Am I doing this right?

Mellzuh
Mellzuh Posts: 3
in Health and Weight Loss
Hello! Here's a little info about me:
18 year old female.
Start weight: 201 pounds.
Current weight: 195.4 pounds.
Goal weight: 145 pounds.
Height: 5'7.

I have been exercising for 33 days now. For the first thirty day I wasn't really dieting, just riding my stationary bike for 70 minutes at 20 mph and that was it. I didn't lose any weight until I had my period which was last weekend and when I did I went down to 197. Three days ago I decided to count my calories and kick up the exercising time to 90. The next day I decided to kick up the exercising time some more and now I cycle for 2 hours a day. I've been doing this for the past two days, have lost 1.6 pounds (.8 the first day, 1.6 down this morning. ) My calorie intake is about 1000 calories a day and I drink about 10 glasses of water a day. I'm wanting to know if I'm doing this safely with all of the exercising and so on? Will I keep losing about a pound each day, or will this only last for a little while? If so, how long will it last, and is this weight I'm losing just water weight or fat? Thank you.

Replies

  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
    Surely you made a typo and are not eating only 100 calories a day. You probably need to eat at least 1800 a day with all that activity.
  • Mellzuh
    Mellzuh Posts: 3
    Oh yes, I did make a typo haha, thank you for pointing that out to me, I fixed it!
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
    Ok well, you're still not eating enough. At your age and weight, you got to eat way more than that with all that exercise, or you'll just end up stalling or damaging your metabolism.
  • 3dogsrunning
    3dogsrunning Posts: 27,167 Member
    You really need to read this.

    http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/why-big-caloric-deficits-and-lots-of-activity-can-hurt-fat-loss.html

    To be totally honest, no you aren't. You are eating too little and doing too much cardio. While it seems like the best way, it isn't. Moderate calorie deficits with some exercise is the way to go, both in the short and long term. track all your calories carefully
  • KaseyMackenzie
    KaseyMackenzie Posts: 14 Member
    In the beginning, you are going to lose a lot of water weight fast. 1000 calories sounds way too low for anyone, but especially when you have a little bit to go to get to goal. I would recommend eating at least 1200-1500 calories a day. Your best bet is to look up your TDEE (total daily energy expenditure) and then subtract 15-20% from that number, and then aim for netting that amount. You will likely want to eat back at least some if not all of your exercise calories. You can search these forums or google to get a better explanation of it. The bottom line is that when you have a way to go to your goal and are exercising a lot, you should be fueling your body enough to be able to keep up with your level of exercise and you will still be able to maintain a deficit. Others can explain it better than me! :)

    ETA because I stated it poorly the first time.
  • 3dogsrunning
    3dogsrunning Posts: 27,167 Member
    Another link to help you out
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/819055-setting-your-calorie-and-macro-targets
  • timkane46
    timkane46 Posts: 29 Member
    http://scoobysworkshop.com/accurate-calorie-calculator/

    Good answers so far ! Use this tool to help you establish your calories... your very young and you can damage your metabolism... don't look for overnight success it wont happen that way..slow and steady is safe and lasts a life time if you learn along the way
  • LokiOfAsgard
    LokiOfAsgard Posts: 378 Member
    You should be eating almost twice what you are now. I think mfp would put me around 1600/1700 at 200. I've been as low as 212, and my calorie allowance hasn't dropped below 1600. (I am also 5'7)

    1000 is not enough.

    Especially with exercise.because you need to be eating back the calories you burn with exercise.

    Like, my allowance right now is about 1800. I need to eat at least that, I don't want to go very far under that. And that's if I did nothing all day.
    I go to burn 200 calories,
    Now my body thinks I ate 1600 calories.
    That's 200 calories less than it needs. It's not a huge difference, but I should still eat those back. But look at it this way.

    You're eating 1000 calories.
    Then you burn 200 calories
    Now your body is like 'WHOAH. HOLD UP. I ONLY HAVE 800 CALORIES TO USE FOR TODAY'

    That is half of what your body needs, if you did absolutely nothing all day.
    You're depriving your body too much and soon it's going to say 'Okay. I only get half of what I need. So let's stop anything that isn't necessary, and save some of those calories for later, incase we need them'

    You'll eventually stop losing weight, you'll probably feel tired and irritable, you could lose hair, you could feel nauseous, get dizzy, get headaches, and many other, very undesirable things.
    Ontop of that, when you start eating normally again, you could possible gain back everything you lost and more.

    So please, recalculate what your body needs and adjust accordingly. Weight loss is not worth killing yourself over. Especially when most of the time, losing weight this way, you only gain it back.
    Slow and steady wins the race :)
  • sarahrbraun
    sarahrbraun Posts: 2,261 Member
    Hello! Here's a little info about me:
    18 year old female.
    Start weight: 201 pounds.
    Current weight: 195.4 pounds.
    Goal weight: 145 pounds.
    Height: 5'7.

    I have been exercising for 33 days now. For the first thirty day I wasn't really dieting, just riding my stationary bike for 70 minutes at 20 mph and that was it. I didn't lose any weight until I had my period which was last weekend and when I did I went down to 197. Three days ago I decided to count my calories and kick up the exercising time to 90. The next day I decided to kick up the exercising time some more and now I cycle for 2 hours a day. I've been doing this for the past two days, have lost 1.6 pounds (.8 the first day, 1.6 down this morning. ) My calorie intake is about 1000 calories a day and I drink about 10 glasses of water a day. I'm wanting to know if I'm doing this safely with all of the exercising and so on? Will I keep losing about a pound each day, or will this only last for a little while? If so, how long will it last, and is this weight I'm losing just water weight or fat? Thank you.

    According to MFP, if you laid in bed all day, you'd burn 1700 calories just breathing. According to a few sites I checked, you are burning 1800-2200 calories with a 2 hour bike ride at 15-20mph. You need to eat closer to 2000-2400 calories a day, and cut the bike ride down to an hour 4 times a week.
  • Mellzuh
    Mellzuh Posts: 3
    Thank you all for responding so quickly, I really appreciate it! I have been wanting to lose this weight for as long as I can remember and before I even reached the 200 pound mark I would always think "Well, I'll never be 200 pounds."
    My goal is to at least lose two pounds a week. I have read so many sites that one might say "eating such and such amount of calories is healthy!" and other sites that say the complete opposite, and the same goes for how much I exercise as well. My plan wasn't to lose like a pound a day, however before I cut the calories and did only 70 minutes of cycling, I lost zero pounds. By the time the 4 weeks mark had went by I was very discouraged by the lack of results, but since I had done all that work for a month I decided to keep going because I thought "why stop now?"
    I need to know how long I should ride my bike (a day for each week because whenever I only exercise for like 3-4 a week, I always get off track and by exercising everyday I stay on track), how many calories should I eat a day?
    Again, thank you all for responding so far!
  • michellekicks
    michellekicks Posts: 3,624 Member
    I came to MFP at 180 lbs and lost really well on 1650 net. So 1650 plus exercise calories. I'm also 5'7" but old :laugh:

    Here's my recommendation:

    Set your lifestyle multiplier to "lightly active", set your goal to lose 1.5 lbs/week. Exercise no more than 60 minutes a day, 6 days a week. Take 1 or 2 days off weekly or just switch it up to walking on those days. Use a heart rate monitor to get a pretty accurate burn. Eat your exercise calories back.

    Only do while dieting what you're prepared to do forever. No one should devote 2 hours a day to cardio unless they're training for ultra-marathons and other such races. Seriously.
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
    It doesn't matter how long you ride your bike, the ideal though is that you'll stick to an exercise regime that you can maintain once you've reached your goal, and that you eat enough to make up for it, so you don't starve yourself, which is what you've been doing.
  • 3dogsrunning
    3dogsrunning Posts: 27,167 Member
    I came to MFP at 180 lbs and lost really well on 1650 net. So 1650 plus exercise calories. I'm also 5'7" but old :laugh:

    Here's my recommendation:

    Set your lifestyle multiplier to "lightly active", set your goal to lose 1.5 lbs/week. Exercise no more than 60 minutes a day, 6 days a week. Take 1 or 2 days off weekly or just switch it up to walking on those days. Use a heart rate monitor to get a pretty accurate burn. Eat your exercise calories back.

    Only do while dieting what you're prepared to do forever. No one should devote 2 hours a day to cardio unless they're training for ultra-marathons and other such races. Seriously.

    Bolded for emphasis.
    I'm a runner, I do a lot of cardio, but I wholeheartedly agree with this. Unless you are training for something specific, there is no need to do hours a day of cardio.

Categories