Getting confused about calories

plasticserenity

Hi everyone. I'm sure I'm here asking questions that you must have answered 1000 times before, but I feel like I've spent an age reading different advice all over the Internet and hearing advice from friends, and I'm starting to get very overwhelmed by all the different versions I'm hearing!

Last year I lost 2 stone in preparation for being a bridesmaid at my sister's wedding, though looking back now I did it all wrong. I basically cut down on as many calories as I could (usually less than 500 a day, but at one point I had nothing but cups of tea for 3 days). I know now how completely crazy that was, so I definitely have no plans to repeat that. Over the next 6 months about a stone of it went back on, so now that January is upon us I, like most people, want to lose a few more pounds.

This time I attempted to do things as healthily as I could, so I found a diet diary app that told me how many calories I could have to obtain my target weight, and it said 800 calories a day, and I saw no reason not to trust it. That's what I've been doing since 1st January and so far I've lost 9lbs. However I found that I hit a plateau when the weight stopped dropping off so I started doing a bit more research.

This is what has brought me to this site, and now the majority of what I'm reading says that the golden rule is never to go below 1200 net calories. Obviously I feel very silly now, as I really wanted to go along a healthy and sustainable lifestyle change!

So now here is where I'm at, and I could really do with some reassurance that I've got the right idea this time. I am 26 years old, 5'6" and currently weigh 9 stone 12lbs. I want to get down to around 9 stone 4lbs, as this is where I'm most comfortable. I aim to do around 45 minutes on my exercise bike every day (according to the dial this burns around 225 calories) and I also linked a fitbit zip to my MFP account so that it can adjust my intake if I've had an unusually active day. According to the MFP site, I should be aiming to hit 1200 net calories, which means i need to eat around 1425 calories a day, after taking exercise into account. Can this be right?

I hope this doesn't sound silly, but I've been attempting to meet this for the past couple of days and it feels a bit wrong? I feel like I'm forcing myself to eat when I'm not really hungry, and at the end of the day I'm searching for something else to eat just to meet a target. Is this just because I'm so used to restricting my calories too much? I honestly didn't find it that difficult to stick to 800 most days. Will I start seeing results this way, or am I still managing to get the wrong idea? My friend at work told me that it still sounds like 1400 is too few calories, but I already feel like I'm eating as much as I did when I gained all the weight in the first place!

Any advice or reassurance would be very much appreciated.

cwolfman13

According to the MFP site, I should be aiming to hit 1200 net calories, which means i need to eat around 1425 calories a day, after taking exercise into account. Can this be right?

Yes...contrary to popular belief, you don't have to starve your *kitten* to lose weight. Really, this is probably not enough considering you only wanting to lose a mere 8 Lbs...with little weight to lose, you really have to go slow. I would imagine that you put in 2 Lbs per week because that's what every woman on the planet seems to think they need to do...that's too fast for 8 Lbs.

Also, with what you've been doing you've likely jacked up your hormones and thus your metabolism pretty good...you may need to do a little metabolic repair. I would also add that jacking those hormones is what is making you "feel" full with such a platry calorie goal...basically your body has turned off your leptin supply...this is why anorexics can eat so very little and never complain about being hungry...eating no food turns off your leptin and leptin is what is responsible (along with gherin) for your hunger cues.

By the by, my wife is a mere 5'2" and pushing 40...she lifts weights 3x weekly and goes for a run a few times per week and maintains at around 2,300 calories and loses nicely at around 1800 calories. 1400 gross calories is nothing...you don't have to eat a lot of volume...you need calorie dense foods and you need to learn that calories aren't the devil...they are just a unit of energy.

plasticserenity

Thank you for your reply, it's definitely reassuring.

It had crossed my mind that my metabolism might have taken some damage by my eating habits. So my next question: does this mean I can expect to see some weight gain now that I've bumped my calories up to a more appropriate level? And if so, will this take a long time to rectify itself?

I ask so that I can try to reign in the disappointment if I see the scales go up, or take weeks to start going down again!

cwolfman13

Thank you for your reply, it's definitely reassuring.

It had crossed my mind that my metabolism might have taken some damage by my eating habits. So my next question: does this mean I can expect to see some weight gain now that I've bumped my calories up to a more appropriate level? And if so, will this take a long time to rectify itself?

I ask so that I can try to reign in the disappointment if I see the scales go up, or take weeks to start going down again!

I think it varies person to person and a lot will have to do with how long your diet has been crashed.

Also, when you increase calorie intake there is always going to be some weight gain for the simple fact that the more calories you consume the more water is required to metabolize those calories...thus you retain more fluids. Also, you start to fill glycogen stores (this is a good thing) which has weight.

This is one of the reasons so many people freak when they go to maintenance...they up their calories to maintenance and almost immediately put on 3-5 Lbs within a day or two...it's all water and glycogen but they're so scale obsessed that they've never actually bothered to learn how this all works and the science of it all...if they understood just half of how this all works they would realize that gaining 3-5 Lbs of actual fat overnight is 100% scientifically and mathematically impossible...but what most of them do is just go back on their diet unfortunately.

Give this a read...

http://www.nerdfitness.com/blog/2011/07/21/meet-staci-your-new-powerlifting-super-hero/