Daily calorie intake

Gotchocolate

This thread made me realize I should change my setting to sedentary on mfp to change my calorie limit to 1580, that more accurately reflects what I've found my body burns in a day. However, I hadn't ever thought of myself as sedentary! I'm a very busy stay at home mom to a 2 year-old:) Do any of you use the sedentary setting even though you're more active?

CharlieBeansmomTracey

Gotchocolate wrote: »

This thread made me realize I should change my setting to sedentary on mfp to change my calorie limit to 1580, that more accurately reflects what I've found my body burns in a day. However, I hadn't ever thought of myself as sedentary! I'm a very busy stay at home mom to a 2 year-old:) Do any of you use the sedentary setting even though you're more active?

no,I use sedentary because right now its cold out and not that active. but once its warm again and Im outside more I will set it to lightly active or the next one up. if your body burns 1580 just by being alive you want to eat a little more than that.you dont eat your BMR or less. eat what MFP gives you.I dont know if you would be considered lightly active or not. but I would say possibly if you are on your feet all/most of the day.some people will set theirs to sedentary if they have say a desk job where they sit all day or arent walking very much.

CharlieBeansmomTracey

Christine_72 wrote: »

CharlieBeansmomTracey wrote: »

Gotchocolate wrote: »

Two seperately issues here, that level of calories is NOT healthy and I think you should raise it immediately to at least 1200. However, I'm not going to make you feel bad for asking, that's what this forum is for right? And, I am also 5'7 and 120 lbs. I can maintain that weight with about 1500 calories on average. I eat more on days I workout and sometimes slightly less, maybe 1400 when I don't work out. Just some info for you to not be afraid to eat more. I'm also not looking to lose weight, I just use mfp to maintain and to make sure I'm getting enough protein, etc.

Im 5'6 1/2 and my maintenance is more than 1500 calories and Im 41. why is yours so low? just wondering

I was about to ask the exact same question..

I'm 5"8 and 44, and my maintenance will be 2000+ when i get there. But my goal weight is 143lbs, so not sure if that extra 20lbs would make a huge difference??

couldnt really say as I dont know. I have about 25lbs to lose. my goal is around 140(if I ever get there its been 4 years almost) I dont really know if someone who weighs 20 lbs more if their maintenance calories would be higher or lower. guess you could find an online calculator and mess around with it and see if the calories at maintenance would be higher or lower. at one point I was losing at 2000 calories then it stopped.dropped it to 1800,lost then stopped(got in a 6+ month plateau),Im now down to 1580 lost 1lb and now Im stuck again.

lynn_glenmont

Gotchocolate wrote: »

This thread made me realize I should change my setting to sedentary on mfp to change my calorie limit to 1580, that more accurately reflects what I've found my body burns in a day. However, I hadn't ever thought of myself as sedentary! I'm a very busy stay at home mom to a 2 year-old:) Do any of you use the sedentary setting even though you're more active?

No, I use the active setting even though my life better fits the description of sedentary (desk job, no children to chase after, and I count any activity beyond walking around the house or office as exercise that I log as over and above the active-setting calories). That's what I have to do to get the MFP estimate of my daily calorie burn to come close to what more than 2 and a half years of logging show is what I actually burn. No online calculator beats your own results.