Do you eat back your exercise calories?

if I ate them i'd probably spend my evenings throwing up from being sick from too much food. I can't eat that much. i barely reach 1000.

Then you should really think about adding more healthy fats and such to your diet. Your body needs energy!

I do if I'm hungry. I don't if I'm not. I don't bust my *kitten* just so I can eat more.

^^^ this

I eat according to my TDEE-15% and then sometimes eat back above and beyond that. I put my exercise in just to keep track. I figure if I'm hungry, I am set to maintain by eating my deficit back, so if I eat half back (I do a lot), then it's okay. I'm eating 2,000-2,300 calories. I walk and run, and I strength train.

Most times I workout only so I can eat more! I try to keep things balanced! If Im having a big night out I try to do more exercising during the day to cater to whatever calories I will be putting back in!

I do but certainly can't expand on what sleepytexan has posted below.......she has hit nail on the head and is right on

I've yoyo dieted my whole life and just recently started using MFP and for the first time I am losing weight. This is with me eating all my calories. This is what the site is built for - for that type of diet. Many other diets, such as weight watchers, also believe in eating "extra calories" once you have worked out in the day. I have lost over 12 pounds in a month doing this and I feel mentally and physically amazing and can't imagine not eating them back. Also, instead of going online and asking people that do not know me and by what I see, a majority of them are doing anything they can do to lose weight the fast and easy way, I went and spoke with my Doctor about this since it has everything to do with my health.

Agreed! I think this can be a bit decieving. If you burn 300 calories,it doesnt make sense to add that back to eat more for the day. Seems that defeats the purpose. I want that to come out of the reserve I have already built up!

my doctor told me to eat my normal diet calories.. That is getting you the nutriton you need. Unless you're honestly burning 2000 - 2500 calories a day dont try to eat back your calories. some are ok, but eating back all defeats the puropse. hope this helps.. Almost forgot,, water,, and when you can drink any more have another glass just for luck.

It does NOT defeat the purpose. MFP has a deficit built into your goals already. If you meet your goals with 0 as the number at the bottom, this means you actually have a 500 calorie deficit for the day if you are set to 1lb/wk or 1000 calorie deficit if you're set to 2lbs/wk....and 250 if .5lbs/wk. Having excessively large deficits WILL work against you eventually...

I did when I did 1200 cal because 1200 cal is so low. Now I am on maintenance and it's a lot more calories so I don't usually eat them all back but I dip in a little bit. I eat a lot of fruits/veggies and they are full of fiber which makes me too full to eat back all my exercise calories. I am maintaining.

Wow - don't really appreciate being called an idiot!! I am losing weight steadily & I don't eat back exercise calories - my endocrinologist, who recommended this method of weightloss, has successfully helped many of his clients to lose weight & keep it off. What are your qualifications in this field exactly?? You must be an "expert" of some kind to be freely calling other people idiots for doing what works for them!! As would be the case for everyone one here, I will continue to use whatever method gives me results...:noway:

Your endocrinologist has probably prescibed a calorie target for you, by estimating your TDEE and takiing out a calorie deficit. Or did your endocrinologist actually tell you to go make an account on MFP, where your daily exercise is omited from the calorie target and go ahead and eat that calorie target arbitrarily? :noway:

Spare me on the "you must be an expert expert" nonsense You don't have to be an expert or a genius to understand a very simple energy balance equation.

I ignore exercise calories so the exercise log is just to track time spent exercising for me. Exercise calories are highly over rated. You can't exercise away eating too much food. I learned this the hard way most of my life running marathon after marathon (and lifting) and not being able to lose weight and in fact continued to gain year after year. And I don't pig out, binge, snack mindlessly, eat out of boredom, etc, but the portion sizes are too big for a small person like me. (Well I wasn't small when I weighed over 170 lbs at 51'0"!)

Anyway I found what worked for me was separating out the two things:

Eat less to lose weight
Exercise to maintain or build lean body mass
end of story.

I found just ignoring all the complicated stuff everyone throws at us is the key. Day in and day out focus on two things. Eat lless, move more, stay within calorie budget (either weekly or daily). You can eat low one day and high the next, whatever you want. Well, it did work for me. I am the fittest, leanest, strongest, and most muscular I've ever been in my life at age 51 and I'm healthy and don't get sick and have long endurance.

If you have a lot of body fat reserves you would be surprised at how little you can eat (unless you have emotional eating issues or disorders). The leaner you get the less your body has to draw from and then you have to taper up your calories. There is no such thing as starvation mode for women over 12% body fat or men over 6% body fat. I am a living breathing example of that. I went from obese to now under 12% BF and I've maintained for one year and built muscle the whole time. You don't BUILD muscle in starvation mode, so I proved everyone wrong.

Define eat less. I eat less than my TDEE (which is over 3200 calories a day) and I eat 2600 calories to cut body fat. I have gone from 18% to 12% (rechecking in 45 more days). I can tell you when I ate 1800 calories, not only did I maintain my body fat percentage, I also did not lose weight nor did I lose inches. I have also worked with over 200 men and women on this board who had similar issues. All low calorie (did not eat back exercise calories or ate at too aggressive of a goal [2 lbs per week with 20 lbs to lose]) and withing a month of eating more calories, all but 2 of them started to lose fat and weight.

Now, the question is what are you advocating? Are we talking less than TDEE, are we talking 500 calories a day, are we talking 1500 calories a day, etc.. Now another variable you might have, that many do not, is your age. At 50+ years old, its very natural that a body decreases it's metabolic rate. And even more so if you did a lot of crash diets a throughout the years.. so it's quite possible that a body adapted to maintain body fat until you hit 1200 calories a day. This is also not uncommon in women who have gone through menopause. So yes, while you have an impressive story (as I have read it), it will not, in my personal opinion, work for many people on here.

Below is something to consider. I know it's a small sample study, but people expect quick results around here, lol. The main thing to take away from it is a trend. Those who do not eat some of their exercise calories (I say some as MFP can over estimate and people should eat 50-75% of them or include exercise as part of your lifestyle) tend to lose more weight from muscle than those who eat back exercise calories. I will note, that the more lbm you have, the leaner and tighter body will be. I will also note for those who say, "I will worry about weight now and once I reach my goal, I will worry about muscle or gain some back", that it's a lot easier to lose muscle that increase muscle. Most women can only gain 10 ish lbs a year, maybe 15-20 if it's their first year trying. So I always say, set yourself up to meet your long term goal befoe your short term goal.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/729141-exercise-calories-to-eat-or-not-to-eat-results?hl=exercise+calories+psulemon&page=1#posts-10742097

FML, it's no use

I made a post about net calories a while ago, but now I'm just wondering - do you eat back your exercise calories?

My calorie goal is 1200 a day, and I eat that, but when I exercise every day my net calories are somewhere between 800 and 900 calories. I'm worrying this is too little and that I need to eat them back.

I've found two sorts of people on this site and they're split down the middle - those who eat back their exercise calories and say that they hit a plateau when they didn't, and those who have had great weight loss results not eating them back and never hit a plateau.

I really don't want to end up having to get myself out of a plateau!

I guess everyone's body is just different, but I figured I'd do this as somewhat of a poll so I could get as many opinions as possible on making my decision to eat back those calories or not.

A plateau would be a loss of 0.0 on your weigh in time right? So if you have your weight loss set for 2.0 lbs per week it is going to restrict your calories by a 1,000 calorie deficit for you to achieve that goal. But if you eat over your 1200 minimum goal (hypothetically) you would only be eating into your deficiency and not into the "eat this and you will be more over weight or plateau" range. The thing is, anything over 1,000 calories deficit is going to hurt your organs (something you can not feel because there are no pain fibers on your internal organs).

I am using a registered dietitian. She has never told me to eat back my exercise cals, but has stressed the importance of never going below actually consuming 1200 cals. She knows I use MFP and uses it herself and has never suggested that I eat all that. She uses the my plate standards. We only need so many serving of each group at day, and they should be healthy choices. So if you've gotten all those serving in, and your at 1400, and burn 500 exercising, I dont see why you need 300-500 cals more of what your body doesn't need? You've already met requirements. Rest is not needed. It's like when the vending machine says $1 but you put ,in $2 and then leave the change, doesn't make sense! Ha ha, so I'd say as long as your diet is mindful of health and getting in the groups, you don't need to eat more. Just remember to eat balanced, not just to lose weight but for total health :-) hope this helps your thought process and decision you make for yourself!

The point is that 1200 is ALREADY a deficit. So if you eat 1400 and do 200 in exercise, you are at still at 1200 which is a deficit so you will lose. The 1200 number is not a maintenance number.

I don't, not because I don't want to, but because it's so flipping hard for me to eat THAT MUCH good food. I'm trying to eat very clean food with very specific macro splits, and it's just too hard to do it. I have tried and ended up feeling disgusting. I say see what works for you; listen to your body and be willing to try different approaches till something clicks.

Clean eating is 100% not required for weight loss.

I know that, but that's something I'm choosing to do. As I workout more, I may feel more hungry and I will eat more then; I'm not disposed to any unhealthy ED-type behaviors, so I'm just listening to my body. I'm not going to stuff myself just to meet the numbers.