Question about calories?

kissedbytheocean

I read this article: http://www.livestrong.com/article/415893-eating-1-200-calories-per-day-exercising-and-not-losing-weight/

It says "risk of weight gain when calories are increased". Is this true?

Right now, at 5'6" and 143 lb., I'm eating about 1,200 calories a day and would like to increase it later on when I'm not so sedentary, but don't want to gain any weight back.

Anyone have any input? I'm kind of confused. :huh:

StarkLark

You "risk" gaining weight anytime you consume any type of calories. That doesn't mean you will. Use an online calculator to figure out your TDEE then shoot for 500 calories below that. once you do that for a few weeks you can adjust your intake up or down based on your results.

HMVOL7409

There's always the risk and many do at first only to see the initial gain fall off quickly. It's all individual; I have yet to gain at all during my calorie increases. Currently at 1800 trying for 2000 for maintence. I started MFP at 1200.

Cmandy67

What is TDEE

StarkLark

So for example, using this link

http://www.fitnessfrog.com/calculators/tdee-calculator.html

And putting in the information you provided, female, 143 lbs, 5'6", 22 years young, and a sedentary lifestyle, your TDEE might be roughly 1773 calories per day.

This means that each day you might burn around 1773 calories. In order to lose weight, you must burn more calories than you consume. So subtract 500 from your TDEE and your calorie goal would be 1273 calories per day.

A pound of fat is 3500 calories, so if you are at a deficit of 500 per day, you can lose 1 pound per week (500 cals x 7 days per week = 3500 calorie deficit)

Now all of this can change depending on what you select for your daily activity level on that link above. Fill it out yourself and see what you get!

StarkLark

What is TDEE

Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) is an estimate of the total number of calories you burn in a day. Generally speaking TDEE is comprised of the calories your body burns just to stay warm and alive plus any calories you burn from moving around and exercising.

StarkLark

Here is another link that runs the same formula (as well as a few other calculators) but also has some more explanation of the concepts:

http://thefitgirls.com/tdee-calculator.aspx

kissedbytheocean

Here is another link that runs the same formula (as well as a few other calculators) but also has some more explanation of the concepts:

http://thefitgirls.com/tdee-calculator.aspx

Thanks very much for the lengthy explanation. I think I get it a little more now.

StarkLark

Always happy to help It took me a bit of time to figure out all the acronyms, formulas, and math, so I'm always happy to explain a bit. Feel free to reply here or message me directly if you have any questions. Good luck!:drinker: