Caloric Deficit???
tiffanyschadow
Posts: 20 Member
I understand the fundamental thought process of a caloric deficit and why that is critical for weight loss in addition to exercise but how exactly does one understand how much of a caloric deficit they need to create daily and how do you even begin to track it other than specific exercise? So....while I can easily log my workout minutes and calorie loss....about how many calories am I burning just living a "normal day" so that I have a clearer understanding of what my "real" deficit is. Right now, per Fitness Pal, my calorie goal is 1200 a day to get to my 125lb weight goal. I typically eat about 800-1400 calories a day and then exercise resulting in a loss of 800-1000 calories a day 5x a week. If you need to burn (approximately) 3500 calories to lose 1 lb then I should be at or below my goal weight but have plateaued at about 128 lbs for weeks!!! HELP
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tiffanyschadow wrote: »I understand the fundamental thought process of a caloric deficit and why that is critical for weight loss in addition to exercise but how exactly does one understand how much of a caloric deficit they need to create daily and how do you even begin to track it other than specific exercise? So....while I can easily log my workout minutes and calorie loss....about how many calories am I burning just living a "normal day" so that I have a clearer understanding of what my "real" deficit is. Right now, per Fitness Pal, my calorie goal is 1200 a day to get to my 125lb weight goal. I typically eat about 800-1400 calories a day and then exercise resulting in a loss of 800-1000 calories a day 5x a week. If you need to burn (approximately) 3500 calories to lose 1 lb then I should be at or below my goal weight but have plateaued at about 128 lbs for weeks!!! HELP
This is a tough read but if you claim to be eating 800 - 1400 calories per day I think your logging may be off because that is a rather large window.0 -
What do you mean by large window so that I can explain. I log everything that I eat down to a tsp of red wine vinegar. I eat less on days I know that I won't exercise so that would be an 800 calorie day and eat more, 1400 calories, on days that I know that I will work out because I can offset that with workouts.0
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Can you open your diary?0
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tiffanyschadow wrote: »What do you mean by large window so that I can explain. I log everything that I eat down to a tsp of red wine vinegar. I eat less on days I know that I won't exercise so that would be an 800 calorie day and eat more, 1400 calories, on days that I know that I will work out because I can offset that with workouts.
800 is REAL low. That shouldn't be typical. You don't give enough info and your OP is very hard to read.0 -
I think I've opened my diary!0
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tiffanyschadow wrote: »I think I've opened my diary!
Are you weighing your food? From your diary it looks like you aren't.0 -
Not weighing....measuring and counting into "serving sizes". Eeeeeks should I be measuring?0
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tiffanyschadow wrote: »Not weighing....measuring and counting into "serving sizes". Eeeeeks should I be measuring?
No. You should be weighing. Everything. Banana included.0 -
In my philosophy thread I give a way to work this out with rough numbers, and then you can use a trend graph with your scale for 2-3 weeks to fine tune from there.
Even I, who believe in eating not much, think that 800kcals/day without a corresponding feed day on the weekend is probably a little low. However, I don't think you really need to eat back your exercise calories, so you can eat a more sustainable quantity throughout the week and let your workouts just drive additional loss, or eat back a fraction of those calories instead of 100% of them.
It's very hard to get 600 calories of exercise in one day, so your numbers don't quite add up.
Osric0 -
ncboiler89 wrote: »tiffanyschadow wrote: »I think I've opened my diary!
Are you weighing your food? From your diary it looks like you aren't.
I was going to say the same thing. Go out and invest in a scale. I promise it's worth it.0 -
Cool I will def try that!
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Hi @tiffanyschadow , have you looked at the stickies? Please review the calorie counting 101 sticky. You will probably have all your questions answered from that.
http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10177910/most-helpful-posts-general-diet-and-weight-loss-help-must-reads#latest0 -
Sounds like you are under estimating the amount of calories you eat and over estimating the amount you burn. Work on your logging and you'll probably see the results you're looking for. A food scale is one of your best weight loss tools.0
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I agree....burning over 600 is treacherous! But I do high intensity cardio for 80-120 minutes a minimum of 5x a week so it's become standard for me. I've googled my workouts in addition to the calories displayed on the monitor so I'm fairly confident with my calories burned. I realize most people cannot sustain that type of a workout with that frequency but I've been a distance runner all of my life and have an extreme endurance. I can see that not weighing my food would have an impact though! I'm going to invest in a scale. I should note that I most often over estimate my food intake just to play it safe for example....if I log 2 cups of cooked pasta, it was actually pasta with peppers and tomatoes, which would have actually brought the total calories and carbs down had I factored the veggies into that 2 cups.
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I do take medication for a blood sugar issue, not diabetes though. I have PCOS if anyone is familiar with that and I have often wondered if that makes it more difficult to lose weight?0
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In terms of setting a calorie deficit that's right for you, you need to calculate your BMR and then your TDEE (both can be found on google). Once you know this you can set a calorie deficit according to your current weight, but I wouldn't suggest any more that a 15-20% deficit unless your BMR is above 300
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timberflake wrote: »In terms of setting a calorie deficit that's right for you, you need to calculate your BMR and then your TDEE (both can be found on google). Once you know this you can set a calorie deficit according to your current weight, but I wouldn't suggest any more that a 15-20% deficit unless your BMR is above 30
I am pretty sure BMR here meant BMI.
Osric
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Hi @Protranser I read many of the links and that was great! Answered a lot of questions I had! Going onto Amazon NOW to get that scale. I do believe that will make a big difference!0
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I just did my BMR calculation, I've never heard of that but yes indeed it is BMR, and come up with 1319.9 and then multiply that by 1.55 as a moderately active person which suggests I should be consuming around 2,045 calories....GROSS I did that this weekend and am hitting the gym extra hardcore. My BMI is 22.7. With the 20% deficit @timberflake suggests that puts me around 1,636 calories a day. Seems pretty high, no? I rarely eat that much. This has been fascinating! I clearly need to do a lot more research!
Thank you respondents I have learned so much!0 -
tiffanyschadow wrote: »I just did my BMR calculation, I've never heard of that but yes indeed it is BMR, and come up with 1319.9 and then multiply that by 1.55 as a moderately active person which suggests I should be consuming around 2,045 calories....GROSS I did that this weekend and am hitting the gym extra hardcore. My BMI is 22.7. With the 20% deficit @timberflake suggests that puts me around 1,636 calories a day. Seems pretty high, no? I rarely eat that much. This has been fascinating! I clearly need to do a lot more research!
Thank you respondents I have learned so much!
No, that sounds good. Since you don't weigh your food you may have been closer to that number than you think. The 1636 number, your tdee -20, includes exercise so you wouldn't eat back calories. I'm 128, and I'm eating 1450 plus exercise calories (so total around 1550-1600 calories) & I'm losing. You don't need to kill yourself with low calories to lose weight!0 -
Honestly, I think you'll be happier and find more success if you:
-start weighing your food.
-then start eating closer to 1600 or so total calories per day.
If your TDEE is 2000 and you average 1200 or so total calories, I think you're trying for too great of a deficit for your goals. Of course, you first have to start logging food as accurately as possible, since you might be eating closer to 1600 on average already.0 -
Since you have PCOS, it may be beneficial to go lower carb. Many of the women I know on this board tend to see the greatest success around 80-120g per day.
If you want to research it a bit more here is the link to the PCOS group . It's a pretty common thing.0 -
tiffanyschadow wrote: »I agree....burning over 600 is treacherous! But I do high intensity cardio for 80-120 minutes a minimum of 5x a week so it's become standard for me. I've googled my workouts in addition to the calories displayed on the monitor so I'm fairly confident with my calories burned. I realize most people cannot sustain that type of a workout with that frequency but I've been a distance runner all of my life and have an extreme endurance. I can see that not weighing my food would have an impact though! I'm going to invest in a scale. I should note that I most often over estimate my food intake just to play it safe for example....if I log 2 cups of cooked pasta, it was actually pasta with peppers and tomatoes, which would have actually brought the total calories and carbs down had I factored the veggies into that 2 cups.
Hi, I also do a lot of cardio. I have never truly believed the read outs of cardio machines etc. I have an workout schedule of 4 x runs a week and 4x gym session 70-100 minutes each. I have been running for 18 months and starting hitting the gym about 2 months go. I wouldn't eat back my exercise cals all the time but sometimes I would eat up to 50% if I was hungry.
I recently got a Fitbit charge hr and have been keen to compare. First of all my dog walks and runs which I always track with runkeeper matched the exact calorie burn to my Fitbit, give or take 5 cals. I was then really keen to hit the gym and compare! According to my Fitbit most machines where out by 40% inflation to actual burn. The heart rate plates in the machines where wrong by about 30 Bpm and some machines where inflated by 60%. So for my normal routine I would have logged 900-1000 cals but it was actually 550cals.
Another thing was a personal training told us the type of arc trainer machine we where using burn more calories then running outside. Which I found hard to believe, I compared my gym vs running and gym on average is a 6 cal per minute burn for me where as running is between 11-8 cals depend on run type.
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OsricTheKnight wrote: »In my philosophy thread I give a way to work this out with rough numbers, and then you can use a trend graph with your scale for 2-3 weeks to fine tune from there.
Even I, who believe in eating not much, think that 800kcals/day without a corresponding feed day on the weekend is probably a little low. However, I don't think you really need to eat back your exercise calories, so you can eat a more sustainable quantity throughout the week and let your workouts just drive additional loss, or eat back a fraction of those calories instead of 100% of them.
It's very hard to get 600 calories of exercise in one day, so your numbers don't quite add up.
Osric
I don't understand this statement. I quite frequently hit 600 and often go over.0 -
As I understand it, you're not a 128 pound woman.tincanonastring wrote: »OsricTheKnight wrote: »In my philosophy thread I give a way to work this out with rough numbers, and then you can use a trend graph with your scale for 2-3 weeks to fine tune from there.
Even I, who believe in eating not much, think that 800kcals/day without a corresponding feed day on the weekend is probably a little low. However, I don't think you really need to eat back your exercise calories, so you can eat a more sustainable quantity throughout the week and let your workouts just drive additional loss, or eat back a fraction of those calories instead of 100% of them.
It's very hard to get 600 calories of exercise in one day, so your numbers don't quite add up.
Osric
I don't understand this statement. I quite frequently hit 600 and often go over.
That said, I think 600 is unreasonably high for her.
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DeguelloTex wrote: »
As I understand it, you're not a 128 pound woman.tincanonastring wrote: »OsricTheKnight wrote: »In my philosophy thread I give a way to work this out with rough numbers, and then you can use a trend graph with your scale for 2-3 weeks to fine tune from there.
Even I, who believe in eating not much, think that 800kcals/day without a corresponding feed day on the weekend is probably a little low. However, I don't think you really need to eat back your exercise calories, so you can eat a more sustainable quantity throughout the week and let your workouts just drive additional loss, or eat back a fraction of those calories instead of 100% of them.
It's very hard to get 600 calories of exercise in one day, so your numbers don't quite add up.
Osric
I don't understand this statement. I quite frequently hit 600 and often go over.
That said, I think 600 is unreasonably high for her.
That is definitely true. Only on Fridays. I got it now; clearly haven't had enough coffee yet today.0 -
DeguelloTex wrote: »
As I understand it, you're not a 128 pound woman.tincanonastring wrote: »OsricTheKnight wrote: »In my philosophy thread I give a way to work this out with rough numbers, and then you can use a trend graph with your scale for 2-3 weeks to fine tune from there.
Even I, who believe in eating not much, think that 800kcals/day without a corresponding feed day on the weekend is probably a little low. However, I don't think you really need to eat back your exercise calories, so you can eat a more sustainable quantity throughout the week and let your workouts just drive additional loss, or eat back a fraction of those calories instead of 100% of them.
It's very hard to get 600 calories of exercise in one day, so your numbers don't quite add up.
Osric
I don't understand this statement. I quite frequently hit 600 and often go over.
That said, I think 600 is unreasonably high for her.
I'd want a HRM or more data to confirm a burn like that, myself. I mean if it's really 2 hours of running, sure.0 -
Since you have PCOS, it may be beneficial to go lower carb. Many of the women I know on this board tend to see the greatest success around 80-120g per day.
If you want to research it a bit more here is the link to the PCOS group . It's a pretty common thing.
I'd suggest she get her caloric consumption in order via weighing first. If she goes low carb and is still overeating it's not going to do her any good on the weight loss. Proper weighing and logging will benefit her regardless of what dietary path she chooses. She might also want to first discuss such dietary changes with her doctors especially if she's being medicated for her condition.0 -
PrizePopple wrote: »Since you have PCOS, it may be beneficial to go lower carb. Many of the women I know on this board tend to see the greatest success around 80-120g per day.
If you want to research it a bit more here is the link to the PCOS group . It's a pretty common thing.
I'd suggest she get her caloric consumption in order via weighing first. If she goes low carb and is still overeating it's not going to do her any good on the weight loss. Proper weighing and logging will benefit her regardless of what dietary path she chooses. She might also want to first discuss such dietary changes with her doctors especially if she's being medicated for her condition.
Yea, I understand that. My suggestion was more additive in nature. Address logging accuracy and consistency and it may be found beneficial to modify macronutrient profile.0 -
Let's recap
1. Strive for more logging accuracy in nutrition diary, buy food scale and weigh all solid/semi-solid foods
2. Use something a bit more reasonable for calorie burn estimations, HRM for steady state, calculator for HIIT & lifting
3. Increase calories to a much higher percentage of TDEE. Honestly being as close to your goal weight as you are and working out that much a 10% deficit should be your max. You just don't have that much to lose. It would probably be a good idea just to aim for recomp at this point.
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