Im sooo confused that i dont even know what to do anymore.

TheGreat0ne

hi im 20 years of age an i been confused soo much lately with people telling me one thing and people telling me others.. i been trying to be on a diet to lose atleast 60 pounds since i weight 263 an well i been wanting to be on a diet of atleast 1500 calories a day.. im confused about a couple of things.. the thing is how do we need to burn more then we eat? i kno many will tell me that we lose calories just by breathing an heart pounding etc.. what im confused about is i been told that if i eat less calories then my bmr then i would lose or lets just say burn calories for example.. my bmr is 2400 if i eat 1500 a day wont i be burning 900 without the additional excersise added? some people say no its not true an no you shouldent eat lower then what you're bmr is.. but how so? if there is many overweight that are on 1500 calories or even less probally a day an that is way lower then what there bmr is for there weight? btw ive been told by numerous people that if i eat 1500 calories an that my bmr is 2400 i would burn 900 off of me but then again ive been told by someone who has been on yahoo answers on the diet and fitness section for a good while now an has 75% answers right.. if its not trust please explain to me what i need to do to lose weight.. please im really confused.. thank you.

KAYRRIE

I'm going to give you as simple an example as possible. Let's say you are allowed 1500 calories per day, those are the calories your body needs to function normally or at its peak. You should be eating all those calories. Now if you burn 500 of those calories, those are calories that your body still needs to function which you just burned off, so that's why people say to eat your calories. It's just another way of saying you have to replenish those calories so your body can continue to function at it's best. I too get confused once I start hearing BMR or TDEE stuff. But that's what it means, simply put. Your body does burn off calories naturally. But just worry about what you're allowed, what goes in, and what you burn off, so you can replace those calories.

shadow2soul

You really have to find what works best for you. The really is no one size fits all method.

- You could do MFP's preset method. Set to maybe 1.5lbs a week loss, and eat back some (if not all) exercise calories burned. This works for some people.

- You could do TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure) minus 10 - 20% and not eat back exercise calories. For more information look here:
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/976981-welcome-to-mfp-don-t-worry-there-s-cliff-notes?hl=welcome+to+MFP

- You could set a custom goal, at your BMR (or a few hundred higher) and eat back some (if not all) exercise calories burned. This is the method I'm using currently and it works for me. On days I work out I end up eating a total intake close to what I would eat if I was using TDEE -20% (sometimes over, sometimes at, and sometimes just under). On days I'm just plain lazy and don't do much, (I've had days where I didn't even burn 2000 calories according to my fitbit) well at least I'm eating my BMR. I also have days (at least once or twice a week) where I go over my calorie goal by up to 500.

- There is a fasting method, but I don't know much about it.

I'm sure there are other methods out there. Be sure to give whatever method you try 4-6 weeks before deciding if it works or not. Don't be surprised when you gain a few pounds over night (typically just water anyway). Don't be surprised when you lose say 4lbs one week, but the next don't lose any (weight loss doesn't happen at a steady rate). Don't eat/net under 1000 calories for months on end (can be very unhealthy to do so, but again it takes months and months of eating like that to actually cause damage). Oh and don't forget to measure yourself and take progress pictures (changes don't always happen on the scale).