Need advice on setting calorie goal

baciodolce18

I need some advice on picking a calorie goal. I haven't lost weight since the end of January so I need to reevaluate my calorie goal I guess to be sure I'm in a deficit.

My stats- 5'7, 30yr old, 215ish. Started working out in March (6-7 weeks ago now). Am currently doing 3-5 days at the gym. Mostly cardio. Started a body weight circuit routine as well last week.

It'd be nice to lose 2lbs/week considering I'm still over 200lbs but I'll settle for anything at this point.

I was aiming for 1500 cals which by all calculations should be a decent deficit for myself.

I'm a little nervous posting here because I've seen the responses so... Just please be constructive.

I do use a scale to weigh my food at home. And I do my best to calculate outside the home. I've lost weight successfully in the past on weight watchers (45 pounds), weighing and measuring my food so I feel confident I know how to be accurate.

So yeah. Would love some advice on where to set my calorie goal.

AJ_G

Honestly, you should absolutely be losing weight at 1500 calories. I'd stay at 1500 calories for a few more weeks and really really dial in the accuracy in your logging. Weight and measure every single thing before you eat or drink it, try to keep eating out to a minimum, etc. If you're still not losing weight after that, then reevaluate.

Maxematics

I just want to make sure I understand this post before I issue any advice.

• You haven't lost weight since January. Did you stop trying between January and March when you started working out or have you been actively trying since January but not losing weight?
• If the answer to the prior question is that you've been trying since January, have you been eating 1500 calories the whole time?
• If the answer to the first question is that you actually restarted in March, have you noticed any change in weight since then?
• If the answer to the prior question is no, have you been eating your exercise calories back and, if so, how are you calculating them?

baciodolce18

@synacious I've been actively trying to lose weight. I started the first week of January and lost about 7lbs pretty easily and then I've just been gaining and losing about the same 3-4 pounds since then (going between 213-217). So yes I've been trying to eat 1500 calories since then. Even less sometimes out of frustration. Some days are over but I try not to do it more than once a week with the exception of a week on vacation and my birthday weekend. My weekly averages are always 1500-1300 cals.

And as far as exercise calories- sometimes I eat them back, sometimes I'll eat just an extra 100-200 cals. Sometimes not. I sort of let my hunger/energy be my guide on that.

heybales

1500 is probably that 1000 cal deficit on days with NO exercise - but you do 3-5 days worth.

On days you do more, should really aim to keep that 1000 cal deficit - by eating more when you do more.

Make a body stressed about undereating too much while it's trying to recover, and it'll elevate cortisol and retain water - probably masking your weight loss.

First big loss was water weight. Some increases to water weight probably happened from exercise, especially if cardio only.

Might log your workouts and eat back your calories if not - and cause less stress to your body.
Likely to get the whoosh effect and drop some stress related water that way - giving better indication where you are really at.

You could gain upwards of 20 lbs from retained water from cortisol - would that be stressful for however many weeks that slowly happened hiding fat loss?

You measuring too. Scale may be the same, but inches going down - indicating the above is indeed happening. Except tummy may go up where water is held.

sunflowerhippi

I am 5'6.5 and started out at 212. I was loosing weight at 1750 calories a day NET, so I ate back my workout calories. Figured those out via HRM and fitbit. MFP overestimates calories burned.

Do you weigh you food or measure it? If not a scale I would get one and weigh out your foods. It is annoying but I found I was eating enough calories over to basically void my deficit by using measuring cups. Sorry missed that part in your post it says you did.

Estimating eating out though can be just as bad. You don't know how they cook a food. What might seem a healthy option can be hundred more calories.

Maxematics

Okay, thank you for clearing that up.

The next thing is if you'd be willing to temporarily make your diary public. This would help immensely in trying to figure out the issue. I'd normally ask if you weigh your food, but you already specified that you currently weigh all of your food. The open diary would help in locating possible inaccurate database entries that you may be unintentionally using. When it comes down to the actual calorie allowance, you absolutely should be losing weight at 1500 calories and should not be at a stall. This is why my feeling is that the issue will make itself present through your food/exercise diary.

baciodolce18

I definitely do weigh my food at home and I find it the easiest thing in the world. I don't mind it at all. My only frustration is in logging it because sometimes it's hard to find entries that use weight instead of volume for foods.

I thought my diary was public so let me check those settings now.

baciodolce18

Yep it's set to public.

SezxyStef

baciodolce18 wrote: »

@synacious I've been actively trying to lose weight. I started the first week of January and lost about 7lbs pretty easily and then I've just been gaining and losing about the same 3-4 pounds since then (going between 213-217). So yes I've been trying to eat 1500 calories since then. Even less sometimes out of frustration. Some days are over but I try not to do it more than once a week with the exception of a week on vacation and my birthday weekend. My weekly averages are always 1500-1300 cals.

And as far as exercise calories- sometimes I eat them back, sometimes I'll eat just an extra 100-200 cals. Sometimes not. I sort of let my hunger/energy be my guide on that.

okay since your diary is open and I took a peek.

Usually no weight loss is an issue with the logging.

I see you log lots by weight but some are by servings...1.33 or 0.75...did you make those yourself? create the recipe in MFP and log it that way because you knew that's what you ate?

Other things like medium banana etc.

Weighing and measuring is great but you have to log it like that too...tighten up the logging.

evildeadedd

If you have been within the same 3 to 4 pound range for months, then you are eating at maintence. You say that you weigh all solids and are accurate, have you double checked the entries you are using? Sometimes they can be off hundreds of calories. Could be that the days you are going over are wiping out your deficit. The only advice is to make sure you are using accurate entries, and you do not overestimate exorcise burns. Try to go 4 weeks without any over days. if you know there a special event coming, look at your calorie goal for the week not just the days and try to bank some extra to cover the event. But for those 4 weeks try not to eat anything you didn't make, so you know exactly what is in it. If after four weeks of super strict loging you are still in the same place, might be time to talk to doc and have tests done.

baciodolce18

@SezxyStef like I said I do weigh everything at home so like the banana I ate while I was out so I couldn't weigh it. What does everyone do for those things when they don't have a scale with them?

And as for the portions- the pasta I've been eating the past 2 days I did input manually into the recipe builder. Though I will say I'm new to that and I'm not sure how to calculate servings since it just wants me to divide the recipe and not make portions by weight which would obviously be better/easier. If that's what you're referring to regarding the servings.

baciodolce18

@mangamadayan I like running and cardio and want to improve my cardio/heart health/general fitness so I can do activities without getting winded. I don't find it to be a waste of time at all. And right now I'm not at a fitness level where I can burn more calories with resistance training over what I can do cardio wise. Neither is the calorie burn during resistance training accurately measureable. Not that cardio is either but it's closer.

knitty46

Could someone please explain "eating back your exercise calorie". So if I exercise and my calorie exercise is say 200 do I eat the 200 calories on top of my 1350 calorie for that day?

baciodolce18

@knitty46 Simply speaking, yes. But it's important to make sure you're calculating your exercise calories correctly. Some advise to just eat 50% back to account for discrepancies.

evildeadedd

knitty46 wrote: »

Could someone please explain "eating back your exercise calorie". So if I exercise and my calorie exercise is say 200 do I eat the 200 calories on top of my 1350 calorie for that day?

In a perfectly accurate world yes you would eat the 200 back, but depending on how you are measuring that burn it could be off. So most recommend only eating around half of you exorcise calories back.

baciodolce18

Still though would like advice on what to set calorie goal at. MFP says I can eat 1900 cals (under lightly active) and lose a pound a week. I'd be thrilled to be able to eat 1900 cals and still lose a pound a week.

zoe6724

I apologize that I can't offer advice as to what is happening in the present but for the long term goal, definitely start doing weight/resistance training. Increasing muscle increases metabolism and is the only way to make sure you can keep losing fat without having to go down to 1400, 1300, etc. because who could do that forever and not gain back the weight? An interesting topic to research is reverse dieting. It is upping calories little by little after hard dieting without gaining weight, so as to increase the number of calories the body uses without storing as fat. Again this is all long term but metabolism health (muscle) is so important.

evildeadedd

baciodolce18 wrote: »

Still though would like advice on what to set calorie goal at. MFP says I can eat 1900 cals (under lightly active) and lose a pound a week. I'd be thrilled to be able to eat 1900 cals and still lose a pound a week.

How are you measuring that you are lightly active? Are you including your exorcise into that? Or do you have a more active job ?

zoe6724

baciodolce18 wrote: »

Still though would like advice on what to set calorie goal at. MFP says I can eat 1900 cals (under lightly active) and lose a pound a week. I'd be thrilled to be able to eat 1900 cals and still lose a pound a week.

Try IIFYM.com where you input your stats and it tells you your total daily energy expenditure, and what you need to eat to lose, etc. and manually change your nutrition goals in MFP.

mama000

Fitness pall will calculate calorie needs but I've found 10 times weight wanted works. Want to weigh 150 = 1500 calories. Most people, including myself, don't always track honestly by weighing and measuring food. Exercise is also usually over valued as far as calories. Age or less activity ... multiply by less ... 8 xs =.

MsBuzzkillington

If MFP is telling you to eat 1900 calories to lose a pound a week, you should be eating 1900 calories, especially since you exercise on a regular basis.

Sometimes the less you eat, the slower you lose. I would recommend eating 1900.

benevempress

You said you need to "reevaluate your calorie goal to make sure you are in a deficit." An excellent plan if you aren't losing as you expect and you actually know how many calories you have been consuming. But you don't, for several reasons:

You have log days that are blank.
You have a lot of food that was prepared by a factory (did you know that they can legally be up to 20% heavier but not lower than the advertised weight?). If you are really trying to get your logging tight and accurate, you're going to have to weigh this stuff too.
You have a lot of restaurant food that you can't be sure of the calories. Even if Dunkin Donuts tells you that a muffin has 240 calories (for example, not saying you ate a muffin from DD), did YOUR muffin have that many, or was it bigger or smaller than the "average"? The same for a flavored coffee or a restaurant burger or anything made on site. You can't know, so the more of this kind of food that is consumed, the less accurate you can be.
Calorie burns from exercise equipment are not reliable, which is why so many people advocate eating only a percentage of their exercise calories back.

Not knowing what your actual calorie consumption has been makes it impossible for someone on the internet to suggest what number will work for you.

The best advice I have for you is to try to eat food that you have control over; things you can buy at the grocery store, weigh at home, and log. Then weigh and log EVERYTHING. If you do that, you'll know how many calories you are eating and will see if that number is working for your goals and can adjust up or down from there. If you can't do that, this is going to continue to be frustrating for you because you are going to be making decisions without facts.

You are basically starting over, because you don't know how much you've been eating over the course of a week, so you don't know if you are at a deficit or not. If you need a number suggestion, then pick any number you want between the 1500 you've been sort-of trying and the 1900 that MFP suggests, and then really, really strictly count, weigh, and log every single thing that goes into your mouth. Once you know what number works for you and you are losing at a rate acceptable to you, you can choose to reintroduce food that you aren't quite as sure of the calorie counts if you want to. But having a diet filled with uncertainty isn't a solid place to start.

WinoGelato

mama000 wrote: »

Fitness pall will calculate calorie needs but I've found 10 times weight wanted works. Want to weigh 150 = 1500 calories. Most people, including myself, don't always track honestly by weighing and measuring food. Exercise is also usually over valued as far as calories. Age or less activity ... multiply by less ... 8 xs =.

Um no. I've never actually met anyone for whom the 10x desired weight works. I'm 5'2 and maintaining a 30 lb loss at 120 lbs. I never ate less than 1600 to lose. 1200 was too low for me and I'm a petite person.

OP as others have said, at your current weight, you should definitely be losing at 1500 if your calories in and out are both logged as accurately as possible.

MissusMoon

If you're eating 1300-1500 with exercise and haven't seen any results since January, you might speak with your doctor and explain this. Other things could be going on. Personally, I believe you about weighing and measuring and being accurate with your log.

sky_northern

baciodolce18 wrote: »

@SezxyStef like I said I do weigh everything at home so like the banana I ate while I was out so I couldn't weigh it. What does everyone do for those things when they don't have a scale with them?

And as for the portions- the pasta I've been eating the past 2 days I did input manually into the recipe builder. Though I will say I'm new to that and I'm not sure how to calculate servings since it just wants me to divide the recipe and not make portions by weight which would obviously be better/easier. If that's what you're referring to regarding the servings.

I bring my snacks pre-weighted and logged with me most of the time.

For recipes, I will often use the # of grams of the whole final result of the batch as the # of servings, then I can weigh my portions and track by grams (or if really huge recipe then use 100 grams). I have to adjust the weights of ingredients and number of servings for every time I make a batch.

knitty46

baciodolce18, Hi, Thank you for replying to my question. I get to full if I eat more than 1350 and I saw on MFP FB that if your weight wasn't moving down maybe it might be not eating enough of your exercise calorie intake. I haven't moved(exercised) for 2 months. I started going to the gym last month and that could be it also. 2 1/2 weeks been in a rut, so today is a new day, a new month and a new time to get back on track.

heybales

baciodolce18 wrote: »

I definitely do weigh my food at home and I find it the easiest thing in the world. I don't mind it at all. My only frustration is in logging it because sometimes it's hard to find entries that use weight instead of volume for foods.

I thought my diary was public so let me check those settings now.

If the volume in an entry equals the label on a food item - you merely go by the weight also given on the food label.

You eat say 200 g divided by 120 g serving size (which also says 1 cup) = 1.67 serving sizes.
You find entry that happens to only mention the 1 cup serving size - you log 1.67 servings.

And you are as accurate as the label can be.

Now - anyone reviewing your diary may think you are going by volume - but if they are smart they notice the decimal accurate serving sizes and realize what is going on.

Because even a medium banana has a weight to it in the entry (when you can weigh it anyway) - and therefore 1.2 servings means you did weigh it.

heybales

baciodolce18 wrote: »

Still though would like advice on what to set calorie goal at. MFP says I can eat 1900 cals (under lightly active) and lose a pound a week. I'd be thrilled to be able to eat 1900 cals and still lose a pound a week.

Perhaps you like the idea of a daily eating goal that doesn't change, as long as you keep up the average weekly workout routine. That avoids the whole need to log exercise and figure out how much to eat back - because it's already included in the average weekly daily burn (TDEE).

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1G7FgNzPq3v5WMjDtH0n93LXSMRY_hjmzNTMJb3aZSxM/edit?usp=sharing

You didn't mention how long the workouts were of cardio, assuming 1 hr for those 4 days (3-5 avg). If circuit training is in there, same level, not weight lifting yet.

You mentioned lightly active activity level outside of gym, so kept that.

Doing a 20% deficit - or 1.1 lb weekly - 2800 TDEE.
Eating goal - 2238 (as accurate as can be anyway)

If my assumptions were wrong, you can make a copy of spreadsheet and correct them.

SaraD60

Perhaps, like someone else said, you are maybe not eating enough calories....I started out on 22nd February this year weighing around 203lbs (age 55) and "lightly active". I was aiming to lose a pound a week.
MFP gave me 1600 calories a day to eat. I would exercise (dog walking) for around half an hour a day x 6 to "earn" extra calories AND eat them back. Now then, I have lost 13.5lbs so far (9 weeks). I weigh everything I eat carefully and have fallen off the wagon a few times, but always account for it (chinese takeaways, fish and chips, chocolate you name it). I am not trying to lose quickly and will never be sylph-like. Another stone or two off would make me happy but if it takes till Christmas or after, so be it. Good luck anyway.

cbihatt

benevempress wrote: »

You said you need to "reevaluate your calorie goal to make sure you are in a deficit." An excellent plan if you aren't losing as you expect and you actually know how many calories you have been consuming. But you don't, for several reasons:

You have log days that are blank.
You have a lot of food that was prepared by a factory (did you know that they can legally be up to 20% heavier but not lower than the advertised weight?). If you are really trying to get your logging tight and accurate, you're going to have to weigh this stuff too.
You have a lot of restaurant food that you can't be sure of the calories. Even if Dunkin Donuts tells you that a muffin has 240 calories (for example, not saying you ate a muffin from DD), did YOUR muffin have that many, or was it bigger or smaller than the "average"? The same for a flavored coffee or a restaurant burger or anything made on site. You can't know, so the more of this kind of food that is consumed, the less accurate you can be.
Calorie burns from exercise equipment are not reliable, which is why so many people advocate eating only a percentage of their exercise calories back.

Not knowing what your actual calorie consumption has been makes it impossible for someone on the internet to suggest what number will work for you.

The best advice I have for you is to try to eat food that you have control over; things you can buy at the grocery store, weigh at home, and log. Then weigh and log EVERYTHING. If you do that, you'll know how many calories you are eating and will see if that number is working for your goals and can adjust up or down from there. If you can't do that, this is going to continue to be frustrating for you because you are going to be making decisions without facts.

You are basically starting over, because you don't know how much you've been eating over the course of a week, so you don't know if you are at a deficit or not. If you need a number suggestion, then pick any number you want between the 1500 you've been sort-of trying and the 1900 that MFP suggests, and then really, really strictly count, weigh, and log every single thing that goes into your mouth. Once you know what number works for you and you are losing at a rate acceptable to you, you can choose to reintroduce food that you aren't quite as sure of the calorie counts if you want to. But having a diet filled with uncertainty isn't a solid place to start.

*I will preface this by saying I did not look at your diary and I only skimmed most of the responses here.*

This is excellent advice, especially considering you have been "gaining and losing the same 3-4 pounds." That indicates a lack of consistency. I know that when I eat out I am more likely to show a gain that week, usually followed by a big loss the next week when I don't eat out. You don't have to avoid that stuff forever, but it might be a good idea to stay away for a week or two and then keep it limited, going forward.