I think I found my maintenance calories?

tomcornhole

I hit my goal weight of 185 lbs while targeting 2,100 cal and not eating back exercise. According to the online calculators, that should have put me at a 25% deficit and resulted in 1.5 lbs / week weight loss. I averaged 1.37 lbs / week loss which matched up with the scooby predictions pretty darn good.

So, when I hit 183 lbs, I decided to start adding calories to stabilize at 185 lbs. I targted (and hit) 2,300 cal / day. I gained a few pounds but have now been at 185 lbs +-1 lbs for a month. I am happy with that. I didn't change anything else, just ate more calories. But the calclulators (and my data) show that my maintenance calories should be 2,800 cal / day. That means I should still be at an 18% deficit and I should still be dropping weight. Does it just take a while to work through the initial add of 200 cal / day? If so, I would expect to start losing weight again at some point and then just add more calories to stabilize again.

Appreciate any input from those who went from a long losing streak to maintenance.


Tom

djeffreys10

The online calculators are simply ballpark estimators, which you then dial in precisely according to your results (I liken it to sighting in a rifle, the onlince calculators being akin to a bore sighting). You may be misjudging your activity level, causing the calculators to put your maintenance too high. If you are not gaining or losing over the course of several weeks, you are at maintenance. If you begin to gain or lose consistently over the course of 3-4 weeks, readjust accordingly.

heybales

You can also test if you are truly at maintenance, and not just a suppressed TDEE.

Eat 250 more calories daily for 2 weeks.

That should be a slow increase of 1 lb gained. That's it.

If fast water weight was put on, then you gained glucose stores.
Now why would you gain glucose stores if eating at maintenance?
Because you really aren't at maintenance yet.

Now, you can live at suppressed TDEE no problem, many people do it purposely, just a bear trying to lose weight that way.
Also hard to increase performance or other things since anything eaten in excess may just tend to raise the metabolism back up, not truly being in surplus.

aelunyu

According to this calculator, I should be maintaining at 2100. Instead I hold weight at 2700. Things happen in your body. No time to explain! But just know you're doing great