Negative adjustments?
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It's because your activity level is set to "Active". MFP expects you to burn the same number of calories every hour of the day. When your activity level is set to active that means you have to be really, really active during every single waking hour to make up for when you're asleep (like you said in a previous message - zero down time). So, if you didn't stay really active until midnight, you probably ended up with negative calories.
If you truly have an active lifestyle, then setting your activity level there can help you have a really good idea of how many calories you'll be able to eat that day, even first thing in the morning. That works for some people. I like getting a positive adjustment and seeing that number go up as the day goes on, so I keep my activity level set to Sedentary.
At the end of the day, you should end up with the same number of calories, no matter what your activity level is set to, but if seeing calories get taken away whenever you take a break bothers you, you might prefer setting a lower activity level.
Well, I suppose that makes sense. I just set it from "Active" to "Sedentary", and after logging 30 minutes of exercise and having not eaten anything yet today (I know the whole thing about 'breakfast being the most important meal', but just the thought of food in the am makes me ill) and in my diary it says "*You've earned -144 extra calories from exercise today"
Just when I think I understand it, I get confused all over again...
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Click on the blue i (beside Fitbit calorie adjustment) and see the time, it may not have updated yet0
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I keep hearing about this blue "i" but I can't find it anywhere. Jeez I'm really starting to feel dumber than a box of rocks...breeze_brat wrote: »Click on the blue i (beside Fitbit calorie adjustment) and see the time, it may not have updated yet
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Don't feel dumb. Click on the exercise tab and it's under cardiovascular0
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Oh!!! Thank you! I guess I'm sort of starting to understand how this works now
I was looking in the wrong place entirely! 0 -
Once you're using your Fitbit for a while, you'll start to see patterns in how many extra calories it gives you. I'm set to sedentary. On an average day (10k steps), Fitbit/MFP will give me an additional 400 calories, give or take. So I pretty much build that into my menus for the day unless I know I'm going to be less active.0
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I see
wow, my average is 10 - 11000 steps per day too but I seriously doubt I could eat 400 extra calories! Good to know that I could though if I was particularly hungry one day, instead of starving with the only 2 options being deal with it or go over 0 -
So....what happens if you decide to "eat back" those calories? What if one decided to do so every. single. day? Just curious...0
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So....what happens if you decide to "eat back" those calories? What if one decided to do so every. single. day? Just curious...
I eat back most of mine. During the first six months of my weight loss I lost 25 pounds, which was pretty much exactly on target with the 1# per week I was shooting for.0 -
I see wow, my average is 10 - 11000 steps per day too but I seriously doubt I could eat 400 extra calories! Good to know that I could though if I was particularly hungry one day, instead of starving with the only 2 options being deal with it or go over
And lucky you! I find eating 1700-1800 calories incredibly easy. Sadly. :P0 -
Angierae75 wrote: »I eat back most of mine. During the first six months of my weight loss I lost 25 pounds, which was pretty much exactly on target with the 1# per week I was shooting for.
Wow, that's awesome!
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So....what happens if you decide to "eat back" those calories? What if one decided to do so every. single. day? Just curious...
Then you would be eating at exactly the deficit you selected in MFP for losing weight.
If you selected 1 lb weekly, or 500 cal deficit - then eating those adjustments means you are getting a 500 cal deficit daily.
And don't imagine bigger is better, it's not consistently.
Odd day not bad, but then be willing to go over the odd day too - without remorse.
And now that you've set MFP from Active to Sedentary - you too should be getting big calorie adjustments. But guess what - the eating goal is probably going to be about the same, it's merely how the numbers are displayed.
And now that you understand what is being talked about, reread many of the posts above that specifically answer what happens if you eat your adjustments.
You just didn't get what they were talking about.0 -
So....what happens if you decide to "eat back" those calories? What if one decided to do so every. single. day? Just curious...
Your Fitbit burn is TDEE (your maintenance calories). Your default MFP calorie goal is activity level minus deficit. Adjustments are the difference between your Fitbit burn & your MFP activity level.
If (and only if) you enable negative calorie adjustments in your diary settings, eating back your adjustments means you're eating TDEE minus deficit.0 -
So....what happens if you decide to "eat back" those calories? What if one decided to do so every. single. day? Just curious...
Theoretically, you would lose weight at exactly the rate you have set in MFP. However...- Logging food accurately enough to achieve that is insanely hard (for me, anyway).
- If you've set too high a rate of weight loss in MFP then you'll lose muscle, not fat.
- If you've done too much restrictive dieting in the past (see previous item) you may not burn calories as fast as Fitbit estimates.
- There could be other factors throwing things off.
If you trust your Fitbit for 30 days, while logging your food as accurately as possible, then you can get a good feel for how accurate it is for you. You can look on your Fitbit profile page (website, not phone app) to get average calories out and calories in for the past 30 days (I don't know if this info can be gotten on the phone app). Do the math to get expected loss:
((Average calories burned per day - Average calories consumed per day) * 30)/3500 = expected weight loss
Then, look at your MFP "report" to see your weight loss for the last 30 days. Is it higher than expected? Congratulations, either your Fitbit underestimates or your food logging errors are on the high side. Is is lower than expected? Then either your Fitbit overestimates or (most likely in my case) you're underestimating what you eat.
Last time I evaluated it, I seemed to be off by about 80 calories a day. So, I've been adding 100 "quick add" calories every day in MFP to compensate. But, I haven't been obsessive about logging, so we'll see if it is adequate to make my expected loss match my actual loss.0 -
^^^ ^^^^
Yep, that's the thing... If you're going to 100% trust the calories fitbit is giving you, then your food logging has to be on point.
I've seen posts from people questioning fitbits calorie adjustments because they're not losing, but 9 times out of 10 their food logging is not accurate.0 -
I pretty much log everything I eat. Today I did a bit of snacking throughout the afternoon and evening, and with my dessert already logged in, meals, and snacking, I wound up with 28 calories left. But I figured it really wouldn't hurt to skip that 200-something calorie dessert, so I removed that, so now I get to add those calories that would have been eaten to my deficit. I think maybe I'm getting the hang of this. I so appreciate everyone helping me to understand this, thank you so much 0
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I pretty much log everything I eat. Today I did a bit of snacking throughout the afternoon and evening, and with my dessert already logged in, meals, and snacking, I wound up with 28 calories left. But I figured it really wouldn't hurt to skip that 200-something calorie dessert, so I removed that, so now I get to add those calories that would have been eaten to my deficit. I think maybe I'm getting the hang of this. I so appreciate everyone helping me to understand this, thank you so much
I have two weaknesses when it comes to logging. One is casual snacking - a nut here, a bite of chocolate there - that doesn't get recorded. I've gotten better about that but it is still a problem. The other is not weighing every single bite. For instance, tonight, I didn't weigh the components of my salad. Not just the lettuce, cucumber, tomato, and jicama, but I also didn't weigh the bacon, cheese or salad dressing. Now, I've gotten pretty good at eyeballing those, so I probably wasn't too far off, but I know that if I let myself do that too often then the amounts will start to creep up without my awareness.
I know that accurate logging is key to my weight loss. However, I also don't want to become obsessive about my eating, so I'd rather log those 100 "quick add" calories every morning and allow myself a little sloppiness in my logging.0 -
@angelz23 - notice the difference in what the Nancy and Christine are talking about, and the words you used.
Log everything I eat does not mean accurate - possibly by a long shot.
They both used the word "weigh" - probably purposely - because calories is per gram, not per spoon or cupful.
Accurate logging is per weight.
You could log a ton of fruit - medium apples, medium oranges, small carrots, ect - and be 500 calories off.
Because your idea of medium and what that entry means are not related.
But you ate 350 g apple and log 3.5 servings of 100 g serving size - now you got accurate logging, as you can get anyway.0 -
Interesting reading all this. I don't have negative calories set - it discouraged me and since I'm maintaining okay with it this way, I'll continue for now.0
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@angelz23 - notice the difference in what the Nancy and Christine are talking about, and the words you used.
Log everything I eat does not mean accurate - possibly by a long shot.
They both used the word "weigh" - probably purposely - because calories is per gram, not per spoon or cupful.
Accurate logging is per weight.
You could log a ton of fruit - medium apples, medium oranges, small carrots, ect - and be 500 calories off.
Because your idea of medium and what that entry means are not related.
But you ate 350 g apple and log 3.5 servings of 100 g serving size - now you got accurate logging, as you can get anyway.
True, I understand that. BUT I find myself NOT snacking on something if it's something I don't know how to track, so it's usually something like 14 Special K cracker chips, 1/2 fiber one bar, 22 green grapes, etc. Y'know?
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