TDEE-20% Still seems too HIGH! So now what?!?

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  • Paganrosemama
    Paganrosemama Posts: 86 Member
    What I have been doing is sort of a combo of TDEE- 20 and MPF.

    My TDEE can vary wildly due to my health, some days I can't get off the couch, other days I can hike for hours and be fine.

    So I calculated my TDEE for the days when I sit and do nothing and subtracted 15%- which turns out to be very near 1600 cals- which is my goal. If I am more active I record the exercise and eat back some of the calories. Although I can't eat more than 2200 cals without feeling sick- so on days where I burn more than 700 cals I am almost always way under.

    So far I have lost 10 lbs in the past 2 months....

    If your TDEE - 20% is too much to eat , start to slowly increase your calories- be warned because some who have been eating very low calorie diets started to gain a few pounds before losing rapidly when switching to the TDEE method. So make sure you stick with it for a few weeks....
  • albaehr
    albaehr Posts: 8 Member
    heybales

    I just checked again and mfp says with 3 times a week working out and having my goal set at 1.5lbs loss i should be burning 2450 cal aday, I do use body media and on most days it says I burn 3000 or a little more with exerciseI never go less than 1670 a day so hopefully I am not losing good mass. But YES i do think I am losing some inchs and with the running and weight training hopefully been adding some good lbs on. I find myself enjoying goals reached in the gym to be more rewarding than the scale now I am down 50lbs this yr so I think my body is adjusting.. Thanks for the reply

    Note I workout days I eat more than 1670 more like 2100
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    heybales

    I just checked again and mfp says with 3 times a week working out and having my goal set at 1.5lbs loss i should be burning 2450 cal aday, I do use body media and on most days it says I burn 3000 or a little more with exerciseI never go less than 1670 a day so hopefully I am not losing good mass. But YES i do think I am losing some inchs and with the running and weight training hopefully been adding some good lbs on. I find myself enjoying goals reached in the gym to be more rewarding than the scale now I am down 50lbs this yr so I think my body is adjusting.. Thanks for the reply

    Note I workout days I eat more than 1670 more like 2100

    First, you need to separate the MFP diet eating goal from the exercise goal - the 2 are not related. Change your exercise goal to whatever and your diet eating goal will stay the same.

    So MFP thinks your daily burn is 2450 without exercise, your BodyMedia says easily 3000, but of course more with exercise.

    So you already have a 500 cal deficit from BodyMedia's better estimate to MFP's guess based on YOUR selection of activity level, which is obviously not right.
    Then you are getting another 750 calorie deficit from MFP's already lowered daily estimate. Not good, ya, you've lost muscle mass, your metabolism has slowed down most likely.

    Suggest you select a higher MFP activity level to better match reality that BodyMedia is trying to tell you.
    Keep increasing it until it shows same 3000 cal maintenance level.
    1.5 lb weight loss goal weekly is probably decent for now, until you have 20 left to lose. Then 1lb recommended is recommended.

    And turn your syncing on, so on more active days you eat more, or at least log those workouts and benefit from them.

    So you can gain LBM even though not muscle for a little while, and then just fat can drop. If you want even more from your workouts as your margin for error closes up (when you have a lot to lose, you can do many things wrong and still see some results, big margin for error) you'll want your deficit to be more reasonable.

    You might try this.
    Fill out the Simple Setup tab down to the Activity Calculator, but skip that for now, or totally perhaps depending on how you want to do things.
    Then go to the FitBit/BodyMedia tab, and remove the RMR estimate unless you have been tested, then go down that page. You would likely see some improvements.

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/961054-spreadsheet-for-bodyfat-bmr-tdee-progress-tracker
  • albaehr
    albaehr Posts: 8 Member
    Heybales
    No its 3000 with exercise around 2500-2600 on days without. I do only have around 20lb more to go so I am going to try 2200-2500 calories a day and see how that works. Thanks for the advice I am going to reowrk my numbers on MFP, I think it might be figured to low and maybe Body media is more accurate
  • sk_pirate
    sk_pirate Posts: 282 Member
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