Eating my net calories

I don't eat back my exercise calories because I didn't see any progress when I did. I only did it for about a week. I do however make sure I eat every few hours to keep my body from going into starvation mode. Does it really make a difference? Do I really need to keep eating those net and see what happens? Thanks for any advice.

Replies

  • glassyo
    glassyo Posts: 7,722 Member
    You can't tell anything in one week. Did you maintain when you ate them back for that one week? Actually that's good because if you'd gone a long time without eating them, you probably would have gained from your body thinking, "Holy crap! She's actually feeding me! Better hold on in case it doesn't happen again!"

    From your profile it looks like you're pretty active. What's your activity level set to on here? You could be undereating already just from setting it too low.

    Basically it's a good idea to net the calorie goal MFP gives you taking into consideration your activity level and how you calculate exercise calories (not eating them all back if you use MFP's calculations or eating most or all of them back if you use a heart rate monitor).

    I
  • I'll give it a shot. I am really active. I just really want to make this work. I've been trying for 3 years now. I don't want any set backs. Thanks for the advice.
  • glassyo
    glassyo Posts: 7,722 Member
    Good. :smile:

    Personally, I'm really big on eating all the calories you're allowed if you can still lose weight by eating them. After losing weight on Weight Watchers, I ended up gaining 30 lbs back after hitting a plateau, finding out I was only netting between 700-1000 a day and started eating how many calories I supposedly should have been eating. I put part of the gain to netting so low and part on how much crap I still eat. :smile:

    Just give your body a chance to get used to the change before changing it up again. I would say 3 weeks.
  • everyones body is different, im currently in a LONG plataue, i had never eaten my exersise calories, but in order to attempt to break this platuau, i started to eat back my exercise calories, for 6 weeks (i have a HRM) and I gained.. Ok it was only 1 kg (2.5lb) in six weeks, but it was still a gain.

    so Ive now changed my settings to lose 1lb per week and increased my calories a bit (and i stopped eating ex cals) and i had a 700g (1lb) loss last week ..

    losing weight is a lifestyle change, not a quick fix, sometimes we need to trial many things in order to find out what works for our bodies as individuals..

    Definatly give it a go, your body may respond to it..