so confused!

mandalpanda7

I feel stupid even asking because I've taken nutrition and exercise classes but I'm still confused about counting calories.

They say a pound of fat is 3,500 calories - so to lose one pound of fat you must burn 3,500 calories.

I've also heard that to lose weight one must burn more calories than one consumes.

So correct me if I am wrong - if I consume 1500 calories a day I need to burn a minimum of 3500 a day to lose weight each week?

If this is true why does MFP tell me I can eat more calories?

I guess I want to know how many calories I should be burning everyday. I need to lose 25lbs in 2 months and have been put on a 140p calorie diet by my doctor. Help?

TIA

BWBTrish

the 1500 MFP gave you has already the deficit in it.

So you gave in the settings you want to lose 2 pounds a week, MFP says oke than you have to eat around 1500 calories

rkcampbell

You would need to be at a deficit of 3500 per WEEK not per day.

forgtmenot

If you burned 3500 calories a day you would lose a pound a day not a pound a week.
You burn calories just by existing and going about your daily life. Say for example that number is 2000 calories just for you to function and do your daily routine and maintain your current weight. Mfp gives you a deficit from that number of 1500 which is a 500 calorie deficit from what you burn just by living your life. 500x7=3500 which means you will lose a lb a week. If you exercise you are just adding to that deficit of 500 calories, so you can eat those exercise calories back and still end up at a 500 calorie deficit and still lose 1lb a week.

diannethegeek

When you talk about burning more calories than you eat, you have to take into account all of the calories that your body is burning just keeping you alive as well as the calories you burn doing day-to-day activities. Everything that you do burns calories. When you put your stats in MFP it calculated a best guess estimate of how many calories you're already burning without exercise and then gave you a calorie goal to meet so that you'll lose weight. When you exercise and burn more calories, you're burning more than MFP calculated, so it adds more calories to your goal to keep you at a nice, safe deficit for weight loss.

Not everyone eats their extra exercise calories. Most people recommend eating back about 50-75% just to err on the safe side in case of inaccuracies. But you can do a little research and decide for yourself how best to deal with them.

jaqcan

Not enough info for you so I'll use my stats. And I'm rounding to make it easy.
To stay the same weight I am, I would eat 2500 calories every day.
to LOSE 2lbs a week, I'm set to 1500 calories. (1000 calorie reduction per day, times 7 days = 7000/2 lb) 3500 x 2
That is with NO exercise or burning of extra calories. Our bodies are always burning calories to function.
I'm guessing at the end that was a typo, and you mean 1400 calories by your doctor?
That's probably pretty close. But putting a time limit on your weight loss will set you up for failure. While you can do everything right, our bodies sometimes don't cooperate. Even doing everything perfectly.
I hope what I explained makes sense.

jorinya

jaqcan wrote: »

That's probably pretty close. But putting a time limit on your weight loss will set you up for failure. While you can do everything right, our bodies sometimes don't cooperate. Even doing everything perfectly.
I hope what I explained makes sense.

Exactly, if you say "I have to lose 20lb in 5 weeks", it won't happen. Take it at a pace you are comfortable with and set small goals. I'm working with kilos here so I set a goal to lose 2kg-4kg in two weeks, if I hit it good. If I don't good. At least I've tried. I had a mini goal to fit into size 14 by June. I'm already wearing size 12-14 and its May.Which is an added bonus for me. Slow and steady wins first place.

mandalpanda7

I'm having surgery so yes I am on a time constraint. But thank you all for the help. It has definitely help me understand this calorie thing better.