Some early stumbles

I'm well into my 6th day of CR, and things are going a bit rockily--but I'm not worried. I've got nothing but time to get it right.

I've been cautioned by leading experts in the field of CR that my initial target of 1300/day was too low. And if you see my data, you'll see that I managed to come in under 1300 just once--on January 1st--and the rest of the five days the calories were well over my targets, some higher than 2000!

How did this happen?

After being "not hungry" all day long and doing a good job of staying within my targets, late-night cravings hit, and I turned to a comforting old favorite snack that used to seem like a "healthy" choice: raisin bran with honey and soymilk.

Well, healthy maybe if compared to another favorite snack: half a box of donuts and a quart of 2% milk (I'm serious). But still, on a CR diet, the raisin bran made for a 400+ calorie "snack" that ultimately didn't satisfy, but just made me want more, while smashing my targets for the day!

Nutrition software reveals these things in such a stark, unambiguous and objective way that corrective behavior seems almost a given here.

So, I've retroactively upped my calorie target to 1500/day in the CRON-O-Meter software before producing those reports. Even 1500 may prove too strict--but here's the thing: in five days, I've dropped maybe one pound. On Monday, I'll do the reports for the seven-day period, see what my average is, check my weight, and see how I'm doing. I want to lose two pounds/week, so I'll make the necessary adjustment to my target on Monday if I've either exceeded that goal--or failed to meet it. I plan to make my target decisions based on weekly averages for now, since I have little data to work with.