Confused??? I Need clear cut answers not opinions

HakeemTheDream89

I'm going to be totally honest ..I'm not off to a good start as far as food selection for today. Definitely regretting having that Cheeseburger especially right after eating a PB & J. Does exercise calories not matter If I go over my calories goal of 2,800?

I plan to burn at least 1,200 calories today but i'm trying to figure out why doesn't that count? I've been told that If I eat over 2,800 calories and burn 1,200 of them I still will not lose weight.. I will be just maintaining my weight. Someone let me know

By the way for dinner I plan on eating pot roast and mixed vegetables

TavistockToad

If net 2800 cals is a deficit (if you used MFP to get your numbers) then yes, you will lose weight if you eat net 2800 cals or less.

If you eat more that that it will reduce your deficit so you may end up eating at maintenance or in a surplus depending how much more you ate.

Spliner1969

I'm not sure who told you that, but exercise calories are available to use. Granted, if your goal is 2800 BECAUSE of your exercise calories are already figured in (which is likely) then eating them back would mean exactly that, you'd be eating at surplus.

Figure your TDEE (use any of the many available calculators on the Internet or MFP) without exercise factored in at all. That'll tell you how many calories you can eat in a day and not gain weight without exercising. Then add your exercise calories (in this case 1200) to that number. That'll be the MAX you can eat today without eating in surplus. Just keep in mind that exercise calories are usually over inflated, so leave some of them left over for the day.

Spliner1969

For instance, I am 6'2" tall, 181 lbs, my TDEE with 90 minutes of exercise five days a week figured in is 2700 calories a day. As long as I stay at 2700 7 days of the week I won't gain weight. But my actual TDEE is lower than that, so if I tried to log my exercise calories and eat those back on top of the 2700 I would gain weight because that TDEE calculation was figured with exercise already.

HakeemTheDream89

My deficit is 3,800 so I set it up to 2,800 to lose 2 pounds a day

saphin

We all have less compliant days so log it and move on. Why not consider a lighter evening meal and save the pot roast for tomorrow?

If you are using MFP as intended and your calorie goal set by MFP is 2,800, when you burn an additional 1,200 calories in exercise the exercise calories go straight towards your deficit and you should be eating at least some of these back. I don't understand what you mean about them not counting. If, however, you have manually set your calorie goal based in TDEE the exercise calories are already accommodated in this and will not count so you should not eat any of them back.

lemurcat12

Exercise calories count, and also you will lose weight with anything under your maintenance (I assume 3800 is your maintenance and then 2800 is a 1000 calorie deficit for a 2 lb loss?).

So don't worry about it, do a little extra exercise if you can, and stick to the plan for tonight.

HakeemTheDream89

If I eat 3,200 calories today and burn 1,200 calories which leave me with 2,000 calories for the day.. Wouldn't that mean it was a positive day or due to me eating 400 calories over my calorie goal considered a negative day?

TavistockToad

abneyhakeem89 wrote: »

My deficit is 3,800 so I set it up to 2,800 to lose 2 pounds a day

Your maintenance is 3800, your deficit is 1000 you mean?

nowine4me

Just punch your stats and goal into MFP and let it do the math. Eat back exercise calories, or a portion thereof. No need to make manual adjustments to create a deficit - it does it for you.

janejellyroll

If you net 2,000 calories, then you would be in a deficit. If your goal is 2,800 then you would actually be 800 below your goal (assuming you are accurately measuring your calories consumed and your calories burned).

lemurcat12

abneyhakeem89 wrote: »

If I eat 3,200 calories today and burn 1,200 calories which leave me with 2,000 calories for the day.. Wouldn't that mean it was a positive day or due to me eating 400 calories over my calorie goal considered a negative day?

How did you get the MFP goal? Sedentary and plan to lose 2 lb/week? If so, you add the exercise back in and any net number below the goal is going to be on track for the loss.

HakeemTheDream89

To maintain my weight = 3,800 calories consumed every day. So I set my goal to 2,800 to lose two pounds a day which is a healthy weight loss. I was told to eat lesser then what I ate yesterday which was over 3,000 calories . I did burn over 1,200 calories but she felt like I didn't lose any weight for that day

CattOfTheGarage

I'm confused about your numbers. What is your actual calorie goal? Is it 1600? How did you work that out? If you used myfitnesspal, what did you put in as your weight loss goal - 1lb a week, 2lb a week?

Clarify that and we'll get it sorted out.

HakeemTheDream89

I won't be eating dinner tonight and will make sure to burn over 1,000 calories

TavistockToad

abneyhakeem89 wrote: »

To maintain my weight = 3,800 calories consumed every day. So I set my goal to 2,800 to lose two pounds a day which is a healthy weight loss. I was told to eat lesser then what I ate yesterday which was over 3,000 calories . I did burn over 1,200 calories but she felt like I didn't lose any weight for that day

Why are you measuring weight loss by the day????

janejellyroll

abneyhakeem89 wrote: »

To maintain my weight = 3,800 calories consumed every day. So I set my goal to 2,800 to lose two pounds a day which is a healthy weight loss. I was told to eat lesser then what I ate yesterday which was over 3,000 calories . I did burn over 1,200 calories but she felt like I didn't lose any weight for that day

Who is advising you to measure weight loss by the day? That isn't really how this works.

TR0berts

Whoa - full stop.

You're making this soooooo much more difficult than it needs to be. So let me give some really easy-to-follow advice.

You've already input your stats (age, height, weight, etc) into MFP. Add your exercise in, as you should. Eat however many Calories MFP tells you to eat each day. After a month, look to see if you've lost the 8 lb you should lose in that time frame. If so, keep on doing your thing. If you've lost less than 8 lb, just eat a little less each day. If you've lost more than 8 lb, then you can eat a little more each day.

lemurcat12

abneyhakeem89 wrote: »

To maintain my weight = 3,800 calories consumed every day. So I set my goal to 2,800 to lose two pounds a day which is a healthy weight loss. I was told to eat lesser then what I ate yesterday which was over 3,000 calories . I did burn over 1,200 calories but she felt like I didn't lose any weight for that day

Who told you that?

VintageFeline

Your goal on MFP EXCLUDES exercise. So when you exercise those calories increases your deficit/increases how much you can eat and still lose.

1000 calorie a day deficit = 2lbs per WEEK, not day.

Tacklewasher

I think he mis-typed. Maintenance is 3,800, goal is 2,800 so weight loss would be 2 lbs per WEEK.
How do you plan to burn 1,200 today? And how accurate is that measurement? All I'm reading here is that most fitness gear overstates calories burned so be careful in eating them all back as you may not burn the 1,200 you think you are.
I'm trying to lose +100 lbs and am using exercise calories for wine (I love wine) but only drinking back ~ 1/2.

DawnNathan

If your MFP daily calorie goal is 2800 that is the number you need to stay at or under to lose weight.
If you eat 3200 cals and burn 1,200 cals your deficit for the day will be 800 over the intended built in deficit.
Here's the equation 2800 food allowed + 1200 exercise calories earned = 4,000 available cals for the day. If you only eat 3,200 of cals available you end up 800 cals below what you were allowed on top of the built in deficit that MFP already gave you. Hope this helps. Feel free to friend me.

lemurcat12

DawnNathan wrote: »

If your MFP daily calorie goal is 2800 that is the number you need to stay at or under to lose weight.
If you eat 3200 cals and burn 1,200 cals your deficit for the day will be 800 over the intended built in deficit.
Here's the equation 2800 food allowed + 1200 exercise calories earned = 4,000 available cals for the day. If you only eat 3,200 of cals available you end up 800 cals below what you were allowed on top of the built in deficit that MFP already gave you. Hope this helps. Feel free to friend me.

No, not really.

His goal is 2800 for a 2 lb loss. If he eats 3200, he's still on track for a bit more than a 1 lb loss, even without exercise.

If he adds in 400 calories of exercise (even assuming his 1200 calories is way overstated), he's back on track for 2 lbs.

Exercise counts.

OP is a big guy and will burn quite a bit more than most when exercising, although I tend to think it's safer for him to half the exercise calories to not count the amounts you would have burned during that time anyway.

cerise_noir

grmckenzie wrote: »

I think he mis-typed. Maintenance is 3,800, goal is 2,800 so weight loss would be 2 lbs per WEEK.
How do you plan to burn 1,200 today? And how accurate is that measurement? All I'm reading here is that most fitness gear overstates calories burned so be careful in eating them all back as you may not burn the 1,200 you think you are.
I'm trying to lose +100 lbs and am using exercise calories for wine (I love wine) but only drinking back ~ 1/2.

This

And I am interested in the bolded. Burning 1200 through exercise is freakin hard. I can burn 300-400 an hour with jog/walk intervals.

VintageFeline

cerise_noir wrote: »

grmckenzie wrote: »

I think he mis-typed. Maintenance is 3,800, goal is 2,800 so weight loss would be 2 lbs per WEEK.
How do you plan to burn 1,200 today? And how accurate is that measurement? All I'm reading here is that most fitness gear overstates calories burned so be careful in eating them all back as you may not burn the 1,200 you think you are.
I'm trying to lose +100 lbs and am using exercise calories for wine (I love wine) but only drinking back ~ 1/2.

This

And I am interested in the bolded. Burning 1200 through exercise is freakin hard. I can burn 300-400 an hour with jog/walk intervals.

I don't think it's beyond the realms of possibility when OP is big enough to maintain without exercise at 3800 calories per day.

HakeemTheDream89

DawnNathan wrote: »

If your MFP daily calorie goal is 2800 that is the number you need to stay at or under to lose weight.
If you eat 3200 cals and burn 1,200 cals your deficit for the day will be 800 over the intended built in deficit.
Here's the equation 2800 food allowed + 1200 exercise calories earned = 4,000 available cals for the day. If you only eat 3,200 of cals available you end up 800 cals below what you were allowed on top of the built in deficit that MFP already gave you. Hope this helps. Feel free to friend me.

I understood the first part but the last two sentences threw me off. I'm just going to not eat dinner tonight and stay under 2,500 calories for rest of day

Aaron_K123

abneyhakeem89 wrote: »

I'm going to be totally honest ..I'm not off to a good start as far as food selection for today. Definitely regretting having that Cheeseburger especially right after eating a PB & J. Does exercise calories not matter If I go over my calories goal of 2,800?

I plan to burn at least 1,200 calories today but i'm trying to figure out why doesn't that count? I've been told that If I eat over 2,800 calories and burn 1,200 of them I still will not lose weight.. I will be just maintaining my weight. Someone let me know

By the way for dinner I plan on eating pot roast and mixed vegetables

I'm not sure who told you that but that certainly isn't true. You can burn calories through exercise and those calories do come off of your total.

lemurcat12

abneyhakeem89 wrote: »

DawnNathan wrote: »

If your MFP daily calorie goal is 2800 that is the number you need to stay at or under to lose weight.
If you eat 3200 cals and burn 1,200 cals your deficit for the day will be 800 over the intended built in deficit.
Here's the equation 2800 food allowed + 1200 exercise calories earned = 4,000 available cals for the day. If you only eat 3,200 of cals available you end up 800 cals below what you were allowed on top of the built in deficit that MFP already gave you. Hope this helps. Feel free to friend me.

I understood the first part but the last two sentences threw me off. I'm just going to not eat dinner tonight and stay under 2,500 calories for rest of day

This isn't necessary or a good idea, as it will likely make it harder for you tomorrow. You can eat a pretty low cal dinner (300-400 calories, easily) if you focus on meat and vegetables.

Also, this poster is wrong in telling you that you won't lose if you go above 2800 and also wrong in telling you that exercise does not count. The important thing for you is to figure out a sustainable way to eat that you can follow consistently, and adding back in some exercise calories is totally fine.

ndj1979

you want to make sure that you are NETTING 2800 calories...so if you burn 1200 you would eat 4000 calories - 1200 burned = 2800 which puts you at your target calorie goal.

Now, most calories burned estimates are way off, so you should only eat back half of your calories. So if you think you burned 1200 you only eat back 600, which means that you eat 3400 calories - 600 burned = 2800 net.

MFP method already has your deficit built in.

HakeemTheDream89

thanks guys and ladies for all the knowledge

Rebecca0224

abneyhakeem89 wrote: »

I won't be eating dinner tonight and will make sure to burn over 1,000 calories

Why are you skipping meals? Just log your food and exercise and mfp should show you how much you went over or under the goal. Try looking at your weekly stats and don't panic is you go over for the day. Calories consumed- exercise calories= total calories. You can eat back exercise calories, consumed 3200 calories exercise 1200 calories (3200-1200=2000) so if your goal is 2800 you can consume up to 800 calories more.