How much calories should I eat a day? 5 foot 3 girl here

Jashwood92

I'm 5 foot 3 and 126 pounds with a goal weight of 115. I do not know what the ideal amount of calories for me to eat is. I want to be healthy and not eat too little. My goal is 1200 now and I exercise monday through friday and burn around 600 calories every workout. Thanks.

BinaryPulsar

You will probably get a lot of good advice on here and people will give you links to threads that help you work this stuff out. You can certainly eat more than 1200. I use Scooby's Workshop to calculate my calories with various methods, and for me I need to choose the higher amounts. I am petite also.

Prettyangel21

Hey! I'm the same height and weight as you! I don't work out quite as often as you do though...

I'm in the middle of an experiment right now in trying to figure out how much I should eat. I'm testing each of these different calorie calculators, one per week. I'm trying to maintain, not lose weight, so if I end up losing too much weight in that week, I move on to the next calculator. Hopefully one of them will work.

I'm finding my BMR, and letting MFP take over on the exercise calories, so I'm using "sedentary" for each calculator.

Remember, we all have different metabolism speeds, and different percentages of muscle and fat, so my answer might not be the same as yours. I've screwed up my metabolism due to yo-yo dieting. Don't get too obsessed over this website... and don't weigh yourself more than once a week (that's what got me started. The fluctuations drove me nuts).

http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm
http://www.realage.com/food/personalized-calorie-count
http://www.cancer.org/healthy/toolsandcalculators/calculators/app/calorie-counter-calculator

I hope these help! I'm in the middle of #2 right now... so far so good!

MustangUSN

I am the same height, though not the same weight (or age)...your 126 is about my goal weight! HA! At any rate, I consulted a nutritionist to help address the weight I gained from a diagnosis of Hashimoto's Thyroiditis...no thyroid=no metabolism. She put me at 1520 calories per day and adjusted my carbs as well. She is the one who turned me on to MFP.

Eating normally and tracking, I've been losing an average of 1.5 lbs/week for the past 79 days. She advised no more than a 2 lb. per week as a healthy weight loss to allow your body to adjust (skin, etc.). I add exercise to gain calories for days when I plan to go out or want something extra, or just want to do some exercise, usually 3-5 times per week.

Otherwise, it has just been making better food choices. My favorite is hotdogs, so I have the 40 calorie Hebrew National all beef with the 80 calorie Sara Lee bun vice the 260 calorie choice of my ever-so-fit husband and the 200 stadium bun he eats it on. Just a matter of choice.

The suggestions to use/try out other calorie estimating tools is also helpful, I used several though didn't stray from my nutritionist's target.

Jashwood92

I also have a thyroid problem. I have underactive thyroid.