Eating 3000 calories a day??

lydiialaura

I don’t seem to be able to get full eating any less than 2500-3000 calories a day. I am 5’7, 11 stone, 21 and female. I seem to be maintaining my weight on this amount after a quick weight gain (3 stone since April) but I was very underweight before due to underrating. I’m not sure if my body is still trying to recover from over a year of eating 1000-1500 calories a day or if this is just how much my body needs. My other question is: if I reduce my calories to about 2000-2500, is it likely I’ll loose weight or continue to maintain? Thank you
EDIT: i’m Active when I’m at uni, I go to the gym and walk to lectures etc but I’m currently at home for summer and do around 5,000 steps a day so not very active at all.

psuLemon

lydiialaura wrote: »

I don’t seem to be able to get full eating any less than 2500-3000 calories a day. I am 5’7, 11 stone, 21 and female. I seem to be maintaining my weight on this amount after a quick weight gain (3 stone since April) but I was very underweight before due to underrating. I’m not sure if my body is still trying to recover from over a year of eating 1000-1500 calories a day or if this is just how much my body needs. My other question is: if I reduce my calories to about 2000-2500, is it likely I’ll loose weight or continue to maintain? Thank you

It's possible the types or combination of food that you are consuming isn't the right macro split to keep you full. So you might want to play with that. Second, it is quite possible that you have messed up your hunger signals a bit from severe calorie restriction over an extended period of time. Third, if you reduce your calories, you theoretically should lose.

MikePTY

Are you active during your day and do you exercise? That would help give a better idea of what your calorie burn would be. 2500 would be about the maintenance level expected of someone your age who was active.

If you are truly maintaining on your current intake, then yes, by reducing your calories, you should be able to lose weight. However you are currently at what is considered a normal weight for your height, and given your previous history with eating disorders, you should tread carefully and consult a doctor before attempting to lose any weight.

lgfrie

Lot of questions packed in there. I suggest you start at the beginning with the key question and work your way outward from there. The key question is: what is your daily burn rate for weight maintenance. According to TDEEcalculator.net, your burn rate, assuming you are Sedentary, is around 1800 calories per day. If you are lightly active, your burn rate would be 2050. Maybe you're between those two numbers, but in any event you are most likely in that range.

So to answer your specific question, if you eat 2000 calories, you'll probably about break even and not lose or gain much fat. You would have to create a calorie deficit from that 1800-2050 baseline to lose fat.

In truth you shouldn't feel hungry at all while eating 700-1000 calories over your maintenance level, and that hints that you might be eating the wrong stuff. It's possible to spend a lot of calories on junky, empty calories and refined carbs and not feel full, whereas protein, unrefined carbs, fats, etc., can be much more filling.

You might've screwed up your hunger and satiety signals with all the bouncing around from undereating to overeating (1000 calories is way, way too little food, and gaining 42 lbs in 4 months implies severe overeating). Reconditioning your body - and mind - to be adjusted to a proper day to day calorie level could take a while but is doable.

My recommendation would be to work through the MFP goals tool with a 1/2 lb per week goal and eat exactly how many calories it tells you to eat everyday, never less, never more, for at least a month or two, so that your body and mind get reoriented around consistent, proper amounts of food. That number will probably be around 1600-1700. I suspect when you get some time under your belt of consistent, mild calorie deficit eating, everything will readjust and you'll be fine. You might have to just be a little hungry at first - that isn't the end of the world, just be a little hungry. It won't kill you. What could kill you is continuing with the unhealthy cycling between severe undereating and severe overeating. Get past all that. Eat the # of cals that MFP tells you to eat for a 1/2 lb per week weight loss, no more no less, everyday.

But even before doing that, I would probably take 2 weeks and just eat an exact 2,000 calories per day with the intent of retraining my mind and body to take in the proper amount of food to maintain my weight. No extra snacking, no giving in to hunger, no undereating - just a clean, healthy 2,000 calories so you get reacclimated to what a break-even day worth of food really looks and feels like.

LKArgh

Were you eating 1000-1500 to lose weight and it got out of hand? Have you been diagnosed with an eating disorder? It might be a good idea to consult your dr and perhaps a therapist to let you ease into more "normal" eating without worrying about gaining or losing.

deannalfisher

I maintained on around 2900 a day - female; 5’3”; 160lbs

I walk 3-4 miles most days at work; not including my workouts

PAV8888

So you're eating until you're full (and this translates into some big random scary number) and are currently no longer gaining?

So why are you messing with things again?

If you're continuing to gain while having trouble feeling full, then look at what you're eating to perhaps optimize feeling full with less calories.

But if you're feeling full enough and are weight stable, stop tinkering (given you've already proved there are risks there for you).

kshama2001

154 pounds at 5'7" puts you in a normal BMI, so if you want to maintain this weight, you need not change anything.

But yes, if you are maintaining at 2500-3000, dropping calories to 2000-2500 will result in weight loss.

staticsplit

Your hunger cues could still be adjusting from your previous time undereating. See the Minnie Maud/Homeodynamic method of ED recovery: https://edinstitute.org/homeodynamic. A lot of the time, the body can overshoot and retain a little extra fat because it's afraid you're going to starve it again. I don't hold much water with starvation mode theory as such, but do think the body will try to get you to move less to conserve energy and the leptin and ghrelin hormones can shift to tell you you're really hungry.

Eventually, it'll start to trust there's no food scarcity and your appetite will normalise, and then usually that overshoot weight can gradually shift to a weight that is healthy for you and easy to maintain. If you do want to shift it consciously, I suggest a gentle, mild deficit. Try just 2500 for a few weeks, see you how feel, then 2250, same again, etc. Don't jump right back into a big deficit as it'll just start the whole process over again.

I went through this process unofficially when I recovered from anorexia, and then I kept gaining/losing 10 pounds quite fast and messed up my hunger cues for awhile. It's only this year I feel like I've finally gotten back to a normal appetite. I maintain on about 2200-2800 depending on my activity levels (just under 6 feet tall and 153-156 pounds).