Tell me why? Only serious replies please.

By what method is your body fat getting tested?

If the trainer is doing it, I'm betting caliper test

the gyms here use hand held things that look like gaming controllers. some gyms have the scales that tell BF%.

I use calipers at home.

Yes digital calipers

What do you mean by digital calipers, exactly?

calipers that have a digit read out.

I see.

Realistically, any change in skinfold measurement over the course of a single week is going to be dwarfed by measurement error.

You're going to do what you want to do either way. So enjoy.

By what method is your body fat getting tested?

If the trainer is doing it, I'm betting caliper test

the gyms here use hand held things that look like gaming controllers. some gyms have the scales that tell BF%.

I use calipers at home.

Yes digital calipers

What do you mean by digital calipers, exactly?

calipers that have a digit read out.

I see.

Realistically, any change in skinfold measurement over the course of a single week is going to be dwarfed by measurement error.

You're going to do what you want to do either way. So enjoy.

What WOULD be a good fat measuring device in your opinion?

Calipers are great.

After following the forums for quite sometime, it seems to me that most of the more educated or more experienced people on here give the following advice:

1. There is no starvation mode unless you haven't ate in over 48 hours.
2. There is no magic eating times or amount of meals to eat.
3. A calorie is a calorie (in regards to energy not nutrition)
4. The only weight loss formula is calories in < calories out.

So based on this information, is ok for me to only net under 1000 calories a day? I'm 5'7", 173 pounds, 40% BF, 35 years old, female. I believe my BMR is around 1400 and TDEE is around 1800 to 1900. ( I have a desk job and I use to eat back exercise calories so I calculate my TDEE with light activity). My trainer and I, are doing an extreme cut right now and since starting my net calories are very low. We are trying to rapidly bring down my 40% BF. My trainer is certified, educated, and a pro-body builder so she knows her stuff.

I don't want a flood of responses that tell me to eat more or to eat TDEE - 20%. I want to legitly know, with back up, what the problem is with me netting less then 1000 calories while trying to lose weight. I know that you need a certain amount of calories just to function but will my body not used the stored stuff if I do not feed it enough? I am told body builders net extremely low prior to shows and it works for them with little to no side effects?

Some more things to consider, I am making sure I eat at least 100 grams a protein daily. I haven't been eating the healthiest all the time. I do take BCAA supplements to help retain muscle from my extreme calorie burn. Keeping in mind this cut is a phase, so a temperary program to give specific results. Please don't responsed with eat more calories, eat more protien, starvation mode, eat healthier.... etc. Just please give me only serious answers to my question.

Just because your trainer does shows, is a pro, certified, etc., still doesn't mean jack squat! Trust me on this. It's well talked about in the body building community. Look up names like phd Layne Norton, Lyle Mcdonald, or Kiefer for more information on what really happens as far as bio metabolics goes. I'll give every trainer the benefit of the doubt until until they do or say or have their client do something stupid.

Only ignorant bodybuilders run very low calories doing a show. Plenty of smart ones run thousands of calories and eat hundreds of grams of carbs right up to show day!

The term starvation mode is arguable, but what happens is that your metabolism is always going to want to slow down with low calorie intake or with even moderate calorie intake with "high calorie burn" workouts...as it should. It doesn't like or care about exercise or how you feel about what's attractive. It's trying to protect the body and get it into tomorrow. It's not that 48 hours is a magic number, but it takes about 48 to 72 hours for protein break down and other catabolic(self digesting/ slower metabolic) triggers to really take in effect. It's the hormonal triggers that result from not eating or eating very low calories or nutrients that slows down the metabolism to protect you.

Yes your body runs off of stored fat but REMEMBER...fat is not a complete nutritional product. It gets converted over to glucose to burn for energy in your cells, and it stores SOME vitamins and minerals, not all of them, and it doesn't give possible beneficiary hormonal responses that eating protein and carbs do such as leptin, glucagon, igf, etc., and it doesn't provide NITROGEN...remember that other key life sustaining element? Your body will go catabolic, slow your functions via altering thyroid and brain outputs and rates(which affects about everything else) and strip your muscle to get nitrogen. You need it to rebuild DNA!!!!!! and make VITAL hormones, enzymes, etc. Protein isn't just a word for bodybuilders. But I won't say eat more protein because you said not to. BCAA's help with nitrogen balance but they have no thermic effect. For most people eating more protein sources to get those amino's would be waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more beneficial, especially for weight loss.

Then with low calories and low protein you're more apt to lose lean body mass(muscle). We already know about that and how it lowers your furnace.

There are no magic eating times because why would there be? Your body is directed by hormones in a check and balance kind of way. You eat less, this goes up, you eat more that goes down, vice versa, etc., So over the course of 3 days to a week, you even out any "spike" or late night eating or skipping breakfast or not eating after a workout, by eating a net total of what your body needs. If you have 100 dollars in the bank and you withdraw it all You're at zero for the day. Say you go two days, then you deposit 150. You made 50 bucks. If you had 100, took it all out, then put back 125 the next day, then 25 the day after, you made the same amount of money. So over the course of two days your net affect is the same and unless you're in an extreme situation (bodybuilder for the stage, medical emergency,etc) your body could care less as long as the bills are paid from the account! Body builders, especially those on hormonal assistance may gain a small percentage of advantage with meal timing because they HAVE THE EXTRA HORMONAL POTENTIAL to direct the nutrients to acceptable places. Your body runs on 24 hour cycles but you can train your hormonal outputs by proper total macronutrient intake, so that your hormonal shifts at the end of a few days or a week are the same net effect.

A calorie is a calorie is technically and scientifically false because the human body is not a closed system.Everything is limited by hormones and there is heat and waste to deal with. But given a healthy body that is devoid of major malfunction or disease, the effects are predictable. This is why TDEE and maintenance levels of calories takes into account that fact that your heart needs to beat, your liver needs to run, that lump of fat in your head(the brain is mostly fat), needs calories, your retina needs calories and nutrients and carbs. Your iris needs carbs. Your skin burns calories. Your cuticles...get the idea...all the stuff we forget about it needs calories AND nutrition. The thermic effect of food is the amount of energy and thus heat that you body must use to digest and deal with food which also can throw off the calorie in/out theory. The more important part of this rule is that when you're tracking, if you're not cheating and you're measuring, you have a baseline to go off of. It doesnt matter if calories in truly equals calories out. If you're not achieving your goals,and again if you're healhty, you adjust your macro nutrient intake and caloric intake from your baseline levels, to get change. Protein is roughly 10 times more work for your body to deal with than fat and carbohydrate, and a positive nitrogen balance is VITAL to keeping metabolism in a favorable position. Guess what's not in carbohydrate and fat. Nitrogen! These are the two top reasons why we shout protein so much! Remember that we LOVE to UNDEREAT AND OVER EXERCISE our selves into a malfunction which changes the hormones, thus changes the rules, due to malfunctioning of metabolic pathways.

Under-eating and over exercising slows metabolic rate, and over time your hormonal outputs get trained in this lower rate. This is why many overweight people are eating 1000 calories and still not losing weight. How can that be? There bodily functions, thyroid outputs, adrenals, etc., have been lowered to accomodate for the lower input, plus digestive enzymes and hormones as well. So then to lose any more weight they need to eat even less and or exercise even more which of course is even way more unhealthy and down right dangerous, and drives the metabolic rate down even further and or results in sickness.

Plus way more "trainers" and "body builders" than you probably suspect are on some form of hormonal assistance or they train those that do so they can get away with non optimal protocols. What you are embarking on is a non optimal protocol, and you risk metabolic slow down and only priming your system to store fat later. A more optimal protocol would have you eating more, using the thermic effect of food, the power of carbohydrates and exercising less or without anything resembling "extreme" besides extreme consistency.

At least you're not in denial of the term temporary. As your achievements or some portion thereof are that much more likely to be temporary. The idea of doing short extreme bouts of exercise or dieting is popular due to before and after pics and bodybuilding trainers(on steroids). These people always gain back considerable weight or lose gains made.

Easy. I have yet to have my question answered. My question was (more or less) what are the effects of netting below 1000 calories? And then I asked for back up so I could see how their conclusion was reached. A lot of responces seem to assume I am not eating or eating a VLCD. I am eating a lot of food to get nutrients and vitamins. I just burn off a lot of calories. This is not a everyday thing. I only train 4/7 days a week. This is not a long term thing. Just a cut cycle. I've only done this two days so far Monday and Tuesday. Wednesday is a rest day. Then I will do it Thursday and Friday.

Just so you know OP the reason I even bother with these types of threads is because I actually did see a girl IRL die on day two of cheer camp from severe calorie restriction in the summertime. We were told that she would have survived had she eaten just one banana.
...
I don't know the science behind it, all I know is I witnessed it with my own eyes. It's real. It can happen. Some aspects of dieting are okay to tinker with. Some are not. You choose what's logical or worth the risks. Unfortunately I don't have any studies or empirical evidence to back up my story as I did not approach her parents for pic's or coroner's reports when they had to show up to camp to retreive her body. I never imagined ever wishing I had "proof" of that kind of experience. Until sometimes on threads like these.

By the way... I hope that qualifies as a "serious" enough reply.

So you only want responses that will tell you what you want to hear? Netting less than 1000 calories is not healthy no matter what your educated, certified, body building trainer says.

Just so you know OP the reason I even bother with these types of threads is because I actually did see a girl IRL die on day two of cheer camp from severe calorie restriction in the summertime. We were told that she would have survived had she eaten just one banana.
...
I don't know the science behind it, all I know is I witnessed it with my own eyes. It's real. It can happen. Some aspects of dieting are okay to tinker with. Some are not. You choose what's logical or worth the risks. Unfortunately I don't have any studies or empirical evidence to back up my story as I did not approach her parents for pic's or coroner's reports when they had to show up to camp to retreive her body. I never imagined ever wishing I had "proof" of that kind of experience. Until sometimes on threads like these.

By the way... I hope that qualifies as a "serious" enough reply.

Probably potassium deficiency.