'calories in-calories out' model might be flawed?

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  • tmdalton849
    tmdalton849 Posts: 178 Member
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    for example, two of the three days i entered this week came in at over 3000. the other was close to 2700. this is a relatively typical eating pattern for me, and has been over the course of the six months that i have been eating this way.

    as i said, i exercised a bit at first, then stopped. recently added a bit back in.

    not much has changed, to be honest, the entire time.
  • ahoy_m8
    ahoy_m8 Posts: 3,052 Member
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    It seems there is a bit of an individual energy balance discussion going on here, but back to the article....
    The study was based on SELF-REPORTED data. It is entirely plausible to me that consumption was underreported 30 years ago and is underreported by a much greater amount now, given that portions have supersized in the intervening years. That was my primarily take, anyway.
  • tincanonastring
    tincanonastring Posts: 3,944 Member
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    tmdalton849 wrote: »
    for example, two of the three days i entered this week came in at over 3000. the other was close to 2700. this is a relatively typical eating pattern for me, and has been over the course of the six months that i have been eating this way.

    as i said, i exercised a bit at first, then stopped. recently added a bit back in.

    not much has changed, to be honest, the entire time.

    I really can't say this any other way. You are miscalculating somewhere. There is no physical way to eat above TDEE and lose weight. You would be the first person in the history of persons to do so and an evolutionary wonder.
  • PeachyCarol
    PeachyCarol Posts: 8,029 Member
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    ahoy_m8 wrote: »
    It seems there is a bit of an individual energy balance discussion going on here, but back to the article....
    The study was based on SELF-REPORTED data. It is entirely plausible to me that consumption was underreported 30 years ago and is underreported by a much greater amount now, given that portions have supersized in the intervening years. That was my primarily take, anyway.

    I think the individual energy balance discussion comes down to an issue of self-reporting as well.

    Bear with me here...

    You know how with body dysmorphia, most cases involve people viewing themselves in a more negative light than they actually appear? Well, it can go the other way too. Some body dysmorphics have an, um, overly optimistic view of their bodies.

    Well, the same goes for calorie reporting/estimating/eyeballing.

    Most errors are usually made by those underreporting/underestimating intake. However, it is not unknown for a subset of people to overreport/overestimate their intake and underreport their activity.

    I am aware of three instances of proponents of special diets who promote this thinking among their adherents.

    I'd also like to add one more thing not at all related to this:

    Muscle is built in a caloric surplus with progressive overload. It is not built with minimal activity and a certain sort of food.
  • juggernaut1974
    juggernaut1974 Posts: 6,212 Member
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    *smile...nod*
    PeachyCarol wrote: »

    I'd also like to add one more thing not at all related to this:

    Muscle is built in a caloric surplus with progressive overload. It is not built with minimal activity and a certain sort of food.

    And I'll re-iterate this as well.
  • annaskiski
    annaskiski Posts: 1,212 Member
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    I'm baffled as to how they did a control group of "30 years ago dieters"
  • nmason4348
    nmason4348 Posts: 8 Member
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    mhaskins08 wrote: »
    Interesting article. A little over a year ago I would have gobbled this up. I was looking for the reason I could not drop weight. Was it my thyroid? Eating white (processed) foods?

    Dr confirmed no thyroid issue... I switched to mostly whole and healthy foods... Got back on my exercise game... Lost some weight then hit the wall.

    I wasn't monitoring my caloric intake. I thought as long as I got rid of "bad foods" from my diet... My body would take care of the rest. Lol. Once I started monotoring both what I ate AND how much... I pushed past and lost 10 pounds (3.8 of Those since joining MFP).

    I believe the root of most weight problems is not monitoring how much you eat

  • gothchiq
    gothchiq Posts: 4,598 Member
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    For the person with the hormonal problems and the very low maintenance cals: I have blood sugar/ insulin issues and can at least tell you what my doctor told me, while you pursue your own testing and diagnosis. She said never eat carbs alone. Always pair them with a protein. It has to do with trying to keep your blood sugar as level as possible. Also, don't do uber-low carb, but be very moderate in carb consumption and favor complex carbs over simple ones (once again, helps maintain blood sugar as stable as possible.) It also helps regulate feelings of hunger when your blood sugar levels are not bouncing all over the place. Give it a try and see if it helps.
  • blankiefinder
    blankiefinder Posts: 3,599 Member
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    There seem to be a basic misunderstanding about what is TDEE here. Your TDEE is truly determined by what calorie level keeps you at maintenance. This will vary individually. So if you are maintaining, you are eating at maintenance (your TDEE). If you are losing, you are in a deficit. The best way for anyone to calculate their personal TDEE is to track their intake accurately over an extended period of time, and compare that to their weight loss/gain over that time frame. I have done this, and know my personal TDEE, and my numbers based on that continue to hold true.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    tmdalton849 wrote: »
    *not eating at s deficit. (:

    Eating at a deficit simply means eating less than you need to maintain your weight. By definition, you are eating at a deficit. I get the feeling you are using some different meaning for it, so I'm curious what that is.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    ahoy_m8 wrote: »
    It seems there is a bit of an individual energy balance discussion going on here, but back to the article....
    The study was based on SELF-REPORTED data. It is entirely plausible to me that consumption was underreported 30 years ago and is underreported by a much greater amount now, given that portions have supersized in the intervening years. That was my primarily take, anyway.

    That's my guess also.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    blankiefinder wrote: »
    There seem to be a basic misunderstanding about what is TDEE here. Your TDEE is truly determined by what calorie level keeps you at maintenance. This will vary individually. So if you are maintaining, you are eating at maintenance (your TDEE). If you are losing, you are in a deficit. The best way for anyone to calculate their personal TDEE is to track their intake accurately over an extended period of time, and compare that to their weight loss/gain over that time frame. I have done this, and know my personal TDEE, and my numbers based on that continue to hold true.

    I tried to explain this also. No response.
  • maidentl
    maidentl Posts: 3,203 Member
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    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    blankiefinder wrote: »
    There seem to be a basic misunderstanding about what is TDEE here. Your TDEE is truly determined by what calorie level keeps you at maintenance. This will vary individually. So if you are maintaining, you are eating at maintenance (your TDEE). If you are losing, you are in a deficit. The best way for anyone to calculate their personal TDEE is to track their intake accurately over an extended period of time, and compare that to their weight loss/gain over that time frame. I have done this, and know my personal TDEE, and my numbers based on that continue to hold true.

    I tried to explain this also. No response.

    Same here, she's been told repeatedly that a TDEE is at best a guesstimate and if she's positive about her intake then the alternative is that she's burning more than the calculator spits out. Why this is dismissed out of hand with an insistence that she defies the laws of physics is beyond me at this point.
  • queenliz99
    queenliz99 Posts: 15,317 Member
    edited October 2015
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    s3la4wo78wct.png
  • auddii
    auddii Posts: 15,357 Member
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    I would say that most people who argue that CICO doesn't work is mistaking the energy balance equation for online calculators. Some people may not have their calories out estimated well by the various calculators. They are estimates based on population averages (and healthy adults at that). The estimates by definition won't work well for the outliers on the bell curve.

    That does not invalidate CICO.
  • RGv2
    RGv2 Posts: 5,789 Member
    edited October 2015
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    Just walk'n away.
  • Orphia
    Orphia Posts: 7,097 Member
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    tmdalton849 wrote: »
    tincanonastring wrote: »
    strong_curves wrote: »
    tmdalton849 wrote: »
    according to the calculations most of you seem to go by and trust, even overestimatimg my level of physical activity, i would have to have been eating less than 2000 calories per day over the past six months in order to lose the weight that i have. i know beyond a shadow of a doubt that i have not.

    make of it what you will. i believe there's more to it. you certainly don't have to.

    I'd like to see your food diary if you have one.

    She doesn't track her food intake, which is how she knows without a shadow of a doubt that she isn't eating under 2000 calories a day.

    i know what i eat, and what it comes in at. and i eat pretty much the same thing every day. sometimes it varies, but the average is over 2000.

    @strong_curves you are welcome to add me and view my diary if you are truly interested. it's not terribly complete, as i eat ad libitum and only make entries periodically out of curiosity.

    There are people who "know" that wind farms make them ill. There are people that "know" they saw a ghost. There are people that "know" homeopathy cured their cold.

    This is in the same category.
  • queenliz99
    queenliz99 Posts: 15,317 Member
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    Orphia wrote: »
    tmdalton849 wrote: »
    tincanonastring wrote: »
    strong_curves wrote: »
    tmdalton849 wrote: »
    according to the calculations most of you seem to go by and trust, even overestimatimg my level of physical activity, i would have to have been eating less than 2000 calories per day over the past six months in order to lose the weight that i have. i know beyond a shadow of a doubt that i have not.

    make of it what you will. i believe there's more to it. you certainly don't have to.

    I'd like to see your food diary if you have one.

    She doesn't track her food intake, which is how she knows without a shadow of a doubt that she isn't eating under 2000 calories a day.

    i know what i eat, and what it comes in at. and i eat pretty much the same thing every day. sometimes it varies, but the average is over 2000.

    @strong_curves you are welcome to add me and view my diary if you are truly interested. it's not terribly complete, as i eat ad libitum and only make entries periodically out of curiosity.

    There are people who "know" that wind farms make them ill. There are people that "know" they saw a ghost. There are people that "know" homeopathy cured their cold.

    This is in the same category.

    And believe in magic.

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