Can someone explain how this works in clear, easy terms?

focuseddiva

I just started with MFP, and I love the logging aspect. I consider myself a fairly sharp person. But or some reason, i can't wrap my brain around the NET calories concept or the numbers it shows me on a daily basis. When I entered my profile info, it told me to eat 1200 cals a day. Then, you've got some sort of exercise calories -- which totally confuses me.

So here's what my day yesterday looked like:
Goal: 1200
Food: 1391
Exercise: -476
Net: 915
Remaining: 285

What do these numbers mean? Am I hitting my goal, going too far below it? By the way ... the exercise calories were walking 5 miles on the treadmill at 4.3 mph. However, when I look this up to log it, it only offers 4.0 mph or 4.5 mph for brisk walking --- so I assume my exercise calories are more like 500 or a bit more. Who knows. I'm just really confused as to what these numbers mean. They should make it so it's super easy -- like, "You have burned a net total of XX cals today" or "You have XXX cals left to eat today when you factor in your exercise."

Ack. Help!!

emilyisbonkers

"remaining" means you have that many left to eat. But i dont trust the calories they give you for exercise here, and i only eat half back.
Read the stickyed posts at the top, it has everything explained

focuseddiva

Thanks. I did read those yesterday ... I sort of get it but am not quite clear. I also see there is kind of debate on these boards about eating your exercise calories back. I'm not sure how to proceed, because I have been on Jenny Craig for a while. And I know pretty precisely what works for me in terms of weight loss. 1200-1300 calories eaten per day works for a 1-2 lbs loss per week. And that INCLUDES heavy cardio 5x a week and strength 2x a week, WITHOUT eating my exericse calories back. So, I guess I am on the side of trying not to eat bakc what I burned through exercise, but if I am starving, having some string cheese or a bowl of cereal won't kill me. RIght? (nervous laugh)

At one point, when I was at my goal weight of 140 (I'm 5'8", 40-ish female), I was so so careful and logged everything. And, it turns out that if I ate 1200 cals at my goal weight, and did very light exercise, I would only maintain (which blew my mind b/c wouldn't most people lose weight on 1200 cals a day)? If I ate 1500 cals and did moderate exercise, I'd maintain. If I ate anything over 1500 a day, no matter how much exercise I did, I would start to gain. No lie. Anyway, I am now 180 lbs, trying to get to about 155 this time around. I think I just got tired of paying so much attention to what I put in my mouth that I just started a really bad binge/restrict cycle and it it just threw me into disarray. So, I am trying to get more consistent now, and use MFP to stay accountable t- and just get healthy again. In a way, MFP forces you to think about food even more often, but I am trying to adopt it as a habit like brushing my teeth.

WalkingAlong

And I know pretty precisely what works for me in terms of weight loss. 1200-1300 calories eaten per day works for a 1-2 lbs loss per week. And that INCLUDES heavy cardio 5x a week and strength 2x a week, WITHOUT eating my exericse calories back.

I would suspect you have a lot of logging underestimation if that's true. But if it is, the MFP plan of 'net calories' and 'eating back' is obviously going to cause you to gain weight, right? The plan doesn't make sense to you because it doesn't make sense for people who don't burn a lot in BMR, if you ask me. You're a female, over 40, who is not obese, right? I'd pick a different plan. I'd pick a uniform calorie level that makes sense to you and stick to it for 3 weeks and see what happens.

emilyisbonkers

i would start to weigh everything you eat, you would be surprised how much food weighs, and I always eat half of my excercise calories back; just in case.
Look at TDEE that may be useful for you..
I have a BMI of 21 and I am still losing weight eating 1500 calories a day, so you can certianly get away with eating more, but only if you are logging food and activity correctly

Mokey41

If you have your budget set to 1200 which is most likely too low then you should be netting 1200 at the end of the day. That said the exercise thing is up for debate. Most machines give very inflated numbers for exercise and MFP's numbers are usually very high as well unless you are extremely unfit. I rarely eat back my exercise and if I were going to it would be no more than 50%.

The biggest thing is logging everything accurately. You need to weigh and measure all of your food and be honest with logging. If it's something with packaging check that against any entries you find in the database and don't search for the lowest number for a food.

focuseddiva

I think my metabolism is shot from 40 years of massive gains and losses.

cassiemorris85

I am little confused as well. I am fairly new to MFP. I have been using it off and on for several months, but I am ready to make a full on commitment to it and stick with it and there is no better time to start than right before a major holiday...If I can get through Christmas I can get through anything! LOL. Anyway, I have been going to the gym at LEAST 5 days per week since I was allowed to start going again after having my baby in July. So, around September I'd say is when I started kicking my exercise back in to high gear...I take spin 3 days per week and I do a boot camp class 2 days per week and then whatever I have energy for on Saturday. Since that has been my schedule since September I have gone in and tweaked my settings in MFP and put for my activity level "very active" because even when I am at work, I am walking around I'd say about 50% of the time. For weight loss, I'd like to lose 2lbs per week if possible. MFP is allowing me 1430 calories per day, I am starting new this week....last week and weeks previous I was trying to keep it around 1200 and blew it everyday because I was starving all the time! So while I am happy with the calorie increase, I am just a little worried that is too many to really lose weight. I am 5'6 and currently around 188lbs. Has everyone seemingly had success with their allotted calories for the day? Plus, when I do exercise, it allows me more calories to eat...should I eat those too? just some of them?! HELP!!!! I want to be successful. This is such an amazing tool and it's free so I want to do this right!!!

haroon_awan

See my post in http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1144894-doctors-advice

ILiftHeavyAcrylics

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/818082-exercise-calories-again-wtf

Here's a pretty good explanation of when you should or should not eat them back.

The best plan though is to log consistently and accurately for a month and adjust your plan according to your actual results.

cwolfman13

It's a mathematical formula. You need so many calories per day to maintain your weight...a bit of oversimplification, but essentially this need is determined by your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate), your NEAT (Non Exercise Activity Thermogenesis...you day to day stuff), and finally your EAT (Exercise Activity Thermogenesis). All of these together are known as your TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure)....this is the amount of calories your body requires for maintenance of weight...you eat less than this number you lose weight...you eat at a surplus of this number and you gain weight.

BMR + NEAT + EAT = TDEE

Many calculators take the formula just as noted above and cut from that...about 500 calories per day to lose about 1 Lb per week or 1000 calories per day to lose 2 Lbs per week. But MFP isn't a TDEE calculator, it is a NEAT method calculator...this means that your EAT as noted above is not included on the front end of the formula...it is unaccounted for with MFP until you log it. MFP's looks like this:

BMR + NEAT - Weight Loss calories (500 or 1000) = Calorie Goal + EAT

Your exercise has to be accounted for somewhere...so it is tacked onto the end of the formula when you log it. They are unaccounted for in your activity level. When you say you're going to do X amount of exercise, MFP just says, "well that's nice...but I don't really believe you...log it and I'll give you more calories, otherwise you need to eat like a little birdie."

TL/DR - your MFP calorie goal includes a deficit of calories for weight loss. Your MFP goal is NET of exercise...meaning an estimate of that activity is unaccounted for until you log it. Just make sure you're not overestimating your burn which is very common. You simply do not burn as much as you think you burn.

Note that I easily lost 40 lbs at a clip of about 1 - 1.5 Lbs per week doing exactly what MFP is designed to do. I also made sure I was as precise as possible when logging my intake...meaning I weighed and measured EVERYTHING and consistently logged. I generally ate back about 80% of what my HRM told me I burned during an aerobic event. It works if you're actually doing everything right...doing everything right requires a great deal of precision.

tigersword

http://shouldieatmyexercisecalories.com

misschoppo

It's a mathematical formula. You need so many calories per day to maintain your weight...a bit of oversimplification, but essentially this need is determined by your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate), your NEAT (Non Exercise Activity Thermogenesis...you day to day stuff), and finally your EAT (Exercise Activity Thermogenesis). All of these together are known as your TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure)....this is the amount of calories your body requires for maintenance of weight...you eat less than this number you lose weight...you eat at a surplus of this number and you gain weight.

BMR + NEAT + EAT = TDEE

Many calculators take the formula just as noted above and cut from that...about 500 calories per day to lose about 1 Lb per week or 1000 calories per day to lose 2 Lbs per week. But MFP isn't a TDEE calculator, it is a NEAT method calculator...this means that your EAT as noted above is not included on the front end of the formula...it is unaccounted for with MFP until you log it. MFP's looks like this:

BMR + NEAT - Weight Loss calories (500 or 1000) = Calorie Goal + EAT

Your exercise has to be accounted for somewhere...so it is tacked onto the end of the formula when you log it. They are unaccounted for in your activity level. When you say you're going to do X amount of exercise, MFP just says, "well that's nice...but I don't really believe you...log it and I'll give you more calories, otherwise you need to eat like a little birdie."

TL/DR - your MFP calorie goal includes a deficit of calories for weight loss. Your MFP goal is NET of exercise...meaning an estimate of that activity is unaccounted for until you log it. Just make sure you're not overestimating your burn which is very common. You simply do not burn as much as you think you burn.

Note that I easily lost 40 lbs at a clip of about 1 - 1.5 Lbs per week doing exactly what MFP is designed to do. I also made sure I was as precise as possible when logging my intake...meaning I weighed and measured EVERYTHING and consistently logged. I generally ate back about 80% of what my HRM told me I burned during an aerobic event. It works if you're actually doing everything right...doing everything right requires a great deal of precision.

This :-)