Eating Back Exercise Calories

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  • myrna125
    myrna125 Posts: 8 Member
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  • myrna125
    myrna125 Posts: 8 Member
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  • myrna125
    myrna125 Posts: 8 Member
    I have lost over 30lbs. I am now having a hard time maintaining my current weight. I get from a lot of people that I am to small and I need to eat more. I am still in the mind frame to lose weight. It is hard for me to realize it is okay to eat more. I workout every day for an hour. I have set my calorie intake to 1340. If I want to maintain my weight should I also eat back my calories that I burn? If I do that I would be taking in 1748. I am 4,10' and I weigh 100lbs. I am scared that If I eat my calories burned I will gain weight when all I am trying to do is maintain what I have worked so hard to get.



    It sounds like you are at a normal weight. I think as a society we have become accustomed to seeing everyone overweight, so when someone gets down to a healthy weight, those close to them will say, You're too thin, when in reality they're not. Get your body fat measured and if you are within normal range, ignore what other people have to say. You know you are healthy, congrats! Don't let everyone else's perception of what healthy looks like, second guess all of the hard work you've done.
  • myrna125
    myrna125 Posts: 8 Member
    I think the calories calculated for my exercise are too low. I have a hard time believing that a 5k run only burns 320 cal but if I put my time and pace in that's all MFP gives me.

    I would suggest a heart rate monitor. That way you can find out what you're ACTUALLY burning. As for everything else, I agree with the OP. I try to eat back at least half (if not all) of my exercise calories, otherwise I do NOT feel good. I feel tired, weak, and I get constipated as well (even though I drink 8-12 glasses of water a day).

    Usual rule of thumb for a 150 pound person, 100 calories burned for each mile, regardless if walked, jogged or ran. Give or take.
  • rgrady33
    rgrady33 Posts: 48 Member
    Interesting. Question:

    I have lost 30 pounds and am at my lowest adult weight ever, but I am trying to lose another 16 more. At what point is it appropriate to adjust the "loss per week" setting? Right now I am allowed 1490 (6'3", 216). My new GW is 200.
  • erickirb
    erickirb Posts: 12,294 Member
    I am glad that this topic continues to help people. I have now lost 90% of my final goal and in a healthy way!! I have only 8.6 pounds to go. I have actually increased the number of calories that I eat so I only lose 1.5 pounds per week instead of 2 and it works better for me.

    with less than 10 lbs to go you should be aiming to lose no more than 0.5lbs/week, otherwise a large % of your loss will come from lean muscle.

    If you have 75+ lbs to lose 2 lbs/week is ideal,
    If you have 40-75 lbs to lose 1.5 lbs/week is ideal,
    If you have 25-40 lbs to lose 1 lbs/week is ideal,
    If you have 15 -25 lbs to lose 0.5 to 1.0 lbs/week is ideal, and
    If you have less than 15 lbs to lose 0.5 lbs/week is ideal.
  • erickirb
    erickirb Posts: 12,294 Member
    As an example say MFP gives you 1450 calories to lose 1 lb/week, and you plan on exercising 5x/week for an average of 400 cals per workout. well MFP will tell you to eat 1450 on the days you don't workout and 1850 on the days you do whereas a "professional" or TDEE calculator may tell you to eat 1700 everyday regardless if you workout.

    So for the week MFP will have you eat 12,150 (1450*2+1850*5) whereas doing it the other way will have you eat 11,900 (1700*7) almost the same number of cals for the week (250 dif). The issue in not following MFP is if you don't workout the full 5 days or burn more or less than planned. If that is the case you may lose more or less than your goal, whereas MFP will have you lose your goal amount regardless how much you actually workout.

    What many MFPers do is take the low 1450 and not eat back exercise calories which is wrong, if you are not eating them back then your daily activity level should reflect the higher burn with would be covered in the 1700/day above.
  • thepandapost
    thepandapost Posts: 117 Member
    People just need to understand how this tool works and this method of calorie counting. You're not going to get validating information elsewhere because by and large the TDEE method is the most common method for determining calorie needs. With that method you include some estimate of exercise up front in your activity level...so it's included in your estimate of total calorie requirements from which you take your cut. Essentially you are eating you exercise calories with this method, just not deliberately...they're built into your goal already.

    With MFP, it is NOT accounted for in your activity level. It has to be accounted for somewhere and with MFP, that somewhere is on the back end after you do it and log it. It's actually all very simple if one takes about 5 minutes to actually read up on this particular and specialized tool...there really is no debate when you actually understand how this tool works.

    Good job OP and glad you're losing in a healthy way now.

    Exactly what I do. MFP was too confusing with eating back calories. TDEE has been much better for me.
  • ChrisM8971
    ChrisM8971 Posts: 1,067 Member
    I have always eaten back my exercise calories and it has worked for me.

    One word of warning though, it depends on accuracy, accuracy of logging what you eat (weighing and making sure the entries you use are also accurate) and accuracy of exercise burns.

    I tend to use an HRM (not 100% accurate I know and then deduct my NEAT maintenance calories/24 per hour of exercise. That may sound a little OTT but if my HRM said I burn 350 calories in the hour my body would have burnt about 90 ish of those in that hour anyway so I would log it as 260 and eat those back.

    Because no method of calculating calories burnt during exercise is 100% accurate this does take some trial and error.
  • MKEgal
    MKEgal Posts: 3,250 Member
    My doctor & dietician told me to ignore "net" or exercise calories while I'm losing weight.
    1 - most people underestimate what they eat
    2 - most machines (including MFP) overestimate calories burned
    They'll balance each other out.

    If your weight goal is 150, eat 1500 calories per day TOTAL to get there.
    (10x your healthy goal weight based on BMI is the formula they use.)

    In the last 30 days, my net calories have always been below my 1650 cal goal.
    14 days I was below 1200 net, and 1 day I was at 1208 net.
    1 day I was at 75 net. LOL!
    My actual calories have never gone below 1200, because that's the lower limit for women.
    Calories burned are generally 450-700.
    My doctors are pleased with my progress & health & have told me to keep doing what I'm doing.
    I am now having a hard time maintaining my current weight. I get from a lot of people that I am to small and I need to eat more. I am still in the mind frame to lose weight. It is hard for me to realize it is okay to eat more. I workout every day for an hour. I have set my calorie intake to 1340. If I want to maintain my weight should I also eat back my calories that I burn? If I do that I would be taking in 1748. I am 4,10' and I weigh 100lbs. I am scared that If I eat my calories burned I will gain weight when all I am trying to do is maintain what I have worked so hard to get.
    Start by adding 50-100 calories to what you've been eating. Give it several weeks to see the effect on your body. Repeat until you start maintaining instead of continuing to lose.
    feeling nauseous every day
    You don't feel nauseous, you look nauseous to other people.
    I work out 3 times a week (weights) for about an hour and tend to do one cardio for about 30 minutes. I eat 2100 calories a day - 138g P, 64g Fat & 258g Carb. The goal is to lost 1 pound a week
    If you want to burn calories & lose weight, do cardio.
    Do at least 30 minutes every day.

    http://articles.latimes.com/2011/may/16/health/la-he-fitness-muscle-myth-20110516
    "Claude Bouchard of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La., who has authored several books and hundreds of scientific papers on the subject of obesity and metabolism... told me that muscle, it turns out, makes a fairly small contribution to RMR.
    ... muscle, contributes only 20-25% of total resting metabolism.
    ... intense aerobic activity like running burns twice as many calories per hour as hard weightlifting, and the metabolic boost from added muscle is not nearly enough to compensate for this difference... "

    "Most weight loss occurs because of decreased caloric intake.
    However, evidence shows the only way to maintain weight loss is to be engaged in regular physical activity.
    "To maintain your weight: work your way up to 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity, 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity aerobic activity, or an equivalent mix of the two each week."
    (The page explains moderate & vigorous.)
    http://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/physical_activity/index.html
  • enterdanger
    enterdanger Posts: 2,447 Member
    I find that when I don't eat back my exercise calories the day that I exercise, I eat like crazy the next day.

    Sunday, I had a net around 800 calories. I did more exercise that I had anticipated and was super active that day.

    Yesterday I went over my calories by about 600. I just couldn't say no to a big dinner and a soft pretzel in the morning. I was hungry all day!

    I usually eat back at least 50-70% if my exercise calories. The only times I don't are when I go to the gym at like 9pm because it is the only time I can fit it in. I don't like to eat more calories in advance, because what if I don't make it to the gym? I hate to eat right before bed though, so...you'll see weird, low Net calories one day and then a large overage the next in my diary sometimes.

    Not trying to starve. I love food. There is a reason I've lost 35lbs and have 40 more to go.
  • jbuck123
    jbuck123 Posts: 4
    Here is a really good article that explains "eating back exercise calories".
    http://www.aworkoutroutine.com/eating-back-calories-burned/
  • shonako
    shonako Posts: 98 Member
    jjinteso wrote: »
    Over the past few weeks I have done quite a bit of research on this topic. There are posts on this website that state that you can, don't have to and should. There are "professional" websites that contain contradictory information.

    Here is what happened to me and why you may NEED to eat at least PART of your exercise calories back.

    I started my diet in mid April. At the end of May, I found this site. By the middle of August, I had lost just over 50 pounds. I was leading a completely sedentary lifestyle. Then I found a message board on here with weekly challenges. I started doing them. I even went out and bought a pedometer. I started walking a minimum of 3.5 miles per day and doing the challenges. By the end of August, I bought a Fitbit Flex. It started showing me how many additional calories I was burning per day. I did not change the sedentary settings on MFP or Fitbit to show being more active.

    As my weight continued to drop, so did the number of calories that MFP told me I could eat if I wanted to maintain my current weight loss goal per week (2 pounds per week). I am now "allowed" 1380 calories per day. I was eating close to (but not over) that number each day.

    Over about a 2 week period, things started changing with my body that I either attributed to losing weight or just really didn't notice. 1. I was starting to get cold very easily 2. Muscles were sore 3. Got constipated 4. Lost less weight than I should have

    There were several other things as well. Last Thursday night, on my way to going out to dinner, I went to a bookstore to buy an exercise book. I got extremely lightheaded and felt like I was going to pass out. I felt better after dinner but not 100%. I had similar results the next day. I checked both blood pressure and blood sugar levels. Both were normal. After much research, reading and studying, I came to the conclusion that you NEED to have a MINIMUM of 1200 NET calories.

    What is a NET calorie? If you take that calories that you consume in a day and subtract out your exercise calories that is your NET calories. This is actually shown on the top of your "My Home" area on MFP. Do NOT believe posts or websites that tell you unequivocally that you do not need to eat back your exercise calories. You MUST have a minimum of 1200 NET calories per day to stay functioning properly. I realized that I was eating way too few calories. There were days that I had 83 and 131 net calories. I averaged 762 net calories over a 2 week period leading up to last Thursday. I have also adjusted to only lose 1.5 pounds per week to give myself a larger margin of error.

    You can view graphs of your gross and net calories, under the Reports section on this site. I learned everything the hard way. Although it could have been much worse.

    I know that I will get quite a few comments about how stupid I am, but I feel that this post is worth the negative comments.

    Thank you so much from posting this!!

  • donnamwebb39
    donnamwebb39 Posts: 315 Member
    One thing that people don't seem to be considering here is the nutritional content of the calories they are eating. If you are eating your calorie allotment and getting the nutrients your body needs, then it isn't necessary to eat your exercise calories back. Lack of nutrients can be causing the dizziness, weakness, and muscle pain. I believe you would need to look at both net calories and nutrition when deciding if you should eat them back.

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