1200 calories a day... I'm confused

People you are eating to few calories this is the problem and why ur struggling to lose weight. If u dont give ur body enough calories then ur metabolism slows right down and ur body starts to store as much as it can it also starts to break down lean muscle both of these things not good! Easy fix increase ur calorie intake. I can heard the collective gassp as I just blown ur minds but its true. Now I have jst filled in the form there and its telling me I should eat 2290 calories in a day but I know that I should be eating at least 3000 in a day this way my body is properly fuelled for going to the gym and exercising and is ready to cut fat and build lean muscle also ur metabolism will not slow ur body will lose fat quicker and when u start building lean muscle this also speeds up ur metabolism now im not talking about turning u into a body builder jst toning up and now if I was to eat 3000 calories worth of mars bars n cakes then yes it would get messy but a health balanced diet and ur good to go also make sure you drink at least 1 1/2 ltrs of water a day this will boost ur metabolism considerably. Also leave the scales alone what you should be concentrating on is changing you body shape this is done with exercise and healthy eating if you starve you body yes u may loss abit at the start but it will quickly slow and as soon as you stop starving your body boom back on comes the weight my way this does not happen you need to be more sensible about it and think more long term people

Thank you, I have recently discovered this also, and am working my way back to eating my correct maintenance level. I do expect to gain some weight back, until this is resolved, but once my metabolism catches back up and is working properly again at least i will have something to cut from.

I weigh 223 lbs, 5'4" and I eat 2185 calories per day, losing 1-1.5 lbs per week. You need to EAT to lose weight. Eat too little and you will lose at first, but then your body will say you are starving yourself and start holding all the calories... thus stalling. Find out your BMR ( cals burned if you slept for 24 hrs), TDEE (total calories burned in a day with all activity) and eat between them. Very few people have a BMR of 1200 or below. Never NET below your BMR, or you are not eating enough to just exist.

Use this... http://scoobysworkshop.com/calorie-calculator/

complete nonsense

If she is losing at stated kcal number then that is not nonsense.
Eating between BMR and TDEE is more accurate when calculated by actual personal data to be sure, but not nonsense.
Starvation...not exactly what is happening, but I wouldn't call it nonsense. Exaggeration maybe, but not nonsense.
So...

For the OP I would suggest some reading

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1080242-a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-sexypants
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1187899-in-place-of-a-roadmap-short-n-sweet-reposted
http://nerdfitness.com/blog/2011/07/21/meet-staci-your-new-powerlifting-super-hero/
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/521728-upping-cals-what-to-expect-why-you-need-patience

What you eat vs how much you eat makes little difference. 1200 calories of junk is processed essentially the same as 1200 calories of healthy food. You're just missing out on important nutrients, but it won't stunt weight loss as much as people here are saying. 3000 calories of healthy food will make you gain weight! For example, I ate 190 calories in chocolate the other night, or something, but I won't lose weight slower than someone who ate a 190 calorie salad.

Also, the whole "if you don't eat enough, you won't lose weight" thing is simply untrue. You will never not lose weight from eating too little. I'm not encouraging VLCD, because it's unhealthy as unsustainable, but my feeling is that the people struggling here are either overestimating calorie burns or underestimating how much they eat.

Starvation mode as people define it here is nonsense. Do adequate research before throwing the term around.

ETA: The links mentioned in the post above me are great resources!

Part of your information is correct, but the other half is incorrect. Starvation mode in an incorrect term, its more like preservation mode. if you eat below you BMR you may lose something but the body then starts to preserve your fat reservations in order to sustain your body and keep your organs functioning the longer you do this the harder it becomes to lose weight as this slows down the metabolism.

After the exhaustion of the glycogen reserve, and for the next 2–3 days, fatty acids are the principal metabolic fuel. At first, the brain continues to use glucose, because, if a non-brain tissue is using fatty acids as its metabolic fuel, the use of glucose in the same tissue is switched off. Thus, when fatty acids are being broken down for energy, all of the remaining glucose is made available for use by the brain.

After 2 or 3 days of fasting, the liver begins to synthesize ketone bodies from precursors obtained from fatty acid breakdown. The brain uses these ketone bodies as fuel, thus cutting its requirement for glucose. After fasting for 3 days, the brain gets 30% of its energy from ketone bodies. After 40 days, this goes up to 75%.[6]

Thus, the production of ketone bodies cuts the brain's glucose requirement from 80 g per day to about 30 g per day. Of the remaining 30 g requirement, 20 g per day can be produced by the liver from glycerol (itself a product of fat breakdown). But this still leaves a deficit of about 10 g of glucose per day that must be supplied from some other source. This other source will be the body's own proteins.

After several days of fasting, all cells in the body begin to break down protein. This releases amino acids into the bloodstream, which can be converted into glucose by the liver. Since much of our muscle mass is protein, this phenomenon is responsible for the wasting away of muscle mass seen in starvation.

However, the body is able to selectively decide which cells will break down protein and which will not. About 2–3 g of protein has to be broken down to synthesize 1 g of glucose; about 20–30 g of protein is broken down each day to make 10 g of glucose to keep the brain alive. However, this number may decrease the longer the fasting period is continued in order to conserve protein.

Starvation ensues when the fat reserves are completely exhausted and protein is the only fuel source available to the body. Thus, after periods of starvation, the loss of body protein affects the function of important organs, and death results, even if there are still fat reserves left unused. (In a leaner person, the fat reserves are depleted earlier, the protein depletion occurs sooner, and therefore death occurs sooner.)

That is the correct usuage of starvation mode, currently your low calorie diets are causing more of a preservation of the fatty stores in preperation for going into starvation mode, this is why you will fall off the rails and go on a binge, its the body telling you that you need to eat more food. Once you binge you re supply all the fuels your body needs weather from good or bad foods and the viscious cycle starts again.

I don't get the absolute hate 1200 kcals gets. Like that is the exact cut off point between being healthy and immediately killing yourself. Given the fact that people underestimate what they eat by up to 50%, a 1200 kcal diet may actually be an 1800 kcal diet given the person.

Then everyone gets on muscle loss...are none of you obese? Do you not have extra muscle due to carrying your extra weight? Fat and muscle will come off of you and it's no big loss. It takes a long time for an anorexic to eat so little that they're bones are protruding, it's not an overnight event. Muscle loss on an obese person is not a big deal because we have more muscle than the average joe. Heck I'd love to lose some muscle in my calves, they're huge!

1200 kcals works for me for now, it's short term while I'm forced to be sedentary and once I can move around again it'll increase but gosh darnit ya'll love to jump down peoples necks for eating less than you like it's some competition.

Are we sure VLCD makes people irritable because it always seems the people who are eating more attack those who are eating less.

After 8 weeks religiously following 1200 per day, I am pleased to say that I've given it up!

Initially I lost, but then my weight loss became slower and slower - complete standstills for weeks. I gained twice and got upset, grouchy, moody, tired and started struggling with sleep.

I read a post where a fellow MFP recommended that if you have 40lbs or less to lose, change your weight loss goal to 1.5lbs per week. I have now done this and things are much better! I eat 1300 calories per day and have started losing again.

As previously said by others, it works - just not for everybody :-)

Kaela x

I am confused also. I to am on a 1,200 cal diet. I see everyone else talking about 1,800, 2,200 cals etc. and I wonder why mine is so low. I am not hungry at all, but I am not losing weight very fast. Looking for some help.

It really depends on your height, current weight, and activity levels.