Uping my calorie goal?

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katiefridley
katiefridley Posts: 151 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hello everyone! When I started here 40 days ago, I set my activity level to "sedentary". I am a on-campus college student so I walk around campus a lot, but I didn't really do any true exercising, so I wanted to be safe versus sorry. About a month ago, I started to do some moderate walking on the treadmill. Thee weeks ago, I increased the intensity of my walks to where I was sweating. And for the past week, I have been doing Couch to 5k and did my first workout of week 2 today. I have noticed that the past week or so I am very hungry after I eat dinner, which is usually not the case considering I eat dinner around 8 o'clock.

Because of my exercising habits, I am thinking of upping my activity level on MFP to say lightly active. I am currently at 1700 calories to lose 1 pound a week, but I think I might need more calories to sustain my new fitness habits, yet still keeping my 1 pound a week loss.

Thoughts? Is this a good idea or should I stick to 1700? Thanks so much!

Replies

  • darleyschroeder
    darleyschroeder Posts: 322
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    Upping your calories is fine. Just make sure you are not eating the calories you burn during the day at school since you will be making your activity level lightly active.
    I would just make it be lightly active because of school, I know when I was still in college I walked a butt load! Then log your workouts outside of school. Try it for 2 weeks and if you are still making progress then great, if not, then change it back :)
  • katiefridley
    katiefridley Posts: 151 Member
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    Oh, I forgot to mention! I don't log my exercises nor do I eat any of the calories back!
  • kdeaux1959
    kdeaux1959 Posts: 2,675 Member
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    Yes, you should up your calories. how you do that is up to you. You can increase the daily allowance based upon upping your activity level OR start adding the exercise you are doing. I personally like the latter but as long as you are successful it really don't matter. By all means, if you are losing weight and are hungry and have increased activity, you need to eat more. Food=Fuel.
  • californiagirl2012
    californiagirl2012 Posts: 2,625 Member
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    Hello everyone! When I started here 40 days ago, I set my activity level to "sedentary". I am a on-campus college student so I walk around campus a lot, but I didn't really do any true exercising, so I wanted to be safe versus sorry. About a month ago, I started to do some moderate walking on the treadmill. Thee weeks ago, I increased the intensity of my walks to where I was sweating. And for the past week, I have been doing Couch to 5k and did my first workout of week 2 today. I have noticed that the past week or so I am very hungry after I eat dinner, which is usually not the case considering I eat dinner around 8 o'clock.

    Because of my exercising habits, I am thinking of upping my activity level on MFP to say lightly active. I am currently at 1700 calories to lose 1 pound a week, but I think I might need more calories to sustain my new fitness habits, yet still keeping my 1 pound a week loss.

    Thoughts? Is this a good idea or should I stick to 1700? Thanks so much!

    It's probably a pretty good start. No one here can tell you what to eat. I don't eat my exercise calories back most of the some, mainly if I'm a bit more hungry because I worked out hard I eat a bit more, but I'm no longer in the weight loss phase of this journey, I've been maintaining now for over a year.

    Your body is the end game not the online estimate. Try it out. If it doesn't work you can notch your calories up or down by 100, wait and see what happens. Adjust again or stay the same. Find what works for you.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    Hello everyone! When I started here 40 days ago, I set my activity level to "sedentary". I am a on-campus college student so I walk around campus a lot, but I didn't really do any true exercising, so I wanted to be safe versus sorry. About a month ago, I started to do some moderate walking on the treadmill. Thee weeks ago, I increased the intensity of my walks to where I was sweating. And for the past week, I have been doing Couch to 5k and did my first workout of week 2 today. I have noticed that the past week or so I am very hungry after I eat dinner, which is usually not the case considering I eat dinner around 8 o'clock.

    Because of my exercising habits, I am thinking of upping my activity level on MFP to say lightly active. I am currently at 1700 calories to lose 1 pound a week, but I think I might need more calories to sustain my new fitness habits, yet still keeping my 1 pound a week loss.

    Thoughts? Is this a good idea or should I stick to 1700? Thanks so much!

    Those activity levels aren't correct for exercise, they don't ramp up enough. Notice nothing in them is regarding exercise.

    Because MFP works different than most sites. Deficit is there on non-exercise daily activity already. Add exercise, eat more to keep the exact same deficit in place. Smart if followed correctly.

    You'll need to set it for Active at a minimum, that would cover about 3 hrs of cardio a week. Move it to Very Active if doing more than that.
    Lightly active is correct for just the normal walking around you do for school, nothing more.

    Shoot, everyone that has gotten a FitBit or BodyMedia or BodyBugg that has a desk job is surprised when there normal non-exercise days are hitting Lightly Active, so you are probably above that anyway.

    Don't shoot yourself in the metabolism, eat correctly for your level of activity, or why even waste time doing it if you are asking your body to make improvements, but not feeding it enough to do so.
  • tellyportation
    tellyportation Posts: 12 Member
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    Hi! I found this on the net. You might wanna check it out too. http://www.livestrong.com/article/557524-one-great-answer-what-is-the-best-way-to-determine-how-many-calories-i-should-eat/
  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
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    Oh, I forgot to mention! I don't log my exercises nor do I eat any of the calories back!

    why not?

    MFP is designed so that you log and eat back exercise calories.

    definitely eat more as you are probably netting under 1200 with all the exercise.
  • VanessaHeartsMasr
    VanessaHeartsMasr Posts: 727
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    I keep my activity level at sedentary and then log my exercise calories and eat them back if I'm hungry. I've lost 23 pounds doing it that way.
  • katiefridley
    katiefridley Posts: 151 Member
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    Oh, I forgot to mention! I don't log my exercises nor do I eat any of the calories back!

    why not?

    MFP is designed so that you log and eat back exercise calories.

    definitely eat more as you are probably netting under 1200 with all the exercise.

    I find that, first, the calorie counts are inaccurate. Second, I think it would be more hassle to me than worth and I would start to resent exercise because I find it difficult to know exactly what I did and how much I burned, ect.

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