Question about Eating Your Exercise Calories!

I eat some of mine back. I just make sure my NET stays above BMR. if you are not sure what that means you can you to the EAT MORE TO WEIGH LESS group.

Can anyone fill me in on the exercise calories and why we can eat them back? It just doesn't make sense to me, lol. What's the point of eating back all the calories we just burnt off?? How does it cause you to lose weight?

The calorie goal that MFP sets for you is based on your typical day *without* any extra exercise. Losing weight at a pound or two a week is much more sustainable than trying to crash-diet or crash-exercise a whole bunch off very quickly. You're much more likely to be able to *keep* the pounds off if you've lost them slowly and your system has had time to adjust.

When you exercise, you burn more calories. If you don't eat them back, then your weight loss would be faster in theory, yes, but your body feels like you're starving and your metabolism will change to hold on to every pound as hard as it can. Studies have shown that the metabolic rate can double or cut in half in response to diet and activity level. If you eat enough extra calories to make up for the extra that you've burned, and come back to a calorie deficit that will have you losing a pound or two a week, then your metabolism stays on an even keel and you can continue to lose.

You can lose weight with a huge calorie deficit, fighting uphill against a slower metabolism and going cold turkey on all your bad habits, or you can lose weight with a much smaller calorie deficit but do so relatively easily, making gradual changes for the better. I know which I'd prefer!

Check out the book "Rethinking Thin" by Gina Kolata for an overview of pretty much *all* the actual research that's been done into weight loss and diet in the last hundred years plus. Forget conventional wisdom, look at what people have found when they actually *test* what works and what doesn't! :-)