ARE YOU SUPPOSED TO EAT YOUR BMR?

kiknies
kiknies Posts: 4
in Health and Weight Loss
I just learned about bmr from this board. mine is 1721. does that mean I should be eating that many calories? how does exercise factor into that?

Replies

  • smash820
    smash820 Posts: 22
    Your BMR is what your body burns by sitting on your bum all day just breathing. If you eat to your BMR, you will maintain your current weight without any exercise. If your goal is to lose weight, you need to keep your overall calories under that number.
  • kiknies
    kiknies Posts: 4
    got it. thanks!
  • jkwolly
    jkwolly Posts: 3,049 Member
    Your BMR is what your body burns by sitting on your bum all day just breathing. If you eat to your BMR, you will maintain your current weight without any exercise. If your goal is to lose weight, you need to keep your overall calories under that number.
    Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo !

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1080242-a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-sexypants
  • mikevandewetering
    mikevandewetering Posts: 155 Member
    Your BMR is what your body burns by sitting on your bum all day just breathing. If you eat to your BMR, you will maintain your current weight without any exercise. If your goal is to lose weight, you need to keep your overall calories under that number.

    i do not agree with this, you should not eat bellow BMR. BMR x activity level is TEE/TDEE you should eat bellow TEE/TDEE not bellow BMR or you might loss alot musclemass instead of fat (more muscle means higher BMR and you will burn more cals)
  • itsbasschick
    itsbasschick Posts: 1,584 Member
    BMR is supposedly the amount of calories you'd burn if you didn't move at all, for example if you were in a coma. you don't theoretically want to eat less than that. just keep in mind that BMR from an online calculator is very approximate, as is BMI, TDEE, calorie burn or anything else you get from a calculator that doesn't require you input your body fat percentage, which is something most people don't know. even if you have one of those scales that claims to supply body fat %, the results aren't all that accurate, which means any results from online calcs aren't that accurate.
  • Laurenloveswaffles
    Laurenloveswaffles Posts: 535 Member
    Your BMR is what your body burns by sitting on your bum all day just breathing. If you eat to your BMR, you will maintain your current weight without any exercise. If your goal is to lose weight, you need to keep your overall calories under that number.

    I suggest researching BMR and TDEE before posting again. This is all false.

    OP, read this.
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/931670-bmr-and-tdee-explained-for-those-needing-a-guide
  • Mischievous_Rascal
    Mischievous_Rascal Posts: 1,791 Member
    Your BMR is what your body burns by sitting on your bum all day just breathing. If you eat to your BMR, you will maintain your current weight without any exercise. If your goal is to lose weight, you need to keep your overall calories under that number.

    i do not agree with this, you should not eat bellow BMR. BMR x activity level is TEE/TDEE you should eat bellow TEE/TDEE not bellow BMR or you might loss alot musclemass instead of fat (more muscle means higher BMR and you will burn more cals)

    Exactly. My BMR is 1470, but my TDEE is 2400. Try your best to figure out these numbers as accurately as possible, and eat between them. I've found that Scooby's online calories calculator has been the closest for me.
  • going2heaven87
    going2heaven87 Posts: 32
    I just learned about bmr from this board. mine is 1721. does that mean I should be eating that many calories? how does exercise factor into that?

    Yes! I always suggest eating your BMR. That zeros you out and any extra calories you burn going about your daily life (walking, cleaning, gardening, shopping, walking ect.) are pure weight loss. Just remember, as you lose weight, your BMR will decrease so make sure you re-evaluate it regularly to avoid and stop in your weight loss.
  • WBB55
    WBB55 Posts: 4,131 Member
    I just learned about bmr from this board. mine is 1721. does that mean I should be eating that many calories? how does exercise factor into that?

    If it helps, the formula typically used to calculate TDEE for sedentary individuals (people who aren't in a coma, but mainly just sit around all day) is 1.2xBMR. So if your BMR is 1721, even if you do nothing but mainly sit on the couch and walk to the fridge and back, your TDEE (the total number of calories your body burns) is about 2000 per day. TYPICALLY a good starting point is to eat at least 80% of your TDEE every day. So in this case, at least 1600. But since this is below your BMR, you'll want to make sure that you are logging your exercises and eating back at least half of the calories you're burning thru logged exercise.

    I highly suggest getting a FitBit if you think you're sedentary. Not only does it often motivate people to get up and move more, it also can open your eyes to what your actual TDEE is (as opposed to using formulas and estimates from online calculators).
  • kenc1971
    kenc1971 Posts: 107 Member
    I just learned about bmr from this board. mine is 1721. does that mean I should be eating that many calories? how does exercise factor into that?

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/931670-bmr-and-tdee-explained-for-those-needing-a-guide
    I remembered seeing this a while back. It's a long post, but goes into detail, with links to tools that will help you :)
  • erickirb
    erickirb Posts: 12,294 Member
    Your BMR is what your body burns by sitting on your bum all day just breathing. If you eat to your BMR, you will maintain your current weight without any exercise. If your goal is to lose weight, you need to keep your overall calories under that number.

    Wrong!! BMR is how much you burn in a coma like state, you burn even more sleeping, and once you wake up, move, eat, stand, you will burn more. A good rule of thumb to lose weight is to eat your BMR. If you have a lot to lose eating less than BMR is fine, if you don't have a lot to lose you should eat at least, if not more, than your BMR.
  • going2heaven87
    going2heaven87 Posts: 32
    Your BMR is what your body burns by sitting on your bum all day just breathing. If you eat to your BMR, you will maintain your current weight without any exercise. If your goal is to lose weight, you need to keep your overall calories under that number.


    Haha! If you don't move all day, then that sounds like a personal problem. I'm pretty sure even the laziest of Americans move during the day which means they will be losing weight, even if they only walk to get their food and to go to the bathroom. eating your BMR means you zero out and any activities other than staring at the wall all days will be weight loss.
  • RGv2
    RGv2 Posts: 5,789 Member
    What's too bad is the OP got her answer, thanked the poster, and left....probably never to return to get the proper info.
  • smash820
    smash820 Posts: 22
    I'm pretty sure I said its when you SIT AND DO NOTHING ALL DAY.... which I did not say is what this person does, not sure of any healthy person who would...

    I had been working with a trainer a few months ago and he told me to stay as close as possible to my BMR at the end of the day (after working out) in order to keep the scale down and it worked incredibly well for me. He helped me drop 11 pounds in 6 weeks using this method and I was by no means hungry or unhealthy. So yes working out and/or general activity level plays a large role with calorie goals and I should have mentioned that in the original post.
    Sorry, no need to be so hateful, geez.
  • RGv2
    RGv2 Posts: 5,789 Member
    I'm pretty sure I said its when you SIT AND DO NOTHING ALL DAY.... which I did not say is what this person does, not sure of any healthy person who would...

    I had been working with a trainer a few months ago and he told me to stay as close as possible to my BMR at the end of the day (after working out) in order to keep the scale down and it worked incredibly well for me. He helped me drop 11 pounds in 6 weeks using this method and I was by no means hungry or unhealthy. So yes working out and/or general activity level plays a large role with calorie goals and I should have mentioned that in the original post.
    Sorry, no need to be so hateful, geez.

    It reads that you told the person if they eat their BMR the will stay the same weight and they need to eat under it to lose weight.

    We wanted to make sure the OP understands the difference between BMR, TDEE and eating minus a percentage of TDEE and that losing weight is eating less than TDEE, not less than BMR.
  • parkscs
    parkscs Posts: 1,639 Member
    Your BMR is what your body burns by sitting on your bum all day just breathing. If you eat to your BMR, you will maintain your current weight without any exercise. If your goal is to lose weight, you need to keep your overall calories under that number.

    i do not agree with this, you should not eat bellow BMR. BMR x activity level is TEE/TDEE you should eat bellow TEE/TDEE not bellow BMR or you might loss alot musclemass instead of fat (more muscle means higher BMR and you will burn more cals)

    Eating below BMR does not equate to losing a lot of muscle mass. There are factors known to help with lean body mass retention (namely protein and resistance training), but they don't include eating at your BMR. There are studies that looked at how aggressive of a deficit you can run before your body turns to lean body mass for energy, but the thresholds they identified are no where close to your BMR (they're significantly lower and vary depending on your body's fat stores). Eating around BMR is a useful rule of thumb for setting a reasonable caloric deficit, but the notion that eating below BMR means you will lose a lot of lean body mass is just an old myth and is not backed up by the relevant research.

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