Vegans, how many calories?

Melmo1988

How many calories a day do you have as your goal? And how many lbs a week are you losing?

DaddieCat

Calorie goals are going to vary from person to person and even two people of the same height and build are not going to have the same calorie goals or weight loss.

A better question would be: What are your goals?

and to follow that up... what is your calorie goal or method? Are you using what MFP has provided? What does your macro split look like?

And then to follow that up, I presume that you ask this because you aren't seeing the loss that you'd like, although I can definitely be wrong there. But if that's the case, how do you measure your intake? Do you weigh everything solid in grams and everything liquid in appropriate liquid measures?

CooCooPuff

Go by either the numbers MFP gives you, plus exercise calories, or by whatever a TDEE calculator gives you. Vegan or not, you will only lose weight by eating less calories than you burn.

As for how much weight per week to lose, the general recommendations are:
50+lbs to lose: 2lbs per week
20-50lbs to lose: 1lb per week
less than 20lbs to lose: .5lb per week

Melmo1988

I havent been able to stick to logging and staying under calorie goal yet, so I am trying to find a calorie goal that is doable but will make me lose.
I have a food scale so everything is weighed in grams. I also have measuring cups for liquids.

janejellyroll

My goal to maintain is 1,460. To net this, I usually eat 1,800-2,000 calories. When I was losing weight, I would aim to net 1,250-1,300 calories a day. Until I got a Fitbit, I wasn't the greatest at calculating how much I was burning through activity so some weeks I would lose more than others -- I usually saw .5 - 3 pounds per week, but there were several periods where I didn't lose anything for 2-4 weeks in a row.

janejellyroll

Melmo1988 wrote: »

I havent been able to stick to logging and staying under calorie goal yet, so I am trying to find a calorie goal that is doable but will make me lose.
I have a food scale so everything is weighed in grams. I also have measuring cups for liquids.

What calorie intake have you found that is sustainable? If you figure out what is easy for you to do, start there and begin gradually subtracting from that.

auddii

janejellyroll wrote: »

Melmo1988 wrote: »

I havent been able to stick to logging and staying under calorie goal yet, so I am trying to find a calorie goal that is doable but will make me lose.
I have a food scale so everything is weighed in grams. I also have measuring cups for liquids.

What calorie intake have you found that is sustainable? If you figure out what is easy for you to do, start there and begin gradually subtracting from that.

This. A good way to start is to track what you eat; everything that goes into your mouth regardless of if you are hitting your goal or not. Then you can look at patterns and possibly some swaps in your diet to increase the volume of food you are eating while cutting calories (or changing your macros around) to help keep you satiated on a lower calorie goal.

Melmo1988

I guess what I'm having trouble with is when it asks how active you are. I have two kids and I walk my 5 year old to school every day so that's 10-15 mins each way 2x a day. Plus when I go out to the store a few times a week I wear my 30lb 8 month old on my back so I would consider that active? Plus I'm setting a goal to walk 1/2 hour or more 5 days a week on top of walking to and from school. MFP is giving me 1830 calories when I set it to active. (To lose 2 lbs a week)

auddii

Melmo1988 wrote: »

I guess what I'm having trouble with is when it asks how active you are. I have two kids and I walk my 5 year old to school every day so that's 10-15 mins each way 2x a day. Plus when I go out to the store a few times a week I wear my 30lb 8 month old on my back so I would consider that active? Plus I'm setting a goal to walk 1/2 hour or more 5 days a week on top of walking to and from school. MFP is giving me 1830 calories when I set it to active. (To lose 2 lbs a week)

Are you having problems staying within 1830, or are you having problems believing that 1830 is the correct number?

Melmo1988

When I go over my calorie goal I tend to stop logging and a lot of the time give up. My two goals are log no matter what and walk.

Melmo1988

What I meant above is not knowing weather I should say I'm Active or if that's not considered active

janejellyroll

Melmo1988 wrote: »

I guess what I'm having trouble with is when it asks how active you are. I have two kids and I walk my 5 year old to school every day so that's 10-15 mins each way 2x a day. Plus when I go out to the store a few times a week I wear my 30lb 8 month old on my back so I would consider that active? Plus I'm setting a goal to walk 1/2 hour or more 5 days a week on top of walking to and from school. MFP is giving me 1830 calories when I set it to active. (To lose 2 lbs a week)

MFP's activity settings are meant to be based on your job. In your situation, I would set myself to sedentary and log my 1/2 hour daily walk as exercise and eat back 25-75% of the calories given for that. I would count the walk to and from school as part of my regular daily activity. If I found myself, over time, losing more quickly than my goal, I would then move myself to lightly active. Active seems too high for your level of activity (as you described it here). If you find you are losing faster, you can always adjust your activity level upward. But 20-30 minutes of walking per day likely isn't enough to put you in the active range -- that's designed for people who spend a large part of each day on their feet.

Since you know you have trouble sticking to a lower calorie goal, I wouldn't choose an aggressive goal like 2 pounds per week. This will give you lower calories. I would choose a goal like .5 pounds a week -- this will give you more calories to eat, but still generate a deficit.

This is just my two cents.

jsidel126

You don't really need to know how active you are. When I start logging my intake I ensure everything is logged for a week. This gives me a calorie count starting point. At the beginning of each week thereafter I would lower my target daily calorie consumed by 50 calories. Over time I am consuming less. This allows me to find the calorie count that allows weight loss.

auddii

Melmo1988 wrote: »

When I go over my calorie goal I tend to stop logging and a lot of the time give up. My two goals are log no matter what and walk.

I honestly think this is a great place to start. Once you can make the logging a habit, you can slowly incorporate other changes to what you eat to help you stay within your goal.

And I would suggest lightly active with a more moderate goal like Jane suggested.

Melmo1988

Thanks for all the suggestions, I really appreciate it.