Did you increase your calories with positive results?

2

Replies

  • Favor_fire
    Favor_fire Posts: 11
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/654536-in-place-of-a-road-map-2-0-revised-7-2-12

    Yes, still losing (more inches than pounds), exercising smart, eating healthy, never hungry anymore. The best benefit? If I had to do this for the rest of my life? I definitely could. And I definitely will.

    Check this site out. All are welcome. :smile:

    I think I'm going to try this. Just for clarification -- is TDEE the number in the final chart that takes into account your activity level?
  • literatelier
    literatelier Posts: 209 Member
    I was netting about 1200 calories from May through the end of July. I lost the first 10 pounds pretty quickly, but then nothing for a verrry long time. It was super frustrating! Started researching and began upping my calories. I eat now about 1600 to 2000 per day depending on how much I exercise - but rarely less than that. I've been consistently losing 2lbs per week for three weeks now, so I'm a believer!
  • beachlover317
    beachlover317 Posts: 2,848 Member
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/654536-in-place-of-a-road-map-2-0-revised-7-2-12

    Yes, still losing (more inches than pounds), exercising smart, eating healthy, never hungry anymore. The best benefit? If I had to do this for the rest of my life? I definitely could. And I definitely will.

    Check this site out. All are welcome. :smile:

    I think I'm going to try this. Just for clarification -- is TDEE the number in the final chart that takes into account your activity level?

    TDEE is the number of cals you need to maintain your present weight. IT does take into acount your activity level. Dan (helloitsdan) has also started a group on MFP (In Place of a Roadmap) and it lets us be able to get questions answered by people who have been doing this for a while - including Dan. If you working on your numbers from the site and hit a snag, you can pm Dan and he will help! Good luck!!!
  • Onaughmae
    Onaughmae Posts: 873 Member
    Increasing my calories and protein seems to have helped me break that stubborn plateau I was on. I think just mixing it up in general helps. Keeps your metabolism on its toes! :happy:
  • geebusuk
    geebusuk Posts: 3,348 Member
    Oh, I meant to say that increasing my calorie count did slow my rate of loss a little; as I expected.
  • monicalosesweight
    monicalosesweight Posts: 1,173 Member
    I've been eating what Myfitnesspal tells me is appropriate for my fitness level. I'm on my feet all day and was really surprised at how much walking I'm doing here at work. The Fitbit was an eye opener. In fact, I discovered I was definitely not eating enough (and the right foods too) and now that I'm doing that I'm slowly losing weight. I suspect before I started this I was actually starving my body and hadn't realized it. The good foods though do make a big difference.
  • cappri
    cappri Posts: 1,089 Member
    After 5 months of losing weight steadily at right around a 2 pound a week average, my weight loss then sputtered and stalled for most of the summer. Honestly I felt like I was fighting the scale to get the weight off. Two weeks ago I made the decision to start eating my exercise calories, I had been totally afraid to do this. I use WW so I switched my tracker to using my Activity Points first but only on the day I earn them. I then committed to eating at least half of all AP I earned. I also signed up for MFP and began tracking here to get a better look at my nutrition and have a back up calorie count for those exercise calories.

    So far it's been a huge success, I've lost 6 pounds in the last two weeks. The nice thing is I can see the scale moving steadily down again on a daily basis. I workout almost every day, and I eat almost all of my calories back. I've only had one day when my WW points and my MFP calories didn't really jibe, which happened to be yesterday when I was at work for a meeting and filled up on a lot of fruit at lunch. Usually even with fruit and veggies being zero points, the two trackers are pretty similar in calories/points used for the day.
  • PrincessNikkiBoo
    PrincessNikkiBoo Posts: 330 Member
    Bump
  • rlwart
    rlwart Posts: 47 Member
    There's a group here on MFP called Eating for the Future You (or me) I don't remember exactly, and we do just this, we eat the calories for maintaining the goal weight. More than 1200 in most cases, I assume.
  • rlwart
    rlwart Posts: 47 Member
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/groups/home/3088-eating-for-future-you
  • Favor_fire
    Favor_fire Posts: 11
    Thank you! Going to try and find it now :)
  • wendytc
    wendytc Posts: 189 Member
    Great info!
  • gypsybree
    gypsybree Posts: 218
    I was eating at 1660 and losing nothing, struggling to keep off what I lost already. All summer I didn't lose after having lost at least ten pounds a month previously. So I figured I'm tracking and been doing it since March without missing a day. So I upped to maintenance levels, thinking if I gained then I could drop it back down. So I lost 3 pounds.
    I'm still losing at maintenance levels. On average for a week I eat about 120 calories less per day than my maintenance goals--that includes eating my workout calories.
  • LuLuSUPER
    LuLuSUPER Posts: 189
    I have upped my calories and lost a pound a weekfor first two weeks. Amd starting to implememnt carb cycling now. my body is happy, so happy now !!

    I have been losing a pound a week, with or without exercise.
  • candctaber
    candctaber Posts: 274
    bump
  • greeneyed84
    greeneyed84 Posts: 427 Member
    I started at 1200 calories because, like everyone else in the world, I wanted to lose the weight as quickly as possible. (Plus exercise calories. I always at my exercise calories.)

    That lasted a month, until I realized that the only time I lost more than one pound a week was when I had a stomach flu.

    So, I figured, if I'm only going to lose one pound a week, why not set my goal to one pound a week? Then I got 1350. And that very first week, I lost 1.5 pounds. :happy: I continued at that until I got about 10 pounds from my goal, then I switched to a half pound a week, which was around 1500.

    When I reached my initial goal weight, I stopped logging on weekends, but kept at 1500. I also increased my protein and aimed for a minimum of 100g a day. That month, I averaged one pound a week. While only trying to lose a half pound a week, and only logging Monday through Friday.

    So... yeah, increasing calories was a very good thing for me. In the past, I thought the only way to lose would be to continue to eat less and less and less. I was wrong. :smile:

    That's a terrific example to a lot of people here who starve themselves and see nothing wrong with it. Go you!
  • tara0825
    tara0825 Posts: 5 Member
    Bump...to read later. :)
  • ElleFerguson
    ElleFerguson Posts: 51 Member
    Thanks for the head's up on the Scooby's BMR webpage. I'd like to find out more about this as I tend to have a difficult time losing weight as of late.
  • Fiona_Bullough
    Fiona_Bullough Posts: 138 Member
    Bump
  • WickedGarden
    WickedGarden Posts: 944 Member
    no. I started out eating back my exercise calories, and lost a bit of weight (working out 6 days a week). Then I stalled out, and tried adding MORE food (while still working out) I was within my TDEE.

    I finished P90x, and ate 15% below my TDEE, still couldn't lose weight. So, I started cutting back little by little. Still didn't lose weight. So, now I just eat when I'm hungry, I loosely pay attention to my calories (still log them) and I am finally seeing the scale start to move again.

    It's great that eating more works for some people, but it just didn't work for me.
  • kcmomof2
    kcmomof2 Posts: 457 Member
    Bump for later. :smile:
  • Altruista75
    Altruista75 Posts: 409 Member
    Yes and feel SO much better for it!!
  • lucy2021
    lucy2021 Posts: 24
    I'm just going to give this a try. I talked to a personal trainer yesturday and told him what I have been doing for calories and he thought I should be taking in about 1800-2000 calories. He also told me to cut out carbs after 3pm. No Pasta No Bread and No Fruit. I sounds completely crazy but I'm going to give it a try. I will let you know how it goes.
  • EccentricDad
    EccentricDad Posts: 875 Member
    Wouldn't you agree that 1200 diets are for sedentary people and increased calories are for people who exercise? I would NOT recommend increasing calories for someone who DOESN'T exercise; but I would for someone who exercises daily.
  • TheRealParisLove
    TheRealParisLove Posts: 1,907 Member
    I increased my calories by 300 a day this week. I also way over ate this past weekend. I managed to lose a pound even with the binge weekend, and the additional calories.

    Even better, I've been able to push more weight at the gym, and my lap time on the bike has decreased. Yesterday, I shaved 13 minutes off my 20 mile ride. Even at the end of the ride I felt strong and energetic whereas I used to collapse on the couch for the rest of the night after a ride of that distance.

    I obviously needed the extra calories, but if my progress should ever stall again, I will make adjustments as necessary.
  • HeidiHoMom
    HeidiHoMom Posts: 1,393 Member
    I upped from 1200-1850 (plus 200-400 breastfeeding calories) and have lost 10 lbs so far.

    I initially lost on 1200 but hit a 3 month plateau. Eating more broke the plateau, solved my digestive issues, gave me more energy and just changed my life in general.
  • norcal_yogi
    norcal_yogi Posts: 675 Member
    bump....def watching this one!
  • Jennical
    Jennical Posts: 219 Member
    Bump to read later.....
  • melaniedzialo
    melaniedzialo Posts: 1 Member
    Per my dietitian, I increase from 1200 to 1500 and feel SO MUCH BETTER! And the funny thing is I am still on track to lose weight at the same pace. I think I was starving myself before. :happy:
  • spark409
    spark409 Posts: 96
    im in the same boat as u bump

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