so do you eat the calories back or what?

changingdietforgood
changingdietforgood Posts: 10
in Health and Weight Loss
Hey I bet this has been asked over and over again but are you SUPPOSED to eat back the calories? I don't want to go into starvation mode however.. if you eat them back then what is the point of exercising?

Replies

  • MrsJBro
    MrsJBro Posts: 59 Member
    You only eat back enough to get you to the daily caloric value you need to consume for loss. If you exercise away all your calories, you're body will just take from your lean protein (muscles) to make up for what you're missing. That slows down the metabolism, making to harder for you to lose weight in the future.
    Lets say you can only have 1200. If you exercise 300 calories away, you can consume 1500 calories that day and still see a loss (without losing lean muscle mass).
  • sammyneb
    sammyneb Posts: 257
    The easy answer is when you set up your MFP account and you say you wan to "lose 1 lb a week" MFP automatically calculates a deficit for your to loose that one lb. You will get A LOT of different answers on here. But the short of it, since it is already calculated for you (the defecit) you want to eat your calories back from exercise. Some people eat all of them back, some eat some of them back and some don't. I have mine set at sedatry, because I have a desk job. However I work out pretty regularly. But on days I don't work out I try to stick to to lower calories, on days I work out I eat some of my calories back, but really it just depends on how hungary I am, and how hard I worked out.

    Try different things and see what works for you.
    good luck!
  • Serendipityunt
    Serendipityunt Posts: 120 Member
    You only eat back enough to get you to the daily caloric value you need to consume for loss. If you exercise away all your calories, you're body will just take from your lean protein (muscles) to make up for what you're missing. That slows down the metabolism, making to harder for you to lose weight in the future.
    Lets say you can only have 1200. If you exercise 300 calories away, you can consume 1500 calories that day and still see a loss (without losing lean muscle mass).

    ^^ What she said!^^

    The exercise is to get fit and energetic. You can be thin and still not fit, unless you work out. The food and exercise help each other out.
  • pwnderosa
    pwnderosa Posts: 280 Member
    if you eat them back then what is the point of exercising?

    To eat more!!

    Actually I have found this is the only weight loss plan I've done where I eat more for workouts and it has only encouraged me to work out more and more, which is a good thing. I feel in better shape than in years and I still get to enjoy desserts & wine! :) The weight is still coming off just fine!
  • edessad
    edessad Posts: 91 Member
    I eat back some but not all. I always make sure my deficit is NEVER below 1500cal. I seem to maintain a steady loss of about 3lbs on average each week doing this.

    Not sure if this will work for everyone but it does for me.

    Need to remember though that each person is different so the answers you get may not work for you in the same way they work for others.
  • wolftrax
    wolftrax Posts: 50
    Eating back some of the calorie deficit is a good idea...when you are really hungry...getting into great shape is about more than losing weight...Let's think about vitality,strength,endurance,muscle tone, and such..exercise provides those along with increased sex appeal..nourishing a healthy body takes fuel and calorie burn provides the fuel...if you work out hard and consistently you are going to need fuel..and lots of it...the healthier the better because high quality food provides the proper power..

    Eating back calories gets you into the habit of concentrating on the machine that you want to create..highly efficient, tuned up,and ready to go,go.go...
  • Mokey41
    Mokey41 Posts: 5,769 Member
    I'll start with I don't eat exercise calories back but if I were going to I would be using a very conservative number. Most of us will under estimate our food intake and over estimate our exercise so it's really easy to mess up your daily numbers if you're a couple hundred over one way and a couple hundred under the other.
  • meredith1123
    meredith1123 Posts: 843 Member
    Hell no.

    i sometimes save them all so that when i have a cheat day, such as on the weekends - they dont harm me. but i try to stay away from eating back my earned calories. I worked hard for those!

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