Slippery slope - eating exercise calories

Thanks Kairk!  It's not surprising you got two different opinions of how to approach it.  I find a lot of differing opinions on this subject and the subject of nutrition & workouts in general.

I've lost an inch on my waist and two on my hips while gaining a few pounds, so there's no doubt I'm building muscle.  I just can't deal with being an unhealthy BMI (irrational maybe?) when I've come this far.  I certainly have some excess fat to lose, so that's my goal.

 "He suggests losing the fat (which means losing more weight) and then focus on building more lean muscle. "

That's what I did and it worked pretty well.

I have started setting two different calorie goals - one for exercise days and one for rest days. I guess it's pre-planning for the additional calories I need to fuel my body (i'm adding an extra 200-300 calories/afternoon snack when I know I'll be doing an hour + workout)  But, I'm definitely trying to be mindful that I can't finish my workout and say "now I can eat XYZ" since I've already added the extra calories. It's a work in progress because I reallllly love a good excuse to eat more, but I can see how that's a very slippery slope.

I'll never be a normie, so I'll always have some food disfunction in my life.  I've accepted that for some time now.  So I'm always looking for excuses!  However, I am better now than I was before about seeing the error of my excuses and challenging myself to do the right thing even if it's not easy.

I think your idea of adding 200-300 calories seems reasonable and it's probably what I need to limit myself to on my heavy exercise days.  Thanks!

 Finding that balance around fueling our exercise and managing our weight is kind of like the holy grail, I think.  Funny, this was what my running group was chatting about during our long slow distance on Sunday.  Most of the women talked about putting on a few pounds during the last training round as they over-estimated their calorie burn or were in the mindset of "Of course I can have that, I ran 14K today!"  

One of my friends is doing significant circuit-training (5 x per week, I think she's nuts but she says the same thing about my running) and she plans for an additional 200 calorie snack on her training days.  Another friend who is completely into "fitness" - I say that with emphasis because it is that weight-training that they just call "fitness", do you know what I mean? Tosca Reno & crew - and she eats according to some very specific rules that isn't at all about calories but is about the timing of fat/carbs/protein and food combinations and I don't know, she lectures me regularly and I can't get past the dry grain puff things.

Personally I know that if I don't plan for a little extra on my hard training days I will put myself in danger of grazing too much. I also have to be honest about what those hard training days are, because it isn't my muscle days or even my long slow distance but more my hill runs and sometimes the tempo runs if the distance is high enough. 

I seem to be balanced in the sense that my weight is stable, but that is ANNOYING because I want to lose my 8 pounds (Worst. Christmas. Present. Ever!).  My body fat is sitting at 25% and I try to be happy about that but I'd be happier 8 lbs less.  Anyway, tracking my food, yes, but I also track my exercise effort each day, not to get obsessed about eating more but to be honest about my effort out vs food in.  This has also helped me understand what my body needs for each work-out, so on LSD I know my eating schedule needs to be adjusted a little, no extra food just moved around in the day, and so on.

I have thought about seeing a sports nutritionist and might do that.  A lot of the more general sports nutrition stuff I'm not finding super helpful because of the VSG and my delicate tum.  Trainers aren't nutritionists, doctors aren't nutritionists, and general NUTs don't always have the sports component factored in outside of the calories in/out.   A friend went to an athletic nutritionist and she said it was amazing.  Now she doesn't have WLS and so I know I'd have to talk to them about adjusting their thinking but it might be worth it, especially as I want to lose those 8 pounds while fueling my efforts.  I mean, if they can get athletes to the olympics surely they can get my 8 lbs off, right?  Am I right??  

I also secretly want to walk in there and tell them my goal is to win gold in track and watch them struggle with how to let me know a middle-aged Canadian is more likely to go to space than medal in track.

I have just realized this is more of a ramble and not the useful advice or thoughts everyone else posted.  So..um...I'm glad others are on the ball!

Ok, I know I'm really late to this thread, but I'm really appreciating the conversation.  I also have tendencies toward the I burned x calories so I can eat Y mentality, which I know is very dangerous ground.  Which probably means I should quit using the heart rate monitor to track caloric burn (duh!)  Sigh...   Still, I have to admit there's at least a part of me that's pretty firmly convinced that not upping my calories on days when I'm burning a lot more is destructive long-term to my metabolism. 

The need to fuel workouts is actually one of the reasons I've been hesitant to think about training for a half marathon.  Personally, I think I'd find it necessary to add calories on days when I was burning a lot more in workouts, but eventually the event would pass, and I'd be scaling back my workouts again.  I've run into trouble there before (years ago, before surgery and my low-carb enlightenment).  I got used to eating in a certain pattern, and it was really hard to rein it back in again once my daily caloric needs were lower.  (And, if I'm honest, I was using the workouts to justify a lot of really bad habits - apple fritters - cringe!)  I guess I want to give myself some time to really establish good, stable maintenance habits.  I'm definitely not there yet, I've been flirting with binge eating over the past few months, regaining and losing the same 5 pounds.  Until I've got that under control and have a solid foundation, I don't want to be upping calories based on workouts.