Confused..I'm not sure if I'm doing this right now

FitnessFreak1821

I thought I knew what I'm doing but watched a video by jillian Michael's I'm confused. I'm trying to lose weight(10 more pounds) and figure out how much I burn in a day. Do I take my calories burned that I got by counting my activity level. For example: online calculator got me to log In my age , height, how much I weigh and how much I work out. It says my calories burned a day is 2094. If I put I do not work out at all its 1697.

So do I take the 2094(calories burned with excercise) then minus calories I eat which was 1455 and if I burned 300 in excercise minus that too? My total for calories burn is 939? Or am I suppose to use the sedentary calories?

DancingMoosie

Don't overcomplicate it. You are on a calorie counting site. Use it as it is designed. Jillian is probably using a TDEE calculator. Just put your info into MFP, log your exercise and your food, watch your weight decrease 😉

AnnPT77

Most online calculators are TDEE calculators. (TDEE = total daily energy expenditure, essentially the calories you'd be expected to burn in all ways based on the settings that you input.) They ask you to include your intentional exercise (workouts) in setting your activity level.

If you get a calorie goal from something like that, you don't log your exercise separately and eat it back, because you'd be double counting your exercise. (The calculator has already included it.)

So, in the scenario you describe - assume the calculator knows about your intentional exercise and your daily non-exercise activity level**, and it says you'd maintain at 2094 with exercise; then you ate 1455; you have about a 639 calorie deficit for the day, which - if you did it every day - would be expected to be just under 1.3 pounds loss in a week (which would not magically show up on the scale at the end of the week, because bodies and their water-weight fluctuations are weird that way).

** In contrast, MFP is not a TDEE calculator. It is a NEAT calculator. (NEAT = Non-exercise activity thermogenesis, essentially the calories you burn being alive and doing all your job, home chore and miscellaneous stuff, but not including intentional exercise/workouts.) If you get your calorie estimate from MFP, it does not include exercise. Therefore, it expects you to log it separately, and eat it back. If you told MFP you wanted to lose weight (X pounds/kg a week), it will already subtract your calorie deficit - allowance for maintenance - from the calorie goal it gives you. It intends you to eat all of the calories in that goal (or very close), plus an accurate estimate of calories from intentional exercise.

Either method can work, but you don't want to mix them.

If you want to eat exercise separately, ideally it's better to use your MFP profile settings to get a calorie goal (i.e., let MFP estimate), rather than using the sedentary setting from a TDEE calculator. The reasons are techical, having to do with how the two kinds of calculators handle activity multipliers of BMR (basal metabolic rate) or RMR (resting metabolic rate) differently.

I hope that makes sense.

FitnessFreak1821

AnnPT77 wrote: »

Most online calculators are TDEE calculators. (TDEE = total daily energy expenditure, essentially the calories you'd be expected to burn in all ways based on the settings that you input.) They ask you to include your intentional exercise (workouts) in setting your activity level.

If you get a calorie goal from something like that, you don't log your exercise separately and eat it back, because you'd be double counting your exercise. (The calculator has already included it.)

So, in the scenario you describe - assume the calculator knows about your intentional exercise and your daily non-exercise activity level**, and it says you'd maintain at 2094 with exercise; then you ate 1455; you have about a 639 calorie deficit for the day, which - if you did it every day - would be expected to be just under 1.3 pounds loss in a week (which would not magically show up on the scale at the end of the week, because bodies and their water-weight fluctuations are weird that way).

** In contrast, MFP is not a TDEE calculator. It is a NEAT calculator. (NEAT = Non-exercise activity thermogenesis, essentially the calories you burn being alive and doing all your job, home chore and miscellaneous stuff, but not including intentional exercise/workouts.) If you get your calorie estimate from MFP, it does not include exercise. Therefore, it expects you to log it separately, and eat it back. If you told MFP you wanted to lose weight (X pounds/kg a week), it will already subtract your calorie deficit - allowance for maintenance - from the calorie goal it gives you. It intends you to eat all of the calories in that goal (or very close), plus an accurate estimate of calories from intentional exercise.

Either method can work, but you don't want to mix them.

If you want to eat exercise separately, ideally it's better to use your MFP profile settings to get a calorie goal (i.e., let MFP estimate), rather than using the sedentary setting from a TDEE calculator. The reasons are techical, having to do with how the two kinds of calculators handle activity multipliers of BMR (basal metabolic rate) or RMR (resting metabolic rate) differently.

I hope that makes sense.

Oh ok so I just take my calorie maintenance (that includes excercise already ) and minus what I ate that day. No need to minus the calories burned in excercise because it already takes it into consideration if I use that number(2094).

DancingMoosie

That's not really how this site works(as explained above) but sure.

AnnPT77

XoXashleighXoX wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

Most online calculators are TDEE calculators. (TDEE = total daily energy expenditure, essentially the calories you'd be expected to burn in all ways based on the settings that you input.) They ask you to include your intentional exercise (workouts) in setting your activity level.

If you get a calorie goal from something like that, you don't log your exercise separately and eat it back, because you'd be double counting your exercise. (The calculator has already included it.)

So, in the scenario you describe - assume the calculator knows about your intentional exercise and your daily non-exercise activity level**, and it says you'd maintain at 2094 with exercise; then you ate 1455; you have about a 639 calorie deficit for the day, which - if you did it every day - would be expected to be just under 1.3 pounds loss in a week (which would not magically show up on the scale at the end of the week, because bodies and their water-weight fluctuations are weird that way).

** In contrast, MFP is not a TDEE calculator. It is a NEAT calculator. (NEAT = Non-exercise activity thermogenesis, essentially the calories you burn being alive and doing all your job, home chore and miscellaneous stuff, but not including intentional exercise/workouts.) If you get your calorie estimate from MFP, it does not include exercise. Therefore, it expects you to log it separately, and eat it back. If you told MFP you wanted to lose weight (X pounds/kg a week), it will already subtract your calorie deficit - allowance for maintenance - from the calorie goal it gives you. It intends you to eat all of the calories in that goal (or very close), plus an accurate estimate of calories from intentional exercise.

Either method can work, but you don't want to mix them.

If you want to eat exercise separately, ideally it's better to use your MFP profile settings to get a calorie goal (i.e., let MFP estimate), rather than using the sedentary setting from a TDEE calculator. The reasons are techical, having to do with how the two kinds of calculators handle activity multipliers of BMR (basal metabolic rate) or RMR (resting metabolic rate) differently.

I hope that makes sense.

Oh ok so I just take my calorie maintenance (that includes excercise already ) and minus what I ate that day. No need to minus the calories burned in excercise because it already takes it into consideration if I use that number(2094).

Yup: Maintenance calories with exercise included
minus
Calories you ate
equals
Calories in your deficit (that contribute to weight loss) for today.

All estimates/approximations throughout, of course, but close enough for gubmint work.

FitnessFreak1821

Thanks