Eating 600 to 900 calories

Why eat at all? I'm sure not eating would be even faster.

ETA: this is sarcasm, before someone reports me :laugh:

Because of a slow metabolism caused by paraplegia, I need to cut down to 800 calories a day in order to lose a pound a week. Its not fun, and I'm hungry all the time, but it does work. I've found the following approach to be helpful:
a) ease into it - cut 200 calories every 2 weeks until I'm at 800; dropping straight to it is just to harsh
b) allow a "cheat day" about once every week or two - this helps guard against metabolic slowdown.( Although I give myself permission to eat whatever on these days, I find that once my body is used to 800 calories, my cheat days rarely go over 1200, so the impact on weight loss is minimal)
c) vitamins and minerals. Sadly, its almost impossible to get all the nutrients needed at this calorie level. I typically find myself low on calcium and iron
d) the biggest tip: plants. the secret is to eat bucket loads of plants. forget diet bars etc., they just aren't enough volume to keep me satisfied.

Hope this helps!

It sounds like the 'young lady' in question is impatient for weight loss, and I completely understand the feeling...but it doesn't work that way. There are no shortcuts. Healthy sustainable weight loss takes time. 600-900cal plus exercise isn't a diet, it's starvation. She will do horrible damage to her body.

Can someone really succeed with this amount of calories? And if you exercise 5X a week and do not eat the calories back, isn't that even worse?

I'm trying to help a young lady out, I would love your input.


Thank you

Very unlikely. This might be possible for someone who is morbidly obese and under a doctor's supervision. I certainly wouldn't recommend it long term.

Why eat at all? I'm sure not eating would be even faster.

ETA: this is sarcasm, before someone reports me :laugh:

^ This for the win! :laugh:

has she had gastric surgery?

has a specialist suggested this amount of calories to her?

if not then the minimum amount needs to be higher

This ^^^^

I never saw anyone baulk when I was losing weight at 1300/1400 calories.
That's quite possibly similar to a smaller person losing weight at 900 calories.

You need to look into WHY 1200 seems to be a holy-grail-minimum.
The main reason is getting enough micro-nutrients.
1200 is a nice and easy round figure where by it's reasonable to get enough micronutrients without loads of effort.
That's not to say that someone eating 600 calories may do better than another person on 2000.

However, none of that is likely what you're looking for.
What you're probably looking for is "OMG, you'll die".
Which probably IS good advice for most people as for most people it ISN'T a great idea, I'd agree!

I would have - that is disturbingly low for a man :noway:

I never saw anyone baulk when I was losing weight at 1300/1400 calories.
That's quite possibly similar to a smaller person losing weight at 900 calories.

You need to look into WHY 1200 seems to be a holy-grail-minimum.
The main reason is getting enough micro-nutrients.
1200 is a nice and easy round figure where by it's reasonable to get enough micronutrients without loads of effort.
That's not to say that someone eating 600 calories may do better than another person on 2000.

However, none of that is likely what you're looking for.
What you're probably looking for is "OMG, you'll die".
Which probably IS good advice for most people as for most people it ISN'T a great idea, I'd agree!

Honestly I've wondered where the 1200 # comes from, but hey, it's really not a problem for me :laugh:

OP are you worried about the young lady having some sort of eating disorder? If not I'd just try to be around when she realizes this awful diet is not sustainable and give her information on moderation and MFP of course

I would have - that is disturbingly low for a man :noway:

This was a bit over a year ago - now I do every other day at 1400 net and achieve similar results.

However, it caused me no problems - and I was also doing a hell of a lot of manual work at the time. Barely lost any strength. Actual net calories were likely pretty damn low as I was often working twelve hour days moving car parts from one unit to another (carrying car gearboxes up a long flight of stairs and so on.)
Oh and mostly I was eating ready meals!

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