Am I suppose to eat the exercise calories?

sorilue
sorilue Posts: 19 Member
edited September 2024 in Food and Nutrition
I just started logging my food diary a few days ago and noticed that I get 1360 calories w/o exercise but when I exercise it increases about 400 calories. Do I need to keep it at 1360 to lose the weight?

Replies

  • Eliaheart
    Eliaheart Posts: 73 Member
    The answer is YES - you definitely need to eat the exercise calories.MFP has already calculated a calorie deficit for you to lose the weight, without accounting for the workouts you're getting.

    In the long run, if you do not, your body may go into "starvation mode" and store calories instead of burning them to prevent itself from getting starved. I know that if I don't eat at least half my exercise calories, I lose weight much more slowly.

    HTH!
  • kdiamond
    kdiamond Posts: 3,329 Member
    First of all, I had to reply and tell you that dog is the cutest thing I have ever seen! I want her!!!

    There are a lot of posts on this subject, if you search you'll find them.

    Everyone's different. Some people eat them, some people don't. Generally if you work out more you need extra fuel, and I'm sure you will find you are hungrier, so if you are, eat them. If you have a lot of weight to lose and you're not hungry, don't and see how it goes.

    The body requires constant adjusting and tweeking to keep it changing, so you might want to try something for a week, see if you're happy with the results, then try something else.

    Good luck! (Now can I have your dog?) :laugh:
  • LaraeTX
    LaraeTX Posts: 674 Member
    I personally do not eat the exercise calories. I have 1200 calories, anything below that puts your body into starvation mode. If i go running and earn 400 calories, if i eat those 400 calories, then why did i just spend 30 minutes of my life running? if you eat what you earn, you don't get anywhere.
  • Mom2Emery_Liam
    Mom2Emery_Liam Posts: 149
    Yes, for the most part, you are supposed to eat them.I can see if you were burning like 500-1000 a day it being hard but most people are under that.
    My allowance is around the same as yours (I upped it from 1200 b/c sometimes I came in under) so if you never ate them, it'd be like getting 900 calories...not very healthy for long term weight loss. If you aren't that hungry, even after all that exercise, I'd suggest chosing snacks like nuts, peanut butter on toast, bananas, and apples, b/c they're higher in calories AND good for you.
  • sorilue
    sorilue Posts: 19 Member
    The answer is YES - you definitely need to eat the exercise calories.MFP has already calculated a calorie deficit for you to lose the weight, without accounting for the workouts you're getting.

    In the long run, if you do not, your body may go into "starvation mode" and store calories instead of burning them to prevent itself from getting starved. I know that if I don't eat at least half my exercise calories, I lose weight much more slowly.

    HTH!

    Yippeee!
  • sorilue
    sorilue Posts: 19 Member
    First of all, I had to reply and tell you that dog is the cutest thing I have ever seen! I want her!!!

    There are a lot of posts on this subject, if you search you'll find them.

    Everyone's different. Some people eat them, some people don't. Generally if you work out more you need extra fuel, and I'm sure you will find you are hungrier, so if you are, eat them. If you have a lot of weight to lose and you're not hungry, don't and see how it goes.

    The body requires constant adjusting and tweeking to keep it changing, so you might want to try something for a week, see if you're happy with the results, then try something else.

    Good luck! (Now can I have your dog?) :laugh:

    I think you are right, I will just experiment and see what works for me. Thanks for the input.

    My little dogs name is Ginger and she is my bff. I see from your picture that you are an animal lover as well.
  • ron2282
    ron2282 Posts: 2,760 Member
    You’re going to get a different answer from everyone. I generally can’t eat all my exercise calories, most of time I can’t eat all my regular calories. I’m not hungry enough and I won’t force myself to eat more. However, I eat pretty much all day – I just make healthier choices. My daily calorie intake (before exercise) is listed as 1560, but I’m usually between 1300 – 1400.
  • merguson
    merguson Posts: 281 Member
    Personally, I don't eat my exercise calories. HOWEVER, there are days where I tend to go over the 1200 calories that I'm alotted so if I've exercised I don't feel so bad about going over. They're kind of like back-up calories for me. or guilt free calories. But I don't purposefully go out of my way to eat them. kwim?
  • Rhyssa6
    Rhyssa6 Posts: 33
    I've found this very confusing. Reading Ron2282 and Ferff3's posts was very encouraging.
    I started off like them, not eating my exercise calories and often not even managing my 1200 base calories per day. I was slowly losing weight, about half a pound every 2 days.
    Then I read that I'm supposed to eat my exercise calories, so I upped my calorie intake to where I was eating about half of my exercise calories and my weight didn't change at all for several days. I managed to get my calorie intake up a couple of days ago to where I was eating almost all of my exercise calories and I gained a pound.
    I also tend to eat several small meals rather than one large one. My food diary might show that I had a huge dinner or snack but actually those foods were spread out over a few hours, I just log them into whichever mealtime seems to fit. Also sometimes I eat dinner at 4.00 in the afternoon so what looks like a lot of food at my evening snack may well be spread out from 7.00pm to 10.00pm.
    Today was my measuring day and I was really depressed by it - body fat up (in line with the weight gain) and no change in most measurements.

    Reading Ron and Ferff's posts and seeing their weight loss in their sigs is the first thing that's made me feel any better today. So I'm going back to what works for me.

    Another thing I feel is very important is how you feel mentally. I've had times in the past where I feel like I've lost weight even though I've been eating lots of chocolate and "bad" foods and when I weighed myself I actually had lost weight. Likewise I've had times when I've felt that I've gained weight even though I've been eating really well and when I weighed myself I actually had put on weight.

    I'm going to stop watching the calories so closely and work more on feeling thin.
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