
(emphasis mine)
I’ve never heard of a doctor recommending cutting back on fruit, is that very common? I realize that they contain fructose but they’re mostly water, vitamins and fiber aren’t they?
Sugar is sugar and you can definitely over-do it on fruit. Bananas, grapes and oranges tend to be favorites and they are loaded with sugar. Fruit also has calories. I know Weight Watchers says “fruit is free” but you can definitely over-do it on fruit. It can be a source of too many calories and also it can trigger hunger like any other sugary snack. So if you have a guide to watch your fruit intake then you’re far less likely to go overboard on it.
I realize that if you go crazy eating bananas that you’ll gain weight but “1 or 2 small pieces” seems like going too far the other way. Of course, IANAD.
I don’t know that I could reduce my fruit intake to that low that fast. I’m a serious sugar lover and I figure that I can get the sweet I want with fruit without it being completely horrible for me.
I am traveling this week (left yesterday) for work and it has been a nightmare. I’ve only just started this again this time and I just have no idea what I should eat. When I am at home I can cook for myself or at least pick only one day when I splurge. Yesterday, I blew my points budget by 30 points. This morning I ate some sausage and that has completely screwed up my day. My hotel room doesn’t have a microwave or a fridge so I can’t put leftovers anywhere. I was so not ready for this. How do other people keep to a diet when you HAVE to eat out every meal?