Am I doing this right?

ashleymmannisto
ashleymmannisto Posts: 62 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I am 23 year old, who weighs 245 pounds. For the past 3 days I have dilligently been using MFP to track my food intake. I am consuming roughtly 12-15 hundred cal. However, 2 of the 3 days I burned 650 on the elliptical at the gym. I am not hungry but I am worried that I wont lose weight b/c I am burning too many cal?? Does that make sense? I want to see a dietitian but don't have insurance. I want to do it, and do it right.

Replies

  • lwhtfrd
    lwhtfrd Posts: 1 Member
    You should still lose weight. When you watch your home page on my fitness pal you will see it make up the difference in calories when you add cardio exercise. Be sure to log it and eat the calories that fitness pal is telling you. Good Luck!!
    Lisa
  • 33Freya
    33Freya Posts: 468 Member
    Just snack on something dense like nuts or avocado if you need more calorie intake. :). Try not to worry or over think it- just develop those good habits and you'll see the weight come off.
  • Katla49
    Katla49 Posts: 10,385 Member
    The experts will give you more specific advice, but as a beginner, I eat back part of my exercise calories but not all of them, and I'm losing weight. If your body thinks it is starving it will hold on to fat and burn muscle. What you're doing will work very well IF YOU'RE MODERATE. If you get to the point you aren't eating enough you'll quit losing weight and start converting muscle to fat. It is all about balance. Good luck. I hope you are very successful.
  • stroutman81
    stroutman81 Posts: 2,474 Member
    People don't not lose weight over appreciable lengths of time because they are eating too few calories. Just go ask an anorexic.

    Granted, I'm a huge advocate of eating as much food as possible while still allowing a reasonable rate of weight loss. But that's for reasons that go beyond some crazy notion of the 'starvation mode' making someone fat when they eat too few calories.

    I wrote pretty extensively about my thoughts on the starvation mode here:

    http://body-improvements.com/resources/eat/#starvationmode
  • bfcano
    bfcano Posts: 19
    I've found that the calorie counts for exercise on this website and also on the machines at the gym are not always accurate since it doesn't take into account your weight.
    You mention burning 650 calories on the elliptical which sounds really high.
    Without knowing how long you were on there I couldn't be sure but you may be overestimating your calorie deficit from exercise.

    I found this same issue when I first started logging and since I've erred on the lower end of the calorie count I'm losing weight a lot easier now.
  • ashleymmannisto
    ashleymmannisto Posts: 62 Member
    But I'm not hungry. I love food too :P I am just watching my portion sizes really...Can you be in starvation mode and not be hungry? Sounds crazy, but I just want to know that as long as my body says I'm good, I'm good :)
  • ashleymmannisto
    ashleymmannisto Posts: 62 Member
    I've found that the calorie counts for exercise on this website and also on the machines at the gym are not always accurate since it doesn't take into account your weight.
    You mention burning 650 calories on the elliptical which sounds really high.
    Without knowing how long you were on there I couldn't be sure but you may be overestimating your calorie deficit from exercise.

    I found this same issue when I first started logging and since I've erred on the lower end of the calorie count I'm losing weight a lot easier now.



    Oh yes, MFP said I burnt upwards of 1000!!! I took what the machine said. It had my height weight entered and of course saw how fast and resistance and blah blah blah :)
  • Crazy4Healthy
    Crazy4Healthy Posts: 626 Member
    I've found that the calorie counts for exercise on this website and also on the machines at the gym are not always accurate since it doesn't take into account your weight.
    You mention burning 650 calories on the elliptical which sounds really high.
    Without knowing how long you were on there I couldn't be sure but you may be overestimating your calorie deficit from exercise.

    I found this same issue when I first started logging and since I've erred on the lower end of the calorie count I'm losing weight a lot easier now.



    Oh yes, MFP said I burnt upwards of 1000!!! I took what the machine said. It had my height weight entered and of course saw how fast and resistance and blah blah blah :)

    You will also burn more if you weigh more, that (unfortunately) comes down with the weight as well. :smile: I'm not sure how tall you are, but MFP seems to put everyone in the same 1,200 calorie bucket. Depending on your height and weight, you just might need to eat more and I definitely agree with eating back at least 60-80% of your exercise calories. It may seem tough and you may not really feel hungry, but your body truly needs the fuel. Like someone else mentioned, find healthy, calorie dense foods like nuts to help fill the void when you are not feeling all that hungry. You really want to be sure you are eating above your BMR and as you lose more weight you will also want to adjust the amount your try to lose a week (lower it). It becomes difficult to lose 2 lbs a week when you only have say 20 lbs to lose. You can use the tools on here to help with BMR or go to a site like http://www.fat2fitradio.com/tools/bmr/.

    Best of luck on your journey
  • LordBear
    LordBear Posts: 239 Member
    cut cals to 15oo cals... eat several small meals a day..and get ur azz moven... ur going to get hungry..that is just something you are going to have to deal with... because u are use to over eating ..
  • ashleymmannisto
    ashleymmannisto Posts: 62 Member
    cut cals to 15oo cals... eat several small meals a day..and get ur azz moven... ur going to get hungry..that is just something you are going to have to deal with... because u are use to over eating ..


    I'm not hungry. That's what the post was about. I am eating 1200-1500 and burning 600 on an elliptical over an hour workout where I keep my heart rate between 140-160 for the entire hour....I work my azz off! Just wanting to make sure that even though I'm not hungry, I'm ok :)
  • ashleymmannisto
    ashleymmannisto Posts: 62 Member
    I've found that the calorie counts for exercise on this website and also on the machines at the gym are not always accurate since it doesn't take into account your weight.
    You mention burning 650 calories on the elliptical which sounds really high.
    Without knowing how long you were on there I couldn't be sure but you may be overestimating your calorie deficit from exercise.

    I found this same issue when I first started logging and since I've erred on the lower end of the calorie count I'm losing weight a lot easier now.



    Oh yes, MFP said I burnt upwards of 1000!!! I took what the machine said. It had my height weight entered and of course saw how fast and resistance and blah blah blah :)

    You will also burn more if you weigh more, that (unfortunately) comes down with the weight as well. :smile: I'm not sure how tall you are, but MFP seems to put everyone in the same 1,200 calorie bucket. Depending on your height and weight, you just might need to eat more and I definitely agree with eating back at least 60-80% of your exercise calories. It may seem tough and you may not really feel hungry, but your body truly needs the fuel. Like someone else mentioned, find healthy, calorie dense foods like nuts to help fill the void when you are not feeling all that hungry. You really want to be sure you are eating above your BMR and as you lose more weight you will also want to adjust the amount your try to lose a week (lower it). It becomes difficult to lose 2 lbs a week when you only have say 20 lbs to lose. You can use the tools on here to help with BMR or go to a site like http://www.fat2fitradio.com/tools/bmr/.

    Best of luck on your journey

    I'm 5 feet even!
  • LordBear
    LordBear Posts: 239 Member
    well then if ur not hungry.... ur either doin something wrong or your doing something right and lucky for not being hungry.... so run with it.
  • alaskaang
    alaskaang Posts: 493 Member
    At 5 foot, 1200 to 1500 should be reasonable. If you're not hungry, don't feel like you have to eat more. Just don't get stuck in the mentality that you can never eat more than you are. You will likely hit a point when you do need to eat more.
  • ashleymmannisto
    ashleymmannisto Posts: 62 Member
    At 5 foot, 1200 to 1500 should be reasonable. If you're not hungry, don't feel like you have to eat more. Just don't get stuck in the mentality that you can never eat more than you are. You will likely hit a point when you do need to eat more.

    That's what I was hoping. I assume my body will tell me when I NEED to eat more..And I am ok with that. But for now, what I am doing appears to be working. If I am hungry, I eat. If I'm not, I don't. I find I get bored late at night and want to eat just because, so I go to bed to resist the urge to eat out of boredom :)

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