Do you eat back your burned calories?
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Posts: 1 Member
I am trying to gather data to understand why I am not losing at the moment. The flow chart i saw on one of these forums was really helpful, but I am in a deep deficit already (1200) and using my smart watch to detect my burned calories. Just wanting to see what others are doing.
Do you eat back your burned calories? 61 votes
I eat back my burned calories
29%
18 votes
I do not eat back my burned calories
39%
24 votes
I eat back half of my burned calories
31%
19 votes
0
Replies
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I eat back my burned caloriesThere are mistakes that people commonly make that cause them to not lose weight that we might be able to spot if you change your Diary Sharing settings to Public. In the app, go to Settings > Diary Setting > Diary Sharing > and check Public. Desktop: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/diary_settings
For others who might be thinking, "What flowchart?" here it is:
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I do not eat back my burned caloriesTypically no… but—If I’m famished… I’ll eat back some burned calories. If I’m not.. I don’t force myself to eat if I’m not hungry.
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No, I use TDEE and not activity level with exercise calories burned. If your weekly exercise program is somewhat consistent you can just use your average TDEE amount and figure maintenance from there as a baseline for getting into a deficit.
MFP is set up as figuring exercise calories however by looking at the poll the not adding in exercise calories wins.1 -
I eat back my burned caloriesIf you DO believe it should win... why are YOU choosing to estimate off your TDEE which BY DEFINITION INCLUDES exercise calories?2
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I eat back my burned caloriesI said, "Yes," but only because that's the way THIS SITE IS SET UP TO BE USED - so I used it that way and it works for me. 80 pounds lost, in 2007-08. Still at my maintenance weight of 21-22 BMI, that's 15 years of doing it that way.
Can you go around that and pick your own numbers? Of course.
Those people who say, "No," maybe use Tom's method.
Those people who say, "Half," are... I dunno.
All of it is a guess. Accuracy in logging food is a huge part of that. (I cook almost all my own food and use a food scale.) So is how you are exercising, how often, how hard, and for how long, your current weight, and your weekly loss/gain/maintaining rate AND how accurate you are in guessing your daily activity in the Activity setting. All of it is an experiment. It just takes a few months of using the site to get good data.
The question is not so easily answered as the poll would suggest.4 -
I think the methodology is the same as choosing a diet method, you do what seems to work best for you and which you are having success withcmriverside wrote: »I said, "Yes," but only because that's the way THIS SITE IS SET UP TO BE USED - so I used it that way and it works for me. 80 pounds lost, in 2007-08. Still at my maintenance weight of 21-22 BMI, that's 15 years of doing it that way.
Can you go around that and pick your own numbers? Of course.
Those people who say, "No," maybe use Tom's method.
Those people who say, "Half," are... I dunno.
All of it is a guess. Accuracy in logging food is a huge part of that. (I cook almost all my own food and use a food scale.) So is how you are exercising, how often, how hard, and for how long, your current weight, and your weekly loss/gain/maintaining rate AND how accurate you are in guessing your daily activity in the Activity setting. All of it is an experiment. It just takes a few months of using the site to get good data.
The question is not so easily answered as the poll would suggest.
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I eat back my burned caloriestomcustombuilder wrote: »
I think the methodology is the same as choosing a diet method, you do what seems to work best for you and which you are having success withcmriverside wrote: »I said, "Yes," but only because that's the way THIS SITE IS SET UP TO BE USED - so I used it that way and it works for me. 80 pounds lost, in 2007-08. Still at my maintenance weight of 21-22 BMI, that's 15 years of doing it that way.
Can you go around that and pick your own numbers? Of course.
Those people who say, "No," maybe use Tom's method.
Those people who say, "Half," are... I dunno.
All of it is a guess. Accuracy in logging food is a huge part of that. (I cook almost all my own food and use a food scale.) So is how you are exercising, how often, how hard, and for how long, your current weight, and your weekly loss/gain/maintaining rate AND how accurate you are in guessing your daily activity in the Activity setting. All of it is an experiment. It just takes a few months of using the site to get good data.
The question is not so easily answered as the poll would suggest.
exactly.
It's just such an exhausting discussion...and maybe I should stop getting involved.
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tomcustombuilder wrote: »
And if you didn't figure exercise calories into your weekly tdee, you wouldn't be eating them back.
It's the same damned thing. Just different ways of getting there.
I didn't answer the poll but I have eaten every last exercise calorie I could get away with....in weight loss mode, in maintenance, and now apparently in gaining whilst going back to mindlessly eating.
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tomcustombuilder wrote: »
And if you didn't figure exercise calories into your weekly tdee, you wouldn't be eating them back.
It's the same damned thing. Just different ways of getting there.
I didn't answer the poll but I have eaten every last exercise calorie I could get away with....in weight loss mode, in maintenance, and now apparently in gaining whilst going back to mindlessly eating.
with TDEE you eat ALL activity calories back automatically you just don't figure individually.
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I eat back my burned caloriestomcustombuilder wrote: »tomcustombuilder wrote: »
And if you didn't figure exercise calories into your weekly tdee, you wouldn't be eating them back.
It's the same damned thing. Just different ways of getting there.
I didn't answer the poll but I have eaten every last exercise calorie I could get away with....in weight loss mode, in maintenance, and now apparently in gaining whilst going back to mindlessly eating.
with TDEE you eat ALL activity calories back automatically you just don't figure individually.
Sure. In pure MFP method or pure TDEE method, exercise calories are included in one's daily calorie target. It's just a different accounting method. Either can work, and one or the other may suit an individual better. (I'm team "eat exercise separately".)
But there are also people who set base calories "the MFP way" (based on non-exercise activity level), and then let exercise calories increase their calorie deficit.
If those people have a quite moderate calorie deficit, and quite moderate exercise, that can be fine. (Other than the part where they may need a new method in maintenance.)
OTOH, if those people have a very aggressive, big calorie deficit for fast loss, and add a more intense/frequent exercise schedule on top of that to lose even faster . . . well, personally, I don't think that's very sustainable, health-promoting, or likely to be successful in the long run.
In between those extremes, it's a individual gut check about how much health risk (or failure risk) the person wants to take.3 -
I eat back my burned caloriestomcustombuilder wrote: »
No it doesn't denote that.
They are included in your weekly TDEE thus you are eating all or a portion of them back, deliberately. because you are already including them in your TDEE
This is not something most MFP users who have picked "not very active/sedentary" as their base activity level and then go on to exercise for a couple of hours a day have already done.1 -
Well, as I mentioned earlier, do what works for you, personally. If after a month or 2 whatever you're doing seems to have the results you are after then continue and if not then regroup and fine tune what you're doing.
I'm not encouraging anyone to do anything. The method I use has worked perfectly for 25 years when I was using fitday.com until they were no more and I lost 25 years of data, hence why I moved to MFP.
If someone prefers to figure exercise calories individually and it works for them then great, that's up to them.
I've never known anyone in my diet/fitness circle that figures individual exercise calories besides the MFP users
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for me, I do not eat according to MFP calories. I use it for calorie tracking, nutrient tracking, accountability and knowledge.tomcustombuilder wrote: »Well, as I mentioned earlier, do what works for you, personally. If after a month or 2 whatever you're doing seems to have the results you are after then continue and if not then regroup and fine tune what you're doing.
I'm not encouraging anyone to do anything. The method I use has worked perfectly for 25 years when I was using fitday.com until they were no more and I lost 25 years of data, hence why I moved to MFP.
If someone prefers to figure exercise calories individually and it works for them then great, that's up to them.
I've never known anyone in my diet/fitness circle that figures individual exercise calories besides the MFP users2 -
I eat back my burned caloriestomcustombuilder wrote: »Well, as I mentioned earlier, do what works for you, personally. If after a month or 2 whatever you're doing seems to have the results you are after then continue and if not then regroup and fine tune what you're doing.
I'm not encouraging anyone to do anything. The method I use has worked perfectly for 25 years when I was using fitday.com until they were no more and I lost 25 years of data, hence why I moved to MFP.
If someone prefers to figure exercise calories individually and it works for them then great, that's up to them.
I've never known anyone in my diet/fitness circle that figures individual exercise calories besides the MFP users
and yet - that is how the calculations on this site work.
I don't understand why you continue to post this - it's confusing for people who don't have any clue about weight management. Sure, your TDEE is something you calculated (I'm assuming) over TIME and observations. People who are just starting to use myfitnesspal need to understand the difference between what you are suggesting and what this site is calculating.
As I mentioned to you months ago, if you're gonna post one-sentence answers all you're doing is making everyone's lives more difficult than they need to be.
At least start posting this link along with your "other" way of doing things.
When in Rome, eh? If you were on a site about football you wouldn't start recommending a certain catcher's glove.
https://support.myfitnesspal.com/hc/en-us/articles/360032625391-How-does-MyFitnessPal-calculate-my-initial-goals
You've been on this site long enough to know how common this question is. At least give a helpful and complete answer instead of adding to the confusion. Please. If you don't want to do that, maybe consider not posting in these discussions. (?)
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I do not eat back my burned caloriesI think this may be the most asked question in MFP. It also always has the most amount of answers.
For me— I’ve been off and on MFP for over 10 years..
I found early on that the exercise numbers I “earned” were severely inflated. (Even with accurate height and weight input, etc. and being a champion obsessive weigher and measurer..)
Especially for rowing, sailing and indoor spin class. Heck even cleaning the house gave me 200 calories.
So for me.. eating those back resulted in no weight loss. I was earning 600-700 cals extra per day doing 4 days of intense cardio and eating more calories than ever before. My weight went up not down. I later realized the calories MFP gave me for cardio were too many. I felt cheated.
I finally saw this on the MFP info site - We calculate your exercise calories using your profile statistics, and exercise effort values knows as "METs."
These calculations, while reasonably accurate, are not as accurate as the feedback from a cardio machine in the gym, or an activity tracker, that can calculate your calories burned based on data collected moment to moment. For this reason, our system allows users to input their own values for calories burned
After I started eating less back and then none.. I saw improvement. it wasn’t until I was using a chest strap or heart rate monitor that I saw more accurate calorie burn numbers.. but that took trial and error.
This morning - I did a leisurely 2 mile walk.
MFP gave me 327 cal burn. Apple Watch and heart rate monitor gave me 209 cals. That’s a daily data discrepancy when counting every calorie and weighing every morsel.
I may be an outlier- but relying on the MFP mets really undermined my efforts.
YMMV 🤗
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I eat back my burned caloriesAlso the poll question.
In the discussion all of my burned calories vs half of my burned calories makes not much sense.
Most of the people responding "all the calories" are not referring to a magical number given out by picking up random exercise entries on MFP but are referring to self calculated over time actual exercise calories.
This may be the MFP exercise number, or half of it, or 90% of it, or even 120% of it depending on logging, type of exercise, and source.
By the way since mets were mentioned, at least one major exercise band averages their movement and heart rate detections over a time period to come up with single assigned met value for the time period (5 minutes).
Then they assign calories based on the assigned mets during these intervals. Somehow I'm fairly sure that the other companies are not reinventing the wheel.1 -
I eat back my burned caloriesGood point, PAV.
I "eat back all my exercise calories" but that's (for me) not synonymous with using the MFP default calories in the exercise database (or synonymous with always believing what a tracker or machine says).
I used the MFP values more at first, but as I learned more, I started estimating exercise calories in way that I thought might be closer to accurate for a given type of exercise. I'd also compare multiple estimate sources early on, and make conservative choices about sources.
Nowadays, I sometimes use the MFP descriptions from the database but with my own exercise calorie estimate. The only case where I use the MFP default calories regularly is "Strength training (weight lifting, weight training)" which is one of the more conservative estimates I've found for that activity.
I wouldn't describe my exercise estimates as "accurate", because I know they're always approximate at best. I'd more likely call my estimates "careful". They're workable, for almost 9 years now.0 -
Correct. Many of us do. The eating back of individual exercises is strictly an option. Lol, some people here get their panties in a wad if you don’t. I don’t think they realize there are other methods of counting and tracking than the MFP method.
for me, I do not eat according to MFP calories. I use it for calorie tracking, nutrient tracking, accountability and knowledge.tomcustombuilder wrote: »Well, as I mentioned earlier, do what works for you, personally. If after a month or 2 whatever you're doing seems to have the results you are after then continue and if not then regroup and fine tune what you're doing.
I'm not encouraging anyone to do anything. The method I use has worked perfectly for 25 years when I was using fitday.com until they were no more and I lost 25 years of data, hence why I moved to MFP.
If someone prefers to figure exercise calories individually and it works for them then great, that's up to them.
I've never known anyone in my diet/fitness circle that figures individual exercise calories besides the MFP users
It seems that many here are astute enough to have some type of variation to the MFP model which works on an individual basis. If something’s working for you then stick with it
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