for all you people with success stories:

larovers

congratulations! I am doing research on what people do on here to achieve the best goals. I am wondering, for those of you that stuck to this and lost over 50lbs ...how did you:
1. set up your MFP settings: did you use the custom (manual) or just go by the settings it gave you once you put in your activity level
2. set it up to lose 1, 2, or some other amount per week?
3. eat back ALL your exercise calories, part of them, none of them

Just wanted to post this to the most successful people....to see what works. Thank you for your help!

Sherbog

You post that your doing research and do not mention for who the research is for. Will the research be published. Checking your profile and it is empty. Only that your a 41 year old woman.

Really??????

Shirley in Oregon

larovers

You post that your doing research and do not mention for who the research is for. Will the research be published. Checking your profile and it is empty. Only that your a 41 year old woman.

Really??????

Shirley in Oregon

Sorry...I am doing the research for myself because I want to lose weight and just wanting to know what has worked the best for everyone. I have not really set up my profile yet because I am just getting started on this journey. I figured getting tips from the most successful people on what they have done would be the best way to start. some people on here say "eat back all calories." some say eat "none" ......there seem to be so many methodologies so my main goal is to see what the MOST successful people did, make sense?
no, lol, no going to be published anywhere but here on this thread.

mdepko

Here's my story with MFP. When I started on this weight loss journey, I was checking out various website to figure out my BMR, TDEE and any other figure that would give me an idea of how many calories I required to maintain my weight which at the time was 342 pounds. As I was doing this, I stumbled across MFP! Between all the sites I visited, MFP came up with a figure for my TDEE that was about the average of the other sites. As I looked more into MFP, I decided it was the site for me.

I let MFP set my setting. Activity level was sedentary (which was very true).
I set my weight loss at the max it would let me per week (2.5 lbs I think).
I think my daily calorie intake was set around 2400 cals as my TDEE was around 3400.
And then here's what I do.
I try to keep my calories around 1500-1700 per day.
I very rarely eat any of my exercise calories back. I figure since I am trying to lose weight, why would I eat them back. Once I have gotten to my goal, then I will eat back exercise calories.

With the exception of walking and golf, all of my exercising has been done with a Wii (Wii Fit Plus and Wii Active More Workouts). I have a bad knee and the Wii has allowed me to work around the pain. I actually had to lose weight before I could use the Wii because it has a 325 pound limit. So I did not exercise for the first 2 weeks.

I joined MFP the last week of January 2013 and have lost 69 pounds since then. Six weeks ago, I quit smoking and continue to lose weight!

Hope this helps.

workaholic_nurse

congratulations! I am doing research on what people do on here to achieve the best goals. I am wondering, for those of you that stuck to this and lost over 50lbs ...how did you:
1. set up your MFP settings: did you use the custom (manual) or just go by the settings it gave you once you put in your activity level

I went by what it gave me, but you need to be honest with yourself about your true activity level.

2. set it up to lose 1, 2, or some other amount per week?

2 pounds per week

3. eat back ALL your exercise calories, part of them, none of them

Depends on the day and how hungry I feel...listen to your body, over time you'll learn what works for you. The biggest thing is patience. You didn't gain this weight in one day, you aren't going to remove it in 1 day.

Just wanted to post this to the most successful people....to see what works. Thank you for your help!

Anyone using this site is successful, no matter the weight lost...at least we are getting healthier than the people still sitting on the couch!

ETA: @mdepko congrats on the :smokin: cessation, 121 days :smokin: free here...and all of my weight loss has been since I quit!

Sherbog

Thanks for replying to my post. Guess I may been overly cautious.

Shirley

Isakizza

hahaha, don't publish what I tell you okay!
Even though I'm publishing them here myself, lol.

Anyway, I do use the custom settings. I set my calories using the TDEE -20% method and you DO NOT eat back your workout calories on that plan, learned the hard way.

My activity level is workout 3 times a week, I believe.
I set my marcos at 40/40/20 (40% protein/40% carbs/20% fat), seems to have worked very well for me.




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kcaffee1

When I started MFP I was already loosing weight. No one is exactly sure why. I found the sight mostly because I was looking for something to help EXPLAIN the sudden drop in weight, and as things finally started slowing down (the first 6 months were a landslide of weight loss for me, and I was rather worried, to say the least!) I started getting a lot more serious about it.

Because of medical conditions, I have to use the custom settings so I can ensure I maintain a strict carb restriction (settings at 15/35/50 carb/protein/fat) though the bump in the fat setting has only been recent as it appeared I had hit a plateau. (before it was 20/40/40 carb/protein/fat)

I started with what MFP suggested, but quickly changed the calorie goal to 2k per day, and attempted to eat back most of my exercise calories. Things started heading towards another unhealthy landslide, and I was not able to meet the calorie goals. So, I took a step back and re-evaluated what I was doing. Now, I'm working with the TDEE - 20% and NOT eating the exercise calories. Things are moving, but as I've just started this about a week ago, I don't know if I'll have to tweak it some.

I also tend to turn in both monster TIMES and monster BURNS (before I edit the calories burned out, just so I can keep track of what days I'm doing which sets), and lifting 2 - 3 X per week. Won't say the lifting is helping with the weight LOSS, but it IS helping with the body fat right now. The cardio is where I'm thinking the accelerated weight loss is coming from, and I've been trying to scale that back some. (But swimming is so much FUN! It's HARD not to put in a full hour every day!)

kazzsjourney

I lost most of my weight before i found MFP. And for most of my journey i have eaten 1800 calories. Currently I eat TDEE - 30%...which is due to me having PCOS (I have lost 188 pounds)

larovers

thanks guys...I am so happy you guys have been so successful. and again, for the record...I am not publishing anything anywhere, lol. I am doing this research myself to see what the most successful people do. I hope to get more answers but thank you to the people who have answered so far, it helps a lot! I have 70-80 lbs to lose and want to do it healthy but not too slowly so I want to find a happy medium so I can lose about 1-2 lbs a week but not lose too much muscle .

hungrypotato

When I first started losing weight at 290 lb I put my activity to sedentary and and 2 lbs a week loss. When I exercised I ate all of the exercise calories back. I was starving if I didn't. I mean if I wasn't hungry and had some leftover I wouldn't eat them. But I like to eat so I try to kill myself at the gym so I can eat a f uck ton. That is one of my main motivations to get my as s to the gym.

But as of recently I have been putting it at 1 lb a week since the calories have been getting too low for me.

katy_trail

the important thing is to keep it simple. there's a lot of bro science and myths that you have to cut out carbs or meat, or meal timing. and much more.

all that really matters is having a calorie deficit

of course as you go along
it would be nice if you kept the muscle you already have
so eating a good amount of protein (100g a day is a general guideline)
and doing strength training regularly will tell your body
to keep holding onto the muscle.

so really you could just log your food, strength train 2-3 times a week.
that's basically the bare bones of what i do too.
if i have the energy and time i do cardio too.
and doing cardio as many benefits too.

just try to keep it as simple as possible.
eat food you enjoy, most of it healthy actual food.
and you'll be fine.

airangel59

I used my own settings, as I need to watch my carbs (type 2)
If I do any exercising I don't eat the calories back.
I probably originally started with trying to lose 2 lbs a week.

larovers

When I first started losing weight at 290 lb I put my activity to sedentary and and 2 lbs a week loss. When I exercised I ate all of the exercise calories back. I was starving if I didn't. I mean if I wasn't hungry and had some leftover I wouldn't eat them. But I like to eat so I try to kill myself at the gym so I can eat a f uck ton. That is one of my main motivations to get my as s to the gym.

But as of recently I have been putting it at 1 lb a week since the calories have been getting too low for me.

This is exactly what I plan on doing. setting to sedentary and a 2lb a week loss and eating back all exercise calories. I hope it works. I just get so hungry.....

katy_trail

high protein helps more than you think with the hunger. i didn't believe it either.

larovers

high protein helps more than you think with the hunger. i didn't believe it either.

great to know. I plan on custom setting my macros to 30/30/40

Tatiyanya

1. set up your MFP settings: did you use the custom (manual) or just go by the settings it gave you once you put in your activity level

Custom, protein level seemed crazy low and carbs i considered evil (am gluten intolerant as i recently learned, might be why), so i set it 40/30/30


2. set it up to lose 1, 2, or some other amount per week?

At very begining when i had nearly 100 lbs to loose it was 2 lbs per week, but i lowered it down progresively. Now its less than 1 lbs/week (think 0.8 or 0.5) since I'm 15lbs from target and just learning to eat in bit new way.


3. eat back ALL your exercise calories, part of them, none of them

30% of em. I used to do a bad bad thing i guess. I used excercise as a way to sneak in more food when i was really hungry. But on other hand for most of time I only did walks and yoga cos I was too fat (in my opinion) for anything else.

I am/was a bit silly, yes.
Might not be "most succesfull" but for me its big deal to drop nearly half of my weight
Think i overall lost 117 lbs in last 2 years, gained some back due to the damn gluten extravaganza bull****, but i'll get there again

larovers

thank you so much! Looking forward to getting even more answers on this thread. Thanks!