From what I go by, that's too little. Try taking a look at the Harris Benedict Equation it helped me a lot. I shoot for between 1700 to 2100 every day. It's a fairly large range, but it's easy for me to keep and even on my "bad" days, I don't really go outside of it.

Alrighty, so I found a couple of calorie calculator thingys online.

One said that too maintain my weight, I need to eat 2168 calories a day. Another 2709, and another said between 2000-2200. And the last said 2010.

I also read in my reading that one should aim to drop their intake by 500-750 cals for weightloss. So, I'm going to aim for 1250-1500 cal/day. Humm, no worries about me going too low! I think 1500 is going to take some serious discipline !

Ohh, I'll go check it out. Thanks pebbles!

Alright, so that one said I use 2320, which would mean that if I wanted to drop 500-750cals/day I need to be in the range of 1570-1820.

There sure is a lot of different info out there! Taking it all into consideration, I'm going to set 1800 as my higher end limit, average around 1600 and aim to not fall below 1250 on my sedentary days. How's that for a wide range?

For me though, my hunger seriously depends on my TOM. Prior to it, I'm ravenous, and it tapers off to rarely hungry. So I think I need to have a wide range to work with as I obviously have different needs at different times.

I believe that NO woman is supposed to be under 1200... forget where I read that, but I'm sure I have quite a few times. Good to know that you're reading about where you should be aiming for!

Went for a good walk tonight with a friend. My usual 50min route took an extra 15mins as her foot hurt, but it was great to have the company!

I did fine with the food - with the cookie and juice I snuck in my total cals for the day were about 1400. I actually ate too much for supper and felt too full. Very weird for me! But my chicken creation was good!

I'm going to definatly keep track of my food and calorie intake when I'm able to, but I'm not going to go hungry for any length of time. I don't think I could happily keep up on that for very long. Today was fine at 1400cals, but I know that sometimes what I ate today would leave me hungry. When I'm hungry, I will eat. It just will be good stuff

Today controlling eating was a snap - I think my appitite went out the window when I got a cold.

I had a 3 turkey sausages and an egg for breakfast 240 cal
leftover chicken and wild rice with tomato and cucumber salad for lunch 420 cals
coffees 90cals
snack of 9 almonds 65cals
hummus and red bell pepper 150cals
and for supper I just ate most of a bowl of ground turkey and white bean soup with a bit of cheese on it. It was homemade with no added fat other than the cheese, so I'm guessing the cals to be about 300

So daily total today 1265. Low, but if my appitite returns, I'll have a snack tonight. I'd love a big stompin bowl of buttery popcorn and a movie... my weakness... but maybe I'll just have a little one and some grapes

No exercise today, other than the usual housework chasing kids stuff. I'm skipping the walk tonight, but will go tomorrow morning as I won't have a chance tomorrow as I'm going strawberry picking in the eve.

Oh yeah, there's gonna be lots of strawberries are on the menu later this week!

Oh yeah, the scale said I was at 197.8 this morning. I'm really really looking forward to being able to move that ticker someday - it's been a while!!!

Mine hasn't moved in a while either. Annoying how much of a compulsive need it is to move them haha.

Strawberries are awesome! Have fun pickin'.

This cold has gotten NASTY. I think my kids are getting it too. I just feel drained and achey all over. And the dang scale went up to 198.2 this morning to add insult to injury. I'm thinking I really need to step up on the cardio. The last time I lost weight successfully (1-2lbs a week) I was doing 45mins on the elliptical 3 to 4 times a week. But it's too freaking hot in the house to do that, so hopefully the walking will do SOMETHING sometime soon. My route is getting easier, so I know that I'm getting a bit healthier anyways, so thats' something.

Today I've had an egg, 4 turkey sausages, 2 yogurts, a cup of branflakes, a few slices of red pepper with hummous, coffee, and 4 jalapeno's stuffed with feta cheese and a cup or so of green grapes. Yum. Calories are at 884. I'll have a chicken ceaser salad for supper (about 350cals) and hopefully have a nice big bowl of strawberries tonight, assuming I can haul my butt out the door to go picking. Stupid cold. All said and done, cals should end up around 1400.

I SCREWED UP.

So strawberry picking ended a little earlier than planned as we were the only ones in the field and the owner helped us pick. Of course us gals didn't want to go home early, and we decided to go the the pub for nachos. Beefy, cheesy, guacamole laden nachos. I'm thinking that lapse of willpower was in the vacinity of a beastly 1000 calories, putting my day's totals up around 2200. What a shame!!!

Overall though, I've been pretty disciplined, and yet, not losing much weight at all. I think I need to step up the exercise, but I really don't know quite how to fit it into my already busy life. I'm getting quite frustrated. I tried to go for a walk this morning, getting up early, but the kids woke, hubby had a headache and asked me to keep it short. 25mins of walking doesn't count for much exercise, and I have to stay home with the kids tonight as well so I can't get out to walk. I think I'm going to try out an exercise video - something I've never done before.

Today so far:
breakfast - coffee and strawberries 200cal
snack - red pepper and hummus 100
lunch - taco salad with turkey, beans, lettuce cilantro and half a tomato - 275cal

Don't know what the rest of the day holds foodwise, except more fresh strawberries are a certainty!

Today was pretty good. Dinner was whole wheat pasta, green beans, and shrimp. I'm not sure of the calorie cound as the pasta box said one serving was 1/20th of a box at 310cals, and there's no way I could estimate that. Stupid. But I'm going to guess I put away about 500cals. Putting my calorie count today at only about 1100cals. Low, so I'm going to have a nice snack tonight! Strawberries with a tad of ice cream.

Definately could have used more exercise today - the short walk didn't cut it. But it's been a really busy day with housecleaning errand and chasing the kids at the beach, and it's 8o'clock and they're still not asleep. I think going to the beach after supper was just a tad too stimulating. Long day, and I need some flop time so I'm just going to take it easy and go for a really good walk or put time in on the elliptical tomorrow morning. I think I should probably do the elliptical as I'm thinking it's better for weight loss, but it's just really unappealing to me right now. I'm loving the quietness of walks. Maybe I'll try and do some jogging - never done that before and I'm just not sure I can, but I guess I could try! Not tomorrow though as TOM is just about here, and my boobs hurt! I cringe thinking about it!

Gotta step up on the intensity of my exercise for sure.

Hi Celia, thanks for stopping by my journal. Thought that I'd come visit you as well. A good tip if you have water retention at TOM, is to try dandelion tea. It is quiet palatable with a little honey in it. Remember to keep the faith. It can move mountains, so a few pounds won't be too hard with His help.

Looks like you are doing a good job of sticking to the plan. One of the things I found from reading the forums here was fitday.com. I log everything I eat, all my exercise and my daily weight in there and then it will give you all kinds of reports. Really a useful tool.
Keep up the good work!

Hi Soupdragon and Swampbillies! Thanks for popping in and for the suggestions. Will definatly check out fitday and try the dandilion tea. I already track my weight and what I eat with the total cals on an excel chart, but it might me interesting to read the reports it gives out so when I have time, I will surely check it out!

Today wasn't too bad. Ate a heap of strawberries, and a couple yogurts in the morning, I was out for lunch and had to eat out, but stuck to a Whopper Jr., no cheese no mayo, than had a couple slices of cheese when I got home. And yes, more strawberries! I'm going to turn red. Had a big supper of a cob of corn, some green beans, red bell pepper, and about 8oz of steak. Yum. I only eat red meat once a week, and between the burger and steak I sure had a good time with it! Oh, and I had a couple chocolate wafer cookies and a glass of juice. Oh, and more strawberries for dessert.

Total cals for the day is 1550. Still within my limits, and I feel like I've been eating all day. I might find myself on the pot all tomorrow due to all the strawberries!

Going to go for a walk tonight in the sweltering heat. It's currently 36Celcius and it's almost 8pm. Nuts. And tomorrow it's supposed to get up to 38. Only good thing about this heat is that my daughter can run around naked, which is making potty training quite easy! She's doing so well - she's only been home (adopted) for 6 months, and is only 22months old. Linguistically, she's already speaking at the level of a 30-36month old, which is amazing as there was very little english spoken in the orphanage. And now she's nearly potty trained before she's even two. She amazes me daily. This has nothing to do with weight loss, now I'm just rambling! I better not get started about how super my son is!!

Alright - hubby got home, and kids are still fussing about going to sleep. That is one area where my daughter has gotten worse since she's come home. Sigh. I think I'm too much of a softy in that department!

Okay, getting off my butt now and going for that walk...