Somebody who knows their stuff....help!

heybales

Currently I am aiming for (and have been since he was born) the mpf recommended 1200 calories plus an additional 500 for breastfeeding. ... Plus eating back most, if not all, my exercise calories. I'm averaging 1-2 lbs loss/week.

Just so you know why MFP suggested 1200 - because you selected the biggest weight loss goal of 2 lbs wk.

But math-wise, your 1600 BMR and MFP estimated maintenance of probably 1920 (based on you selecting sedentary), really would be a value of 920 goal calories for 2lb / wk or 1000 / day.

But they have 1 safety factor, don't net below 1200, so they left it there.

They have no such smart factor, don't eat below your estimated BMR.

Good job eating back your exercise calories, you see the benefit there.

But it should work for a while, slowly but surely decreasing the amount of loss / week.

But, if those intense workouts are taking out your glucose stores, you'll also have the body start breaking down muscle to make glucose to burn the fat, which will indeed happen even though you are exercising.

But at least 1 lb of muscle only has about 600 cal of energy (compared to 1 lb fat at 3500), so on a big deficit, you can really lose some good weight by just a minor amount of muscle loss, compared to how long it would take using up the fat energy.

dreambig81

Hi Im bfing my baby (7 months next month!) MFP has me at round 1300 cals and if you look in the food database for breastfeeding you can select one for -500 which will boost your intake to 1700 (since you bf exclusively atm) I have mine at -300 as she has started solids, good luck and losing weight with a baby IS possible, I dont have *that* much to lose but its coming off fast since I started counting what i eat and excersizing 20mins a day.