Question to those who have lost 50+

Alexstrasza

Just a few simple question to help me with some thoughts/calculations.

If you have lost 50+ lbs please answer these for me.

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR?

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE?

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them?

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long?

5. What were your macro's set at?

Thanks in advance!!!!

Alexstrasza

Bump

JoniBologna

1. Above.
2. Below.
3. Yes, most of the time.
4. My exercise amount has varied quite a bit. I am a long distance hiker, so I often exercise for several hours a week. I don't think that's necessary for most people though. It's just my hobby.
5. 40carbs/30fats/30protein.

mauryr

Hiya.

My consumption varied as I progressed. When I started I was quite overweight, well into the "obese" range of BMI. At that point, I ate 1200 gross calories per day, with no problems (eg I wasn't hungry all the time, at least after the first week or two). When I say "gross calories" I mean that I didn't eat back exercise cals, and I was doing about 300/day of exercise, 3-5 days/week.

As time progressed, and I lost weight, I found that I was becoming hungrier. When my BMI approached "normal", I started eating back exercise calories, so I was "Netting" 1200 to 1500 cals. I was also exercising more, perhaps 450 to 550 per day (usually 5 days/week). - this was at about the 50 lbs mark.

Now, I net between 1450 and 1800/day, usually closer to the lower number. My weekly average is about 1450/day (but I "spike" some days - meaning that I go way over on some days, but make it up on other days) but I exercise between 600 and 1100 per day usually 5 or 6 days a week... so I'm consuming 2000-3000 per day gross.

As far as macros: I don't like carbs, so I naturally eat about 33%-33%-33% carbs, proteins, fats. This may seem like a lot of fats, but in raw numbers, I eat significantly less fat cals than the defaults of MFP... it's just that the carbs are such a lower proportion that it skews the others. For instance: Yesterday I did 69g fats, 127g protein and 87 g carbs. That's 2g over on fats, 53g over on protein, and 187g under on carbs (from default mfp settings)... so it seems to me that I'm certainly fine on my fat consumption... even though that puts me at a whopping 42% of my total cals being from fats, 34% from protein, and 24% from carbs. (average is about 33-33-33) Fats simply come along with the proteins in most cases for me, as I eat lots of turkey, some (lean) pork, and use olive oil to cook with.

I know that my response isn't as organized as your question, but I hope it helps!

Alexstrasza

Thank you both for your answers!!

wisebadger53

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR? ABOVE

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE? BELOW

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them? SOME (25% - 45%)

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long? 5 - 6 TIMES FOR 45 - 60 MINUTES EACH TIME

5. What were your macro's set at? CHANGED FROM TIME TO TIME, BUT GENERALLY LOWERED MY CARBS AND RAISED MY PROTEIN

170isreal

I exercise on and off

I generally eat my exercise calories but not all the time

I eat what MFP tells me (currently 1510 calories)

I have a cheat day

Some days I am under on my calories some days I am over

52lbs has taken me 6 months, it went fast though

jennifer52484

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR? I met my macros.

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE? I met my macros per day.. that is all i cared about

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them? no

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long? 7days/week minimum of 30 mins cardio/day, MW upper body Tuesthurs lower body.

5. What were your macro's set at? pro/carbs/fat 170g/125g/35g

xolivyy08xo

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR? Below

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE? below

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them? not usually I don't unless I'm really hungry that day!

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long? 5 to 6 times anywhere from 15 to over 60

5. What were your macro's set at? I'm not sure but I never really went over anything but sodium occasionally

aheartbeatsos

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR?
My BMR is ~1611. I usually eat below it.

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE?
My TDEE is ~2480. I always eat below it.

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them? SOME (25% - 45%)
I seldom eat my calories back. If I know I'm going to be going out, I exercise in the morning so I if I need to I can eat my calories back.

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long?
4-5 days a week for 1.5 hours.

5. What were your macro's set at?
Carbs - 206
Fat - 42
Protein - 75
Sodium - 2500

LatinaGordita

I started out very obese as well started at 226 on January 7 ,2012, currently about 172lbs.

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR? Stuck to 1200 cals, what MFP set for me.

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE? Stuck to 1200 cals, what MFP set for me.

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them? Rarely, maybe 10 to 20%

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long? 5 to 6 times a week for 60 minutes

5. What were your macro's set at? 30% carbs (100grams or less), 40% protein (120grams or more) and 30% fat (never really worried about fat grams)

Rayman79

1. At or above
2. below (there is no way you can lose weight eating above your TDEE)
3. Yep!
4. 5-6 days a week, mix of resistance and cardio work
5. 40C, 35P, 25F, though this varies, and I'm a believer in doing what my body wants (within reason). For example, I might go a couple of days pretty low carb, then have a really high carb day if Im feeling a little drained.

rileamoyer

bump

freew67

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR? I ate what MFP said.

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE? Is that a bra size?

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them? I would eat some back, always a little snack afterwords. On avg 40-50% back, upwards of 80% but almost never 100% (unless dinner put me over and I worked out to be back in the plus).

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long? AVG 3-4 times a week, 30-60 mins, sometimes longer then 60 but almost never shorter then 30.

5. What were your macro's set at? See question 1.

Im down 81 just by walking with a tic of jogging, and going by only cals up till recently. Granted Im sure that doesnt work for everyone. Then again, if the lbs were coming off I wasnt going to change what I was doing.

Sarah_Wins

1. Don't know

2. Don't care

3. Not even close

4. 6 days (8-9 times, .5 - 2 hrs)

5. 5% carbs

angimac

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR? I haven't gotten into all that. I started out with 1200 recommended calories a day because I started out totally sedentary. My metabolism was all screwed up, and I had a hard time making myself eat 1200 calories in a day.

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE? I don't even know what my TDEE is

3. Did you eat your exercise calories back? If so what percentage of them? I didn't when I first started using MFP, I sometimes do now. If I do, it varies. I don't eat them back because they are there. I eat because I"m hungry and it sometimes goes into the extra calories I get from exercise.

4. How often did you exercise per week and for how long? When I first started out, I walked 45 minutes to an hour, once, sometimes twice a day, almost every day, unless the weather didn't permit me to walk (and I walked some days in the pouring rain). Walking is really the only "real" exercise that I have done.

5. What were your macro's set at? Whatever MFP set them at.

I realize that a lot of people work out harder and longer and stuff than I do, but what I'm doing has worked for me. And not only have I lost 123 pounds, my husband has lost 80 and my son has lost 50

mikewpg1ca

While reviewing the replies from the posters who've had so much success, I noted the majority of them all have a common theme (which really isn't that surprising I guess), they exercised - walked, hiked, ran, etc. 4-6 times a week to accomplish their goals.

waldo56

1. Way above

2/3. Each day I have a net calorie goal (that I calculate from moving averages of weigh in results). Eating adds positive calories, exercise adds negative calories. I try to stay near my daily net target. So in a sense yes to both. Not eating your exercise calories applies to people who don't try very hard, I burn 800-1100 calories exercising a day. LOL @ not eating back those calories. Too big of a deficit is a surefire way to stall.

4. I usually exercise about 1.5-2 hours a day, of which about 45 minutes is walking. 7 days a week. On recovery days I do the P90X Yoga video or run for a half hour or so.

5. I set it to the Zone ratios (C-40, F-30, P-30), but I really don't care, the only macro related thing I look at is if I meet my protein goal, which is 1 g/lb LBM (175g in my case). I usually eat higher carb than fat.

TeddyBear47

Just a few simple question to help me with some thoughts/calculations.

If you have lost 50+ lbs please answer these for me.

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR?

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE?

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them?

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long?

5. What were your macro's set at?

Thanks in advance!!!!

1. Below

2. Below

3. No

4. 5 to 6 days a week, 1 hour

psiren28

If you have lost 50+ lbs please answer these for me.

1. Did you eat at, below, or above your BMR? Below with one spike day per week (sometimes 2 when I had loads to lose)

2. Did you eat at, below, or above your TDEE? Below

3. Did you eat your excercise calories back? If so what percentage of them? depends how hungry I was, usually about 50% back

4. How often did you excercise per week and for how long? 3 times for about an hour (just walking and zumba)

5. What were your macro's set at? I pay no attention to macros This probably isn't so good but I really can't be bothered

cherbapp

Great poll...I am really encouraged by all the responses!

I have done both the straight MFP route....1200 calories, basic MFP settings for macros but only watched calories for the first 4 months. Lost 40 pounds Then plateaued, and tried the whole BMR TDEE thing for about 6 weeks with little luck, lost maybe 2 pounds. Went back to the 1200 calories but set my macros according to bob harpers skinny rules...high protein, slightly higher fat and lower carbs...and low sodium....and I moved the scale a few pounds in the last week!

The entire time I have walked about 3-4 hours per week. 10-16 miles.