Confused by bmr

MummyDB

Hi, I am confused by BMR.

I get that it is the cal you burn by just living/breathing/heart beating. But how do I fit that number into my weight loss equation?

According to MFP my BMR is 1624.
Cal give per day by MFP is 1690. This is based on loosing 1 lb per week.
I generally burn min 300 cal per day X 5 days a week. Sometimes more cal and I do try for 7 days a week.
I typically have cal left over at the end of the day 100-200 on average, but sometimes just squeek by. Only once have I been over my cal for the day and once got the message I was too under into starvation mode.

Have not lost in two weeks. What am I doing wrong? Should I be eating more cal? Should I be trying to eat all cal given for the day including what I burned? If so that really doesn't make sense to me. I thought the whole idea is I should have 500 less per day X 7 days in order to loose 1 lb per week. And that 1690 given to me is the 500 less per day. So in theory if I ate less than the 1690 I should loose more than a pound per week. Again what am I doing wrong?

Any suggestions or explanation on how the BMR # should come into play is appreicated.

Thanks
Dawn

KyleJCooper

What MFP is doing is taking your BMR, adding on the calories you burn from normal daily activities (for ex, only a few hundred if you have it set to "sedentary"), then subtracting the necessary calorie deficit to meet the goal weight loss speed you have set. So, if your BMR is 1600, you burn 500 calories a day walking to/from the car at work and doing things like showering, standing, etc etc, and you want to lose a pound a week (3500 calories a week deficit), then you will get BACK to 1600 calories a day needed to consume (1600+500-500)=1600. That's why your BMR and your allowed calories per day are similar. You don't really have to think about your BMR, it's kinda done for you.

BMR + Activity Level = Maintenance Calories

(Maintenance Calories per week - Calorie Deficit per week)/7 = Calories To Be Eaten Per Day

Any exercise you perform adds on to that number of calories to be eaten daily, to keep you at the same daily deficit to stay on par with your weight loss.

I'm sorry if you already knew all of this, but I just wanted to clarify things a bit (not just for you). Your BMR is used with your activity level to determine your number of daily calories. The BMR calculator is just available for your own informational purposes.

MummyDB

Hey Kyle, Thank you! Very detailed and much appreciated for your time.

So bottom line if I stick to the 1690ish cal a day, I should loose approx 1 lb per week.

KyleJCooper

That is correct. If you continue to stay at the same weight, a few things may be going on:
- You may be overestimating your activity level in the goals section. When in doubt, round down (I'm a radiologist that always takes the stairs, bikes to work, etc... but I still sit in front of a computer workstation most of the day so I just set myself to "sedentary" and log exercise that I do throughout the day). Setting your activity level higher "assumes" that you perform a certain amount of exercise that you never really think about or log, so it can be easy to cheat yourself because that will increase the number of calories you are allowed to consume daily.
- You are misrepresenting the number of calories consumed or overestimating the calories burned with exercise. You can always check a heart rate monitor out, as this can give you a more accurate idea of the amount of calories burned for a given exercise.
- You are trying to lose too quickly. If you only have a few pounds to lose total, you can decrease to 0.5 lbs / week instead of 1 lb / week. Painful, I know... but in many cases people actually find they lose quicker with the higher number of daily calories, because they exercise more vigorously with the extra energy.

There are a few other possibilities but these are the most common. Above all, I would give it at least another month before stressing about it too much. In the interim I would examine these possibilities to see if any of them could be the culprit.

Good luck!

MummyDB

Thanks again Kyle. Some good food for thought. At least gives me a starting point.