Have I Been Doing More Harm Than Good?

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Thisgirllovesdisney
Thisgirllovesdisney Posts: 1
in Health and Weight Loss
Hey there! Brand new here! I haven't been losing weight and I just can't understand why. I eat a total of 1200 cal a day. I workout for 2 hours, 4 times a week and the calorie counter I wear shows a calorie burn during workouts of 700 calories. I am 5'2 and currently 132 lb. I also allow 1-2 "cheat" meals a week at a restaurant.

After researching a bit, it sounds like I'm not eating enough? Sparkpeople says I need to eat 1200 NET calories. How does my 700 calorie burn during workouts factor into that? I'm so confused!!

Or are my chart meals just completely wiping away everything else I am doing?

Replies

  • swoffie
    swoffie Posts: 11 Member
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    If you're supposed to eat 1200 net calories then you need to eat back your exercise calories, so you should eat 1900 on the days you work out.
  • rockinglr
    rockinglr Posts: 3
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    if your only eating 1200 calories and your burning 700 at the gym, those days your only getting roughly 500 calories. I would definitely say you are under eating! I had this problem as well first starting out, just with the nature of my job. I ended up adding more calories and about 20 more carbs and i started loosing again. When you restrict to much, your body trys to hold onto everything it seems. i'm no expert but i can go off of my experiences. I would say up your calories to 1600 that way your at least getting 800 calories on the days your workout, and leave it at 1200 for the days you don't. i hope this helps. good luck!
  • lunapetu0311
    lunapetu0311 Posts: 96
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    You are working out a lot - I bet you need more calories than 1200. Especially if you don't have much weight to lose. You should be eating the calories you burn if you aren't already doing so.

    I also wasn't losing weight at 1200 calories ( and I was exercising 5 times/week) so I changed my weekly goal to 1lb/week (1760 calories) - and interestingly enough I started losing weight (though slowly losing weight).

    Definitely count the calories in your cheat meals to make sure you aren't actually eating thousands of calories at once. When I cheat really bad and drink alcohol (even if just 1-2 times per week) - I usually don't lose weight that week :/

    Good luck!

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