How many calories do you eat?

Gisna

Less than 500.

Helloitsdan

Less than 500.

Gastric bypass?
Thats the only reason to eat this little food.

If not please seek help!

Helloitsdan

2000-3000 zig zag.

foremant86

1700-2000

AntWrig

2700 on training days.
1900 on rest days.

Zig zagging of calories does nothing for the metabolism. Cycling of carbs and fats, does nothing for the metabolism. This is only used to create a weekly deficit. You eat when you train, you eat less when you don't.

AntWrig

1570.

No man should be eating 1500 calories a day.

Helloitsdan

1570.

No man should be eating 1500 calories a day.

If hes 4'11" maybe?
=D

cbenzerga

Most of the folks eating higer calorie amounts are lifting weights...I noticed you aren't because of your wrists. I completly understand. I would say try to get on the floor after the kiddies are down for bed and do some leg lifts/ crunches..things that don't envolve your wrists..you know anything helps, also walking would be great for you. But I would say your calorie amount is perfect, simply because you are not trying to bulk up/tone, ppl lifting need more calories yes, but you are not at that point. Good Luck
Disclaimer: I am not a professional, just trying to help:happy

music4rach

I have heard that your can take your goal weight and multiply it by 10... so if you want to weigh 130 you should eat 1300 per day... However, MFP has me eating less than 10x my goal weight, but I am super tall so that is prob why... I would follow what they recommend though. Because I did the whole eating super low calories before and it worked great! until it slowed my metabolism instead of increasing it and made it really difficult to keep the weight off and now to lose it again...

Helloitsdan

I have heard that your can take your goal weight and multiply it by 10... so if you want to weigh 130 you should eat 1300 per day... However, MFP has me eating less than 10x my goal weight, but I am super tall so that is prob why... I would follow what they recommend though. Because I did the whole eating super low calories before and it worked great! until it slowed my metabolism instead of increasing it and made it really difficult to keep the weight off and now to lose it again...

Multiply it by 15 not 10.

tinkerpuppet

I have two kids (6 and 4), and have my activity set to 'lightly active'. So I don't count all the cleaning, chasing, walking to/from school (when its not too cold or snowy!), grocery shopping, etc. I'm set to lose 1lb per week and am at 1390cal. I usually hit about that give/take 100cal. I've lost 12lbs so far, and when I started I was actually given 1460. When I hit goal and decided to keep going, it lowered my calories by 70 per day. I was happy with how things were going, so I haven't been too worried about it. I'm using the calorie counter more as a guide and a reminder to pay attention to what I'm eating (I can be a real mindless eater, not even realizing it until after).

Maybe I'm wrong, but I think many have their activity level at 'sedentary' so get the low calorie allowance as they can then log things like cleaning and shopping, etc and eat back those calories.

EbbySoo

1700 (rest day base)-5000 depending on the week/training etc. Food is fuel.

hales_04

1420, and usually half of the burned cals back

AntWrig

I have heard that your can take your goal weight and multiply it by 10... so if you want to weigh 130 you should eat 1300 per day... However, MFP has me eating less than 10x my goal weight, but I am super tall so that is prob why... I would follow what they recommend though. Because I did the whole eating super low calories before and it worked great! until it slowed my metabolism instead of increasing it and made it really difficult to keep the weight off and now to lose it again...

Multiply it by 15 not 10.

15 is generally accepted is maintenance. I would start off at 12-14. Regardless, these are just guesses. What you can do is do x15 and weigh yourself in 2 weeks. If you gained weight, you're consuming too much, and are close to your maintenance. If you lost weight, you can tweak it more.

Stacyanne324

I am 5'11 and currently 163 pounds. I'm following the Spike diet plan and based on that I'm eating 1200 calories 3 days a week, 1500 three days a week, and 3000 on my spike day.

AntWrig

I am 5'11 and currently 163 pounds. I'm following the Spike diet plan and based on that I'm eating 1200 calories 3 days a week, 1500 three days a week, and 3000 on my spike day.

Do you like the extreme swings in days? by the way your weekly calorie intake is only 11,100. Do you know your maintenance?

kristarablue

Less than 500.

Oh honey, why torture yourself. You are young and you don't have a ton to lose, you NEED to eat more than this, bet you lose quicker if you up your calories...doesn't make sense I know, but it seems to work that way. Also as soon as you begin to eat normally you will undo all the work you did ..if there is a medical reason ok, I guess, but please consider eating a bit more...Just a thought.

Helloitsdan

I am 5'11 and currently 163 pounds. I'm following the Spike diet plan and based on that I'm eating 1200 calories 3 days a week, 1500 three days a week, and 3000 on my spike day.

5'11" BMR is usually around 2k.
Anything below that and youll lose lean mass.
You are just making yourself a smaller version of the fat self.
Not trying to be rude.

I bet youll shed inches at 2200-2500 cals daily!

alandy64

First of all, let me say that I believe this is the wrong place to be asking this question. For the amount of weight loss you want, and your current weight, the best person to answer this question is a registered dietician who has access to your specific goals, current weight, nutritional status, and medical history. You can easily get a referral from your primary care physician or look into programs through your state or county department of health.

Your calorie intake is heavily dependent on your goals, current weight and activity level. Based on what you described, I don't see you actually exercising in a way that would be advantageous to your goals. In other words, you aren't building muscle or working cardiovascularly enough to promote weight loss by increasing your metabolism.

So, those 1430 calories need to be highly efficient for you. 1200 calories is plenty of food when you are not including a rigorous exercise plan. But at your weight, 1400 calories is likely sufficient for a while as well. The problem with 1200 calories is that is the MINIMUM number of calories possible to intake and still receive appropriate nutrition - assuming that EVERY calorie is of high nutritive value (i.e. no baked lays or sugar free cookies - just pure, good, whole food).

If you don't want to increase your exercise at this point (and honestly, it's been shown that exercise actually reduces arthritic pain, so that's not really a viable excuse), I'd make sure that 1. I'm eating no more than 1400 cal/day; 2. That absolutely no more than 30% of my calories are coming from fat (and do not go over 30% in protein either, with 20% recommended by dieticians so as not to screw up your kidneys as those high protein/low carb diets will do); 3. Eat 5 times a day - 3 meals, 2 snacks keeping your meals around 300-400 cal and your snacks at 100-200; and 4. Switching to non-processed foods and increasing your natural, vegetable intake.

It's important to remember that EVERY body is different and reacts differently to food (i.e. therefore, the number of calories you need, etc.). But the one thing that is constant is that if you eat more calories than you burn on a daily basis you'll be overweight and if you don't, you can be fit and healthy.

alandy64

I'm sorry, Dan -but that's not even accurate.

Helloitsdan

I'm sorry, Dan -but that's not even accurate.

How so?
In my experience it is true.

lorenzoinlr

1,400
+ Exercise up to my base metabolism which is 1,860
+ 1/2 my exercise calories over 1,860

Yes, I am very anal.

Most days I'm 1,000+ on exercise calories giving me a total of around 2,100.

If anyone would like my Excel spreadsheet and further detailed analysis I'd be happy to provide it, the only condition being you're abnormally anal like me.

Helloitsdan

I'm sorry, Dan -but that's not even accurate.

How so?
In my experience it is true.

Sry I meant TDEE!
=D

Thats even going to be much higher...like 2400s.

So if you are 5'11" you could in fact eat 2k daily and metabolize a good amount of fat!

Thanx for pointing this out!

Gisna

I meant 1500! Not 500

Di3012

I have my calories at around 1430 per day. I usually eat them and I am working harder at having a better balance of the sugar, fat, carbs etc within the range set by MFP.
I do keep seeing people at the 'magic?' number of 1200. Should I adjust my settings to a lower number or am I fine at 1430?
I have triplets who are 3 and a 4 year old. We are fairly hectic and Im always picking up, cleaning up and catching up after them so I have set my activity level at lightly active. I have athritis in my wrists so for now I am not 'working out' but I am making sure that I am more active during the day ie. walking instead of driving, doing the stairs more than 5 extra times each time I use them etc.
Can those of you that have this figured out please let me know if this sounds ok or if I should eat less,
I'm 5'5 and 238.8lbs. Thanks.

Are you losing weight the way you want to? If so, leave it, why fix something that is not broken.

nasja1984

I'm on 1200 but it does cut down on my energy level if I don't choose my calories very wisely. I usually try to make every calorie really count. Rarely am I hungry.

jching29

Generally I eat about 900, but sometimes (like yesterday) I'll go over that. Generally, though, I just eat when I'm hungry, and that daily comes to less than 1000 calories. MFP recommends I eat just shy of 1200 a day...unless I'm eating out, it's difficult to do that!

Stacyanne324

I am 5'11 and currently 163 pounds. I'm following the Spike diet plan and based on that I'm eating 1200 calories 3 days a week, 1500 three days a week, and 3000 on my spike day.

Do you like the extreme swings in days? by the way your weekly calorie intake is only 11,100. Do you know your maintenance?

Well, other than the 3000 calorie day it doesn't feel that much different between my 1200 and 1500 calorie days. I do the low cal days on the days I'm out of the house a lot more and tend to eat less anyway. And I love Sundays when I relax and eat/drink mostly what I want. It gets me through the rest of the week knowing it's coming and it also always feels good to go back to healthier eating come Monday.
I don't know my maintenance. Honestly this whole plan is pretty new to me but it's finally broken my plateau of the past few weeks and I'm enjoying it so I'm going with it. I'm still playing around with the calorie levels though on the non-spike days. I was eating at the 1500 (my bmr) all 6 days but I found I was wasting calories on wine with dinner or other unhealthy choices so I thought I'd try to do it the way it's intended for a while and cut out some of the booze.

Stacyanne324

I am 5'11 and currently 163 pounds. I'm following the Spike diet plan and based on that I'm eating 1200 calories 3 days a week, 1500 three days a week, and 3000 on my spike day.

5'11" BMR is usually around 2k.
Anything below that and youll lose lean mass.
You are just making yourself a smaller version of the fat self.
Not trying to be rude.

I bet youll shed inches at 2200-2500 cals daily!

For girls? I haven't found a BMR calculator that has given me that high of a figure when I plug it in. When I did it based on my figures it gave me 1530. I round it to 1500 but it's never exact anyway. Even MFP when I set it up to lose a pound a week only allows me 1560 calories a day. So, yes I'm going lower a few days I'm also going well over another day so in the end it works out about the same.... I just get a day to enjoy myself.

niightwind

I'm 5'4'' and 173 pounds at the moment [female].
My BMR is 1630, and I generally eat around 1250-1400 daily.