determine activity level (exercise and diet)

katherinehaleys

i am trying to calculate the amount of daily calories I should be having. my problem is that i don't know how to account for my activity and my diet may change things as well. I have really bad stomach problems, food intolerances and IBS so I have to eat gluten and dairy free. I am 20 114 and 5'5 female. I also wanted to figure out my macros. I do not want to loose more weight and eventually will want to gain but currently want to find maintenance. I have a normal activity level during the day, a student. I typically do around
2 pilates privates (30 mins) a week
and around 2 tennis privates (1 hour) a week

thank you for any help I can get!! I have been to many doctors but I know nutrition isn't always as in depth with them. thanks again

sijomial

Exercise isn't part of your activity setting on here.
If you want to do the average TDEE method (same daily calorie goal) then use a TDEE calculator instead.

What are you hoping to achieve by changing your macros from the default settings?
Would have thought your

I have really bad stomach problems, food intolerances and IBS

would be more of an influence on your diet/health than particular macro goals.....

katherinehaleys

so If I want to find daily calories should I put it on low active and then add my exercise separately? Im little confused sorry. Macros wise I just am trying to not loose weight, its hard to when you cut out all dairy and gluten so I figured my macros may be little different than others, but I am not very knowledgeable on this stuff tbh

katherinehaleys

do you have a specific website you recommend calculator wise ?

sijomial

katherinehaleys wrote: »

so If I want to find daily calories should I put it on low active and then add my exercise separately? Im little confused sorry. Macros wise I just am trying to not loose weight, its hard to when you cut out all dairy and gluten so I figured my macros may be little different than others, but I am not very knowledgeable on this stuff tbh

On here your activity setting is your job and lifestyle only - that's why you log exercise separately and an estimated number of calories is added to your base calorie goal.

On a TDEE site your weekly exercise is averaged out and so your goal is higher but same amount daily rather than varying day to day. Personal preference which you use, both work.

Macros don't determine whether you maintain or not - that's from your calorie setting.

Remember your settings/selections just gives you a reasonable start point, after a period of weeks your weight will tell you if you need to adjust up or down.

Think you will find this very informative.....
http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/819055/setting-your-calorie-and-macro-targets/p1

sijomial

katherinehaleys wrote: »

do you have a specific website you recommend calculator wise ?

I prefer the MyFitnessPal method, my exercise varies enormously from day to day, week to week, even season to season. I cycle a lot so it goes from zero to thousands....

There's only a few calculations/equations that all the sites use. Remember everything is an estimate, don't get over caught up in the numbers. Your pilates and tennis aren't great candidates for accuracy anyway!

katherinehaleys

I understand what your saying, if i want to do the myfitnesspal way would you say put it at which activity level? sedentary? I think its smart to enter exercises anyways. I'm just looking to maintain and I'm confused on how to find the number of calories to do. l entered my info in those websites but all this honestly really confuses me lol. would you say base at maybe 1800 and add my exercise calories? base don my height and weight. you seem to understand this very well. thank you for all the help also

sijomial

Based on just

I have a normal activity level during the day, a student.

then probably lightly active assuming there's walking between classes and around campus etc....
Then you log your pilates and tennis as best you can.