Am I supposed to eat my 'exercise calories'

And this is why I want to pull my hair out. Trisha, MFP gives you a deficit, by not eating the exercise calories you are increasing the deficit, which is not how MFP works. contrary to how it may seem expanding your deficit outside the normal range does NOT increase weight loss, and in many cases can actually slow it down.

well i dont eat them and am loosing weight..... wats the point of loosing all those cals if ya gonna eat them up... besides u need a deficit in order to loose weight!

when you went through your goals, what did you choose for a goal? I don't think you understand MFP, MFP creates a deficit for you, eating your exercise calories KEEPS you at that deficit, it doesn't remove it.

NOT eating your exercise calories is a sure fire way to stop losing weight eventually. Please go to the main message boards section, click on the General topic, and read the sticky posts in there, they will explain everything.

gisii, I'm going to give you a link I think you should read, it's something I wrote a long time ago.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/10589-for-those-confused-or-questioning-eating-your-exercise-calo

I would respectfully suggest you read it. I realize that right now you are losing weight, and that's great, but as you progress, the ability to lose weight will directly correlate to your ability to understand HOW your body burns calories, if we don't understand how calories are burned, and how to eat correctly for the rest of our life we are doomed to live on the rollercoaster that is weight. Trust me, I know it very well.

I have studied this topic for a very long time, ask anyone who's been on MFP for a while and they will tell you that I'm not just another casual weight loss automaton. I enjoy helping, which is why I spent 3 months studying for my Personal Trainer's certification, not to become a career PT, but just to gain the knowledge I needed.

Essentially I'm saying that this journey starts with knowledge. It's not about losing pounds, it's about developing a healthy lifestyle that you can follow for life, losing weight is just a side benefit.

I have less energy if I don't eat my exercise calories, so usually eat at least half of them. I like the idea of having all the extra burned calories by not eating them (as gisii does!) but this doesn't work for me in practice...

Good luck with your weightloss everyone!

Trisha,
If you look around you'll find this question many times on MFP (don't worry - we all ask it). You'll see that most of the people who have been successful in losing a large amount of weight and keeping it off... ate all or most of their exercise calories.

SHBoss is right - MFP already calculates a healthy deficit for you - it's important to make sure that you're giving your body enough fuel to continue to burn calories. The most wonderful thing about losing weight this way (the right way) is you never really have to be hungry. You never have to feel like you are depriving yourself. Eat healthy, exercise and watch the amazing results!

I eat all of my exercise calories! I am losing about 1 pound per week and know that I'm doing it the healthy way. My body is not deprived of basic nutrition, I'm burning calories, and I'm toning my muscles.

In high school and college, I often had the yo-yo diets going on because of unhealthy relationships with food, stemming from unhealthy relationships with persons who pressured me to be a certain weight. For the first time, I am confident that I am losing weight that I won't be gaining back.

I was tempted in my first week on MFP to ignore the "eating your exercise calories" bit, but after reading the science behind it all, I realized that the deficit MFP creates is just being maintained by eating the exercise calories. There are other ways to go about weight loss, but with MFP, it's safe, healthy, and pretty easy. Sometimes I work out in the morning and know that I have extra protein and calories to eat throughout the day. Other days, I go over my calories and hit the gym to get me back to the proper deficit for weight loss at a rate of about 1 pound per week.

More than 1 pound per week, for me, would not work in the long run. It's a slow, steady, and beautiful process. I love looking at the math. I need about 1700 calories per day, so MFP has me at 1200 for a 500 calorie deficit per day. 500 calories x 7 days in a week=3500 calories. 3500 calories equals a pound...and I lost about a pound per week, fluctuating slightly depending on my sodium, water, etc.

If the scale has gone up a little during a week, it doesn't even phase me anymore. I know that I'm logging everything on MFP, logging the calories my HRM gives me that I've burned, and math doesn't lie. A 500 calorie deficit per day, whether I'm exercising and eating those calories, or not exercising and sticking to the 1200 (rough though for me so I work out to eat more!), the math will add up to me losing about a pound per week in the long run. And working out will make my less fat body all the more toned and gorgeous.

Eat those calories, that's how MFP is set up :-)

Sounds reasonable, mrsbeck. I try to leave a bit of a cushion (maybe 1/3) of the exercise calories uneaten in case of miscalcuations.

What has been working for me is: sometimes I eat alot of them, sometimes I eat half, and sometimes I hardly eat any. I base how many I'm going to eat on how active I was that day and how hard my workout was. I'm suppose to be eating 1200 cal a day but I'm pretty consistant with 13-1400. So actually, I am eating the first hundred or two anyway. Its what is working for me so far! I will say, I did hit a platue when I was sticking with 1200 a day, so I just uped my daily intake. I also do the zig-zag approach sometimes just to mix it up and try to trick my metabolism!

I've just joined this fantastic site, hello everyone.

Putting in my food diary and exercise for the last week (I run - well jog, 5.5mph) 3 times a week, then add-in a 'biggest loser wii' workout or workout dvd on odd days.

I can see that I'm spot on with calorie intake, but my carbs are lower, and sometimes protein.

Do I need to stick/eat to the carbs/protein levels as well as calories?

:-)