Do you eat your exercise calories?

cherryblossombabe
cherryblossombabe Posts: 113 Member
in Food and Nutrition
Hey fellow MFP peeps!

Looking for some advice here.. I am currently eating 1,200 calories per day. I have just bought a treadmill and plan to start using this 3 days a week, 1 hour each time. Sooo when you guys exercise and log what you have done exercise wise, do you eat the calories that creates or do you just stick with your given amount? My diary is open too if you want to have a nosey.. Thanks :)

Replies

  • 5stringjeff
    5stringjeff Posts: 790 Member
    MFP gives you your daily net calorie goal, and is designed for you to eat your exercises calories back, especially if you have your activity level set to sedentary. But to answer your question, yes, I do log my exercise and eat those calories back.
  • alska
    alska Posts: 300 Member
    most of the time i do!
  • CrunchyDad
    CrunchyDad Posts: 66 Member
    When I get quite a few calories for exercise in a day, which is rare lately, I try to eat back half. With a goal as low as yours at 1200 calories a day, I would eat back most if not all of them.

    The problem I have is using the MFP entries for exercise, I often feel the calories burned are over estimated.
  • cherryblossombabe
    cherryblossombabe Posts: 113 Member
    Thank you so much for all your feedback, I really appreciate it guys!

    You see I was diagnosed with a brain condition called IIH and the doctor advised me to lose around 4 stone in total. (Apparently weight loss can help ease symptoms off IIH). It can be difficult doing exercise as IIH affects the fluid pressure within my skull so exerting myself can cause pressure to raise in my brain fluid and that would mean I would need a spinal tap (lumbar puncture), so yeah I need to be careful with exercise, this is why my daily calorie intake is low at 1,200. Trying to focus on losing most of the weight on diet.

    I am going to try walking on the treadmill and after reading all your comments I think it will be best for me to eat my exercise calories back. If I don't I will be basically doubling up my calorie deficit in one week.

    Thanks again! :)
  • ChefSteveUrso
    ChefSteveUrso Posts: 84 Member
    only eat back exercise calories if I'm hungry and never all of them. It just works out that way I don't do it on purpose. But that's probably why I averaged over 2lbs loss a week for 5 months. But my personal rule is not to go hungry, so follow your intuition.
  • caracrawford1
    caracrawford1 Posts: 657 Member
    I eat about half back. I always seem to have about 700+ cals left at the end of the day though. I gross 1500. I might be able to deal with 1200 if I wasn't exercising at all. But since I am active and workout 6+ days/week, I eat more than that. You will probably find you will have more energy and effective workouts if you eat some back.
  • summer92008
    summer92008 Posts: 202
    No...I do not eat them back. Maybe once a week or so I will eat part of them.
    I personally feel like it is a waste of time to work out and then eat the calories I burned. If I'm gonna do that, I just won't exercise and eat less calories! Lol.
  • JG762
    JG762 Posts: 571 Member
    Nope...
    I don't eat my calories back, once in a great while I might simply go over my daily calorie intake goal and dip into the exercise calories for maybe 100 but that's all.
    Like the previous poster stated, if I'm going to work my *kitten* off and exercise I want it to mean something, I don't want to do it just to be able to eat more. YMMV.

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