Calories

healthy491

Are calories really everything that matter when it comes to maintaining / losing weight? I mean what about metabolism , genetics etc ?
Sorry for double posting btw , I accidentally posted it in the wrong thread.

seska422

It's just calories.

Things like metabolism and genetics might change where your personal calorie maintenance point is located, but:

Consuming more calories than your maintenance will cause weight gain.

Consuming the same amount of calories as your maintenance will leave you at the same weight.

Consuming fewer calories than your maintenance will cause weight loss.


The tricky parts are figuring out your personal maintenance calories (which may need some logging over time to be able to see), closely estimating your actual calories in, and closely estimating your calories out.

scoii

Metabolism is maybe less than 1% ie. you add muscle and your metabolism goes up. Caffeine helps a little but not enough to warrant the milk in coffee. Don't fall for anything that mentions a "boost" or "kickstart".

Genetics you can't change, but 99.9999% of people's metabolism falls in the expected range for their height. It's often used as an excuse, along with "glandular".

Unfortunately it is all about the diet. It sucks that us people in the developed world, have made our lives so easy to eat far more than we need, and have made such delicious food that we can purchase with our disposable income.

A lot of people try numerous diets and plans that will magically remove fat. They never work.

andysport1

Calories, macros & exercise are the 3 main items along with some mental strength.
Metabolism or the thyroid has very little to do with it, the difference between a normal thyroid and a underactive is less than 250 calories per day which is like 30 mins exercise.
So no matter how hard you look for excuses its 90% about what you put in your mouth.