BMR - how much do you listen to it

Basicly that is what MFP does for you, it is a dumbed down version of the same info but It does work. I lost over 114 pounds in the last 16 months using MFP numbers. And eatting back exercise calories.

I'm having the same dilema. My bmr varies so much depending on the calculator, anything up to 300 calories! Scooby gives me 1245 as my bmr and a tdee of only 1494. this is based on a sedentary lifestyle as I basically sit at a desk for 8 hours and then go home, have dinner and get to bed. I've adjusted my cals to 1200 allocated by mfp. I do resistance work 3 x a week in the mornings and add some cals back for that but it's hard to wrok them out. I have also tried eating more and that didn't do much for me either. I'll see how I get on with 1200 plus exercise cals instead of the 1350 plus exercise cals I had been going with for 8 weeks now. I haven't lost any ionches since march which is really frustrating!

BMR is the amount of calories you would need to sustain life. In a coma. And depending on what you put as your activity level that sounds about right to maintain your current weight (2463).

I hear this an awful lot on here, including in the BMR/TDEE advice threads, but it doesn't quite make sense to me. Obviously loads of people eat below their BMR, either from hour to hour, or from day to day, and don't die, even though they're awake and moving around some of the time.

It seems to me that it might be more accurate to say that your BMR is what you would need to MAINTAIN while in a coma, before you add in the calories you consume from daily activities.

If you go below your BMR you would not be getting enough calories from food to maintain, so would be burning your own body and would lose weight.

But that's actually what most of us are aiming to do - to burn our own body's reserves rather than maintain!

Maybe BMR is a good guideline of a sensible cut-off point so that people can avoid some of the negative effects of dieting. But to say that you will die, your organs will shut down, your metabolism will stop, etc. as is said on these threads - well, we can see that that doesn't normally happen, so I think that may be one reason why people don't trust the information.

When a person is in a coma, they are tube fed their bmr to sustain organ health. Eventually, if they were routinely fed under bmr, their organs would shut down. I am not saying that is going to happen in the immediate future, but it will happen. Further, not receiving enough calories (of a proper macro mix) will cause bed sores, wounds, and other ailments. Tube feeding supplements are extremely scientifically regimented based on a person's needs. Not receiving this proper amount of nutrition will eventually lead to death. Further, giving just a little over bmr will cause weight gain in that person. There have been plenty of nursing homes fined, sued, and shut down for not giving patients proper nutrients.

In the short term, yes you can survive eating below your bmr. However, your metabolism will slow down. If you maintained that caloric deficit for extended periods of time, you will eventually cause bodily harm. Again, I am not saying that is going to happen immediately. But it will happen. Or, you will eat at a deficit just long enough to lose weight. Then when you go back to eating a proper amount of calories, you will gain weight because you have slowed your metabolism so much.

But hey, your choice. Lose while depriving your body. Or lose while feeding your body proper nutrition. The choice is up to you.

When you eat below BMR you lose muscle and so while you might be losing weight once you reach your goal you will have to eat less calories each day in order to maintain because your metabolism will have slowed down from losing lean body mass. If you eat a little above your BMR you are less likely to lose muscle (you might still lose some but less) so when you reach your goal you will be able to eat more to maintain. I love food and I want to eat more so yes, I pay attention! Usually they say BMR + 20% is the minimum to eat without muscle loss so for me that would be 1505 + 20% = 1806 each day. I am 5'4" 181 pounds and I actually usually eat more than that each day cause I'm pretty active.

I eat under my BMR and have maintained lean muscle for months now by lifting heavy. It doesnt hurt to eat under your BMR if you have plenty of fat stores. I check in every month with my dietician so I know what is going on with my stats.

BMR is the amount of calories you would need to sustain life. In a coma. And depending on what you put as your activity level that sounds about right to maintain your current weight (2463).

I hear this an awful lot on here, including in the BMR/TDEE advice threads, but it doesn't quite make sense to me. Obviously loads of people eat below their BMR, either from hour to hour, or from day to day, and don't die, even though they're awake and moving around some of the time.

It seems to me that it might be more accurate to say that your BMR is what you would need to MAINTAIN while in a coma, before you add in the calories you consume from daily activities.

If you go below your BMR you would not be getting enough calories from food to maintain, so would be burning your own body and would lose weight.

But that's actually what most of us are aiming to do - to burn our own body's reserves rather than maintain!

Maybe BMR is a good guideline of a sensible cut-off point so that people can avoid some of the negative effects of dieting. But to say that you will die, your organs will shut down, your metabolism will stop, etc. as is said on these threads - well, we can see that that doesn't normally happen, so I think that may be one reason why people don't trust the information.

When a person is in a coma, they are tube fed their bmr to sustain organ health. Eventually, if they were routinely fed under bmr, their organs would shut down. I am not saying that is going to happen in the immediate future, but it will happen. Further, not receiving enough calories (of a proper macro mix) will cause bed sores, wounds, and other ailments. Tube feeding supplements are extremely scientifically regimented based on a person's needs. Not receiving this proper amount of nutrition will eventually lead to death. Further, giving just a little over bmr will cause weight gain in that person. There have been plenty of nursing homes fined, sued, and shut down for not giving patients proper nutrients.

In the short term, yes you can survive eating below your bmr. However, your metabolism will slow down. If you maintained that caloric deficit for extended periods of time, you will eventually cause bodily harm. Again, I am not saying that is going to happen immediately. But it will happen. Or, you will eat at a deficit just long enough to lose weight. Then when you go back to eating a proper amount of calories, you will gain weight because you have slowed your metabolism so much.

But hey, your choice. Lose while depriving your body. Or lose while feeding your body proper nutrition. The choice is up to you.

That's not really what I'm saying, and I'm not even taking issue with your post in particular - it just so happened that you were repeating something I've seen a lot (and sometimes said more forcefully). I'm not saying people SHOULD eat below their BMR, but that if people keep exaggerating the dangers of it, then other people don't believe/trust the information.

What you'd said was that you need to eat above your BMR to sustain life. I'm just saying that we know that isn't true, because people do eat below their BMRs (sometimes under medical supervision) and normally don't drop dead. In fact, we often go hours and hours without eating, so will have times even in a normal day when your calorie output is quite a lot more than our calorie input. What you say in your second post is that rather than dying, your metabolism slows to accommodate your reduced calories (so your BMR will go down). That's a completely different thing! It's also different to your metabolism stopping altogether, or organ shutdown.

Another thing is that BMR seems a bit arbitrary simply because it's an estimate for most people. Somebody might think they're eating 20 calories above their BMR when they're actually eating 20 calories below it, or vice versa. Would those 20 calories cause them problems? I honestly don't know (although I suspect the transition isn't as dramatic as all that). What if I ate below my BMR a couple of days a week? I don't think I've read anything which clearly explains what happens and when the balance is tipped, whether it matters if it's just occasional, etc.

I'm sure it's a useful figure as a guide (and also that it's possible to get something more accurate than what MFP uses) and I use it myself, but I think it puts people off if the dangers are obviously exaggerated and not explained.

I personally don't understand why anyone would want to eat below their BMR...makes no sense...you can eat more than your BMR and lose weight...eat between your BMR and TDEE and you lose weight. Why do idiots like starving their bodies so much on this site? I swear, 80% of MFP is disordered thinking.

Those numbers are really just estimates....I have seen cases of actual BMR's being hundreds below the what the calculator says.
I know my BMR/TDEE is lower than it should be, and I eat accordingly.

I'm petite, I don't need much food, I do not need to eat 8 times a day or whatever. I lift heavy, I do cardio, I eat clean, below my "BMR". Otherwise, I gain. That's just the way MY body works.

Weight loss is trial and error, you can't just expect some numbers shot out of a computer to work for everyone. Gotta figure out what works for you

When you eat below BMR you lose muscle and so while you might be losing weight once you reach your goal you will have to eat less calories each day in order to maintain because your metabolism will have slowed down from losing lean body mass. If you eat a little above your BMR you are less likely to lose muscle (you might still lose some but less) so when you reach your goal you will be able to eat more to maintain. I love food and I want to eat more so yes, I pay attention! Usually they say BMR + 20% is the minimum to eat without muscle loss so for me that would be 1505 + 20% = 1806 each day. I am 5'4" 181 pounds and I actually usually eat more than that each day cause I'm pretty active.

I eat under my BMR and have maintained lean muscle for months now by lifting heavy. It doesnt hurt to eat under your BMR if you have plenty of fat stores. I check in every month with my dietician so I know what is going on with my stats.

I think you must be an exception, this is not common. But well done for you! That is the holy grail right there!

I personally don't understand why anyone would want to eat below their BMR...makes no sense...you can eat more than your BMR and lose weight...eat between your BMR and TDEE and you lose weight. Why do idiots like starving their bodies so much on this site? I swear, 80% of MFP is disordered thinking.

It's American Get-Rich-Quick thinking, transported to health management. When we decide to do something about our weight, which has crept up over months or years, we want it all to come off in days.

And we wind up screwing ourselves over, because with massive calorie deficits we slow our metabolisms down so we eat less and still don’t lose as much weight and suffer while we do it. Check all the women’s magazines – there’s no concept of “figure out what you’re burning and eat 500 calories less each day.” There’s just “Follow this 1200-calorie plan exactly to LOSE LOTS FAST!” And that’s what we’ve normalized. And for many people its simply unsustainable as a long-term plan, so when they’re done LOSING LOTS FAST, they return to their previous patterns and their now-damaged metabolisms freak out and pack the weight back on.

This is EXACTLY what happened to me. I lost 72 lbs 10 years ago, following a too low calorie diet. I kept it off for about 2 years and then slowly gained it all back, plus another 15. It seemed like I gained a pound if I even LOOKED at food. I could barely eat anything without gaining weight because I had screwed up my metabolism so bad.

This time, I am doing it the RIGHT and HEALTHY way, so I can keep it off in the long term.