calories and exercise

O2bfab

I'm not totally new to the counting calorie thing, but I am new to myfitnesspal and I am a bit confused.

If my calorie goal is 1200 and I eat 1200 calories and do no exercise, I'll maintain or maybe lose a bit (because my previous eating habits were bad).

But if I eat 1200 calories and exercise and burn 400 calories, my stats for the day on MFP say that I can now eat 1600 calories.

I don't exercise so I can have permission to eat more...I do it to create a deficit! Although there are times when I may splurge and say..."no worries, I ran today"; but why is it calculating those calories into my available balance.

I did note that I could wait to enter my exercise at the end of the day and not let the math interfere, but I like entering things as I go along!

Any advice/explanations?

drmerc

Set your goal calories to whatever you want and don't enter any exercise

tabi26

I'm not totally new to the counting calorie thing, but I am new to myfitnesspal and I am a bit confused.

If my calorie goal is 1200 and I eat 1200 calories and do no exercise, I'll maintain or maybe lose a bit (because my previous eating habits were bad).

But if I eat 1200 calories and exercise and burn 400 calories, my stats for the day on MFP say that I can now eat 1600 calories.

I don't exercise so I can have permission to eat more...I do it to create a deficit! Although there are times when I may splurge and say..."no worries, I ran today"; but why is it calculating those calories into my available balance.

I did note that I could wait to enter my exercise at the end of the day and not let the math interfere, but I like entering things as I go along!

Any advice/explanations?

First you need to ask yourself why you are here? if just to lose weight, then set your caloies to whatever and dont eat back your execise calories. If you're here to lose weight and be healthy, then find out your BMR and TDEE and set your goals inbetween those numbers somewhere.

note: if you have been eating vey little for a long time, expect to gain some weight as your body starts to realize that you're done starving it.

MoreBean13

Whatever calorie goal MFP has set for you ALREADY has a deficit built in. If you're set to 1200 calories, it's probably a pretty big deficit already. If you exercise and don't eat the calories back, you're risking have too large of a deficit, which can result in hormonal interruptions, accelerated muscle loss, metabolic slowdown (adaptive thermogenesis) and increasing the (already high) chance of weight regain when you're done. Not worth the risks, IMO.