Question about maintenance calories

vinegar_husbands
vinegar_husbands Posts: 1,499 Member
edited November 24 in Goal: Maintaining Weight
I have been raising my calories by 100 per week. I am a hungry and impatient person. Is it possible just to up my calories to maintenance now? I intentionally went 5lbs below my goal weight to make up for glycogen stores, so I don't really care about a slight bump.

I find find this weight loss calculator to be pretty accurate for me (if not lower), so I've got a good idea of how many calories I maintain on.

Replies

  • WinoGelato
    WinoGelato Posts: 13,454 Member
    How much of a deficit were you running when you were losing? Were you at 250, 500, or more? How close are you to what you think that maintenance # is?

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  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,809 Member
    No reason not to bump them straight up to what you think your maintenance calorie are - especially as you are under goal.
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  • WinoGelato
    WinoGelato Posts: 13,454 Member
    vinegar_husbands wrote: »
    WinoGelato wrote: »
    How much of a deficit were you running when you were losing? Were you at 250, 500, or more? How close are you to what you think that maintenance # is?

    I lost the last couple of pounds very slowly and netted around 1200 calories per day. The weight loss calculator that I mentioned estimates my maintenance calories as 1390 calories when sedentary. I found that I lost at the same rate as said calculator estimated netting 1200, so I think I'm pretty close. I only lost 0.18lb more than what it estimated over a three week period.

    Then yeah, I think I would go ahead and raise them and see what happens. Good luck!

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  • Pbrookf
    Pbrookf Posts: 13 Member
    What's the issue about making up for glycogen stores? Googling but haven't figured it out.
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  • Pbrookf
    Pbrookf Posts: 13 Member
    Got it--thanks!
  • MissJay75
    MissJay75 Posts: 768 Member
    I agree with WinoGelato - just go for it.

    If the absolute worst happens, and in a month or so you are above your weight goal, you know how to fix it. But as careful as you've been I would be really surprised to see that happen.
  • pinkteapot3
    pinkteapot3 Posts: 157 Member
    I didn't do the 100 cals per week thing - I just went from "lose 1lb a week" (1,210 cals) to "lose 0.5lb per week" (1,470 cals) to "maintain weight" (1,710 cals). Only did about a fortnight on the middle option.

    Some people get really scared of eating more, so a gradual increase is good.

    Don't sweat the scales for the first few weeks of maintenance. You may show a couple of pounds higher but this is likely to just be water retention. Let everything settle and only worry if you're a few pounds up after say a month.
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,342 Member
    Of course you can up them, it will affect the scales temporarily...

    I'll give you an example of how that affects me: last week I ate at deficit all week as I decided I'd lose a few more pounds...I had around 300 cals of deficit every day - lost 2lbs, of course that wasn't real loss, its not possible with only a small deficit, but what happened was that less cals involved less carbs/sugar so my glycogen stores just let go of water. Then at the weekend, we had a night out with lots of rich food, I ate slightly above my TDEE - the next day whoosh most of that loss back on. But, its not real gain, its just natural that with extra cals those glycogen stores just fill up again...its temporary and in a few days I'll drop down to my lower weight again. Thats how eating at maintenance works. Those first few weeks of increased calories will let you see small gains but they're not real.

    Maintenance rocks :smiley:
  • ExRelaySprinter
    ExRelaySprinter Posts: 874 Member
    edited September 2015
    I went from eating 1650 (TDEE) straight up to 1900, immediately after i got to goal weight.
    I was still losing (at about 0.25lb per week) - so i upped my calories to 2000.
    Depending on my exercise, i can normally get away with 2100 cals per day though. So sometimes your maintenance/TDEE can be higher than you originally think.
  • WinoGelato
    WinoGelato Posts: 13,454 Member
    I was thinking about this more last night during my insomnia battle... The part I had the hardest time with wasn't upping my calories. When I was losing, my goal weight was 125. Like many others, I went flying past that continuing to lose fairly easily and consistently, so it made me rethink my goal weight. I got down as low as 121 and thought, "oh ok, maybe 120 is going to be my goal weight and I will lose a couple more pounds past that for the bottom end of a range." Well that was probably 6 months ago and I've never gone below 121, and in fact have been fluctuating b/w 121-125 ever since. So that's fine, I think I found my range, and my maintenance calories, but the hard part for me was that I had logged all of those lower weights, and mentally, I didn't want to enter a new higher weight (123) and then say I was done.

    But I did last night. Changed my weight, changed my goal to maintenance, updated my FitBit goal too.

    So thanks OP for giving me the nudge I needed to finally just accept that I'm in maintenance.
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