MFP is telling me to eat 9500kj a day???

noraroon
noraroon Posts: 9 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
This seems a bit crazy to me? I tried contacting MFP to see if this was accurate, but the response I got was "I'm not a doctor". I'm a 26 yo female, 165cm, 132kg. Trying to lose weight so I don't die of a stroke.

Replies

  • MikePTY
    MikePTY Posts: 3,814 Member
    If you entered you data correctly, then that will be the correct amount to lose weight based on the activity level you told MFP as well as the rate at which you told them you want to lose weight.

    What did you set your activity level to, and how much weight did you tell them you want to lose? Those two things have a large affect on your goal, and none of us can fact check the formula for you unless we know those two things.

    Given your stats, to get that goal, you would have either told MFP that you are active or that you want to lose a small amount of weight per week. If either of those two things are true, then the number sounds right for you. But if they are not, it is possible you entered something wrong in set up.
  • lgfrie
    lgfrie Posts: 1,449 Member
    The number checks out on TDEEcalculator.net for your "break even" based on your gender, age, height and weight - that's how many calories you can eat and neither lose nor gain weight, around 2400. MFP is usually very close on the numbers, for most people.

    If you want to lose weight, obviously you have to eat less than that. Try 1900 calories per day to lose 1 lb a week, and take it from there.

    Once you start losing weight, that number will go down. A lot. Enjoy it while it lasts.

  • noraroon
    noraroon Posts: 9 Member
    MikePTY wrote: »
    If you entered you data correctly, then that will be the correct amount to lose weight based on the activity level you told MFP as well as the rate at which you told them you want to lose weight.

    What did you set your activity level to, and how much weight did you tell them you want to lose? Those two things have a large affect on your goal, and none of us can fact check the formula for you unless we know those two things.

    I said I was lightly active (work in a kitchen, standing and running around all day) and that I wanted to lose 1kg a week.
  • noraroon
    noraroon Posts: 9 Member
    I said I was lightly active (work in a kitchen, standing and running around all day) and that I wanted to lose 1kg a week.
  • corinasue1143
    corinasue1143 Posts: 7,464 Member
    Try it for a week or two and see how it feels and how much weight you lose. Mfp gives you a number based on the average person. You may lose on either more or fewer calories than the “average” person. But it sounds like MFP has given you a good starting number.
    Good luck! Keep asking questions. Keep reading. Keep learning.
  • MikePTY
    MikePTY Posts: 3,814 Member
    noraroon wrote: »
    I said I was lightly active (work in a kitchen, standing and running around all day) and that I wanted to lose 1kg a week.

    Are you sure you don't have it set to 0.5kg per week? Your goal is what you would get based on your stats and activity level if that is what you chose.

    However based on your description of your day, lightly active might be a conservative setting for you. It sounds like you are more likely to be described as active. If that was the case, the calorie goal that is set for you is closer to what you should have.
  • threewins
    threewins Posts: 1,455 Member
    edited November 2019
    Using the Harris Benedict formula to predict your energy need while asleep, I get 8774 kJ. Using a multiplication factor of 1.2 for non exercise to eat at maintenance requires 10528 kJ. You want to lose 1 kg a week which is a deficit of 30500/7 =4357 KJ per day.

    10528-4357= 6,171 KJ. You may be quite hungry at that level, if you walked for 30 minutes per day at 4 km/hr, that's now 7013 kJ (Wolfram Alpha website).

    That's more sustainable.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 28,052 Member
    noraroon wrote: »
    This seems a bit crazy to me? I tried contacting MFP to see if this was accurate, but the response I got was "I'm not a doctor". I'm a 26 yo female, 165cm, 132kg. Trying to lose weight so I don't die of a stroke.
    Shortgirlrunning wrote: »
    Okay so doing a lot of conversations here but you are about 5’4” and weigh just under 300 lbs and MFP is suggesting 2375 calories a day? That doesn’t seem crazy to me. When you are heavier your body burns more calories just carrying all that extra weight around. Your daily allotted calories will go down as you lose weight.

    @noraroon using the math above, that doesn't seem crazy to me either.

    You could always log for a week without trying to lose weight to see how much you are currently eating. I'm sure you will find that to maintain your current weight with your activity level, you are eating well over 2375 calories a day.
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,413 Member
    PAV8888 wrote: »
    Mifflin, which MFP used to use (haven't checked the recent changes), is probably more suitable for someone who is overweight given the nature of the samples measured.

    1.2 x BMR is an extremely sedentary level of activity, probably amounting to around 30-45 minutes of non sitting and not in bed activity for the day. All other 23.5 hours lying in bed or otherwise sitting.

    My best advice is to eat approximately what MFP tells you to and compare your expected rate of loss based on the deficit you've achieved on paper to what your actual weight trend goes ahead and does.

    Then adjust.

    Time scale is 4-6 weeks, possibly excluding the first week (if starting with a big loss right away). Weight is determined looking at your weight trend. 3500 Cal (kilocal) of deficit is expected to yield approximately 1lb (453.6g) of weight loss

    Pav, have you read somewhere that they stopped using Mifflin? I don't want to fall into the HelpDesk Rabbit Hole if I can avoid it...and I really hope they didn't change, since there are 15 years of past threads and posts that would all be wrong now. Ugh.
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 14,238 Member
    edited November 2019
    cmriverside wrote: »
    PAV8888 wrote: »
    Mifflin, which MFP used to use (haven't checked the recent changes), is probably more suitable for someone who is overweight given the nature of the samples measured.

    1.2 x BMR is an extremely sedentary level of activity, probably amounting to around 30-45 minutes of non sitting and not in bed activity for the day. All other 23.5 hours lying in bed or otherwise sitting.

    My best advice is to eat approximately what MFP tells you to and compare your expected rate of loss based on the deficit you've achieved on paper to what your actual weight trend goes ahead and does.

    Then adjust.

    Time scale is 4-6 weeks, possibly excluding the first week (if starting with a big loss right away). Weight is determined looking at your weight trend. 3500 Cal (kilocal) of deficit is expected to yield approximately 1lb (453.6g) of weight loss

    Pav, have you read somewhere that they stopped using Mifflin? I don't want to fall into the HelpDesk Rabbit Hole if I can avoid it...and I really hope they didn't change, since there are 15 years of past threads and posts that would all be wrong now. Ugh.

    Not sure but I suspect not. They did say in a help desk note that they've re-done, slightly, the activity level multipliers

    I haven't run the math to see what changes they did exactly. I suspect they are still using Mifflin and just changed the activity factors a little bit.

    Just CMA in case they did more!
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  • noraroon
    noraroon Posts: 9 Member
    Ok so I checked my settings, and turns out MFP had my goal weight set at 120kg. I changed it to 70 kg and my daily kilojoules went down to 7400. Not sure how lowering my goal weight has that kind of effect? If anyone could explain I'd appreciate it :)

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