1,200 calories limit? Can anyone help?

your 2 lb/week is double the suggested 1 lb/week.

You are right there is a general problem with applying a blanket minimum of 1200 calories here. It messes up the maths for many.

This is one method you can use to set up your own limits - one of many, I might add.
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/477666-eating-for-future-you-method

Its the one I personally used, but you can do your own research and decide what you prefer

That is good advice, and by the sounds of it you need less. I have my goal set to 1200 as I am 5'7 and weigh 168 pounds. I find it hard to believe that you need as many calories as I do! See the 1200 as a guideline, and maybe look around the internet or ask your doctor what how you can safely lower you calories to suit your needs/

If anyone is negative ignore them, if you have done your research and are losing weight in a safe a responsible manner you do not have to answer to anyone.

I hope you figure it out! Take care x

Thanks- I know it is more than the suggested 1lb a week i guess I just wanted to go more quickly, and as it does also give you that option I thought it would just lower the calories to whatever I needed to lose 2lb a week. I know 2lb a week isnt really that sensible but i didnt know the calculator would just refuse to do it!!

I do think though that even to lose 1lb a week I don't need 1200 calories a day at 4'11 and 133 pounds so I am going to set my own calories to 1,000 which is managable for me, and see how I go on along with the exercise. I just started Zumba and it is fantastic!

Thanks everyone!x

Instead of guessing, why don't you go over to fitnessfrog.com and figure out you TDEE and then you will know exactly how many calories you should eat?

I did it for you, at 4" 11", 133, and 29, fitness frog says your recommended calorie intake with no exercise is 1643 per day. so, if you want to lose 2lbs per week, you subtract 1000 calories from that to create a deficit, and that puts you at 643 per day. Good luck with that. You should set your goal at 1/2 a pound per week, which will keep you at around 1393 per day, which might be livable. If you want to lose 1 lb per week, eat 1,143 per day. Your choice.

eat more than 1200 calories please.

http://www.quickbmr.com/what-is-tdee.html

go here to find out your tdee (total daily energy expenditure) and that'll help you find your BMR (basal metobolic rate). BMR is what you would need to consume, at MINIMUM, if your body were just laying in bed all day.

you should be eating in between you TDEE and BMR. unfortunatly some people get confused and eat below their BMR, which causes their weight lose to suffer.

eat more, work hard, feel awesome.

I have just joined and put in my height and weight (4'11 and 133 pounds) and that i wanted to lose 2lb a week and will exercise for 45 mins twice a week... i was given a daily calorie goal of 1200 a day and told i would only lose 3.7lb by the end of September eating this way. This is frustrating- I know guidelines say not to go below 1200 but clearly im very short and I need less, why can't they actually tailor it to my needs so that I can lose 2lb a week like I requested?! Has anyone else experienced this?

Keep in mind that your not eating much food = not able to get much nutrition. Even if you pump yourself with vitamins and veg you probably wont have the things in your body to absorb them (like enough fat for example).

Also I'm 5'7 and they recommended 1200 for me. I decided this wasnt healthy and upped to netting 1700 since this was still 300 cals below the recommended intake for your average women to get 97% of the recommended amount of nutrition in your diet. Turns out mfps math can be pretty wrong. If you can't move enough to fit close to your average healthy women I don't think the solution is to stop eating. There are plenty 4 footers on this site who eat more then that. Theres also plenty people taller then that who eat like you right now and I know a few of them have suffered nutritional deficiencies including my 5'1" sister for not eating enough.

Lately I've been eating about 3000 cals a day with exercise and manage to maintain my 120 lbs at 5'7. Trust me, you can definately eat more and lose weight, even if you were sedentary. If you want to lose tons of weight a week by not eating expect it to come backwith a vengence. Because when people start eating like that they deplete forums of energy in their body that well come back when you start eating a sustainable amount of food and it does weigh weight (look up glycogen depletion).

Also, since you are pretty close to your goal weight, it is generally recommended, at least on here, that you lose weight more slowly as you get close to goal. The 2 pounds per week is generally recommended for those of us that have a LONG road ahead of us (weight-wise). There is a significant number of the MFP community that has over 100 pounds to lose, for example.

If in doubt, I recommend asking your doctor. S/he should know you and your needs a lot better than us strangers.

I wish you the best of luck on your journey!

Hi;

I am 4'10" and 59 years old, so I know what you are talking about. Check out the Petite Advantage Diet book by Jim Karas. It's a diet and exercise plan designed especially for short women. I eat 1100 calories most days. If you choose wisely, you can eats lots of food for that amount. I have lost almost 20 pounds at the rate of 1 or sometimes 2 a week. That includes being on vacation and lots of summertime events. This is the only plan that has worked for me in a very long time.

By the way, I checked this out with my doctor, who assures me that 1100 is ok for a short woman, as long as I feel good with no weakness or dizziness.

This website may help you when you're trying to figure out how many calories to eat etc. http://www.cordianet.com/calculator.htm

From the stats that I entered this is what it tells me:

Individual Weights:
Hamwi Based Calculations: 117 pounds for a small frame, 130 pounds for a medium frame, and 143 pounds for a large frame.
Robinson Based Calculation: 130 pounds.
Miller Based Calculation: 135 pounds.
BMI Based Calculation: 142 pounds.

Average Weights:
AVERAGE OF ALL CALCULATIONS ABOVE: 133 POUNDS.
NORMAL RANGE BASED ON THE AVERAGE: 119 - 146 POUNDS.
RANGE BASED STRICTLY ON BMI: 114 - 154 POUNDS.

Caloric Need:
Estimated Base BMR: 1430 Calories.
Estimated TDEE: 2217 Calories.
Estimated Daily Caloric Need For Weight Loss: 1717 Calories.

It also explains the calculations and what BMR, TDEE etc. means.

MFP also gave me a 1200 cal goal for each day to lose 2lb a week. Most people say that if you eat less than 1200 cal your body could go in to starvation mode and hold on to the fat that you already have on your body. Also advise you to eat back 1/3 to 1/2 of the calories that you've burned. Most of the time I stay within 1500-1600 cals each day after a grueling work out.

Hope it helps!

The only way to do it is scientifically. You need to work out your BMR using a calculator (there are many online) Then you work out your daily calorie needs by multiplying this number by 1.2. This shows you what you would need to eat if you were sedentary all day. Then to lose weight take 500 kcal away from that number and this is what your net intake should be. Be sure to add all your exercise calories in as your net needs to take this into aco****. If you eat less than this (especially since you do not have much to lose) you risk messing up your metabolism by shocking it into starvation mode. If you do not give your body enough caloires it will slow your metabolism because it will assumer you do not have enough food available and so it will attempt to conserve the food you do consume. The best way to boost your weight loss at your stage is through exercise, high intensity cardio intervals and light weights prgramme is my top tip. It costs your body more calories to fuel muscle than fat so the more muscle you have the more your metabolism is boosted (you won't get big and bulky as a woman I promise) and also focussing not only on calorie intake but also the quality of your food. For the last 10-20lbs quality really is key. Vut out processed as much as possible, keep your carbs complex and you could try adding in metabolism boosting foods such as green tea, guarana, chillies ect...This works.

I have "the biggest loser" diet book persay. In there, for petites it recommends calorie cycling...one day 1050-1100 for like 2 days then a day of 1200-1300. Try the cycling. Eat more the days you exercise hard, eat the less the days you dont