Stop the Low-Cal Insanity!

whitelaurel

Everybody's suddenly a health professional once they've been on a weight loss website for a few months...

geebusuk

Less muscle means slower metabolism.

But current research suggests not by a massive amount - maybe 6 calories per of muscle. So an extra 34lb of muscle would be 'equalled out' by having a three-digestive-biscuits snack! (And of course an extra 34lb of muscle on a 120lb is actually a massive amount, we're more likely talking one biscuit a day .)

Another major problem with these low calorie diets is that once people have lost the weight, what then? How do you suddenly survive - the moment you start eating what a "normal" person should eat, you will simply balloon again and you are forever trapped in this vicious cycle.

You slowly bring calories up, maybe doing a bit more exercise too?
Seems to work fine for a lot of people.

likemeinvisible

:flowerforyou:

and I find it annoying how ppl eating 2000 and losing come and try to ¨teach¨ people like if they were a fitness guru.

Yes I eat 1200 cal a day, yes im a shorty, and no i wont eat more than that cause I stop losing thank u.

If you eat 2000 and you lose, GREAT for you :drinker: , if I eat 1200 and lose, GREAT for me :drinker: . What works for you doesnt work for me and viceversa. To each their own, do your thing and stop worrying/complaining about what other people do.

:flowerforyou:

:flowerforyou: :flowerforyou:
Not all of us have 140lbs of lean mass to maintain, so the numbers in the OP won't work for everyone.

Helloitsdan

Life of an MPF'er:

1. Sign up
2. Eat as little as possible while posting a thread asking if it's ok to eat as little as possible.
3. Get miserable and stop losing weight.
4. Actually read the forums and decide to up calories to a reasonable level.
5. Start losing weight.
6. Comment on similar threads in forums to try and stop newbies eating as little as possible.

Too true. Every single person who is getting defensive about this is A) Probably eating too few calories and/or A newbie.

#truth

ironanimal

:flowerforyou:

and I find it annoying how ppl eating 2000 and losing come and try to ¨teach¨ people like if they were a fitness guru.

Yes I eat 1200 cal a day, yes im a shorty, and no i wont eat more than that cause I stop losing thank u.

If you eat 2000 and you lose, GREAT for you :drinker: , if I eat 1200 and lose, GREAT for me :drinker: . What works for you doesnt work for me and viceversa. To each their own, do your thing and stop worrying/complaining about what other people do.

:flowerforyou:

:flowerforyou: :flowerforyou:
Not all of us have 140lbs of lean mass to maintain, so the numbers in the OP won't work for everyone.

This is why you work out your own estimates for your own body...

stroutman81

Take a 120 lb woman.

This would put her at around 1800 for maintenance.

A reasonable deficit might be 35% off of maintenance.

This makes no sense. Unless this 120 woman wants to lose like 50 pounds, why the hell would she be on a 35% off maintenance deficit? Insane.

1) When I'm working with someone who's lean wanting to get leaner, the deficit isn't in place, constant, for long spans of time. I pretty much exclusively use a cyclic approach at this stage in the game.

2) This was just ONE example I used in an article to show opposing ends of a giant spectrum. I think you're reading into the numbers a bit much. I don't handle any one client's nutrition exactly the same.

3) Percentages are relative metrics. Not absolute. We can't really say a 35% deficit is "insane." Especially not without knowing more..

stroutman81

I understand where you are coming from and can see that you are experienced in the field, however I cannot accept that its just about weight and a multiplier.
Of course you will get results when putting the body in a state that requires change.
The formulas I tend to use adds in Age, height, weight, body fat and activity.

If I did simple multiplier for myself id be eating small children at work and I think thats where this conversation started.
Its about finding that reasonable deficit.

Different strokes I suppose. My calorie recommendations are a living, breathing process that evolves and adjusts on the fly based on biofeedback. Which is why I take a very loose, educated guess at TDEE. In fact, I'll scale the estimated maintenance of 14-16 x bw based on things like age, body fat %, degree of previous weight loss, activity factors, etc. Beyond that though, I simply don't see a need in making it more complex than that.

If you choose to do so, that's perfectly fine.

It's just that I prefer to focus my efforts on the process over anything else.

There are many ways to skin this cat.

jodi41086

Great post. I recently had to delete two people who were posting crazy nonsense about eating 700 calories and they think they may be anorexic. I'm sitting here like "uh yall need to get it together"

DebbieLyn63

No matter what you punch in for your activity level or age or weight etc, If you put down that you would like to lose 2 pounds a week, MFP sets 1200 as your calories intake

u joking? this isnt true

if you put in 2 pound per week loss, MFP will take 1000 calories off of your estimated BMR plus whatever exercise calories you would burn at the activity level you entered. Most people at sedentary or lightly active do not have a number higher than 2200, so taking off 1000 would put you at or below 1200 per day. Since MFP won't suggest lower than 1200, it raises the minimum up to that number.
For very active/muscular people, the number would be above 1200. But then they don't usually shoot for 2 pound loss per week.

My base number is only around 1600 without exercise, so a 2 pound loss would put me at 600 calories. MFP is not about to tell me to eat that many calories a day, for fear of lawsuits