I only consumed roughly 800 calories today

1200 calories is probably not the right number for you. More that probably. Definitely.

MFP is quite notorious for setting calorie goals FAR too low, regardless of height and weight. For example, it told me to eat 1200, and my BMR (the bare amount of calories I need to LIVE) is 1280. And I am extremely tiny, only 5 feet. So unless you are smaller than me, or bedridden, it is almost a CERTAINTY that you are eating too little. (This can result in lean muscle loss, chronic fatigue, metabolism damage, and bingeing due to over-restriction.)

Go to

http://iifym.com/tdee-calculator/

and enter your height/weight/activity level.

Subtract 10-20% from the number it calculates for you, and that is the number of calories you should be eating a day in order to lose weight. With this method you do not eat back your exercise calories, as they are already figured into your daily goal.

I wasn't scolding you or anything Sometimes stickies on forums are just the rules of posting or something like that, so I wanted to make sure you knew there was good info up there!

I am pretty new at this myself, but since you haven't gotten any replies yet, I want to start you off with something.

First, try reading through the sticky posts at the top, they do a great job of explaining how to figure out where your calories should be! I learned a ton from them.

Second, are you measuring your servings and listing every ingredient? I only ask because if I ate a bowl of cereal, a string cheese, a greek yogurt, some chicken salad, and more chicken with veggies, I would eat way more than 800 calories!

Otherwise, I can't be of much more help, because I have NEVER had a problem eating all my calories I get hungry if I haven't eaten 800 cals by the end of lunch. Good luck!

^ Good advise

So since it says my BMR is 1650, and the 20% would make it 1320? Just want to make sure thats right.
How do you consume that much in a healthy way?
Generally I never eat breakfast, rarely eat lunch and will overeat at dinner ( which is usually 7 PM or later due to work). Today I ate 3 meals and when I ate my snacks, it wasn't because I was hungry, but mostly because I knew my calorie intake was low.

No, you subtract 20% from the TDEE (the larger number). But if you're not exercising, make sure to note that by selecting "no exercise." The calculator seems to automatically select 3 days of exercise. It might seem like a lot of calories, but it's really not and by eating a bit more while losing weight, it will help you create a maintainable diet.
If that's confusing for you, you could start by changing your weight loss goal on MFP. 2 lbs a week is a pretty aggressive weight loss goal. Set it at .5 or 1 lb a week and start by eating that amount of calories.

Don't worry about demonizing food and putting it into "good" or "bad" categories. Just pay attention to how many calories are in your food and try to hit your macros (protein, fat, carbs). Add a little bit rice to your dinner. Add some more veggies to your salad. You don't always have to eat "diet food," you can have yogurt with more calories! It's tastier! :laugh:
You should be eating more than 1200 calories. It will be easier to maintain as you continue to lose weight.

Good luck! :flowerforyou:

BMR stands for Basal metabolic rate and basically means the absolute minimal energy your body needs to survive if you were sleeping all day. So you ate less than half the number of calories you body needs to survive in a day. This number does not include any movement you did such as walking to the bathroom and even sitting up right in a chair. Not to be too sarcastic but does that sound healthy to you? MFP doesn't recommend you go under 1200 calories and I think that is good advice. I did look at you diary and you have very little carbs. Are you trying an Atkins diet? Carbohydrates are important for your brain. Your thinking will become impaired if you deprive you brain of enough carbohydrates. You may be thinking, "I just want to lose as much weight as quickly as possible." Let this site guide you in learning portion control instead. It may take a bit longer but your more likely to keep it off in the long run and not damage you metabolism along the way.

If you haven't come across them yet, I always recommend starting with these links:

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1235566-so-you-re-new-here
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1080242-a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-sexypants
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1234699-logging-accurately-step-by-step-guide
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1296011-calorie-counting-101
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1290491-how-and-why-to-use-a-digital-food-scale

I'm also 20 years old and 5 ft 5 in. I've found that a good way to consume a healthier number of calories is by adding a lot of ingredients to my salads and wraps. I like to try to recreate Panera salads. I'm pretty active, so a plate full of spinach won't fill me up. When I reach the end of the day and I've consumed less than 1,000 calories, I tend to allow myself to indulge in unhealthy food, even if I'm not hungry. I think it's better to eat full healthy meals during the day than to snack all evening.

I agree with the person above who said not to label food as good or bad. I extend that to not thinking of my overall day as having been healthy or not, and my weight loss for a week as good or not. In my opinion that way of thinking is self defeating, because every time you eat something 'bad' or have a week where you don't loose weight, you may self-shame and eventually think there is no point in continuing because you can't be 'good'.

When I began to loose weight I decided to start as I meant to continue, being realistic about the foods I loved, my eating habits and allergies, and times I'd want to have treats (holidays, movie nights, illness, crappy days at work...). Plus I knew that whenever I had tried to give something up before I would suddenly want little else. So I planned in treats into my day, and allowed weekly days where I could go over my calories if I wanted to.
Being this flexible really helped me stick with using MFP and made it easy to change habits over time. For example I pretty much gave up soda, but I'm not quite sure when it happened (I have it at movies and sometimes with takeout, so roughly 1-3 times a month instead of daily).

Today I had pizza, wedges, soup, ice cream, a doughnut, and coffee with sugar in it. I ended up 129 calories over target and consider this a perfectly ok day. I'm pleased I hit my protein goal.
I have an open diary. Anyone looking though would see I have a lot of days like this. I'm by no means a clean eater. But it works for me, and I loose at least a half pound a week (slow but steady).

On the other hand, labeling foods into good and bad categories may be what works for you. There is something to be said for the 'gold sticker' approach of accumulating days you think of as 'good'. But do watch out for how you feel on days that you think are bad and try not to be too hard on yourself. Tomorrow is always a new day.

Just to give you an idea...
For breakfast I made a smoothie with chocolate protein powder, almond milk, spinach and a frozen banana = 300 calories.
For lunch I brought 1/4 cup of quinoa with 3 oz. baked chicken, 1/2 cup cucumber and a TBL of tangerine vinaigrette = 380 calories.
I brought a strawberry greek yogurt as a snack = 150 calories.
So I will have eaten 830 calories by 4PM, and no junk food in the lot of it

Mind you I know I am going to my parents for dinner, and we are having pasta and Italian bread, so that will shoot me right to my calorie goal!

Adding avocado, nuts, and seeds into what you are already eating is a great way to add some nutrition and calories into your diet, just watch the serving sizes. And have a piece of pizza everyone once and awhile if it makes you happy. Slow and steady wins the race...