Calorie targets

veggiebound

So apparently aiming for less than 1000 calories a day is unhealthy but you need to aim for a calorie deficit of 500 less than your maintenance calorie target…
My body scales suggest a maintenance goal of 1334 calories (I’m 5’ 2”) so minus 500 would be around 800 calories a day?

Any thoughts from shorter ladies?

yirara

Your scale does not know how high your maintenance calories are as these calories also include activity. If you're in coma in bed your body still burns calories, just to keep you alive. And every bit of daily activity ads to this, plus exercise. It seems more likely that this scale of yours gave you those coma calories. Why not set up MFP with your calories at maintenance and a realistic estimate for your daily activity outside of exercise, and see what you get from that for your actual maintenance calories. You could also experiment with this link: https://www.sailrabbit.com/bmr/ This link gives you estimates for your BMI (the coma calories) and TDEE (everyday activity plus exercise) And if you're really that lightweight and sedentary that your maintenance calories really are 1334, then the conclusion is simple: weightloss will be slow for every normalweight person anyway, and for a petite and sedentary person even more so. Eat enough and practice a lot of patience.

neanderthin

People are easily confused regarding BMR and TDEE and when diet culture and misinformation that tend to suggest consuming lower calories for weight loss as normal along with and the inherent problems that come up with actual recording proper caloric information it creates a lot of confusion. You might actually be totally sedentary, who knows but even then the average women and that encompasses shorter women will normally have a TDEE in and around 1800 calories and probably a little more, baring any actual health complications. Who knows maybe your underweight, old and sedentary where that number might make more sense imo.

lesdarts180

You will get a lot of pushback on here for suggesting eating less than 1200 calories a day.

You haven't given any indication of how much weight you want to lose or your normal activity level.
Why don't you try 1200 a day for a few weeks and see what happens? As long as you eat a little less than you were before you started your weightloss journey you should get some results.

For context: I'm slightly shorter than you (152 cm) and an older lady (74 years now, 69 when I lost weight). I'm retired and pretty active - I don't have to sit at a desk for several hours a day, nor sit in a car several hours a week - I cycle and walk every day, do cardio workouts at home from UTube.
I lost weight using 1200 calories as my average intake. Now that I am maintaining I find that 1500 - 1600 keeps me at my goal weight.

Good luck!

veggiebound

Thanks for the tips! I did use the calculator suggested and it also came up with a BMR of 1332 but a TDEE of 1545, so that’s helpful to know.

Also helpful to know people would interpret my confusion and question about the numbers as an argument for under eating. I’m not underweight or old but yes pretty sedentary at the moment due to an injury and working from home. Looking forward to getting back to the gym and being outside again soon

Thanks again for steering me in the right direction!

tomcustombuilder

Small women such as yourself shouldn’t really have a 500 cal a day deficit I would shoot for more like 250. You just don’t have a lot of body weight to work with. You didn’t specify what your weight was so that would be a big factor.

yirara

veggiebound wrote: »

Thanks for the tips! I did use the calculator suggested and it also came up with a BMR of 1332 but a TDEE of 1545, so that’s helpful to know.

Also helpful to know people would interpret my confusion and question about the numbers as an argument for under eating. I’m not underweight or old but yes pretty sedentary at the moment due to an injury and working from home. Looking forward to getting back to the gym and being outside again soon

Thanks again for steering me in the right direction!

Hey, that does look better! You don't mention your current weight, but there are several things you can do if you think you need to lose a bit of weight:

* a very small calorie deficit, not 500, but more like 250.
* exercise more, or overall increase your activity level throughout the day: cycle to work, walk stairs instead of using an elevator, etc.
* strength training to look more right instead of flabby

Of course if you have a lot to lose then the same still is true, but with such a small TDEE number that doesn't seem to be the case.

veggiebound

Thanks guys for the advice. I’ll try to be mindful of perhaps the quality of the calories rather than just the numbers.

Just to add, I do have a quite a bit to lose..I’m 160lbs, some 28lbs+ over the healthy weight but I guess the problem is that my body fat is at 38%! So moving more as soon as I can will help with toning and reducing the fat while building muscle. Thanks again!

tomcustombuilder

veggiebound wrote: »

Thanks guys for the advice. I’ll try to be mindful of perhaps the quality of the calories rather than just the numbers.

Just to add, I do have a quite a bit to lose..I’m 160lbs, some 28lbs+ over the healthy weight but I guess the problem is that my body fat is at 38%! So moving more as soon as I can will help with toning and reducing the fat while building muscle. Thanks again!

at your weight and height I would be a little more aggressive with a deficit than 250 a day. You have enough fat on you and it will be able to make up for a lot of the energy that you’re going to need.

I wouldn’t really try to be adding any muscle right now, but you should be lifting weights because that will keep the muscle on that you already have. Keeping your current muscle mass and getting the fat off you’re going to look a lot more toned as much as I hate that word.

If you diet down and you don’t do strength training you’re going to lose a lot of lean mass which will show on the scale as a loss, but it really affects body composition in a negative way.

AnnPT77

veggiebound wrote: »

Thanks guys for the advice. I’ll try to be mindful of perhaps the quality of the calories rather than just the numbers.

Just to add, I do have a quite a bit to lose..I’m 160lbs, some 28lbs+ over the healthy weight but I guess the problem is that my body fat is at 38%! So moving more as soon as I can will help with toning and reducing the fat while building muscle. Thanks again!

Is the body fat estimate from the scale, too? Those aren't very accurate. If one uses the same scale daily, the trend line of body fat percent can be OK, if a person ignores any occasional off-trend reading, but the absolute number the scale gives . . . hmm, maybe not reliable. Among other things, hydration can distort readings, for example.

Even with the trend line, keep in mind that the percent is percent of total weight. You probably get this, but sometimes we see people here freak out because their weight is dropping, but body fat percent isn't dropping, or isn't dropping as fast. If they used the body fat percent estimate to estimate body fat in pounds/kilos, they'd usually learn that body fat is dropping, too.

Don't get me wrong, a scale value for BF% could be accurate, but I'd suggest not over-worrying about it.

As others have pointed out, body composition (relative amount of fat vs. lean) has two sides: The absolute weight of fat, and the absolute weight of lean. It's normal to lose some lean mass while losing fat, and will happen in nearly every case. Some of the lean mass lost, we actually want to lose, because the smaller body doesn't need it. (Down more than 50 pounds from my high weight, I think I'd look pretty puffy if I had my original blood volume, for example!)

Getting overall good nutrition, especially eating enough protein, and doing strength-challenging exercise will moderate loss of useful lean mass to the extent possible. Also, strength exercise - if new to it - can increase useful strength quickly (because we are able to better recruit/use our current muscle fibers quite quickly). That's good stuff. For women, strength exercise will also help strengthen bones, important because osteoporosis is a major long-term health risk for us.

As I mentioned, the other thing that will moderate loss of lean mass is losing relatively slowly. Believe me, I get that we all want to drop it like it's hot, but that may not be the most health-promoting route, may not be a path to thriving. As a bonus, slow loss is more compatible with finding and practicing the new, positive, sustainable activity and eating habits that will not just carry us to goal weight, but make it easier to stay there long term, ideally permanently. Since most people find maintenance more difficult than loss, that's potentially a pretty big deal.

Best wishes!

lynn_glenmont

lesdarts180 wrote: »

You will get a lot of pushback on here for suggesting eating less than 1200 calories a day.

You haven't given any indication of how much weight you want to lose or your normal activity level.
Why don't you try 1200 a day for a few weeks and see what happens? As long as you eat a little less than you were before you started your weightloss journey you should get some results.

For context: I'm slightly shorter than you (152 cm) and an older lady (74 years now, 69 when I lost weight). I'm retired and pretty active - I don't have to sit at a desk for several hours a day, nor sit in a car several hours a week - I cycle and walk every day, do cardio workouts at home from UTube.
I lost weight using 1200 calories as my average intake. Now that I am maintaining I find that 1500 - 1600 keeps me at my goal weight.

Good luck!

The bolded sentence is only true for someone who was eating at maintenance before they started. If they were eating in excess of maintenance, eating "a little less" might mean they continue gaining, just at a slower rate.

veggiebound

AnnPT77 wrote: »

veggiebound wrote: »

Thanks guys for the advice. I’ll try to be mindful of perhaps the quality of the calories rather than just the numbers.

Just to add, I do have a quite a bit to lose..I’m 160lbs, some 28lbs+ over the healthy weight but I guess the problem is that my body fat is at 38%! So moving more as soon as I can will help with toning and reducing the fat while building muscle. Thanks again!

Is the body fat estimate from the scale, too? Those aren't very accurate. If one uses the same scale daily, the trend line of body fat percent can be OK, if a person ignores any occasional off-trend reading, but the absolute number the scale gives . . . hmm, maybe not reliable. Among other things, hydration can distort readings, for example.

Even with the trend line, keep in mind that the percent is percent of total weight. You probably get this, but sometimes we see people here freak out because their weight is dropping, but body fat percent isn't dropping, or isn't dropping as fast. If they used the body fat percent estimate to estimate body fat in pounds/kilos, they'd usually learn that body fat is dropping, too.

Don't get me wrong, a scale value for BF% could be accurate, but I'd suggest not over-worrying about it…

Thank you for such a detailed explanation! My figures are from the body fat scales. As I mentioned in one reply, I am recovering from an accident so I’m aware that some of the weight could be swelling around joints etc as the bruising is just coming to the surface. I didn’t weigh before the accident so I don’t have a baseline so I’m not going to panic just yet. Thanks again!

veggiebound

tomcustombuilder wrote: »

veggiebound wrote: »

Thanks guys for the advice. I’ll try to be mindful of perhaps the quality of the calories rather than just the numbers.

Just to add, I do have a quite a bit to lose..I’m 160lbs, some 28lbs+ over the healthy weight but I guess the problem is that my body fat is at 38%! So moving more as soon as I can will help with toning and reducing the fat while building muscle. Thanks again!

at your weight and height I would be a little more aggressive with a deficit than 250 a day. You have enough fat on you and it will be able to make up for a lot of the energy that you’re going to need.

I wouldn’t really try to be adding any muscle right now, but you should be lifting weights because that will keep the muscle on that you already have. Keeping your current muscle mass and getting the fat off you’re going to look a lot more toned as much as I hate that word.

If you diet down and you don’t do strength training you’re going to lose a lot of lean mass which will show on the scale as a loss, but it really affects body composition in a negative way.

Great advice, I’ll definitely take this on board!

lynn_glenmont

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/comment/48513329#Comment_48513329

You said just one comment up-thread — so well after tomcustombuilder left their comment — that you're recovering from an injury, so be sure to get some medical advice about when you can begin/resume lifting.