Gaining weight

[erwin]

I transitioned from vegetarian to vegan about 6 weeks ago. Although I am not overweight by any standard, at the beginning I lost some weight. Fearing that I either do not eat enough calories or proteins i have been eating large amounts of food for lunch and dinner, often more than my body asks. The meals are mainly cooked vegetables, including soy products with buckwheat and whole rice. Now I am gaining weight.
My problem is that I just don't seem to know when it is enough. So my question is how those of you with experience do it? Should I only eat what my body demands without worrying about calorie or protein intake?

 

[Sax]

I gained weight at first too, which I think was from the extra oil in my diet from salad dressing and sauteeing more veggies. Consider minimizing or eliminating oil.

I usually advocate people eat more than they think they need to when transitioning...but after 6 weeks you can probably start listening to your body.

 

[Lou]

I gained weight too at first. At the beginning, I was overestimating my calorie and protein needs. So i was making daily meal plans that were too high.

One of the best tools I found was CronOmeter that allows you to customize your target goals. The defaults are pretty good but you know - everyone is different.

But even now I still can't lose weight unless I try.

The other thing is that in order to meet all your RDAs you may need to exercise more to burn off the extra calories.

 

[MoreGreens]

This is intriguing to me as I've never experienced this. And I've fallen off the vegan wagon a few times to spend 3-6months eating cheese before my conscience got the better of me. That's when I'd gain weight, because I was consuming too much bread, saturated fat and wine while role-playing Dionysus.

Really the only changes you'd need to make to your diet would be to supplement B12 and watch your Vitamin D and Calcium intake, assuming you don't consume a lot fortified foods --which would take care of all that for you as well. Your intake amounts wouldn't need to change. Well, unless you heavily relied on diary for protein and don't know how best to replace it? Or you're subconsciously craving fat? I want more data!

 

[Poppy]

Do you eat meals or do you graze? On days I graze, I find that I never feel quite full, but on days I eat three real meals (with a snack or two), I get certifibly full and then feel real hunger when the tank empties.