Calories

usmcnas

If i eat 1,200 calories a day how many should i burn to lose 1-2 pounds a week? (I exercise 4-5 days a week and burn about 600 calories a day, and eat 1,200 a day should i burn more im so confused.

kimny72

When you set up your MFP account, if you did so with your correct stats and selected weight loss as a goal, you should eat the calorie goal MFP gave you, plus at least some of your exercise calories. Very few people need to eat as little as 1200 calories to lose weight. Check out the Most Helpful Posts threads pinned to the top of each sub-forum, lots of great beginner info there.

AnnPT77

usmcnas wrote: »

If i eat 1,200 calories a day how many should i burn to lose 1-2 pounds a week? (I exercise 4-5 days a week and burn about 600 calories a day, and eat 1,200 a day should i burn more im so confused.

Um, you're male, according to your profile. Unless you're ultra short, you don't want to start by eating 1200 calories. Frankly, that would put me in the hospital in a state of major undernutrition in a few months, and I'm a 64-year-old 5'5", 134-pound sedentary woman (admittedly a good li'l ol' calorie burner, but you're way younger, way male-er, and quite possibly taller and more active). Frankly, you don't even look morbidly obese. Please don't undereat: You need adequate nutrition for health.

Put your personal stats into MFP, like Kimny said, and set your activity level based on home life and job (not intentional exercise). Follow the goal it gives you, and log any intentional exercise on top of that, and eat those calories, too. The first 4-6 weeks are a trial period. After that, look at your average weekly weight loss (if the first week or two are unusual compared to the others, throw those out, and just look at the subsequent weeks). Adjust your weight loss rate to a sensible level, to go forward, based on your average weekly results.

Keep it adequate for good nutrition, and sustainable. Eating 1200 calories and exercising 600 more is like eating 600 calories a day. That's a dangerous plan for even a very old and petite woman, let alone a man.

I'm sorry if this seems harsh; that's not my intention. I just want to see you stay healthy and strong while accomplishing your weight goals!

usmcnas

Thank you. Needed to hear this ive been feeling light headed lately and cant stop sleeping but I’m not that hungry anymore and im dropping weight fast. I would like to go on a deficit but i dont know how i should do that.

cwolfman13

usmcnas wrote: »

If i eat 1,200 calories a day how many should i burn to lose 1-2 pounds a week? (I exercise 4-5 days a week and burn about 600 calories a day, and eat 1,200 a day should i burn more im so confused.

As a male, you have zero business eating 1200 calories per day. The minimum for a sedentary male is 1500 calories per day and in most cases would result in around 2 Lbs per week weight loss without exercise...for someone not sedentary or who exercises, more calories should be consumed. I'm a 5'10" male pushing 46 years old....I exercise regularly and lose about 1 Lb per week on 2300-2500 calories per day.

Lietchi

What do you mean when you say you burn 600 calories a day? Through exercise?

You're burning a lot more than that a day, you're burning those exercise calories on top of what your body burns just to stay alive and your day to day activities (which is already at least 1500 calories, if not more, depending on your weight, age,...).

If you are currently eating 1200 calories and exercising that much, no wonder you're lightheaded and tired, you're starving yourself.

As others have already said, enter your stats into MFP and let it calculate how many calories you need. It will be more than 1200. Heck I'm a 5ft4 woman and I'm eating 1900 calories on average and still losing weight.

PAV8888

Whatever you're doing, stop, and think and understand what you should do.

You're not feeling hungry (because your body is temporarily protecting your ability to go hunt food). You're feeling faint and soon you will feel tired as your body will try to shut you down to conserve energy.

Your current plan sucks in terms of you achieving your goals and maintaining your weight.

Stop. Eat at least 2,000 Cal for a few days without going nuts on the exercise (closer to 2500 if you continue with exercise), and read some more before restarting.

Your goals already include the deficit you need to lose weight.

You're supposed to eat back (offset) any actual exercise or activity Calories that were not included in your selected activity level, otherwise you'll lose faster than you should, negatively impacting your health and ability to retain lean mass.

You do want to mostly lose fat, right?

Somebody will hopefully post a graph with suggested suitable rates of loss based on lbs left to goal.

Just because 2lbs is "generally safe" this does not mean it is optimal or even "safe for everyone".

(While on MFP losing weight, admittedly with an activity level just above MFP's very active, I averaged 2560 Cal of intake losing ~72.5lbs and 2911 Cal of intake losing another 13.8lbs, so no, eating 1500 was not necessary, even in my late 40s/early 50s. Based on standard equations, the equations seem to predict my weight changes within 5%, so I am an average/tinge below average calorie burner, not as good a one as Anne )