Do you eat ALL of your allotted calories?

SezxyStef

if you're not hungry, DON'T EAT, 'calorie goal' be damned. that's what learning to have a healthy relationship with food is all about, learning when to stop eating and when you need to. if you're very very active, have a very active job like a waitress, army, any work place where you burn a lot or are doing a whole **** ton of exercise you should make sure you're eating a bit more, but if not and you're not hungry being in a deficit is fine in my opinion.

Yah no...

If you changed some of your choices to regular fat versions and added in some protien to that salad etc you would be at your goal already.

Someone may not "feel" hungry but that doesn't mean their body doesn't need th fuel and the nutrients...

1200 calories is the bare minimum a woman should eat.

hookilau

if you're not hungry, DON'T EAT, 'calorie goal' be damned. that's what learning to have a healthy relationship with food is all about, learning when to stop eating and when you need to. if you're very very active, have a very active job like a waitress, army, any work place where you burn a lot or are doing a whole **** ton of exercise you should make sure you're eating a bit more, but if not and you're not hungry being in a deficit is fine in my opinion.

Yah no...

If you changed some of your choices to regular fat versions and added in some protien to that salad etc you would be at your goal already.

Someone may not "feel" hungry but that doesn't mean their body doesn't need th fuel and the nutrients...

1200 calories is the bare minimum a woman should eat.

I agree completely. I only eat full fat versions of foods & it keeps me full, which is why I can't always hit my caloric targets.
However, your case is very different, in that your caloric goal seems overly low to me.

candiceh3

Someone needs to report the joker eating only 550 cals. It is against MFP rules.

Looking starved is not beautiful, it's not sexy, it's not intelligent, and its nothing to be proud of.

marilynx

I personally don't. I allot myself 1650 calories a day and sometimes I eat about 1325-1400 a day. Then other days I may eat right up until that 1650 mark. I also don't eat back my exercise calories. I personally believe that as long as you're eating within the recommended calories everyday and it's quality food, that you don't have to eat back your workout calories.

avskk

I usually fall pretty short of my goal, which means that if I do have a day when I go over -- or, like I recently experienced, a week when I was over nearly every day -- I try not to stress about it too much.

I don't routinely come in under goal on purpose; I design my meals with the intention of having snacks and then find myself without the time for snacking, or I design larger meals and find I'm not hungry enough for them, or I plan a heavier eating day and end up getting to called in to work before breakfast (yesterday), or... you know, life. I should make it more of a priority to hit my goal every day, but I'm not often hungry and when I'm not hungry I don't even think of stopping what I'm doing for food.

Holly_Roman_Empire

You've got to be kidding me.

Yes eat the 400 calories! Go eat some eggs and bacon, or a protein milkshake, or a Wendy's 10-piece chicken nuggets. Aren't you hangry?!

bcf7683

At 1200, YES, you should absolutely eat to goal. After all, that's what goal means, right - something to achieve, go for, meet? Not something to fall well short of. Especially when you're set at the bare minimum.

My goal is 1900 and I usually meet it, no problem. I lost most of my fat while eating 1800-2000 cals a day.

I'm so confused, I hear a thousand different things...won't more of a deficit mean more weight loss?

Yes, bigger deficit means bigger weight loss.

That's not the only consideration, however. Routinely going below a certain level of caloric intake will make it hard to maintain the body in a healthy state. The number of calories for that is different for everyone, "1200" is used as a catch-all proxy, although it is clear many people, especially women, can do just fine on less if they pay close attention to their macros and micronutrient levels.

When I started MFP, I did 1200 cals/day and LOADS of cardio..... Recipe for disaster. I ended up losing the weight, but had NO muscle left. Thank God I educated myself, upped my calories and started lifting heavy 5 days a week. I've gained 10 lbs back in the last year and a half, and now I have decent muscle definition with low body fat.

Do yourself a favor and eat at LEAST 1200 cals/day ESPECIALLY if you're working out also. 1200 cals as a *minimum*.

Think of it as putting $10 worth of gasoline in your car and expecting it to drive you across the country. That's how your body is. If you don't supply it with enough energy (food) it's not going to run (well, at least).