Eating back the calories we burn? should we?

angelaplaxton

I burned calories today and below my food diary, it says "you've earned "blank" calories today"...
does that intitle me to eat that much extra?

also i went 12calories over today, and i have 332 that i earned today too..

jaymark

yes eat your calories you earn.

writergirl921

You are supposed to eat back the calories you burn. I'm not sure if I agree with that completely. I eat back about half of mine but not all. There is a lot of information on this site about this very question. Search the forum and you'll find a lot of information. Good luck!

NoAdditives

Yes.

LivyJo

http://www.shouldieatmyexercisecalories.com/

unhinge

Helpful links to read.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/10665-newbies-please-read-me-2nd-edition

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/186814-some-mfp-basics

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/226404-bmr-maintenance

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

WanderLaura

I never eat all of my calories back!! If you burn off more than you eat back, those are extra calories going toward pounds lost! If you eat all of your calories lost back, I don't even understand why you would exercise other than just to be able to eat more, and in this case, the only pounds you are losing are from your BMR! Good luck! I've had pretty awesome luck with not eating them back thus far!

Losingitin2011

You eat them back because you are already at a deficit from your BMR. If you go too low, you won't lose weight, you might even gain.

myboysmomx2

Thanks everyone for sharing all the helpful links. You are helpful to us all :-D

misrical

I always eat mine back and I lose the weight I specified every week.
if you specify a 1 pound weight loss a week and you eat back your exercise calories, you are still hitting the 500 calorie deficit for the week and you will still lose weight.
Society has conditioned everyone that you must stop eating to lose weight.
listen to the math...you are still hitting your deficit..you are still gonna lose weight.

elliecolorado

I joined this site in January and spent January sticking to 1200 calories a day and never eating back any of my exercise calories. I only lost 3lbs in the entire month of January. Then in February I tried eating back my exercise calories (all of them) and only lost 2lbs that month. I got pretty frustrated and quit for about 2 weeks and when I started up again I started eating about 1/3 - 1/2 of my exercise calories and have been losing about 3lbs a week consistently for the past 7 weeks since I have been doing it that way. This could partially be because I don't measure everything and could be underestimating what I eat and also I don't have an HRM and I think that this site overestimates calories burned. I know that I will probably have to change things up at some point (when I get closer to a healthy weight) but doing it this way is working for now. I don't think that weight loss is 'one size fits all' and that people just need to experiment a little to see what works for them.

baisleac

Your NET calories (on your home page) should be as close to the daily goal MFP set for you as possible.

Your REMAINING calories (on your homepage and food diary page) should be as close to zero as possible.

MFP builds in a deficit for you based on the information you gave it: height, weight, lifestyle, goal weight loss, etc.. All you need to do is follow the calorie goals it gives you.