How much calories do I need to burn?

eatingdaily
eatingdaily Posts: 7
in Fitness and Exercise
I'm set to eat about 1200 calories a day and to lose at least 1/2 a pound to a pound a week, how much calories do I need to burn off through exercise?

ALSO, Due to work and circumstances, I eat around 400 being the lowest and to 900 for the highest (Which I've managed to achieve today!). Is this going to affect my weight loss? I try to eat as much as I could and Its just very hard to reach my intake.
___
Edit
Additional question

Would you define walking about 15 mins to walk as exercise too :/
Urgh, cant believe I dont know anything about weightloss even when im almost 20. Leaves me feeling fairly stupid.

Replies

  • Pebble321
    Pebble321 Posts: 6,423 Member
    If you are using MFP to calculate your calorie allowance, then your 1200 cals is the number of calories you can eat and you will lose weight. You don't HAVE to exercise in order to lose weight, but it is certainly good for your mind and your body to do so.

    Eating 400 - 900 calories a day sounds like a very bad idea to me. You are running the risk of missing out on the nutrition you need to keep your body healthy. Eating 1200 really isn't much and if you are finding that difficult you need to have a good look at your diet and include more calorie dense foods (nuts, olive oil, full fat dairy, red meat, salmon, dark chocolate, sweet potatoes just for a few examples). 1200 isn't a magic number that suits everyone but it is a generaly recommended minimum to keep you healthy while you lose weight.

    If you exercise, then you can add those calories into your diary, eat more and still lose weight. But, if you are only eating 900 cals or less a day, I don't think you should exercise at all until you are eating more. Otherwise you are just creating an even larger deficit and putting your body under even more stress.
  • eatingdaily
    eatingdaily Posts: 7
    Woah your answer! That really clears all the doubts I had :D
    I never thought my intake would have such bad effects- I just thought eating less meant good, especially due to my exam preparations, I'm pretty out of time to sit down and have a decent meal. I'll definitely try my best to include more of the food you've mentioned too- Looking back on my diary, It does include lots of dairy products (mostly fat free) but I have no idea how to include any red meat and things since I recently used to be a vegetarian.... But dark chocolate sounds fantastic, just an regular bar of any brand would do right?

    If in the future I manage to eat a bit more and reach about (and hopefully over) my intake, walking to school and work would count as exercise though right?

    Thanks so much for replying ^^
  • Pebble321
    Pebble321 Posts: 6,423 Member
    I know, I think most of us are programmed to think "eating less is better" - and it's true to a certain point, but when you take it to the extreme (which is what you are doing) you aren't giving your body adequate fuel to keep functioning well.

    Remember that your body is using up a lot of calories just keeping you alive (breathing, pumping blood around, digesting, growing hair, healing cells... all the stuff that happens without us even thinking about it).
    In my case, it takes about 1400 calories just to do this.

    If I add in the calories I use to walk around the house, go to work, walk to the bus stop - generally live my life, then it goes up to about 1800 calories.

    If I only gave my body 400 cals to work with, it would be putting a huge stress on my system when it is looking for 1800 cals.

Categories