Increasing Calories - What to expect & why you need patience...
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I'm only 14..I only have time to go to the gym once a week, where I can do weight lifting
I do pop Pilates at home 6 days a week, which I reckon is a sort of strength training... because I can already see a little bit of tricep muscles forming.. and my chest is so much more defined. I do cardio 3 times a week.
Just recently upped my calorie intake from 1200 to 1600
I've been eating at 1200 for 3 weeks
Was wondering if what im doing is enough and does anyone have an advice for me?0 -
Since you're only 14 years old, my advice would be stop focusing on losing weight or dieting, please, as you are still growing. Your body needs extra calories to support this growth. MFP has an age limit of 18 for a very good reason! I'm all for teenagers exercising and building strength (so keep it up!) but it's not sensible to restrict your calories, unless you're looking to stunt your growth with vitamin deficiences etc. You need to fuel your body properlyI'm only 14..I only have time to go to the gym once a week, where I can do weight lifting
I do pop Pilates at home 6 days a week, which I reckon is a sort of strength training... because I can already see a little bit of tricep muscles forming.. and my chest is so much more defined. I do cardio 3 times a week.
Just recently upped my calorie intake from 1200 to 1600
I've been eating at 1200 for 3 weeks
Was wondering if what im doing is enough and does anyone have an advice for me?
Eat at maintenance, eat back exercise calories and keep doing what you're doing with regards to workouts. You'll find that as you grow more your body will naturally take a shape you quite like Patience is key. 0 -
Since you're only 14 years old, my advice would be stop focusing on losing weight or dieting, please, as you are still growing. Your body needs extra calories to support this growth. MFP has an age limit of 18 for a very good reason! I'm all for teenagers exercising and building strength (so keep it up!) but it's not sensible to restrict your calories, unless you're looking to stunt your growth with vitamin deficiences etc. You need to fuel your body properlyI'm only 14..I only have time to go to the gym once a week, where I can do weight lifting
I do pop Pilates at home 6 days a week, which I reckon is a sort of strength training... because I can already see a little bit of tricep muscles forming.. and my chest is so much more defined. I do cardio 3 times a week.
Just recently upped my calorie intake from 1200 to 1600
I've been eating at 1200 for 3 weeks
Was wondering if what im doing is enough and does anyone have an advice for me?
Eat at maintenance, eat back exercise calories and keep doing what you're doing with regards to workouts. You'll find that as you grow more your body will naturally take a shape you quite like Patience is key.
Yeah, i just want to drop 15 poundsand starting feeling more confident and good about my body... thank you for the encouragements and advice! 0 -
It's been one week after upping my calories from 1200 to 1600.... and I can honestly say that this was such a great decision! I felt fuller longer, I didn't get cravings, I fuled my body..... and I have more energy!
Thank god for this group!0 -
It's been one week after upping my calories from 1200 to 1600.... and I can honestly say that this was such a great decision! I felt fuller longer, I didn't get cravings, I fuled my body..... and I have more energy!
Thank god for this group!
You are definitely on the right track! Great to hear that you're enjoying the changes Have you worked out what your true TDEE is yet? Because being an active teenager I think there's still scope for you to be eating even more than 1600 while still seeing positive changes in your body. 0 -
It's been one week after upping my calories from 1200 to 1600.... and I can honestly say that this was such a great decision! I felt fuller longer, I didn't get cravings, I fuled my body..... and I have more energy!
Thank god for this group!
You are definitely on the right track! Great to hear that you're enjoying the changes Have you worked out what your true TDEE is yet? Because being an active teenager I think there's still scope for you to be eating even more than 1600 while still seeing positive changes in your body.
20% cut is About 1950, but i eat back my exercise calories! So i end up eating about 1800-1900 everyday0 -
that'hey guys i know to expect weight gain etc, so the scales are gone, that way i am not going to freak out and eat less again!
But is this feeling pudgy normal?? not bloated as such just pudgy and fat! i look down and all i see is this big wobbly stomach, i am sure it wasn't this pudgy yesterday?
I haven't done measurements, (hasn't even been a full week since i last did them) my clothes fit the same, and for the first time since starting this journey almost 2 weeks ago, i have actually netted my BMR on a normal eating day!
Normal as opposed to my weekly splurge days where i don't bother with cals
Honestly, yes. That is normal. It's just part of the adjustment process as your body re-learns how to digest larger amounts of food. Your metabolism is still used to digesting lower cals. When your body discovers that this is legit, and not just a binge, it will be willing to let go of food a bit faster. At the beginning, our bodies often aren't very trusting of us in this dept., so it thinks it should hold on during the "feast" because "famine" is around the corner. You should expect this every time you raise the cals.
That's exactly how I'm feeling after a week of upping cala. Glad it's normal. I used to be a low cal/binger but I'm not going back there. I've done this for a week and haven't wanted to binge at all. I feel pretty full and satisfied0 -
Bump0
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I found this group as I was researching why I lost 7 pounds in 5 weeks. Now, nothing for 6 weeks, even though I've been netting under my goal, exercising more, and even cut out alcohol. Duh, I was netting under my BMR. I first came across the road map rules that made sense to me. Now that I've found this group it makes even more sense. MFP had me set to 1300, which I really did not have a hard time with. I was eating 5-6 small meals a day and sometimes eating back (or drinking back until I cut wayyyy back on that 2 weeks ago) some my exercise calories. I would end up netting anywhere from 800-1300 cal. However, when I followed the formulas, my BMR is more like 1400.
I am ready for upping my calories and getting back on track but I have a few questions I hope anyone can help me with. BTW, I had a slow day at work and literally read all 18 pages of this thread, including the links! You would think I was an expert but I do want to know more.
On the road map rules it looks like the 20% cut is more common. What is the benefit of 15% over 20% cut?
I understand that I pick my exercise level and then dont count my exercise calories unless I will net under my BMR. But what if I really like to log my exercise calories? Doing this is a real motivator for me. Im a total anal list maker kind of person and I love logging my activity and seeing it count towards something. Im scared if I stop dong this I will loose the motivation. My question is, can I set my MFP goal to my BMR or "sedentary/desk" activity level and then log my exercise?
I understand that I never want to NET below my BMR, or EAT less then my cut TDEE. This is another reason why I want to log my exercise. If I use my 20% cut number, there is only a 345 calorie difference from my BMR. On my exercise days I can easily go over this, meaning I would need to eat the difference back, so I need to keep track one way or the other.
However, if I use my 15% cut, there is a 625 calorie difference, which I may come close to, but probably wont exercise over. But, then Im afraid if I use this number and I know I dont need to worry about eating back any exercise calories, I may not exercise as much. I know it may sound strange, but I really like that motivator of knowing what my NET is when I add the exercise in.
Then there is the whole "pick your exercise category" It seems so vague to me. I just ordered a heart rate monitor that I am really excited to use and compare just how accurate (or inaccurate) MFP has been. I've had one in the past so I do have a pretty good idea and I dont think its been that for off. My exercise currently includes lifting free weights, body weight workouts, running, swimming, yoga and HIIT. Some days only 20 minutes, other days 2 hours. I did go back and add up last weeks time and I came up with 4.5 hours of exercise. I log anywhere from 130 calories to 650 burned per work out.
Here are my numbers
145lbs
5' 4.5"
41 years old
22.5% BF
I used both Scooby and Fat2Fit for my calculations. They were within 100-150 of each other, so I just did an average
BMR 1431
15% cut
TDEE sedentary 1460
moderate activity (3-5hours/week) 2057
20% cut
TDEE sedentary 1374
moderate activity 1775
I am having a really hard time knowing what to plug in MFP. I will say it again, I really want to log my exercise. What are the opinions on setting my goal to 1550 (about 100 over my BMR) Then, logging my exercise and eating back the calories so that my NET is never under 1430 and my EAT is never less then 1850? (I came up with this number as something between 15% and 20% cut.
I know this is a really long post and Im hoping anyone is willing to take the time to read it and help me. I am 100% open to advice and willing to do what it takes to loose weight. My goal weight is 135 and 16-18% BF. but I really would love to see if I could get to 125. Being only 5'4.5" it seems reasonable.
Thanks to everyone who has posted here. It looks like a great support community and I am looking forward to being a part of it.
I love these questions...I wish someone would answer them! :~)0 -
I needed to read this.
I lost 15 lbs slowly last year then stopped losing completely in Nov. I'm pretty sure I'm not netting enough at the end of the day.
So I calculated my BMR as 1591 so I should be NETTING this and I'm NO WHERE close.
My TDEE is 2463. So my cut 15% would be 2,094. (Am I doing the math right? I'm terrible with numbers)
So yeah someone hand me something to eat ASAP.
THANK YOU for this post again!!0 -
HI I am new here. So here is my back story. got up to 210 a few years ago. I always said if I ever hit 200+ that was it I had to do something. So stared to watch my calories and dropped 10 pounds it took me 5 months. started using MFP dropping my cals really low to 12000 and lost another 10 pounds in 2 months. Was laid up with a knee injury at the time. Come Sept. my doctor put me on a controversial diet and I lost 13 pounds and 3% body weight in 32 days. I tried the same diet on my own and kept dropping pounds until i reached 145. Then I kept losing and regaining the 10-20 pounds. Decided to take a break and just eat and exercise. My body seemed happy, I was putting on muscle and toning like crazy but staying the same size. Realize now I was probably in a building phase. Everyone kept telling me how good I looked but I freaked out at the scales going up. So tried to diet again. BIG mistake. so stopped again. it took me months to get my body stable again. then got in an accident. and started eating everything in sight. I realize now my weight did not really jump considering what I was eating. So after I healed I stared to drop my cals again. But indulged over the holidays and was dropping again. Started to work out again and drop cals. saw changes in my body but not on the scale. Finally found EM2WL. Realized the reason I dropped over the holidays was the increase in cals. so been reading posts and wanted to ask for advice.
my stats: 5'2.5" age 35 current weight 167-168lb. last bf%32
I do light to moderate cardio almost daily (hike, walk, elliptical, recumbent stationary, treadmill, WATP videos) cant lift right now due to shoulder issues (based on dr. advice) working out at home
katch cal calculator for 1-3 hours a week BMR 1490, TDEE 2049, 15% 1742
katch cal calculator for 3-5 hours a week BMR 1490, TDEE 2310, 15% 1963
Wanted to start at 15% for a few weeks before going up to TDEE.
day 1 168.8lb. 1509cal 330cals burn in exercise
day 2 2068cals 571cals burned in ex.
day 3 1993cals
day 4 2573cals 129cals burned in ex.
day 5 2045cals 194cals burned in ex.
day 6 today 167.6 pounds
So far 5 days down around a pound and possible a few inches. You can see my cals have been all over and some days a bit over TDEE. Any advice on how to proceed?
p..s sorry for the long post.
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bumpity bump!0
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Thank you!
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Awesome awesome post!! Bump!0
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bump0
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Fantastic post! It worked for me! Took 6 weeks to regain a few, stabilize and start to lose again.
I used this spreadsheet:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Amt7QBR9-c6MdGVTbGswLUUzUHNVVUlNSW9wZWloeUE
I thought it more thorough than Scooby's calculators.0 -
I set up a spreadsheet and I log my calorie intake, weight, calorie burn daily. I have a formula in it that deducts the burn from the intake and calculate the net calories. I also deduct this from my BMR to make sure I am not going below my net BMR and I have it calculate my daily deficit. I set up my spreadsheet to add up my total deficit for each week. It looks to me like you have a few low days but not lower than your BMR. You have a high day or two (one over your TDEE. It is the weekly deficit so you probably came out fine. I set up the spreadsheet because I have daily variations in my calorie intake and burn and it helps me see if I am eating too little or too much. Since I have some weight fluctuation as well this spreadsheets helps me see the trend. If you had a time where you were eating more such as the holidays it seems like a reset may not be necessary. If you feel your metabolism slowed down from eating lower calories then you would probably benefit from a reset of a month of eating at TDEE. You can gain at first when you up your calories but if after a few weeks you will come down assuming it is an accurate TDEE for you. I did my best at a reset eating 2200 plus exercise calories (MFP maintenance for me) before cutting by 15% from that. I did it since I had been eating below my BMR for a few years before I realized how detrimental that can be or even what my BMR was.HI I am new here. So here is my back story. got up to 210 a few years ago. I always said if I ever hit 200+ that was it I had to do something. So stared to watch my calories and dropped 10 pounds it took me 5 months. started using MFP dropping my cals really low to 12000 and lost another 10 pounds in 2 months. Was laid up with a knee injury at the time. Come Sept. my doctor put me on a controversial diet and I lost 13 pounds and 3% body weight in 32 days. I tried the same diet on my own and kept dropping pounds until i reached 145. Then I kept losing and regaining the 10-20 pounds. Decided to take a break and just eat and exercise. My body seemed happy, I was putting on muscle and toning like crazy but staying the same size. Realize now I was probably in a building phase. Everyone kept telling me how good I looked but I freaked out at the scales going up. So tried to diet again. BIG mistake. so stopped again. it took me months to get my body stable again. then got in an accident. and started eating everything in sight. I realize now my weight did not really jump considering what I was eating. So after I healed I stared to drop my cals again. But indulged over the holidays and was dropping again. Started to work out again and drop cals. saw changes in my body but not on the scale. Finally found EM2WL. Realized the reason I dropped over the holidays was the increase in cals. so been reading posts and wanted to ask for advice.
my stats: 5'2.5" age 35 current weight 167-168lb. last bf%32
I do light to moderate cardio almost daily (hike, walk, elliptical, recumbent stationary, treadmill, WATP videos) cant lift right now due to shoulder issues (based on dr. advice) working out at home
katch cal calculator for 1-3 hours a week BMR 1490, TDEE 2049, 15% 1742
katch cal calculator for 3-5 hours a week BMR 1490, TDEE 2310, 15% 1963
Wanted to start at 15% for a few weeks before going up to TDEE.
day 1 168.8lb. 1509cal 330cals burn in exercise
day 2 2068cals 571cals burned in ex.
day 3 1993cals
day 4 2573cals 129cals burned in ex.
day 5 2045cals 194cals burned in ex.
day 6 today 167.6 pounds
So far 5 days down around a pound and possible a few inches. You can see my cals have been all over and some days a bit over TDEE. Any advice on how to proceed?
p..s sorry for the long post.
Created by MyFitnessPal.com - Free Weight Loss Tools0 -
On the road map rules it looks like the 20% cut is more common. What is the benefit of 15% over 20% cut?
IPOARM is making used of the fat2fit site, and while it helps you calculate your BF%, allows you to enter it for BMR calc, and displays the Katch BMR based on using it, the actual table for eating goal is based on the least accurate and inflated when overweight Harris BMR. Go ahead, change the BF% to anything you like, the TDEE table stays the same.
So you are really taking a 20% deficit off an inflated TDEE, instead of a more accurate TDEE based on Katch BMR.
EM2WL is taking smaller deficit to encourage people that have been eating Low Calorie Diet's and will have lost muscle mass on them, to at least gain back LBM, if not a tad little muscle at the beginning by lifting heavy.
You can take the bigger deficit while lifting heavy and maintain muscle mass and LBM, just less possible to gain.I understand that I pick my exercise level and then dont count my exercise calories unless I will net under my BMR. But what if I really like to log my exercise calories? Doing this is a real motivator for me. Im a total anal list maker kind of person and I love logging my activity and seeing it count towards something. Im scared if I stop dong this I will loose the motivation. My question is, can I set my MFP goal to my BMR or "sedentary/desk" activity level and then log my exercise?
I'd actually ignore that rule unless you are dead accurate on calorie burn, and HRM will not be. For starters, even if the HRM was totally accurate, it is reflecting total burned during that time. But you were going to burn your BMR even if you slept, so in reality, that would need to be subtracted for that time. And actually, since you are accounting for all calories, you would actually remove the non-exercise TDEE calories already accounted for that time. So even from a totally accurate HRM calorie burn figure pretend, 500 calories in 60 min becomes 355 actually burned above and beyond what was already accounted for.
Now take into effect how incorrect the HRM is. Now, treadmill and MFP entries for walking and jogging up to 6.3 mph are much more accurate, but that is still total calories including BMR and TDEE already accounted for. Take those, almost always nothing to worry about. Besides which your bodies needs don't stop at midnight, and they can be made up the next day too.I understand that I never want to NET below my BMR, or EAT less then my cut TDEE. This is another reason why I want to log my exercise. If I use my 20% cut number, there is only a 345 calorie difference from my BMR. On my exercise days I can easily go over this, meaning I would need to eat the difference back, so I need to keep track one way or the other.
However, if I use my 15% cut, there is a 625 calorie difference, which I may come close to, but probably wont exercise over. But, then Im afraid if I use this number and I know I dont need to worry about eating back any exercise calories, I may not exercise as much. I know it may sound strange, but I really like that motivator of knowing what my NET is when I add the exercise in.
That is a very valid way of doing it. Those with variable workouts need it. Those that realize you must learn to eat correctly for your level of activity prefer to break that down to daily not weekly level.
But you take a deficit off non-exercise TDEE. And then you take the same % deficit off any calories logged, after first removing the already account for calories I mentioned above.Then there is the whole "pick your exercise category" It seems so vague to me. I just ordered a heart rate monitor that I am really excited to use and compare just how accurate (or inaccurate) MFP has been. I've had one in the past so I do have a pretty good idea and I dont think its been that for off. My exercise currently includes lifting free weights, body weight workouts, running, swimming, yoga and HIIT. Some days only 20 minutes, other days 2 hours. I did go back and add up last weeks time and I came up with 4.5 hours of exercise. I log anywhere from 130 calories to 650 burned per work out.
Very true, is 60 min of walking the same as 60 min of lifting the same as 60 min of intense cardio? No way. There are better Activity Calculators.
And don't go assuming the HRM is right and therefore MFP must be wrong. In fact, MFP database and the treadmill for walking the speed indicated while level are more accurate than your HRM. As long as treadmill allowed you to input weight. Test your HRM in fact, valid test against the treadmill.Here are my numbers
145lbs
5' 4.5"
41 years old
22.5% BF
I used both Scooby and Fat2Fit for my calculations. They were within 100-150 of each other, so I just did an average
BMR 1431
15% cut
TDEE sedentary 1460
moderate activity (3-5hours/week) 2057
20% cut
TDEE sedentary 1374
moderate activity 1775
I am having a really hard time knowing what to plug in MFP. I will say it again, I really want to log my exercise. What are the opinions on setting my goal to 1550 (about 100 over my BMR) Then, logging my exercise and eating back the calories so that my NET is never under 1430 and my EAT is never less then 1850? (I came up with this number as something between 15% and 20% cut.
So, to all the things above.
You can start with the best estimate of BMR, Katch based on good estimated BF%.
You can get better estimated TDEE with better Activity Calculator.
You can leave exercise out of that, and get a value for non-exercise TDEE with a deficit for daily goal.
And then log your exercise, with correct deficit's in it to benefit too.
You can see if your HRM is getting decent burn estimates, or get your own based on best personal stats.
This is all in the spreadsheet linked here. Simple Setup tab, then MFP Tweak tab, then Macros tab, the HRM tab.
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/813720-spreadsheet-bmr-tdee-deficit-macro-calcs-hrm-zones0 -
thanks will check out the spreadsheet. kc0
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Thank you,
I began this process a week and a half a go. I have gained about 2 kilos since starting it. I have been yoyo dieting for years. I have had this repeating process of shake diets, regain and then shake diets again. This is the first time I have done it with actual food. So now I understand that the gaining process is normal. Thank you again.0
