Calorie consumption and calorie burning.. HELP?!

MFP looks at how many calories you will need to maintain your current weight based on your selected activity level, it then depending on how much you decide you want to lose per week, introduces a deficit. This deficit is 500 cals a day if you want to lose 1lb a week, (because 3500 cals = 1lb). so as long as you are eating a deficit amount of calories compared to your maintence you will lose weight.


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katy

In order to lose a decent amount of weight do I have to be burning more calories than I am consuming? Like if I ate 1200 cals would I need to burn all of those off plus more?! I find this impossible. I have 2 young children, both at nursery, (different ones at that in different towns) so by the time I get them sorted in the AM, I fit my 30 day shred in then it's time for lunch, getting things ready for nursery and getting them off to nursery, then hometime, dinner, clean, bath, bed. HOW do I do this? I need to lose about 100lb+ so it's not going to be easy and I need any and all tips I can get!

Yes, you need to burn more than you consume to lose weight, but the good news is that you burn a bunch of calories (more than 1200) just by being alive, so you definitely don't have to burn them exercising. If you use MFP's tools, it can give you some really good guidelines for how many calories to eat each day, and the calories it gives you won't even include the extra ones you get from working out. I hope that helps.

In order to lose a decent amount of weight do I have to be burning more calories than I am consuming? Like if I ate 1200 cals would I need to burn all of those off plus more?! I find this impossible. I have 2 young children, both at nursery, (different ones at that in different towns) so by the time I get them sorted in the AM, I fit my 30 day shred in then it's time for lunch, getting things ready for nursery and getting them off to nursery, then hometime, dinner, clean, bath, bed. HOW do I do this? I need to lose about 100lb+ so it's not going to be easy and I need any and all tips I can get!

Yes, you need to burn more than you consume to lose weight, but the good news is that you burn a bunch of calories (more than 1200) just by being alive, so you definitely don't have to burn them exercising. If you use MFP's tools, it can give you some really good guidelines for how many calories to eat each day, and the calories it gives you won't even include the extra ones you get from working out. I hope that helps.

OHHHH so MFP says my calorie goal is 1330, so I burn those just being alive basically? Then when I work out I'm burning more? Yes? This is all so confusing :blushing: I'm not losing weight very fast AT ALL. I don't understand why. I'm sticking really strictly to my diet, exercising etc and still next to nothing.

I know it can be confusing. I'll try not to make it even more confusing. :-) MFP gives you a calorie goal based on the info you entered, so if you said you wanted to lose 1 pound a week, that 1330 is the number it suggests you eat to lose that pound. MFP's best guess based on what you told it is that you burn about 1830 calories every day by being alive and your normal activities, and it subtracts 500 from that to give you a calorie deficit of 3500/week (which is what it takes to lose a pound of fat). You may have selected more or less than a pound a week, but that's how the math works. Now if you do workouts on top of that and get good estimates of what your calorie burn is for those, you can safely add those exercise calories onto the 1330 MFP has suggested. You may think you won't be able to lose weight eating that much, but I'd really encourage you to give it a few weeks consistently. If you've been eating less than that, it may take your body a little adjustment period to figure out you really are going to give it enough food, so you could see a stall or even a slight gain in the meantime. I'm sure there are smarter people than me who can explain it better, but I hope that has helped at least somewhat. My biggest message is that you don't have to kill yourself working out and you don't have to starve yourself to lose weight. You do have to be consistent and patient, but it will be so worth it. Best to you!

This might help explain it:
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/faq

Q. How does MyFitnessPal work?

A. Using MyFitnessPal is very simple. Here's how our basic process works:

1. Based on your fitness profile, we'll recommend a daily net calorie target for you to achieve your weight loss (or gain) goals.

2. As you eat and exercise throughout the day, you need to log your meals and exercise in our Food and Exercise diaries. MyFitnessPal will calculate the number of calories you've consumed and burned from exercise and let you know how many calories you have left to eat for the day. If you stick within your calorie limits, you should achieve the weight loss you're looking for.

3. The best part of our system is that logging gets easier the more you do it. MyFitnessPal remembers the foods and exercises you like most and makes it easy for you to add those items to your diary. In just a few days, logging can be as fast as 30 seconds — it's literally that easy.

4. Periodically (we recommend once a week), you should weigh yourself and check-in your new weight with the site using our Check-In feature. Checking in your weight allows us to track your progress over time and also adjust your calorie goals to reflect your new weight.

That's it! Just a few minutes a day can show you so much about what you're eating and how that impacts your health.