Daily Calories + Daily Exercise = "You may not be consuming enough"

DavidHausfeld

I am just curious about this. MFP originally started me off at 1860 cals a day. I had good days and bad days with that. I went to a doctor and told him that even though I am keeping track of my meals, I am not seeing a loss like I expected. He told me then that I have to drop the amount of calorie intake and increase my exercise to burn more also. That I did. I tweaked my MFP to 1400 calories a day and I have really increased my exercise. I try hard to keep my calories at 1400 to 1500 a day. My workouts have taken me anywhere from 300 to 800 calories burned a day. But on these days, MFP says that I am not consuming enough calories and it won't give me my projected 5 week weight estimate. Am I wrong or is MFP just being overly protective?

hill8570

If you're being spot-on with your calorie intake (i.e., weighing the food rather than eyeballing it), and your exercise burns are not overly-inflated, then MFP is not being overly protective. Heck, a guy your size really should be netting more than 1400 cals a day, but it sounds like you're not eating back any of the exercise, so you're netting under 1000 a lot of days. Insanity. I'm surprised you're able to drag yourself out of bed eating so few calories.

DavidHausfeld

@hill8570‌

I go by the calories burned on the machines. But only machines that ask for my age, weight and my sex. If they don't ask those things then I don't take what they tell me seriously. I have to always lower what MFP tells me I burned compared to the machine because the machine says I burned fewer than what MFP says. I also lower what MFP says I burned in weight training because it seems to be wrong with the other cardio exercises I do. So I think my calories burned are pretty close to true. But as far as energy goes... I am up and at them everyday. I used to fall asleep at my desk, but now I am looking for things to do. And I am not starving myself at all. Maybe this will change when I lose more weight and there is less fat to burn off. My lowest net was 1035 because I had a huge breakfast, super light lunch and a very healthy dinner. So my intake was 16+ but exercise was -572. Giving me a lower net. If I am hungry, I eat. I am not purposely avoiding food. I am purposely avoiding eating crappy food as much as I can though.

shambler101

you have to eat back your exercise cals, youll find that you eat more than you used to especially when the food choice is healthier than your previouse diet. Thats what i found.

PaytraB

Although you may not be feeling hungry yet, you don't seem to be eating enough for a man.
Set your GR weekly loss goal to about 1.5 lbs, enter about half of your exercise calories burned (half of what the machine says) and then eat back the exercise calories. Monitor this for 2 weeks and see your progress. For example, if MFP sets your daily calorie limit to 1800 and you exercise 500 calories, enter 250 of these into MFP. This will give you a daily total of 2050 calories. Then eat about 2000 calories, using food that you've weighed on a food scale. You'll lose weight at about 1.5 lbs/week (as an average).
Are you weighing your food? That's the most important "tool" I found on MFP. It was an eye opener and is the only way of truly knowing how many calories you eat. If you aren't losing "enough", you may be eating more than you think if you are not weighing your food.

hill8570

With 80 pounds to lose, you've got some scoosh. If you feel OK, then let it ride for now. If, after the first month, you find you're losing more than a couple of pounds a week then I'd adjust cals up a bit. And, of course, if you start feeling run down and tired all the time, again, adjust up.

DavidHausfeld