Metablolism and Not eating enough calories

I have the same question. Did you get a response?

and i will tell you.. I was exercising every weekday and only still eating 1200 cals (cause I thought that it would make me lose weight fast, right!).. I didn't shed a pound until I started eating at least some of those exercise cals back... I couldn't figure it out and then someone suggested I start doing it on here and whaaa laa.. the weight started coming off again

It is hard to answer that question, because it really depends on your height, weight, activity level, etc. Here is what I know about it:

The body and brain need a certain amount of calories in order to function properly. For the average woman, the minimum is 1000 - 1200 calories. If you are on the shorter side, you may need less and if you are on the tall side, you may need more.

If the body does not get the minimum amount of fuel (calories), it starts to compensate for the loss by slowing down the metabolism. Essentially, it allocates calories to essential functions and you may start to feel loss of concentration, sluggishness, etc. When one does eat more, the body then hoards the extra calories in fat cells, "just in case." This makes losing weight much harder.

That being said, one day of under- or over- indulging does not generally make a difference, as it generally takes about 3-4 days of under-eating to enter starvation mode. If you see a trend where you are not eating the minimum amount (or if you hit a plateau where you are not losing weight even if you are eating responsibly), eat the extra calories.

If it is really hard on you mentally to eat the extra calories, you may want to seek out a dietitian or psychologist, as this is an early sign of a eating disorder.

I hope this helps :happy: . There are technical responses on this message board as to the physiological operations that occurs, if you are interested. Generally, you can search for "starvation mode."

My Fitness Pal tells you that you aren't eating enough calories if you go below 1200. It does that every everyone even if you record 1199 calories. But, if you eat 1201 calories, it doesn't nag you. Well, obviously, none of us record our food accurately enough that 1199 means exactly 1199 or 1201 means exactly 1201.

Plus, for some people, 1200 is too high a number and for other it's WAY too little. It's not like a 6'1" male who is training for a marathon needs the same amount of calories as a 60 year old 4'10" woman who takes walks 3 days a week. For that woman, 1200 may very well be her maintenance calories and she has to go below that to lose weight. For the guy, that's a very low amount and he may feel very bad and not be able to train properly on 1200 calories.

Also, the idea that, if you drop below a certain calorie consumption, you go into "starvation mode" is popular, but it's based on a misunderstanding of the science and clinical data involved. There is something called a "famine response" where dieting makes your body think there is a famine and it does everything in it's power toget you to eat including making you feel extra hungry by producing more ghrelin and by depressing your metabolism. However, this famine response does not magically kick in when you eat below 1200 calories for every person. Scientists are not sure where exactly the cut off line is, but in studies it's been triggered in some people when they lose as little as 10 lbs.! In others, it took 10% of their body weight. In general, it's thought that it kicks in around 20-25 lb. lost for most people.

Plus, when you go on a diet, your metabolism is depressed anywhere from 11-33% and that's even if you keep your weight loss to the recommended 1-2 lb. a week. So, everyone on MFP who is losing weight has slowed down their metabolism temporarily. That's just part of dieting and it can't be helped.

The other thing is that in some famous studies on starvation they hadmen living in a compound where their food intake and exercise could be monitored and completely controlled. They were fed a "starvation" diet (defined as 50% of your expended calories) and were made to exercise excessively and everything about them was monitored -- weight loss, metabolism, muscle mass, health, etc. These men did eventually experience an extreme slow-down in their metabolism. After months on this program, their metabolim slowed down as much as 40%. BUT ... and this is a big BUT, they never stopped losing weight. So this "starvation mode" -- which they only experienced once their body fat dropped below about 6% -- still didn't keep them from losing weight.

That said, while you aren't going to get into some dire state if you eat 1100 calories a day once in a while, it's very hard to lose weight and keep it off and one of the reasons is that people try to lose weight in extreme ways that aren't sustainable. Plus, the fact that your metabolism slows down means that there is a point of diminishing returns. For example, if you have a 500 calorie a day deficit, you should lose 1 lb. a week on average. But, if you have a 1000 calorie a day deficit, you won't necessarily lose 2 lb. on average, though a lot of people still do. OTOH, if you have a 1500 calorie a day deficit, you will probably only lose 2.25 lb. a week, but a 1500 calorie a day deficit is pretty tough for most people to maintain. So you are suffering a lot in order to lose about 1/4 to 1/2 lb. a week more. For most people, this just isn't worth it. But, for others, it is. It's something you have to decide.

Also, the less you eat, the greater your chance of not getting all the nutrition you need. I was under a doctor's care and was getting regular lab work and taking lots of supplements. But most people on here are not. For them, going under 1000-1200 on a regular basis could actually be dangerous to their health.

Bottom line: MFP is a great place to record my calories and exercise but I will not blindly follow the nutritional advice of any website. I did my research and I followed the program I was on, which was doctor supervised, and I lost my weight and I'm keeping it off. I ignored MFP's advice because it conflicted with my medical professional's and what I had learned for myself with my own research.

I once had a diet made up just for me that was computer generated from the items I picked that I liked and didn't like. It consisted of three different levels of calorie intake - 900, 1100 and 1500 calorie days. You could pick and choose which level you felt like that day (of course most of my choices turned out to be 1500 calorie days) I guess the theory was that if you bounced between the three your body would never go into starvation mode, but yet you would still have the calorie deficit to jumpstart your loss. I did lose weight when I followed that diet but in the end I found other diets that worked as well or better for me also. I'm pretty sure they put a disclaimer in there that you could only choose two 900 calorie days per week.

Joyce



Created by MyFitnessPal.com - Free Calorie Counter

What many people do on this site is frustrating, they trust the site absolutely without doing any further research and relying on the site, and other people on here to do their research for them. The problem is, you don't know how thorough that research is, and if it's even right for you. do your own research, make your own conclusions, and use the site as a supplementary source for weight loss and increased health.

God, yes!

The other thing people do is rely on the protein, carb and fat percentages that MFP defaults too. I see so many posts "I'm eating too much protein and not enough carbs - help!"

But MFP's recommendations for protein are on the low side. Plus, when you are on a diet, eating more protein can help control your hunger better than eating more carbs. You also want to eat enough to help prevent loss of lean tissue mass. Then, if you are at all insulin-resistant, MFP's carb recommendation are probably too high for you.

So then people are trying to cut out proteins and eat more carbs without any idea of whether or not that is a good idea for them.