Net Calories - Exercise Calories - To Eat or Not to Eat

6) the ONLY reason for someone who is not obese to not eat their exercise calories (assuming they are correctly reporting their caloric intake) is because they are impatient and don't want to wait. It can backfire on you. Besides slowing down the metabolism and possibly causing long term damage to your organs and glands, it will cause fatigue and possibly muscle degradation, which may help you lose weight, but actually can make you more unhealthy overall.

7) There is NO SUCH THING as gaining significant muscle mass while in a catabolic state. You can't put on muscle while at a calorie deficit. What you CAN do is minimize the amount of muscle mass the body identifies as inactive and keep most of your muscle mass intact while in a deficit, you do this by continuing to exercise (both aerobically and anaerobically).

there's far more to talk about but these are the ones I identify most often.

Thanks for these two points, Boss, as I think they are often overlooked in these discussions.

My own experience has been that low low calorie doesn't work long term. As someone who has lost weight by low calorie eating only to gain it all back and more, not once but several times, I am finding that feeding my body correctly has been the BEST way to lose weight and get a stronger, more shapely body.

For me, what has worked, has been to eat the exercise calories. When I don't, I start to feel like crap. When I do fuel my body correctly, I have great energy and I still lose weight. And inches.

Just listen to your body....................In the end, it will all balance out.

I wish it were that simple. The problem is that sometimes our bodies lie to us.

For example, when you go on a serious diet (not watching what you eat for a few weeks to take off a few pounds), your body perceives this to be a famine. So once the famine is over, it tells you that you are hungry even when you are eating more calories than it takes to maintain your new weight. It fights to get you back to your start weight. Then, because it figures another "famine" may come along at any time, it fights to get you about 10 lb. over your start weight for a cushion. This is your body's new set point. Unless you eat enough calories to maintain that, you will be hungry.

The other thing that happens is that, if you ignore your body's hunger signals long enough, it stops sending them. I guess it figures there just isn't enough food, so why torture you. (Okay, what is really going on is some complex interaction of hormones and other chemicals.)

So in both these cases, your body is lying to you. In one case, it's telling you that you are hungry when you are eating more calories than it really takes to sustain a healthy weight and in the other it's not telling you that you are hungry when you really need the fuel.

This is one problem I have with the whole "intuitive eating" movement. It certainly sounds good on the surface and I have found some of their recommendations helpful, but the whole "just trust your body" philosophy is just not a good idea for many of us. This is why I continue to log my food and weigh myself every day. Behaviors that food shrinks will tell you are "obsessive".

Well, logging work for me so those experts can kiss my "obsessive" *kitten*! :laugh:

only if you want to:happy: Do what you feel is right and it will all fall into place our greatest resource is our knowledge of our own bodies! Good Luck you look great!

OK, so I have read several different posting on this subject, but I want to confirm what I believe to be the case.

I am at 1200 cal/day. When I workout it adds exercise calories.

i.e. - today - 1200 calories starting + 602 workout calories = 1802 calories. I consumed 1319 calories and have 483 leftover.

As long as I ate my 1200 calories, I don't have to eat the remaining calories, correct?

correct!!!!

No, not correct.
You've only been here a month and you dig up a year old thread that's been dead for almost a year only to make a one word answer to a year old question that is dead wrong and explained as wrong many times over in this thread.

The original poster, who probably isn't even here anymore, was eating less than 1200 NET a day, and this is HORRIBLE for you.

First of all, MOST people shouldn't even be aiming for 1200. Then they try to stay "below" calories so the number will stay green, when it is actually a goal to REACH, not a goal to stay under.
Your deficit is already built in to this number, staying under it causes a larger deficit which is depriving your body of essential fuels. If you are exercising on top of such a LOW calorie goal, you are trying to drive a car with no gas in it.

Aim for 1/2 lb or 1 lb a week, log everything you eat accurately by weighing it, and EAT most of your exercise calories.
Links that support this are here:

shouldieatmyexercisecalories.com