Can someone help me with my TDEE?
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zeejane4
Posts: 230 Member
I've found myself in an unexpected situation, where I can't get my weight loss to stabilize/stop losing. At first I attributed this to transitioning to a more moderate carb intake, but I should be past the water weight loss stage (about a month in now). I'm in maintenance and would like my weight loss to stabilize, but I'm still consistently seeing downward trends. I haven't been tracking calories but I have been eating a lot of food it feels like, including higher calorie ones like pistachios, full fat dairy etc. I'm going to start tracking my calorie intake more seriously today, but I was playing around with TDEE calculators and the numbers seem really high for my stats. Would love some input from others 
40 yr old female
current weight: 129.6lbs
5ft, 6 in
I'd consider myself fairly sedentary, I'm a sahm mom who spends way to much time on the computer
I do normal housework every day and then I also do brisk walks 5-7 days a week, since spring weather has arrived. My walks range from 1.43 miles to 2.44 miles according to MapMyWalk, and the estimated burns are from 100ish calories-188ish calories. Only other intentional exercise is modified push-ups that I just started last week, which should have very minimal impact on anything, (have only done them two days, so far).
I ran my stuff through a couple TDEE calculators and they're putting my calories at around 1,900-this seems really high? If my maintenance intake is around 1,600 (per MFP), wouldn't I just add the burns from my walks, to put me at around 1,700 a day on walking days? What am I missing here?
40 yr old female
current weight: 129.6lbs
5ft, 6 in
I'd consider myself fairly sedentary, I'm a sahm mom who spends way to much time on the computer
I do normal housework every day and then I also do brisk walks 5-7 days a week, since spring weather has arrived. My walks range from 1.43 miles to 2.44 miles according to MapMyWalk, and the estimated burns are from 100ish calories-188ish calories. Only other intentional exercise is modified push-ups that I just started last week, which should have very minimal impact on anything, (have only done them two days, so far).I ran my stuff through a couple TDEE calculators and they're putting my calories at around 1,900-this seems really high? If my maintenance intake is around 1,600 (per MFP), wouldn't I just add the burns from my walks, to put me at around 1,700 a day on walking days? What am I missing here?
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Replies
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Doesn't seem high to me. My maintenance is around 2300.
If you are still losing, why would you think it's too high?3 -
1900 does not seem high at all.2
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Wow, I'm trying to wrap my mind around 1,900 calories a day-that seems so high to me! I've been a very loose calorie tracker in maintenance, and the days I was tracking I was in the 1,500-1,600 range (this was before I started experimenting with the lower carb way of eating). I never tracked my calories on the weekend though-now I wonder if I was eating more than I thought I was then, which was compensating for the lower week days, and giving me a 'false' sense of where I was actually at. Now with my new way of eating I've been staying on plan 7 days a week and I wonder if that's what's changing things up-no more higher calorie weekend days to offset the lower week days.
Thanks so much for the input, I have a lot to think through now!0 -
That isn't a huge difference from 1700 to 1900, so most likely your maintenance is somewhere in between those 2. Keep in mind that BMR, TDEE, NEAT are all estimates, and most sites use a different base for BMR and multiplier to get TDEE. It takes trial and error to find out what yours actually is.1
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quiksylver296 wrote: »Doesn't seem high to me. My maintenance is around 2300.
If you are still losing, why would you think it's too high?
It's just messing with my head-I have it ingrained that I should be at 1,600 a day and my walks have minimal impact on anything, because it's just walking. But it looks like I'm totally off here so I'll definitely have to adjust my numbers! I'm still at a healthy BMI, 21.0, but I don't want to get lower-my face is starting to look a bit gaunt and it's not a good look on me 0 -
That isn't a huge difference from 1700 to 1900, so most likely your maintenance is somewhere in between those 2. Keep in mind that BMR, TDEE, NEAT are all estimates, and most sites use a different base for BMR and multiplier to get TDEE. It takes trial and error to find out what yours actually is.
Thanks for the input, I think I'll aim for 1,800 starting out and see where I'm at after 2-3 weeks 1 -
If you want to know your real TDEE, eat and track at the 1900 calories for a few weeks to see if that is your actual TDEE. What you might find out, that might be low. Often when people start eating around maintenance, they will see an increase in energy expenditure (greater changes in NEAT and TEF) and may see some rebounding from some metabolic suppression from being in a long term deficit.
In terms of generality, I see most women maintaining with little exercise at 1800-2300 and men at 2400-3000.2 -
YOUR numbers, tracked over TIME are the only numbers that matter.
We all make errors in the neighborhood of 200-300 a day between logging food and calories out. It's just the imprecise nature of the human body and the actual ability to track food and activity.
I've been in maintenance for 11-12 years and my calculated average long-term intake is 2300 +/- per day. I'm in my mid sixties, 5'8", 140, retired, little housework in a 600 SF condo, and the only real exercise I get is walking 3-5 times per week for an hour.
ALL the calculators say I should maintain on 1700 plus exercise calories. I log everything I eat and I fix most of my own meals and use my food scale. So by my calculations I'm eating a full 300-500 calories more per day than the calculators suggest I should. Whether or not I'm just making big mistakes and don't know it really doesn't matter. My weight tells the truth.4 -
1900 doesn't seem high at all. I'm more active than you, but two inches shorter and 15 pounds lighter -- so thus my BMR is lower -- and that's about where I maintain, depending on day.1
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If you want to know your real TDEE, eat and track at the 1900 calories for a few weeks to see if that is your actual TDEE. What you might find out, that might be low. Often when people start eating around maintenance, they will see an increase in energy expenditure (greater changes in NEAT and TEF) and may see some rebounding from some metabolic suppression from being in a long term deficit.
In terms of generality, I see most women maintaining with little exercise at 1800-2300 and men at 2400-3000.
I've been in maintenance for 6 years though, I'm so confused right now, lol.
The only thing that's changed is I've started walking regularly again, so it makes sense that my TDEE has gone up a bit from that, and then I've modified my carb intake to 50g-75g net carbs. The dietary changes have definitely decreased my appetite, I'm now thinking more than I was aware of.
My libra weight trends-
April: -7.1lbs (started the lower carb woe on the 16th and attributed most of this to water weight woosh)
May so far: -1.7lbs
On the other hand-March I actually was up 2.9lbs from February
Ok, I'm going to start tracking my calorie intake daily for now, and then aim to get around 1,900 calories for a few weeks and then re-evaluate as needed.
Thanks everyone!
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It's possible that you are fidgeting more now or increase spontaneous movements without knowing. It's also possible you are consuming less than you think.4
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If you want to know your real TDEE, eat and track at the 1900 calories for a few weeks to see if that is your actual TDEE. What you might find out, that might be low. Often when people start eating around maintenance, they will see an increase in energy expenditure (greater changes in NEAT and TEF) and may see some rebounding from some metabolic suppression from being in a long term deficit.
In terms of generality, I see most women maintaining with little exercise at 1800-2300 and men at 2400-3000.
I've been in maintenance for 6 years though, I'm so confused right now, lol.
The only thing that's changed is I've started walking regularly again, so it makes sense that my TDEE has gone up a bit from that, and then I've modified my carb intake to 50g-75g net carbs. The dietary changes have definitely decreased my appetite, I'm now thinking more than I was aware of.
My libra weight trends-
April: -7.1lbs (started the lower carb woe on the 16th and attributed most of this to water weight woosh)
May so far: -1.7lbs
On the other hand-March I actually was up 2.9lbs from February
Ok, I'm going to start tracking my calorie intake daily for now, and then aim to get around 1,900 calories for a few weeks and then re-evaluate as needed.
Thanks everyone!
Oh, long term maintenance is awesome! Congratulations!
My TDEE has gone up over the years since I first went into maintenance. I'm older so part of it may be due to lack of absorption, but I'll take it! More pretzels? Why yes, thank you. It also could be because I've continued to fine-tune my nutrition, I likely get more daily activity in general due to feeling so good, and maybe some magic. I dunno, but it's a good thing.
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cmriverside wrote: »If you want to know your real TDEE, eat and track at the 1900 calories for a few weeks to see if that is your actual TDEE. What you might find out, that might be low. Often when people start eating around maintenance, they will see an increase in energy expenditure (greater changes in NEAT and TEF) and may see some rebounding from some metabolic suppression from being in a long term deficit.
In terms of generality, I see most women maintaining with little exercise at 1800-2300 and men at 2400-3000.
I've been in maintenance for 6 years though, I'm so confused right now, lol.
The only thing that's changed is I've started walking regularly again, so it makes sense that my TDEE has gone up a bit from that, and then I've modified my carb intake to 50g-75g net carbs. The dietary changes have definitely decreased my appetite, I'm now thinking more than I was aware of.
My libra weight trends-
April: -7.1lbs (started the lower carb woe on the 16th and attributed most of this to water weight woosh)
May so far: -1.7lbs
On the other hand-March I actually was up 2.9lbs from February
Ok, I'm going to start tracking my calorie intake daily for now, and then aim to get around 1,900 calories for a few weeks and then re-evaluate as needed.
Thanks everyone!
Oh, long term maintenance is awesome! Congratulations!
My TDEE has gone up over the years since I first went into maintenance. I'm older so part of it may be due to lack of absorption, but I'll take it! More pretzels? Why yes, thank you. It also could be because I've continued to fine-tune my nutrition, I likely get more daily activity in general due to feeling so good, and maybe some magic. I dunno, but it's a good thing.
That's really interesting, gives me something to think about
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Ok, set up the food tracking area on MFP for my new calorie target, (decided to start at 1,800 calories and adjust from there), as well as set up my lower carb/higher fat macros ratios that I'm currently experimenting with. I haven't tracked on MFP in a while so it's going to take me a bit to get back into the swing of things. My diary only has my lunch so far, but I made it public for those who may want to take a peek sometime 3
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I've found myself in an unexpected situation, where I can't get my weight loss to stabilize/stop losing. At first I attributed this to transitioning to a more moderate carb intake, but I should be past the water weight loss stage (about a month in now). I'm in maintenance and would like my weight loss to stabilize, but I'm still consistently seeing downward trends. I haven't been tracking calories but I have been eating a lot of food it feels like, including higher calorie ones like pistachios, full fat dairy etc. I'm going to start tracking my calorie intake more seriously today, but I was playing around with TDEE calculators and the numbers seem really high for my stats. Would love some input from others
40 yr old female
current weight: 129.6lbs
5ft, 6 in
I'd consider myself fairly sedentary, I'm a sahm mom who spends way to much time on the computer I do normal housework every day and then I also do brisk walks 5-7 days a week, since spring weather has arrived. My walks range from 1.43 miles to 2.44 miles according to MapMyWalk, and the estimated burns are from 100ish calories-188ish calories. Only other intentional exercise is modified push-ups that I just started last week, which should have very minimal impact on anything, (have only done them two days, so far).
I ran my stuff through a couple TDEE calculators and they're putting my calories at around 1,900-this seems really high? If my maintenance intake is around 1,600 (per MFP), wouldn't I just add the burns from my walks, to put me at around 1,700 a day on walking days? What am I missing here?
Doesn't seem high at all...average women is going to maintain on roughly 1800-2000 calories. If you're losing weight and don't want to, you have to eat more calories period, regardless of whether or not it seems high.2 -
Your actual experience counts for more than any statistical estimate from a calculator, once you have sufficient well-collected data of your own.
MFP thinks I'd maintain on something like 1500 plus exercise (5'5", 130s, 63, sedentary outside of exercise). I lose slowly (maybe half a pound a week or a bit less) when I stick to 1850 plus exercise, based on nearly 4 years of logging experience. It's unusual, since most people are close to the statistical averages the calculators spit out, but it happens.
Believe your results. 1 -
Your actual experience counts for more than any statistical estimate from a calculator, once you have sufficient well-collected data of your own.
MFP thinks I'd maintain on something like 1500 plus exercise (5'5", 130s, 63, sedentary outside of exercise). I lose slowly (maybe half a pound a week or a bit less) when I stick to 1850 plus exercise, based on nearly 4 years of logging experience. It's unusual, since most people are close to the statistical averages the calculators spit out, but it happens.
Believe your results.
Yeah, I think I need to just be faithful in tracking again right now and get an idea of where I'm actually at, and then adjust accordingly. I've been loving a lower carb way of eating but it's definitely acting as an appetite suppressant.
I hit just over 1,800 calories yesterday and added foods that I didn't feel like eating, just to get in the extra calories. Felt overly full and didn't really enjoy the experience. Woke up this morning down another couple ounces I know it takes time to process calories/digest etc, but I was expecting a jump on the scale, due to the sheer volume of food still hanging out in my system.
On a brighter note, I did pretty good hitting my macros targets yesterday, (C20%, P25%, F55%), and came within a few grams of being on target for all of them
eta: does anyone know if there's a way to hide the "If every day were like today..." message on the bottom of the food diary page? Very annoying to see in bolded red letters that I'm going to gain weight...0 -
Your actual experience counts for more than any statistical estimate from a calculator, once you have sufficient well-collected data of your own.
MFP thinks I'd maintain on something like 1500 plus exercise (5'5", 130s, 63, sedentary outside of exercise). I lose slowly (maybe half a pound a week or a bit less) when I stick to 1850 plus exercise, based on nearly 4 years of logging experience. It's unusual, since most people are close to the statistical averages the calculators spit out, but it happens.
Believe your results.
Yeah, I think I need to just be faithful in tracking again right now and get an idea of where I'm actually at, and then adjust accordingly. I've been loving a lower carb way of eating but it's definitely acting as an appetite suppressant.
I hit just over 1,800 calories yesterday and added foods that I didn't feel like eating, just to get in the extra calories. Felt overly full and didn't really enjoy the experience. Woke up this morning down another couple ounces I know it takes time to process calories/digest etc, but I was expecting a jump on the scale, due to the sheer volume of food still hanging out in my system.
On a brighter note, I did pretty good hitting my macros targets yesterday, (C20%, P25%, F55%), and came within a few grams of being on target for all of them
eta: does anyone know if there's a way to hide the "If every day were like today..." message on the bottom of the food diary page? Very annoying to see in bolded red letters that I'm going to gain weight...
There is absolutely no benefit to clicking that.
I haven't clicked that in ten years.
All it does is generate that message and maybe post to your feed if you have that enabled. It doesn't affect any of your reports or anything else at all. Just don't click it.
1 -
cmriverside wrote: »Your actual experience counts for more than any statistical estimate from a calculator, once you have sufficient well-collected data of your own.
MFP thinks I'd maintain on something like 1500 plus exercise (5'5", 130s, 63, sedentary outside of exercise). I lose slowly (maybe half a pound a week or a bit less) when I stick to 1850 plus exercise, based on nearly 4 years of logging experience. It's unusual, since most people are close to the statistical averages the calculators spit out, but it happens.
Believe your results.
Yeah, I think I need to just be faithful in tracking again right now and get an idea of where I'm actually at, and then adjust accordingly. I've been loving a lower carb way of eating but it's definitely acting as an appetite suppressant.
I hit just over 1,800 calories yesterday and added foods that I didn't feel like eating, just to get in the extra calories. Felt overly full and didn't really enjoy the experience. Woke up this morning down another couple ounces I know it takes time to process calories/digest etc, but I was expecting a jump on the scale, due to the sheer volume of food still hanging out in my system.
On a brighter note, I did pretty good hitting my macros targets yesterday, (C20%, P25%, F55%), and came within a few grams of being on target for all of them
eta: does anyone know if there's a way to hide the "If every day were like today..." message on the bottom of the food diary page? Very annoying to see in bolded red letters that I'm going to gain weight...
There is absolutely no benefit to clicking that.
I haven't clicked that in ten years.
All it does is generate that message and maybe post to your feed if you have that enabled. It doesn't affect any of your reports or anything else at all. Just don't click it.
Thanks, didn't realize that by clicking the 'complete this entry' button it generated the message. Un-clicked it for yesterday and it disappeared 2
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