My daily Cals and BMR question

ChantelZf

So my daily intake of cal at sedentary activity, spend most of the day sitting (desk job) is 1450 but I used the BMR today and it gave me 1950. keeping in mind that it is "an estimate of how many calories you'd burn if you were to do nothing but rest for 24 hours. It represents the minimum amount of energy needed to keep your body functioning, including breathing and keeping your heart beating."


also suggestions on if I'm not getting enough based on the daily goal, or it might be estimating too much on the BMR?

RunMyOregonBunsOff

The BMR probably isn't taking in to consideration the calorie defficet that you need to lose weight. With the info you gave you should be losing 1 lb per week. I'm no pro so I could be wrong but that is how I understand it.

Pebble321

You need to look at one more number here to make sense of things.
Your BMR (the cals you need just to stay alive doing nothing) is 1950.
You also need to account for the regular activity you do every day (walking around, going to work, doing things at home etc). If you are pretty sedentary then you multiply your BMR x 1.2

This means that your body burns around 2340 cals a day to stay alive and do your regular daily activities at home and work.

To lose weight you need to create a calorie deficit. If you told MFP you want to lose 2 pounds/wk then MFP will subtract 1000 cals from this amount, giving you 1340 cals a day.

You might find it more realistic to aim for 1 pound a week loss, so you subtract 500 cals - giving you 1840 cals a day to eat.

When you exercise you need to give your body more calories to fuel that exercise. So, if you workout and burn 300 cals you can eat an extra 300 cals. You still have that deficit of 1000 or 500 cals that you created before exercising.

MFP does all these sums for you - have a look at your goals page and you'll see it all there.

ChantelZf

This makes perfect sense I said i wanted to loose 1.5 pounds I think. so it's right I was just wondering if maybe it was too low because I havnt been losing in a long while, but although I have been sure to maintain what I've lost I've been doing cheating because I'm low on motivation and energy, I've been sick. I notice I lose easier on higher daily cals, so I was thinking I should raise it and see how it goes

Pebble321

It is a low amount to be eating - don't forget that MFP assumes you will eat more on days when you exercise.
Or maybe 1.5 pounds a week just isn't realistic for your body or your lifestyle - you need to find something that you can stick to for the long term, that is what really matters.

And if you've been sick and low on energy - I'd take that as a big clue that you need to be getting more nutrition. Either eating more calories, eating more nutritious food - or both.

ChantelZf

I completely agree, I did my best and felt my best when I was eating more and exercising more, it was easier to stay to it aswell. But this was before my full-time job. Now I'm stuck at a desk and it sucks the energy right out of me not to mention we basically breath in each others faces half the time so the colds the go through get almost everyone, we use the same head sets and don't have any sanitizers??? I don;t know what we're supposed to do we've all said something like 3 times each already I bring my own hand stuff but that dose nothing for the head sets.

Lowered my weight loss to 1lb a week, its 1950 I believe now.


But besides this, exercise! I can't decide if a 40$ gym membership at Cali fitness is a better idea then getting my own elliptical? what are your preferences for working out?

Pebble321

The best exercise is one that you enjoy and will continue to do after the first novelty wears off!

For me that means running, and signing up for races motivates me to train even when it's cold outside (1C this morning, and I did NOT want to go!)

For you - who knows? Will you go to the gym or will it be too easy to put that off? Would you be more likely to use the elliptical because you can fit it into a shorter space of time at home before or after work? Maybe you could ask the gym for a free week trial and check out the facilities and classes then you can decide if you would be likely to be motivated to go there on a regular basis.

kazhowe

MFP gave me a calorie allowance of 1200 per day to lose between 1-2lbs a week. I found that after the initial few pounds loss that I just couldn't seem to lose much weight at all. I did some research and found that my BMR is 1471 and I decided to eat that amount and if I did some exercise then I would eat back some of the calories. It worked for me - with the higher calories I am losing weight better.