Background, history, questions, TDEE, calories (long post, sorry)

cmk5444

Background, history, questions. Not trying to show off with this post (just trying to cover all the bases with information if it helps), I am truly a bit freaked out and unsure about what I am doing. I know the answers I think, but as I do all this alone (run, cycle, work, eat, prepare everything) I have no real support network to bounce this stuff off. Also, if this is the wrong board maybe it could be moved? New here and not sure.

TL;DR After cutting and losing weight, I have trouble with my TDEE, my calorie intake and recovery from cardio. Am I underestimating? I commute 50+ miles a week by bike and run 15-20 miles, plus work. I weigh 60kg at 170cm. My resting heart rate is approx 44bpm when I wake (52bpm during the day stood in front of a class. I checked!). I try and eat around 2000-2200 calories a day. I feel tired and a bit grumpy a lot of the time (well durr), I don't "feel" fit. I feel "fitter" than I was, but not this mythical healthy. My appetite has sky rocketed and it is freaking my out. (pro-tip: It's the running that does it)

Hello

LONG VERSION/ Bit of background: 2015, a male at age 40. I weighed 86kg at 170cm. I took it upon myself to drop the weight. I did this quite successfully with a mix of calorie restriction and a bit of cardio (well a lot of bike riding).

It is now late 2016, and I am 41 year old male, at 60kg. Apparently my scales tell me that I have 16.6% body fat. They also sometimes tell me I am 58kg. I take this with a grain of salt because it swings around a bit depending on my hydration etc. So, I have lost weight. Go me. 60Kg is okay.

I am also a bit paranoid about putting the weight back on, so I tend to use MFP in panic mode and tracking everything. I weigh everything (grams of this, that, and the other) and I record everything.

It has become a habit, if not a compulsion. Like I said, panic mode. I have totally changed my diet, and I have since started running.

Sauces, cheeses, biscuits, sugar-laden snacks, fast food, fried stuff: Gone (mostly, if not then weighed and accounted for). White meats, carbohydrates (rices, breads, pastas) and a metric-*ss load of veg, and some oats are all good. Yeah, I know... breads. I keep an eye on those. And don't get me started on the Granola I once bought. Rubbish stuff. (40g is 100 calories??! You're 'avin' a giggle mate.)

Serious veg consumption. Love it. Though the raw stuff does tend to “affect” my digestion, much to my wife's displeasure!! Ahem.... TMI.

And this is where the TDEE, BMR and all that throw me. I can't afford a heart rate monitor (and I don't think I truly need one TBH). Therefore I use a variety of internet resources to tell me what I should be eating in total calories daily rather than taking my heart rate, levels of other things and doing lots of complicated mathematics.

Based on what I am “possibly” doing, this calorie intake swings from the 1900s to the 2800s. ALLEGEDLY. I say allegedly because there is variance in the suggested amounts across sites and sources. But I generally cross-reference ingredients and double check weights when I make food.

An example: I ride my bike 5 days a week on a commute. I do this at an average of about 14-17mph for 20-25 minutes (depending on weather and traffic) with a large bag on my back. I cover about 5.5 miles in that time, according to my GPS. I also run 4 days a week. At a base level I try to cover 5km per run with a bigger run at the weekend which will wipe me out. Sunday I do nothing. No commute, No run.

(My fastest single mile is in 6:22. My “average” rate is around 8-8.5 minutes. 8:30 some days, 7:48 others if I am really slow 9 minutes a mile. My fastest 5k was 23:55. Made me smile to see that considering I have no experience with these things. Not quite as good as my cycling should be. But I have more experience with bikes, and like I said, I started running August 2016.)

Anyway, cycling... That is quite an effort on the bike when weighed down like a packhorse with changes of clothes, lunchboxes, laptops etc. But you Google around and there are runners out there poo-pooing cyclists and their commuting efforts. My overall fitness has greatly increased since running I do certainly recognise that. I use muscles I never knew I had, but to dismiss the effort and energy it takes to get on the damn bike daily come hell or high water and ride as hard as you can is a bit arrogant, dismissive and dispiriting. (I Digress, kinda)

“Hard as you can” you say? Now we are touching on my calorie intake and those numbers above. I ride fully loaded with 35L bag on my back, I work (I stand in front a classes of teenagers who are supposed to be learning. I do this for between 100 and 250 minutes a day depending. I am not allowed to sit in class due to reasons.), I ride home with the same bag, I run. I attempt to do this on about 2000-2100 calories a day. And damn I feel like the definition of “not good”.

So, I log it all, look at the deficit and go “yay! I ran 5k in 25 minutes after the same in 2 commutes and being on my feet wandering round supporting my own body weight. I can eat more rice/pasta/sweet potato/something that came out of the ground!

And I do.

To illustrate this last point: One particular day this week I did daily routine for work and went home. I changed footwear and bolted out the door for 6.7kms (about 37 minutes worth of pavement pounding, yay!). At that point I had consumed about 1500 calories. Ouch. Getting home feeling a little hungry and tired and thirsty, I promptly “topped up” with another post-run 1400 calories, and water over the course of the evening. It was mainly rice, sweet potato, cabbage, onion, some beans and chicken. The beans and chicken breast bumped it up though. Protein or something. I need protein.... and a couple of squares off a chocolate bar which was naughty.

So after all that legging it about and then refuelling on a mad load of carbohydrates (and a bit of chicken), I feel quite good. At least the day after anyway! The calorie intake seems to have helped me recover for my morning commute. My muscles are a little tired, but that's normal for me. I race traffic to and from work.

I also feel a bit anxious eating that much. Do I need that much after so few miles/kilometres? I thought it was marathon runners who had to feed and carb-load and all that, my diet is incredibly carbohydrate heavy as I can't derive energy from fats (yeah, read about that stuff. Another rabbit-hole to fall down). I feel like I should be balancing this out by restricting intake on subsequent days. I say “feel” but I know this isn't advisable because I would just collapse wanting more food. Like I said, "rabbit hole".

To the crux of the issue(s): How much do I honestly need calorie-wise? Apart from “enough to feel normal”. Generally my appetite has sky rocketed and it is freaking my out.

Conclusion to the rambling post:
I track calories and exercise a bit too compulsively. I am not sure if I am over or under estimating so I wear myself out, just in case. I need to find balance as I move from weigh loss to lifestyle change. I enjoy running.

Again, I am not coming in here going "ooh, look at what I CAN DO." I mean, it's a case of of "this is what I have done, this is what I do and I am not feeling 100% Someone with more experience of these things drop me some hints as I feel like I am going round in circles".

Sorry for the long post.

trigden1991

Can you write your questions out below. There are a lot of statements and thoughts but not really sure what you want to know.

charlieandcarol

A couple observations. 60 kg would be a light weight for a 170cm woman yet you are still talking about deficits.

Is all this exercise for a competition, for fun, for weight loss? You seem to be pushing hard physically but it is not clear what your goals are with it.

You aren't eating enough, that's why you feel ordinary.

To figure out how much to eat and what you need to figure out what your goals are.

JustMissTracy

Aren't you doing all those things so you won't have to feel that way? You obviously know your own successes and how hard you work, I don't understand the question.

Cylphin60

Here's the link to the "Must reads" in the maintaining weight forum. They may prove helpful.

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10300324/most-helpful-posts-goal-maintaining-weight-must-reads#latest

What I took away from your post is that you've reached your goals, and are terrified of losing your gains.

Don't overthink this! You know what works to lose weight/gain fitness. Now you just need tips on maintaining your weight while you improve your fitness.

Keep it simple.

cmk5444

Thank you for the must reads. Apologies for the forum vomit styling.

I wrote out a long list of questions. Stuff I already know the answer to. No point posting those, it's a waste of everyone's time.

Reflecting on where I am, what I am doing, where I want to be:

Question!

How do I break this mindset I have developed? I want to shift from diet/weight loss to maintenance and fitness.

Mindset
- I don't eat food I can't log on MFP. If it hasn't got a weight/calorie reference I don't touch it.
- I can't find a satisfactory weigh to eat maintenance without wanting to punish myself for eating over an arbitrarily set benchmark.
- I want to relax about all this stuff again.

What I took away from your post is that you've reached your goals, and are terrified of losing your gains.

This. Sorry again for the brain dump previously.

Christine_72

I'm a tad concerned about your low weight.. I'm a 172cm woman and there's no way i could get down to that weight and stay there without some serious undereating.

Set yourself to maintenance calories on here and eat them ALL. Log all of your exercise and eat those calories back too. Most folks eat back 50-75% of exercise calories back to start with, and increase or decrease depending on their weight/gain/loss/maintain.

red99ryder

one thing to remember , you wont gain all your weight back in a week , calculate numbers on mfp and start there is what i would do , try for a few weeks and see how its working ,, adjust from there

good luck

spiriteagle99

I think you are undereating and it sounds like you may be underweight as well. You are very active and your intake should reflect that. If you are actually hungry much of the time, you aren't doing it right.

I'd do as stated above and eat at maintenance for a while. See if it satisfies your hunger and energy needs. Keep an eye on your weight. If it goes up by 5 lbs. or more, then cut back.

If you have that kind of speed after just a few months of running, I hope you will continue to race. It sounds like you have a lot of talent. I enjoy racing, and I have no speed at all, but it's fun. You might also look into triathlons since you bike and run.

JeromeBarry1

See 60 kg as your golden weight, and 58 kg shall never again get a "Yea me" from you. OK? Can you do that?
See "feels right" as your standard to be achieved, not "feels not right".
Keep bicycling and running and staying in shape. Eat carbs of some sort following your burns, so perhaps a banana or a slice of bread with a dab of peanut butter could be added to your backpack for you to consume after arriving at work. Track and experiment if this recovery meal needs to be close to 100 calories or 200 or even 300. The whole point of my suggestions is that you feel right and only you can know what feels right. Achieve that at 60 kg and you're a paragon of health.

By the way, "feels not right" is the classic symptom of you having your bodily stores of glycogen at Empty. Your brain has demanded that fat be converted to ketones and your body is slow about doing that. You seem to have a very strong power of will, denying yourself the carbs you need to feel right and thus losing a little more weight.
If you keep that up day after day you will harm yourself, and that will be soon.

AnnPT77

How much are you losing now? Are you food logging accurately?

If you're logging, take the amount you lose in an average week in pounds, multiply by 3500 (because roughly 3500 calories in a pound), divide by 7 (days in a week) and add that to your daily calorie goal. Eat that much, and you'll maintain.

If you're not logging, log for 2-3 weeks, then do the calculations.

If it freaks you out to eat more, add 100-200 calories daily (depending on how big the gap is), wait a couple of weeks to see what happens to your weight, then add more if you're still losing. Rinse and repeat, until your weight stabilizes. That's your maintenance calories.

Set a maintenance weight range, plus and minus a few pounds from your goal. Make the plus and minus pounds be a pound or two more than you usually see in daily weight fluctuations. Then, if you're over the top side for more than a few days, cut back a little until you drop toward the bottom of the range. If you drop below the bottom of the range, eat a little more until you hit at least the middle. Rinse and repeat.

As far as eating things for which you can't know the calories: Do an experiment. Force yourself to eat a restaurant meal someplace that doesn't list calories. Log it based on the most similar entry you find in the database (tossing out the lowball ones, picking a mid-high one). Wait a week. What happened to your weight? Probably nothing. So you've proved it's OK to do this now & then. Rinse and repeat.

If this is stressful, remind yourself that calories on food packaging are allowed to be off by 20%, and that apple A has more sugar than apple B, but you use the same database entries. It's still OK. It evens out.

You can do this!

Sued0nim

I do nowhere near that amount of cardio and eat more

cmk5444

Thank you. I have been doing a bit of research and looking at numbers. Apologies for the long wordage. Again.

In a nutshell, I looked here:

RUNNING
http://www.runnersworld.com/nutrition/real-runner-nutrition
and here:
http://www.calculator.net/calorie-calculator.html

CYCLING
Cycling calorie numbers from Strava, MFP and here (which are a bit higher than both MFP and Strava):
http://www.bicycling.com/training/weight-loss/cycling-calories-burned-calculator

WORKING
Standing in classroom: MFP.

It came out more than I realised.

/nutshell

I worked out resting and sedentary calorie requirements. Over and above that I get a bit frustrated with the "bit of exercise/lot of exercise etc" subjective descriptors many sites use. Rather than change up the equations I looked at ballpark figures for the activities I do that use calories: cycling commute, running and standing around teaching.

Multiple sources are used to get a broad picture of the agreed calorie amounts based on height, weight, activity length and perceived stress based on time/speed/distance. Though they are only suggestions, I recognise that.

Quick back of a cigarette packet number crunching gives me the following:
RMR 1462(Mifflin age weight height equation thing)
Sedentary calories 1755 (using one of the sites above). I checked it against MFP and the 1755 is around the 1790 that MFP suggests.
Cycling commute (what would be burnt, potentially) about 360 calories a day,
Standing up doing the teaching thing is about 200 calories a day most days.
"Normal" weekday calorie intake "should" be around 2400-2430 for maintenance when not running. Commute and work does not change significantly. Very constant exertion.
Running.... about 100 calories a mile apparently. I'll go with that for the time being.

But Ouch. How to be an under eater. I'm kind of just making a record of this here as I had never really taken time to try and put it all together.

It is less for total sedentary rest days (My Sunday), and different for Saturday when I do other stuff but no commute. Do house stuff, LONG run, limp around between carb-heavy snacks (joke).



How do those numbers look? Legitimate? Better? Part way there?

You can tell I am a little sceptical about the data provided by websites. Perhaps I shouldn't be? But it should go a little way to get me from "not feeling" to "feeling". Though that is is a mental hurdle that perhaps time will help me appreciate and get beyond.

nutmegoreo

The best target will be derived from your own numbers. How much have you been eating? What is happening to your weight? If you are eating 2000 and losing, then you know that you need to increase your intake. Of course there are fluctuations, so it's best to do an average over several weeks. What are your numbers telling you?

ETA: Stop apologizing for the long posts, at least you are making some paragraphs/breaks rather than a big wall-o-text. So it's readable.

AnnPT77

Personally, I think you're over-thinking it a bit. Take a deep breath. Set a weight range to maintain in. Pick a calorie number - that one sounds reasonable based on your research. Try it for at least 3 weeks. You'll start feeling better because you'll be eating more appropriately.

Gaining a little? Cut back accordingly.

Losing a little? Add more.

You have to eat 3500 calories over maintenance (cumulatively) to gain a pound. It won't happen overnight. You won't be off that far.

The web site calculators are all well and good. They're accurate for most people, off a bit for some, off quite a bit for a tiny, tiny number of people. So start with their number, and consider it an experiment. The experiment will give you a personalized, accurate answer. It may match the calculator, it may vary a little. It's not likely to vary hugely.

cmk5444

Cheers. All new territory. Freaking out because it feels very, dunno. Tentative isn't the right word. Maybe fleeting, transitory, transient. Like you're going to do all this stuff, making all these changes in a losing battle.

Will increase intake, keep records and see what happens. (Input and guidance from all has been greatly appreciated)

AnnPT77

You've got this. Really!

MelodyandBarbells

Unless it helps you with recovery, you don't necessarily need to vary your intake between sedentary and workout days. I like the strategy described about picking a number and seeing how that affects your weight after a number of weeks.

Do you intend to continue running at your current volume and frequency?

charlenekapf

Please do not take this as an attack but it sounds like you have a lot of anxiety over gaining back a few lbs. You won't get fat overnight. Any gains you see right away are going to be water resulting from eating more...unless you're straight up eating 3500 over maintenance daily, you won't be packing on the pounds.

As someone who has dealt with anxiety (I still do I admit) and body issues, I highly suggest seeking a professional who is experienced in counseling in this area. I do not mean anything like weight watchers or a weight loss program, but a licensed therapist or sports dietician. They hear this stuff all day long.

It is very common and they may help give you some tools to learn maintenance, accept gaining back a few lbs that may end up being healthy for you, etc. I would actually recommend seeing both: one to give you facts and information that will help answer your questions, help you learn maintenance, and the other to give you tools to loosen up the rigidity in your routine so you can make this lifestyle sustainable for the long run.

It is great to be disciplined but the amount of cardio you are doing to eat more is concerning...exercise bulimia is real. Not saying you have it but you should not have to do hours of cardio unless you're training for something, to maintain your bodyweight. Again, please do not be offended as I have personally gone through this too but I could not see it when I was in my own head.