calorie met question

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zfitgal
zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hey everyone quick question....has anyone just ate their net calories and didn't add in activity and weight loss stalled? felt tired and blah? If so did you start adding in activity calories and felt better and weight loss began again?

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  • CharlieBeansmomTracey
    CharlieBeansmomTracey Posts: 7,682 Member
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    zfitgal wrote: »
    Hey everyone quick question....has anyone just ate their net calories and didn't add in activity and weight loss stalled? felt tired and blah? If so did you start adding in activity calories and felt better and weight loss began again?


    your calorie goal is your gross calorie amount,(net is what you have left after exercise/and if you eat exercise calories back). if you are eating what MFP gives you and you arent exercising and are tired and feeling blah it may not be enough calories for you.

    if you are eating what mfp gives you and not eating back exercise calories, thats probably why you feel blah and tired but it should not stall weight loss, weight loss isnt linear so if you arent losing every week that is normal
  • Jthanmyfitnesspal
    Jthanmyfitnesspal Posts: 3,522 Member
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    Nope. But I like the way it sounds!
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    I was at 1550 doing 4 days a week, 1 hr sessions of weight training and 15 mins of HIT cardio after training, the other 2 days was an hour a day of HIT cardio...inches were going in, scale weight stayed the same and 17.6 bf% is the same...i k is ur thinking I must not be logging everything, but I sm, I even log my gym...lately I have been starving, very tired and blah....

    I decided to adjust my cal to losing .t pound a week...MFP gave me 1590, but isn't that the calories I need without exercise? And if I was to include my training it would go up?
  • CharlieBeansmomTracey
    CharlieBeansmomTracey Posts: 7,682 Member
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    zfitgal wrote: »
    I was at 1550 doing 4 days a week, 1 hr sessions of weight training and 15 mins of HIT cardio after training, the other 2 days was an hour a day of HIT cardio...inches were going in, scale weight stayed the same and 17.6 bf% is the same...i k is ur thinking I must not be logging everything, but I sm, I even log my gym...lately I have been starving, very tired and blah....

    I decided to adjust my cal to losing .t pound a week...MFP gave me 1590, but isn't that the calories I need without exercise? And if I was to include my training it would go up?

    yes that is your calories without exercise and if you exercise the calories will go up.
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    sry, typing from my phone...i log and track, measure in grams...i even track my gum...
  • CharlieBeansmomTracey
    CharlieBeansmomTracey Posts: 7,682 Member
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    zfitgal wrote: »
    sry, typing from my phone...i log and track, measure in grams...i even track my gum...
    hey whatever works for you. nothing wrong with that
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    Do you think by me not including exercise calories and eating to lose a pound of week of 1550 everything slowed down? because I plan on increasing to 1700 tomorrow...i have never seen a fat anorexic...Tanks for ur help!
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    I don't know how much I burn through exercise classes and weight lifting...when I do a quick 15 min HIT session after weights the machine says I burn 150, is it accurate? Not sure...not really sure how much to add....
  • CharlieBeansmomTracey
    CharlieBeansmomTracey Posts: 7,682 Member
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    zfitgal wrote: »
    Do you think by me not including exercise calories and eating to lose a pound of week of 1550 everything slowed down? because I plan on increasing to 1700 tomorrow...i have never seen a fat anorexic...Tanks for ur help!

    nope,if you are logging and weighing everything correctly then you should be fine. if its slowed down it could be due to water retention from increase in exercise, that TOM(time of the month),excess carbs or sodium.you wont lose every week, some you may gain which could be temporary water weight and others you may not lose at all. give it a month of so and see if you lose anything.upping it if its slowed down may be because something is off somewhere(either logging,not weighing food on a food scale,etc) eating more is not the answer and could result in weight gain depending on what your maintenance calories are.
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    so where does the theory come your not eating enough come from?
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    I have been the same weight for 2 months and there is no way I can lower my food intake at all. Tracking and logging everything perfectly....no mess ups on my part
  • CharlieBeansmomTracey
    CharlieBeansmomTracey Posts: 7,682 Member
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    zfitgal wrote: »
    so where does the theory come your not eating enough come from?

    I really dont know where it comes from.there is so much of this out there its hard to tell where it originated from to be honest.I guess some people think that if you dont eat enough you enter a starvation mode and your body will hold onto everything it can to prevent starving,but it doesnt work that way.
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    why do u feel it's not true? I have a friend who is a fitness competitor and says that if the body is not getting what it needs it will slow down and store for when it's ready to use it. .the body is a machine and it needs to be fueled propperly...if not it will take from muscle instead of fat to perform.

    I have a friend who plateaud at 1200...she bumped her calories up to 1400-1500 and started losing again
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    all I know is that I'm 17.6 bf% I'd like to get down to 16, I'd like to lose 4 more pounds...and I can't lower my calories because I will be starving, and I can't stay where I am because my weight stalled and it shouldn't have for what I do...
  • CharlieBeansmomTracey
    CharlieBeansmomTracey Posts: 7,682 Member
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    zfitgal wrote: »
    why do u feel it's not true? I have a friend who is a fitness competitor and says that if the body is not getting what it needs it will slow down and store for when it's ready to use it. .the body is a machine and it needs to be fueled propperly...if not it will take from muscle instead of fat to perform.

    I have a friend who plateaud at 1200...she bumped her calories up to 1400-1500 and started losing again

    science proves its not true,if the body doesnt get what it needs it will use fat and muscle to use for energy. if someone plateaus for a short time its normal but any length of time it usually means eating more than they think.there is something called adaptive thermogenesis which means your BMR will be lower than it was and that will change your calories in.but its still about CICO.

    if you only want to lose 4 lbs you need to have your calories set to lose .5(1/2) a lb a week as 1lb is too aggressive. the less fat you have the longer its going to take to lose the rest. with only 4lbs to go you could try to do a recomp,which means eat @maintenance calories and do weight/resistance training,it takes awhile but you can lose fat and gain some muscle.

    if you eat more than your body burns you will gain,eat less you lose and eat the same you maintain. its all simple science. ask @AnvilHead or @psuLemon they can explain more in depth than I can.
  • middlehaitch
    middlehaitch Posts: 8,485 Member
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    Dropping your body fat to 16 and losing 4 more pounds will be very difficult. You just don't have the fat reserves to burn.

    What your friend said is partly correct.
    When one is underfueled the body starts conserving energy. For you it means you are feeling blah, very tired, starving, and yes you could well be losing muscle.

    What is probably happening is you are doing your workouts but your daily activity has dropped significantly so you are not actually burning to your NEAT level anymore.

    If you started eating your exercise calories you would have a jump in the scale initially, but once you were back at a normal level of daily activity the scale would start moving again- very very slowly.

    I don't know your stats or why you are wanting to get such a low body fat percentage, but you really could do with a registered dietitian to guide you.

    Cheers, h.
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    My day to day movement I feel is slowing down...my exercises are good though, so you are right there! I really should just accept myself where I am, I look so lean, my abs show i have the abb v cut...i really have to accept myself for where I am, and I'm I a great place! I set need to start eating back some exercise calories, for I am hungry...i just set MFP to .5 a pound a week putting me at 1590 ( still more then I was eating). For the amount of training I do I was thinking of adding 110 calories extra putting me at 1700, does that sound high? It sounds so high to me....#dontwanttogain #nervous
  • zfitgal
    zfitgal Posts: 478 Member
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    And do you think I can just add the extra 150 calories to my diet or do I have to do it in incriments?
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,401 MFP Moderator
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    CharlieBeansmomTracey wrote: »
    zfitgal wrote: »
    why do u feel it's not true? I have a friend who is a fitness competitor and says that if the body is not getting what it needs it will slow down and store for when it's ready to use it. .the body is a machine and it needs to be fueled propperly...if not it will take from muscle instead of fat to perform.

    I have a friend who plateaud at 1200...she bumped her calories up to 1400-1500 and started losing again

    science proves its not true,if the body doesnt get what it needs it will use fat and muscle to use for energy. if someone plateaus for a short time its normal but any length of time it usually means eating more than they think.there is something called adaptive thermogenesis which means your BMR will be lower than it was and that will change your calories in.but its still about CICO.

    if you only want to lose 4 lbs you need to have your calories set to lose .5(1/2) a lb a week as 1lb is too aggressive. the less fat you have the longer its going to take to lose the rest. with only 4lbs to go you could try to do a recomp,which means eat @maintenance calories and do weight/resistance training,it takes awhile but you can lose fat and gain some muscle.

    if you eat more than your body burns you will gain,eat less you lose and eat the same you maintain. its all simple science. ask @AnvilHead or @psuLemon they can explain more in depth than I can.

    I think the biggest misconception over the eat more to lose more is people assume a linear relationship between tdee and calories in (to assume a standard relationship). Yes, it is true that if you eat more caloriea than your tdee over time, you will gain, but there are times where you can increase calories and lose more weight. Now this largely occurs for a variety of reasons and why people think reverse dieting is beneficial.

    For many, increasing calories (especial if large cuts cause a sluggish feeling) will find that the increase will help increase their daily activities (changes in NEAT), or allow for greater compliance. In some bodies, especially those who are lean, will find their bodies are more adaptive and/or resistant to calorie cuts which will make it hard to get into a deficit.

    With all that said, if the OP is actually that lean (which i suspect its that unlikely if its being measured with a bioimpedance), then its going to be very hard to cut more fat. Its possible that working up to maintenance and recomping might be a better deal.

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