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Exercise Calorie Question, Please Help

HannahsBestLife
HannahsBestLife Posts: 209 Member
edited January 15 in Health and Weight Loss
SO.. I have been reading lots of messages on here saying that a 1200 calorie diet is not a good choice for the long term blah blah blah, sweet... Did some research (Thanks Google) and appears this is sensible advice so I upped my calorie goals to 1500 each day,

Now, the question is should I eat back my exercise calories???

While at 1200 a day I did because otherwise I was STARVING!! But 1500 being 300cals higher should I still do it or is 1500 enough to eat to lose weight and still have enough essential thingy-ma-jigs (yes that is the technical term) to be healthy?

Thanks in advance :bigsmile: Google was unable to help me with this (shock horror)

Replies

  • SaraAlexandre
    SaraAlexandre Posts: 1,313 Member
    I have my calories set to 1250, this is after I lost 20 lbs it put me down to this amount. I rarely eat only 1250, I eat closer to 1500. It does make me exercise a lot more to be able to eat more. I'm not sure how effective it is but I do seem to be losing weight(except this week) and I'm more active. I'm not an expert in anyway. I guess you can try it out for a few weeks and see how you do?
  • Our bodies have what is called a Basal Metabolic Rate - This is a measure of how many Calories are needed to maintain the primary and necessary functions of living - this level is determined by your gender, your age, your height, and your weight. That is why you are asked all those profile questions to begin with. If you live a mostly sedentary lifestyle - work at a desk or are a student (not talking about your exercise here unless thats all you do all day long) then the calories required would be a little bit higher than your BMR but not by much. Weight loss is driven by creating a deficit in the calorie intake below this BMR so that your body is forced to get that deficit energy from other sources (i.e. your fat stores). The more active you are, the more calories you should take in. 1200 to 1250 calories is a fairly widely accepted calorie range for women under the age of 50 who are trying to lose weight. For women who live sedentary lifestyles (again not talking about their exercise) and simply want to maintain their weight (while still exercising the recommended 30 min 5Xwk) it is usually about 1700 and for women who are highly active - ie sports activities or personal trainers for a living they should be around 2400 a day. So if you look at the differences in those values you would need to significantly increase your exercise to continue to see the same results you are enjoying if you maintain a 1500 Cal diet. Also after the initial big weight drop women especially tend to slow down in their weight loss. You may consider changing the type of foods you are eating so that you are eating higher protein foods or if you are type of person that feels cheated if your portion size seems overly small consider finding foods that allow you to eat a bit more proportionally without giving up too much in your daily calorie count. Consider how you are using your calories because there is definitely such a thing as eating or drinking away empty calories that could be more filling if used in other ways. Bottom line by adding 300 calories you have essentially added a 4th meal to your diet and are only 200 calories away from the recommended range for women wished to maintain. Without increasing your exercise significantly you will begin to see a decline your results.
  • Arwaxx
    Arwaxx Posts: 113 Member
    i set my daily intake at my BMR and if i work out, i eat back the calories too.
This discussion has been closed.