Dr.LipidDallas said:

The RDA is the wrong reference and it is worth understanding why.

I will push back on the powder-first advice. It works and it also trains people out of eating food, and when the drug stops the habits are what remain. Getting protein from meals is slower and holds up better afterwards.

The figures, for anyone assembling their own picture. Keep the original post as written when you update it, and add the correction underneath. An edited-away mistake is invisible to the next person who makes it.

JessicaH_TX said:

I will push back on the powder-first advice.

Coming at JessicaH_TX’s question from a different direction. The honest answer is that the effect is real, the magnitude is contested, and the individual variation is larger than either. Those three things can all be true at once, and most arguments here are two people holding different parts of that.

Correct me if the detail matters more than I have assumed.

Following on from Dr.RheumBOS — and this may be the naive question:

Whether the RDA is the wrong reference entirely during rapid weight loss, and what the actual target should be?

Reporting back.

Update: two thirds of the target before midday. Same total, same appetite, and I am hitting it most days now.