Confirm suspicions

Get your RMR/BMR measured or listen to your body.

If you're not gaining or losing then it's exactly right. You could try adding more calories and see if you still maintain your weight, it's all trial and error till you find what works for you

Good advice. We are all different. Calculators are estimates. Depending on muscle mass, metabolism, activity, we must adjust for what works for us!

Your weight sounds perfect for you! Gives you some wiggle room!

If you're maintaining, guess what.....you're eating at maintenance. Also, underestimating your intake by a couple hundred calories is pretty easy to do...200 calories is jack ****...it's a small handful of nuts. My guess is in fact, you are eating more than you think you are, but yes...you are eating maintenance obviously.

This.

If you're maintaining, guess what.....you're eating at maintenance. Also, underestimating your intake by a couple hundred calories is pretty easy to do...200 calories is jack ****...it's a small handful of nuts. My guess is in fact, you are eating more than you think you are, but yes...you are eating maintenance obviously.

This.

200 cals is 1 serving of nuts for the most part.
or 1 serving of some kind of nut butter

I stopped losing weight at the end of December, I went from 150lb to 120lb from May until then and have maintained within +/-2.5lb ever since. I'm 5'3.5. I now log about 1650 calories per day on lazy days and about 1800 on active ones - is that /really/ my maintenance? It seems low. I still measure but admit I'm getting a bit sloppy and mostly just eyeball, also eat out more and guestimate what I'm getting if I can't find an accurate looking entry, could I really be underestimating by 200+ cals daily?

Edit: typo

Since you are maintaining, don't worry so much about the 200+ calories daily unless you see yourself gaining. If you continue to hover at the +/- 2.5 lb then no worries but if you see a gain of say 3.5 lb that stays then cut back a little assuming your goal is to maintain at 120 lb. Ideally you will get to a point of maintaining at 120 +/- 2.5 lb without tracking calories only cutting back if you notice a consistent weight gain of a pound or two.

I don't reply to a lot of these boards (because of the drama and misinformation being thrown around like that mythical magical world of "Starvation Mode Land" and those out there saying that 120 lbs for someone at 5’3” is underweight, sheesh {{{FACE PALM}}}).

I am 5’3” and 126 lbs and 36 yrs. old, I’ve been wearing one of those lovely little BodyMedia devices (that they wear on the Biggest Loser to track their calorie burn) for 1 1/2 yrs. now. This tracks calories burned by little sensors that rest on your skin (it is heat and activity sensitive). Through the past 1+ years I’ve closely looked at the results and have noticed that on my days that I just wake up, go to work, make dinner for the kids, drive them to their activities, come home, watch TV, and then go to bed that I only actually burn 1550 - 1650 calories in the day (an no I have NEVER visited the mythical land of “Starvation Mode” to have ruined my metabolism, again {{{FACE PALM}}}), on my more active days (shopping, doing a cycle class, walking around the zoo) I burn between 1850 – 2200 calories, then days that I run (and of course it all depends on duration and intensity) I can burn between 2300 – 2700+ calories. On my rest day after a long run (12 - 15kms) I go right back down to burning the 1550 – 1650 (so my run the day before does not up my calorie burn the day after, this is another mythical land floating around out there that I have yet to visit).

So to answer your question, YES, 1600 calories could actually be your maintenance level if you are not that active in a day (and by active I mean getting that heart rate up). My answer is simply coming from personal experience because of a body burn monitor that I have been wearing for 1+ years. Take from it what you will, good luck, and yes, go for a run, the road misses you

I weigh around 105lbs, 5"2 and have a desk job. I maintain on 1570, give or take a 100 cals. I eat exercise cals back and have a HRM and Fitbit. According to my fitbit, i don't hit my 10,000 steps just on a normal every day activity level so on those days it says i need less than 1500 cals to maintain but i still eat the 1570 cals.

I don't reply to a lot of these boards (because of the drama and misinformation being thrown around like that mythical magical world of "Starvation Mode Land" and those out there saying that 120 lbs for someone at 5’3” is underweight, sheesh {{{FACE PALM}}}).

I am 5’3” and 126 lbs and 36 yrs. old, I’ve been wearing one of those lovely little BodyMedia devices (that they wear on the Biggest Loser to track their calorie burn) for 1 1/2 yrs. now. This tracks calories burned by little sensors that rest on your skin (it is heat and activity sensitive). Through the past 1+ years I’ve closely looked at the results and have noticed that on my days that I just wake up, go to work, make dinner for the kids, drive them to their activities, come home, watch TV, and then go to bed that I only actually burn 1550 - 1650 calories in the day (an no I have NEVER visited the mythical land of “Starvation Mode” to have ruined my metabolism, again {{{FACE PALM}}}), on my more active days (shopping, doing a cycle class, walking around the zoo) I burn between 1850 – 2200 calories, then days that I run (and of course it all depends on duration and intensity) I can burn between 2300 – 2700+ calories. On my rest day after a long run (12 - 15kms) I go right back down to burning the 1550 – 1650 (so my run the day before does not up my calorie burn the day after, this is another mythical land floating around out there that I have yet to visit).

So to answer your question, YES, 1600 calories could actually be your maintenance level if you are not that active in a day (and by active I mean getting that heart rate up). My answer is simply coming from personal experience because of a body burn monitor that I have been wearing for 1+ years. Take from it what you will, good luck, and yes, go for a run, the road misses you

Very interesting. I am 40 years old, 5'4", about 132 pounds and I also wore a BodyMedia for over a year (stopping when they changed the algorithms and my calorie burns got way over-estimated). In that year, I found that my maintenance calories on a rest day were 2000-2100. I work a desk job and don't move all that much unless I do deliberate exercise. It is fascinating to me that two women of comparable age/height/weight can have such a difference in TDEE.

Absolutely, everyone is so very different from each other (regardless of what some members MFP say), I also have a desk job and 3 very active children. It was suggested to me that I may have a low daily burn and to get one of these devices to more accurately track my burn, activity, etc. Getting this device I was able to confirm some suspicions:

1 - I have a low caloric daily burn 1550 - 1650 (on days without extra exercise)
2 - my sleep is horribly low (between 4 - 6 hrs a night, and never more than 1 1/2 hrs at a time, some nights I don't even get 30 mins. without waking up)
3 - my steps taken during the day were awful (sometimes only equaling 2,500 - 3,000 / day)
4 - my moderate and vigorous activities were almost non existent.

So because of the BodyMedia I've upped my steps (last month I averaged over 13,000 / day), upped my activities (last month I ran a total of 216 kms), and because of all the running I've upped my average daily burn, but like I said, when I take my rest days it drops right off again (I'd post a screen shot of my BodyMedia activity manager but I've tried to post pictures before and have been unsuccessful, I haven't a clue on how to post them, except to my profile), and as for my sleep, nothing is helping that, but 3 out of 4 isn't bad