brm, bmi, bloomin confused

nibbynoo

Hi,
i have had a couple threads on here before as i think my cals are too low! please help guys!

i am 5'6, 223lbs and 21. i want to lose about 60lbs then see where i stand.
MFP has recommended me 1250 cals a day as a base with no exercise (obv this increases when exercise is added), everyone thinks this is far too low to avoid starvation mode and i havent lost any weight for a month now and have been inside the nutrition guidelines so religiously!

like everyone i want to lose the weight healthily but quickly, what do you think my daily cal intake should be!?!

crazymama2two

youre not going to lose it quickly...so just get that out of your mind (easier said than done)

and are you exercising?

and you probably want to eat more if youre not losing weight...up it to 1400 calories, throw in some exercise, lots of water, drown yourself in it, and check back in two weeks and see what the evil scale says.

JustMichelleB

for your height/weight/age, I also think 1250cal/day is too low for you. You haven't lost any weight in a month? Do your clothes fit any better? You can play with your calorie intake and see what works best for you. You may need 1400cal/day (before exercise) to see a loss. Remember, you really want to lose ~1-2lb/week (this generally promotes a more sustainable weight loss).

erickirb

It looks like you did lose weight, 11lbs. You may want to eat slightly more. Try changing your goal to 1.5lbs/week this will give you an additional 250 cals/day (1400 total).

morganadk2_deleted

I suggest you read this they may help!

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/10589-for-those-confused-or-questioning-eating-your-exercise-calo

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/61706-guide-to-calorie-deficit

Good luck on your journey

kao708

I'm assuming you have your activity set as sedentary. Is that actually your true activity level for the day? If you don't work at a desk job you might need to change this to compensate for your normal daily activity rate.

Are you working out and eatingback your exercise calories? If you aren't eating them back you are probably falling too low on your net intake and that is what is causing your weight loss to stall.

Are you eating foods that are high in sodium? If yes, try cutting back on that. Drink lots or water, etc. Without knowing all your details I can only speculate but hope something here helps! Good Luck :happy:

Katy

hpsnickers1

I was at 1250 for a while and I was losing bit by bit. When I decided to focus more on weight lifting I switched over to Maintenance calories (1480) and do my best to hit that. I don't always get there though. I try to eat most of my exercise calories and I do my best to stay over 1200 just to be safe. In the 2 weeks after that I dropped another 1 1/2 pounds. (I'm at a healthy weight so it's very hard for me to drop pounds like other people on here).

I just purchased a BodyMedia Fit. It's an armband worn 24/7. I have learned that my laziest days (weekends) I burn 1700-1800 calories. This week so far I have burned between 2000-2200 calories. I'm 5'2" and 123lbs. Think about how many calories you are burning on a given day. So increasing your calories will not hurt you at all.

Good luck. It's good to see someone who realized they need to up their calories instead of trying to restrict more.

MakingAChoice

I used a site other than MFP too (fat2fitradio.com)

Entered information: 21 year old female, 66 inches tall, weighing 223 pounds.

There are a few different methods to calculating your basal metabolic rate (BMR). One of the most popular, developed in the early 1900's is called the Harris-Benedict formula. Based on this formula, your current BMR is 1837 calories.

MFP Says your estimated BMR is: 1,793 calories/day*

So if we took an average of these 2 and got 1815 calories a day. Then deducted the 500 calories a day to lose 1 pound a week you would be around 1315 calories a day. This is assuming no exercise at all. If you add exercise you will need to increase that amount of calories you eat.

nibbynoo

that is a bloody amazing answer.
now it all makes sense!

thanks man, I've added my walk to work in a exersize (its really not, as only 20 mins) but it raises my cals to that mark so hopefully this will work better! will be exercizing more as well

Thank you guys

erickirb

I used a site other than MFP too (fat2fitradio.com)

Entered information: 21 year old female, 66 inches tall, weighing 223 pounds.

There are a few different methods to calculating your basal metabolic rate (BMR). One of the most popular, developed in the early 1900's is called the Harris-Benedict formula. Based on this formula, your current BMR is 1837 calories.

MFP Says your estimated BMR is: 1,793 calories/day*

So if we took an average of these 2 and got 1815 calories a day. Then deducted the 500 calories a day to lose 1 pound a week you would be around 1315 calories a day. This is assuming no exercise at all. If you add exercise you will need to increase that amount of calories you eat.

no, no, no, that is not how it works, you can take the 1815 but you must add an activity amount to it. If you are sedentary add around 350 cals/day so your maintenance would be 2165 at a sedentary setting. then to lose 1 lb/week you would be set at 1665 (2165-500) Ignore BMR for weight loss, the deficit should be from maintenance, as you would lose weight even eating BMR about 0.6lbs/week, if you are set at sedentary more if you are more active.

nibbynoo

its confusing me why its so much higher than MFP!

ladyhawk00

its confusing me why its so much higher than MFP!

Check all of your numbers again (under Settings, update diet/fitness profile)
Also, you can see the numbers MFP has for you under Goals.

Eric is correct (as usual.) BMR is what you burn each day just laying in bed. The number in upper right corner under calories burned on Goals page is BMR + whatever activity level you chose. With 70 lb to lose, I would say you probably want to be at 1.5 lbs per week loss goal, as well. 2 is probably a bit too high.

Are you accurate in your diaries? Weighing/measuring food? Where are you getting your exercise burn numbers from?

And finally, don't just depend on the scale. Measure as well. The scale can be deceiving.