This may be a stupid question..

EllennD
EllennD Posts: 96 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Ive been dieting for a long time now and recently i have joined a gym and do about an hour a day 5-6 times a week, but my question is why are you meant to eat back the calories you burn?

The more i think about it the more it doesnt make sense to me haha, any answers?

Replies

  • IronSmasher
    IronSmasher Posts: 3,908 Member
    Why are you logging your food and counting calories instead of just eating as little as possible and trying to starve yourself?
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,809 Member
    So you chose a calorie deficit which appears to be working very well for you with only 5lbs to go.

    Now you have added in more exercise which will increase your calorie deficit if you don't eat more to compensate. I fail to see any good reason you would want to speed up your weight loss right when you are approaching maintenance.

    To put it simply if you do 400 calories of extra exercise and eat back those 400 calories your deficit is exactly the same but you have the health and fitness benefits of exercise.
  • recriger
    recriger Posts: 245 Member
    My general philosophy is that the exercise itself doesn't create the weight loss. The exercise increases the strength of the body and makes it work more efficiently. That will help the overall health as time goes by. When you set up your deficit you are already accounting for the weight loss you want to achieve. That is the plan you want to stick with.

    When you start increasing your deficite, whether thru decreasing your food intake or increasing your exercise without eating back those calories you are creating what will become a downward spiral. Your body needs a certain amount of food, not only to retain the energy to exercise, but also to aid recovery.

    If you don't eat enough you will quickly lose the motivation to exercise due to having no energy. If you force yourself to exercise at that point you are increasing the odds of injury. Then if you get an injury you have guaranteed that it will take longer to heal... thereby preventing you from exercising........ And down the spiral we go.

    I know it is exciting to be nearing your goal. Stick with what has given constant results. I can remember several times I have become excited and changed things to hurry up the process. Then several months later I look back and see that I was in the same place as before, but only then was I recovering from yet another self inflicted obstacle.

    Beyond the health improvements, I appreciate exercise due to the fact that I love to eat. BBQ, Pizza...Perhaps a few "distilled spirits". The calories I get from exercise allow me to indulge more often and still lose weight.
  • Heather032190
    Heather032190 Posts: 138 Member
    Here it is plain and simple: MFP has a calorie deficit for you that doesnt include the ones lost by excersice that is why you see you lose calories when you enter it in on the calculator to maintain the pace you are at you need to eat back what you lost during exercise.

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