Apple Watch/Health Daily Calories - Recalcing TDEE

NovusDies

For the last 2 months I have had unusable scale results. I am post-op and my weight has been cycling up and down 5 to 7 pounds every few days. Fun. I have also been restricted from exercise until very recently. I have been allowed to walk which I have done daily.

One of the main objectives of the surgery was to free me to move more. That is a success. This is starting to present an interesting situation though as I try to guess at the activity multiplier for my TDEE. I was lightly active before surgery and while I am moving more I am not sure I am up to moderate.

Before resuming cardio Apple had me at a daily EE of 1900-2000 which was at least 450 calories too low. Since resuming cardio it now is reporting me at 3500 which would have me at very active and highly unlikely. I am averaging a little over 12k steps but I believe those to be inflated. I was often at 8k steps when still LA which I know was an accurate activity level.

I am not sure there is a clue here to help me determine if I have fully graduated to moderate or not. I have no idea when the scale is going to start behaving itself again for me to calculate my true numbers again. I don't mind shooting in the dark for longer but opinions are welcome.

cmriverside

Well, there is past data. I don't know your weight or really a whole lot about you, but you do.

You've been logging food and losing weight at the lightly active setting. You could leave it there, pick a number somewhat higher or if you think you are moving a whole lot more bump it up to the next higher activity level. You still have quite a lot of weight to lose, right? If that's the case and you *think* you're moving more why not?

As you know the Activity Level and Apple and MFP don't really play that well together so it's going to be a waiting and see thing. You know the drill. The surgery/healing is causing inflammation too.

NovusDies

cmriverside wrote: »

Well, there is past data. I don't know your weight or really a whole lot about you, but you do.

You've been logging food and losing weight at the lightly active setting. You could leave it there, pick a number somewhat higher or if you think you are moving a whole lot more bump it up to the next higher activity level. You still have quite a lot of weight to lose, right? If that's the case and you *think* you're moving more why not?

As you know the Activity Level and Apple and MFP don't really play that well together so it's going to be a waiting and see thing. You know the drill. The surgery/healing is causing inflammation too.

I have somewhere in the 35 pound range left to lose. I am planning in 2 weeks to go into a 4 month recomp. If it were not for that I probably would not be looking at Apple to see if I could gauge the increase. Unfortunately it shot way up to a level I know is not right and the steps have always been inflated. I never really cared that the steps were wrong because I am a TDEE person so for me it has always been for gamification not for accurate calorie counts. That is why I don't bother with that go-between app.

I am also trying to decide where to err here. If I aim low I will continue to lose and I won't convert but once I get clean numbers and confirm it I could restart the recomp clock then. If I am slightly high then I may be in a bulk situation which could translate to a 4 or so pound regain before I adjusted.

It would be easier to decide if I knew when I was going to be weight stable again but that is one of the fun variables.

corinasue1143

Even though it’s been a while since your surgery, I vote for erring on the side of too many calories, because I think your body is still in post surgery healing, shown partly by the scale fluctuations.
Because you’re really starting exercise all over again after being off a while, it’s reacting to the inflammation just like it did when you were a newbie to exercise. I think maybe when your exercise gets closer to what it used to be for a week or two, your weight will settle down. Of course I don’t know, I’m just thinking out loud.
Maybe this is where weight averaging comes in?

NovusDies

corinasue1143 wrote: »

Even though it’s been a while since your surgery, I vote for erring on the side of too many calories, because I think your body is still in post surgery healing, shown partly by the scale fluctuations.
Because you’re really starting exercise all over again after being off a while, it’s reacting to the inflammation just like it did when you were a newbie to exercise. I think maybe when your exercise gets closer to what it used to be for a week or two, your weight will settle down. Of course I don’t know, I’m just thinking out loud.
Maybe this is where weight averaging comes in?

That is an interesting interpretation that I had not considered. I guess I should have. The surgeon tells me that I am nearly done so I resumed a deficit a short time ago.

The weight swings have been happening the entire time even when I was not allowed to do much walking. I do expect that as I ramp up exercise I will muddy the waters further but just for a couple of weeks. I am phasing it in so I can see how I feel and make sure I don't overdo anything.

I don't believe an average would work. It has been too erratic. In 2 months it has only dipped one time close to what my actual weight "should" be and that just happened 2 days ago. Between healing and eating maintenance which has been some additional restaurant food I have been all over the place.