HELP! with TDEE

AmandaLawter

I am so confused. I started MFP at a 1390 daily net calorie goal to lose 2 lbs a week. I had it set to sedentary, but then realized I am not considered sedentary as I average about 7,000-10,000 steps (depending on the week!) a day on my Fitbit. So, I changed my activity level to 'lightly active" which put me at a net calorie goal of 1720. I just did the TDEE calculator (http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/CalRequire.html). According to that site, my TDEE is 3483. So my question is, how do I adjust that in my MFP settings? What should my daily net calorie goal be?! This is my 29th day of strict logging and I've only lost 2 lbs!! So something is not working for me! Any help/advice is appreciated! Thanks!!

Female
31 years old
5'9"
SW: 275
CW: 258 ( I have lost SOME but it's taken me a couple years!)
GW: 175

AmandaLawter

In addition, I exercise 5 days a week (Mon-Fri) with strict eating. Then Sat-Sun, I usually go a little over my calorie goal and hardly any calories burned. Are the weekends ruining my progress? Also, I like beer. High calorie craft beer........ugh.

AmandaLawter

Hmmm, anyone?

I am reading MANY threads regarding this, and it seems that maybe I'm eating too little? I also recently stopped taking birth control pills. Could that affect my weight loss? I am so discouraged. I feel like I'm working my butt off for no reason. :-(

Mr_Knight

....my TDEE is 3483.

It's not. You can't use that calculator because....

CW: 258

....they vastly over-estimate for obese bodies.

You're looking at a BMR of about 1600 and a lightly active TDEE of about 2200.

WinoGelato

Hi there. It can be confusing. ~3400 sounds kind of high. If you already use a FitBit, and use it consistently, I would use that to determine your TDEE. Your Daily Calories Burned from your FitBit should be roughly your TDEE, and I have found them to be more accurate than an online calculator. I would take an average of the past two weeks or a month and see what your calories burned have been, that's your TDEE.

Then from there, to set your calorie goal in MFP, most people recommend using a 20% reduction from TDEE. See how that compares to what MFP is giving you at Lightly Active. For me, when I changed the activity settings and made sure the weight loss goals were consistent between the two devices, they were within about 50 calories of each other, so I just went with what MFP was recommending. If there is a big difference, then maybe split the difference and set that as your goal, give it a few weeks/month and see if you are losing weight at the rate you are aiming for. That's really the best way to figure out your TDEE, is to track your weight loss relative to the calories you are consuming.

Oh, and make sure to log everything, and add in non-step based exercise in either MFP or FitBit (if they are synced it doesn't matter). I eat back the FitBit calorie adjustments in MFP, and I continued to lose weight and have been maintaining fine.

Good luck.

MinnieInMaine

Are you logging your food on the weekend? If not, your little indulgences could be outweighing your Mon-Fri deficit enough so that you're not losing.

Do you log your exercise and eat all the exercise calories back? If so, that might be part of the problem as MFP tends to overestimate burns.

How accurate are you with food logging. Do you weigh solid foods?

vismal

Meh, you're over complicating things. Simply pick any reasonable calorie target and eat it every day. If you lose weight at a rate that is satisfactory to you, continue to eat that amount of calories. If after a few weeks you do not lose weight, or weight loss is too slow, reduce calories by a bit. At your height and weight, 2000 calories seems like a very reasonable starting point. If you have more calories on the weekends, have less throughout the week. Averages are all that matter. 2000 every day is the same as 1800 M-F and 2500 on Saturday and Sunday.

Aaron_K123

I am so confused. I started MFP at a 1390 daily net calorie goal to lose 2 lbs a week. I had it set to sedentary, but then realized I am not considered sedentary as I average about 7,000-10,000 steps (depending on the week!) a day on my Fitbit. So, I changed my activity level to 'lightly active" which put me at a net calorie goal of 1720. I just did the TDEE calculator (http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/CalRequire.html). According to that site, my TDEE is 3483. So my question is, how do I adjust that in my MFP settings? What should my daily net calorie goal be?! This is my 29th day of strict logging and I've only lost 2 lbs!! So something is not working for me! Any help/advice is appreciated! Thanks!!

Female
31 years old
5'9"
SW: 275
CW: 258 ( I have lost SOME but it's taken me a couple years!)
GW: 175

That is a very large TDEE I must say. If that was accurate then to lose two pounds a week (a deficit of 1000 calories per day) you would want to eat 2,483 calories per day.

My guess though is that you are misusing that calculator a bit to get a number that high.

I agree with vismal that you may be overthinking this and that 2000 calories per day on average seems like a perfectly reasonable and targetable goal for you.

Aaron_K123

So I went ahead and used the exrx.net calculator:

http://www.exrx.net/Calculators/CalRequire.html

I put in your age, your weight, your height and took into account your exercise and it gave me a TDEE of 2795. No idea how you got 3483.

What did you enter and why? What specifically is your exercise?

To put this in perspective as a 6' tall man doing P90X I had my TDEE at about 2900.

vismal

As far as craft beers go for 12 ounces: All day IPA = 147 calories, Stone Brewing Levitation = 132, Guineu Riner = 85!!!!!, and a bottle of Guinness is only 125! Choose your craft beers wisely and they don't need to be an issue.

Aaron_K123

As far as craft beers go for 12 ounces: All day IPA = 147 calories, Stone Brewing Levitation = 132, Guineu Riner = 85!!!!!, and a bottle of Guinness is only 125! Choose your craft beers wisely and they don't need to be an issue.

I was shocked to find out that Guiness is actually relatively low cal for a beer. Who would have thought.

AmandaLawter

I honestly don't know how I got that high of a TDEE number. Oops. According to my Fitbit daily calories burned, my 28 day average is about 2900. I do log my weekends. This past Saturday, I ate 2100 calories and Sunday 2400 calories. What if I 'unsync' my Fitbit and just eat 1700-2000 calories a day? Maybe that will work? I think maybe all the damn numbers are confusing me!

Thank you so much, everyone!

Aaron_K123

I honestly don't know how I got that high of a TDEE number. Oops. According to my Fitbit daily calories burned, my 28 day average is about 2900. I do log my weekends. This past Saturday, I ate 2100 calories and Sunday 2400 calories. What if I 'unsync' my Fitbit and just eat 1700-2000 calories a day? Maybe that will work? I think maybe all the damn numbers are confusing me!

Thank you so much, everyone!

I think at your current weight you are pretty much guarenteed to lose weight at 2000 calories per day (your BMR is about 1950). Not only that I think you can eat in a way where 2000 calories will be very satiating and give you plenty of nutrition.

Other than that yeah just track your calories and don't get overly worked up by gadgets and calculators.

vismal

As far as craft beers go for 12 ounces: All day IPA = 147 calories, Stone Brewing Levitation = 132, Guineu Riner = 85!!!!!, and a bottle of Guinness is only 125! Choose your craft beers wisely and they don't need to be an issue.

I was shocked to find out that Guiness is actually relatively low cal for a beer. Who would have thought.

So was I! Blew my mind! I used to avoid it simply because I assumed it had to be high calorie, it's my go to beer now!

WinoGelato

I honestly don't know how I got that high of a TDEE number. Oops. According to my Fitbit daily calories burned, my 28 day average is about 2900. I do log my weekends. This past Saturday, I ate 2100 calories and Sunday 2400 calories. What if I 'unsync' my Fitbit and just eat 1700-2000 calories a day? Maybe that will work? I think maybe all the damn numbers are confusing me!

Thank you so much, everyone!

I don't necessarily think you need to unsync your FitBit. If it averages your daily burn at 2900, and you are trying to lose 2 lbs/week, you would subtract 1000 cals from that, which would give you a daily goal of 1900. You said MFP now has you set at 1720? Not that far off really. I agree with the other advice here that you could set your goal at 2000 and still lose. I would just set a custom goal at 1900 or 2000 and be consistent with your logging and monitor the results for the next several weeks.

Now the next thing to address will be why you aren't losing weight already - you said you track diligently but are you weighing/measuring all your portions? Usually when people aren't losing weight at the expected rate, that is one of the first suggestions because it is likely you are eating more than you think.

Aaron_K123

I honestly don't know how I got that high of a TDEE number. Oops. According to my Fitbit daily calories burned, my 28 day average is about 2900. I do log my weekends. This past Saturday, I ate 2100 calories and Sunday 2400 calories. What if I 'unsync' my Fitbit and just eat 1700-2000 calories a day? Maybe that will work? I think maybe all the damn numbers are confusing me!

Thank you so much, everyone!

I don't necessarily think you need to unsync your FitBit. If it averages your daily burn at 2900, and you are trying to lose 2 lbs/week, you would subtract 1000 cals from that, which would give you a daily goal of 1900. You said MFP now has you set at 1720? Not that far off really. I agree with the other advice here that you could set your goal at 2000 and still lose. I would just set a custom goal at 1900 or 2000 and be consistent with your logging and monitor the results for the next several weeks.

Now the next thing to address will be why you aren't losing weight already - you said you track diligently but are you weighing/measuring all your portions? Usually when people aren't losing weight at the expected rate, that is one of the first suggestions because it is likely you are eating more than you think.

My first thought with anyone who says they aren't losing weight eating X amount is to ask....well how long have you been doing it for. The answer many times is something like "two weeks" in which case just need to stick with it longer to see if it is working or not.

Consistancy is key, if you are constantly making changes or "adjusting" you will never really be able to get a handle on what amount of food you need to lose weight at a given rate.

AmandaLawter

As far as craft beers go for 12 ounces: All day IPA = 147 calories, Stone Brewing Levitation = 132, Guineu Riner = 85!!!!!, and a bottle of Guinness is only 125! Choose your craft beers wisely and they don't need to be an issue.

I definitely don't always choose wisely. Saturday, I had Wicked Weed Freak of Nature Double IPA and Sweet Talker IPA then last night I had their Hop Burglar IPA. Maybe they aren't all that high in calories per 12 oz, but it does add up when you have more than 1. I have maybe one beer throughout the week (within my calorie goal), but then apparently too much on the weekends. I honestly think I was over complicating my numbers (like you said previously). Having someone break it all down helps me out tremendously.....especially after seeing your results! Thanks so much! :happy:

AmandaLawter

My first thought with anyone who says they aren't losing weight eating X amount is to ask....well how long have you been doing it for. The answer many times is something like "two weeks" in which case just need to stick with it longer to see if it is working or not.

Consistancy is key, if you are constantly making changes or "adjusting" you will never really be able to get a handle on what amount of food you need to lose weight at a given rate.

Today is day 29 for me! The first couple of weeks were all wrong since I was only netting 1390 a day. The past 2 weeks, I have been eating 1800-2400 calories a day, but I think my exercise adjustments were all wrong. Now that I disconnected my Fitbit, I can focus solely on calorie intake and not worry about the exercise part. Thank you very much for all your advice!

AmandaLawter

I don't necessarily think you need to unsync your FitBit. If it averages your daily burn at 2900, and you are trying to lose 2 lbs/week, you would subtract 1000 cals from that, which would give you a daily goal of 1900. You said MFP now has you set at 1720? Not that far off really. I agree with the other advice here that you could set your goal at 2000 and still lose. I would just set a custom goal at 1900 or 2000 and be consistent with your logging and monitor the results for the next several weeks.

Now the next thing to address will be why you aren't losing weight already - you said you track diligently but are you weighing/measuring all your portions? Usually when people aren't losing weight at the expected rate, that is one of the first suggestions because it is likely you are eating more than you think.

I measure everything that can be measured in a measuring cup or by counting. I should probably get a food scale for things like meat to measure ounces. I guess it's possible I'm underestimating. Thanks for your input!