Do you eat all your calories?

sarahanna203

The calories I have allowed seems high. I have a lot to lose and I know the heavier you are the more calories they give you. But my question is, is there anyone who started out very over weight and ate all their calories and still lost weight?. I want to do really well with this any input is appreciated.

amyllu

I find that I have to be very careful not to go over the amount of calories and carbs that are recommended for me especially as I am disabled and on quite a lot of meds too which means I am not at all active.
The answer to your question really depends on each individuals circumstances and general overall height and weight and even age... in other words there's no hard and fast rules to how each person loses weight apart from eating sensibly and within the guidelines of that particular regime.

aledba

If you're reducing your calories anywhere from 10-20%, you will lose. My last go, I was very aggressive and ate 1600 (just over my BMR) to create a 600 cal deficit each day. I lost 25 lbs in 4 months and was very pleased.

This time, I'm eating up to 1800/day, creating a 4-500 deficit/day and losing just under a pound per week. I'm training myself now to eat at what maintenance will be when I reach my goal. Scientifically speaking, I could eat up to 2100 cals/day at this weight and still lose. But that will be too slow for me.

How many cals you eat/reduce by depends on your goals, but as long as you meet your macros, you will succeed!

flamingblades

MFP puts me at 1310 calories a day. I rarely get in over 1200, and I am losing weight, and knocked my A1C down from 7.0 to 6.3 in 2 months. When I get in a good workout I will eat back around 300, if I use my protein smoothies like twice a day instead of once.

erimethia_fekre

I'm usually under by 100 at the most. I exercise when I can. Seems to help.

lynn_glenmont

You can't go by other people's experience. You need to pick a number, and the one supplied by MFP is as good a place to start as any other, if you gave MFP accurate information and selected a reasonable goal for yourself. Do it for a few weeks and see what happens.

I started out severely obese. MFP offered me 1450 calories to lose one pound a week. I rounded it up to 1500 so it wouldn't seem so miserably small. Ate most of my exercise calories back most of the time. Lost two pounds a week for about four months. Consciously decided to eat more through the holidays and some travel, still losing about half a pound a week. By then I was down to the high end of overweight, and blood tests came back with good numbers, resolving the issues that had started me on this path. I decreased my goal to half a pound a week and raised my activity level in my profile from lightly active to active (I have a desk job) to get MFP's estimate of what I burn before exercise closer to what I actually burn before exercise, based on two years of logging. I still lose closer to a pound a week than a half pound a week if I stick to that goal (and eat most of my exercise calories back most of the time).

I've kept off the 30+ pounds that I lost initially for more than a year and a half, which was an important goal for me, as I was really concerned about gaining it back. I have bounced around in a range of about 10 to 15 pounds below that, because what I lose in "regular" weeks I tend to gain back on vacations, work travel, holidays, and other occasions on which I choose to splurge. I'm OK with that. I figure at some point I'll find a reason to lose more, and will either choose a lower goal for "regular" weeks or be a little less extravagant during vacations, etc.

YMMV--in fact, it probably will vary--but the best advice I have is get a food scale, choose accurate database entries for logging (or create your own), and once you have a couple months of data, figure out your actual daily calorie burn: Add up calories consumed over the time in question, add 3500 calories for each net pound of weight loss over that period, or subtract 3500 calories for each net pound of weight gained over that period, and divide by the number of days to get your TDEE. If you'd rather go with a pre-exercise number, and make daily adjustments based on that day's exercise, subtract total exercise calories for the time period in question before dividing by the number of days.

robertw486

lynn_glenmont wrote: »

You can't go by other people's experience. You need to pick a number, and the one supplied by MFP is as good a place to start as any other, if you gave MFP accurate information and selected a reasonable goal for yourself. Do it for a few weeks and see what happens.

I started out severely obese. MFP offered me 1450 calories to lose one pound a week. I rounded it up to 1500 so it wouldn't seem so miserably small. Ate most of my exercise calories back most of the time. Lost two pounds a week for about four months. Consciously decided to eat more through the holidays and some travel, still losing about half a pound a week. By then I was down to the high end of overweight, and blood tests came back with good numbers, resolving the issues that had started me on this path. I decreased my goal to half a pound a week and raised my activity level in my profile from lightly active to active (I have a desk job) to get MFP's estimate of what I burn before exercise closer to what I actually burn before exercise, based on two years of logging. I still lose closer to a pound a week than a half pound a week if I stick to that goal (and eat most of my exercise calories back most of the time).

I've kept off the 30+ pounds that I lost initially for more than a year and a half, which was an important goal for me, as I was really concerned about gaining it back. I have bounced around in a range of about 10 to 15 pounds below that, because what I lose in "regular" weeks I tend to gain back on vacations, work travel, holidays, and other occasions on which I choose to splurge. I'm OK with that. I figure at some point I'll find a reason to lose more, and will either choose a lower goal for "regular" weeks or be a little less extravagant during vacations, etc.

YMMV--in fact, it probably will vary--but the best advice I have is get a food scale, choose accurate database entries for logging (or create your own), and once you have a couple months of data, figure out your actual daily calorie burn: Add up calories consumed over the time in question, add 3500 calories for each net pound of weight loss over that period, or subtract 3500 calories for each net pound of weight gained over that period, and divide by the number of days to get your TDEE. If you'd rather go with a pre-exercise number, and make daily adjustments based on that day's exercise, subtract total exercise calories for the time period in question before dividing by the number of days.

This. Every person has a different body, different goals, and countless other variables that they have to figure out. Using Endomondo for my fitness activity tracker and MFP for the nutritional and weight loss calculations, I'm reaching my goals without major issues. I'm not weighing food (yet) but being honest with everything I eat.

For the next person, using that method might need adjustments to see the results they want.