Loveslupins wrote: »

heybales wrote: »

Loveslupins wrote: »

Thank you for the summary- I have read it and I still have a question I'm hoping you can help me out with.
MFP sets my calories at 1200 (sedentary).
If I burn between 1600 and 2200 per day according to my Fitbit (not hr) do I just subtract 500 from my daily average to determine how much I should be eating?
Thank you!

You sync accounts, and then MFP will correct it's estimate of daily burn based on your selection of Sedentary and what Fitbit reports you actually burned with real activity level, and eating goal will increase to keep the same deficit.

Use MFP for eating side of equation, use Fitbit for activity side of equation.

If you don't want a daily changing goal based on actual activity level - but would prefer a static goal based on weekly average, then you can set that up too.
Obviously it'll be higher than 1200, which is bare minimum recommended for safety for average sedentary woman, and you aren't sedentary, and hopefully don't want to be average, nor get bare minimum results.

Thank you! No, I definitely want to eat more than 1200 a day!
I thought setting my MFP goal to sedentary would be more accurate when Fitbit is recording my actual activity. What should I set it at if I only average about 6000 steps/ day, workout 5 times /week for 39 minutes (kettle bell/circuit)?
I would love to have a static goal so I can eat more on the weekends when I don't work out! How do I do that?

If you are going to sync the Fitbit, then Sedentary is normally best option if you go to bed at reasonable hour (before midnight, I don't). If you go till midnight and will eat a snack up till then - doesn't matter.
Whatever level causes the smallest adjustments is usually better for planning.

But if you want static goal - you can't sync.

You could do that right now though, if you know you have a 500 cal deficit, then just be willing to go in to the red up to 500 cal.

It really doesn't work well to have day after day of what could be unreasonable deficit, and then wipe out the deficit and actually eat over on 2 days on the weekend. Your body will likely adapt and the weekend will merely be adding more fat gain, but less fat loss during the week.

Better would be to be in the green by 100-200 calories on Fri when you could eat more.
Skip some meal on Sat or Sun, like breakfast, have smaller lunch, and leave most calories for dinner if that is big meal.
Only do that on 1 day though, not both.
Meet the goal on the other day.
Then on Mon stay in green by another 100-200 when you could eat more.
2 days to balance out 1 day that doesn't go that extreme is not a bad deal.
But day after day to attempt to balance out an extreme overeating is not going to fool the body.

chuckyjean wrote: »

NancyN795 wrote: »

chuckyjean wrote: »

See I am still confused even after reading all this. Ok, I log 30 minutes of weights in fitbit with a calorie burn of 98, then I log 30 minutes of aerobics in fitbit with a calorie burn of 112. this all gets synced to MFP, but the calorie adjustment only shows 83. This is where my confusion comes into play. So my calorie goal for the day is 1200, does this mean I only get to eat 83 extra calories, where it looks like I should be able to eat an extra 210 (the 98 + 112.

The "Fitbit Calorie Adjustment" in MFP is not simply the sum of the exercise you logged in Fitbit. It is the difference between the calories that Fitbit says you burned (total, not just exercising) and the calories that MFP expected you to burn. So, while you may have burned 210 calories exercising, you were apparently less active than MFP expected the rest of the day, resulting in a "net" calorie gain of 83 calories.

Also, if your daily calorie allotment from MFP is only 1200 calories, that means that the math is going to be extra confusing, because that generally means that you're trying to lose weight too quickly (and/or you're too sedentary) and MFP is limiting your calorie deficit.

Look on the MFP exercise page (website) or diary (phone app) for the Fitbit Calorie adjustment. On the website, click the little 'i' next to it (on the phone app, you need to touch it twice) to see the math that MFP used to calculate your adjustment.

I don't know why it is only at 1200, I said I only want to lose 1 lb/week. I clicked sedentary because I have an office job. But I walk 3 times a day at work, on my breaks and at lunch, and then work out everyday at home, so maybe I should put that down as lightly active instead?

It's 1200 because of body stats and your choices.

If you're shorter and/or older - you are expected to burn less no matter what - sedentary even means less.

If you have 15-20 lbs left to lose - 250 cal deficit, or 1/2 lb weekly - is more reasonable. Because you must not have the range for a 500 probably.

And while that activity level is more than Sedentary - with Fitbit synced it doesn't matter because the adjustments will take care of that.

Also, if that was a normal day of that extra walking and the workout and you only got 83 extra calories - then you really aren't Lightly Active even with exercise included. And those activity levels are for the non-exercise portion of the day.

Keep it at Sedentary.

2nd half of FAQ explains why that is better setting when you include end of day adjustments.

beastmode_kitty wrote: »

Hey guys! Still figuring out my Fitbit when I do my workouts. I usually lift heavy 4 days a week so do I hold the button down for the fitness mode or is that more for cardio?

Since lifting should be manually logged anyway, starting an Activity Record (view that as a snapshot of the stats for that block of time) allows you to then manually log a Workout Record with correct start/end times.
The calorie burn Fitbit gets from the database then replaces what it badly estimates on HR or steps.
Seeing HR for that time could be interesting too. If you see no increase in your weight on bar, and HR stops going up as high - your muscles are tired usually - time for deload/break.