Are you discouraged by your TDEE
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I'm sorry. I meant my BMR is 1880 and my maintenance calories is 2600.
I'm not exactly sure how much I want to lose. I weigh 248 and want to be somewhere between 140 and 160 (I keep changing my mind but I'm not too worried about that right now.) So let's say 98 lbs. That would put me at 150.0 -
I don't have the appetite to eat much more than my current TDEE of ~2500 (assuming a nutritious diet), so I can't say that I'm disappointed.
A daily step count of 10,000 steps is widely considered as "active". While it's true it doesn't say anything about the intensity of those steps, one can burn significantly more calories doing low intensity exercises that add up to 10,000 steps in a day. Last summer I had a job that kept me on my feet all day and was getting about 8000 steps on the days that I worked. My calorie burn was substantially higher than if I was sedentary (500-600 more according to my Fitbit), even though I was only getting a very small number of active minutes a day.BikeTourer wrote: »
What is your height and current weight? What parameters are you giving the calculator to result in the 1400 kcal TDEE estimate? If you are biking and walking "for miles and miles", then you are likely underestimating your activity level for the calculator.
Since you are still several pounds away from your goal, start keeping a trend line of your weight now, using an app like Happy Scales or trendweight.com for the next 8 weeks or so.
Then at the end of that period you can do the backend calculation of your estimated TDEE, like the previous poster suggested.
5'0" 106.5lbs, I put in lightly active with no workout setting because I wanted to get a baseline. I walk everyday for my job but it isn't too much walking, I don't drive everywhere. On the weekends I'm far more active where I walk sometimes 7miles or bike 16-30miles and I exercise on machines at least 3 times a week.. But I add those as eat back calories most of the time, I eat back half half the time and all the other half.
Anyway I downloaded the happy scales app! Will do! I'm also going to try to use my fit bit again. I'm just confused by it really.
The thing is, sedentary is not an appropriate choice for you, even as a baseline. The "sedentary" physical activity level (1.2 x BMR) should only be used by someone who is truly not moving much at all. You sound like a fairly active young person, who walks places instead of driving to them, and does other activities, so "lightly active" (1.375) is a more appropriate selection for you.
Even at your goal weight of 100 pounds (which, at 5', would put you at a 19.6 BMI), your estimated TDEE would be on the order of 1520 (BMR of 1106 x 1.375).
But again, this is just an estimate. As suggested, using your own real-world data (weight fluctuations and actual calories eaten over a period of weeks) will yield an "observed TDEE".
Your Fitbit may help you to see how active you really are, if you start using it again. There are some Fitbit related threads and groups on MFP that should help you to sort through your confusion about it.
Disagree many people who are not consistently active choose to set a baseline based on their normal daily routine and eat back their exercise calories. I don't like to eat an average amount daily because I don't want it when I'm not active and want a lot more when I do a century ride or a fifteen mile hike. Yes I'm active enough often enough to do these things without killing myself but I also have days that I don't register as active at all. Sometimes more than a few days in a row.
Steps are not a good measure of activeness it is 100% possible to reach 10,000 steps and have your Fitbit show 0 active minutes. I did so last weekend. Yes, I burnt some extra calories because I wasn't sitting but never raised my HR into the active range so I don't confuse busy or simply moving with active.
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I've gotten such different estimates from different TDEE calculators; I have no idea what the real one is. My exercise is also sporadic; if I actually ran 3x/wk and did strength 3x/wk like I intend, it would be higher.
I hit goal weight and plan to just gradually increase my calories by 100 every 1-2 weeks until I level off.0 -
Try multiplying your weight (that you want to maintain) by 11.1 and see what you think of the product as your maintenance calories in a sedentary life. At my weight this morning 254, the product is 2819.4. On my good days, I consume 1200-1300 calories. My average weight loss since Jan 25 is nearly .5 lb per day. Look at the math. My daily calorie intake is 1600 less than my sedentary needs. 1600 is a little less than half of 3500. 3500 is the calorie loss that loses 1 lb. My avg daily weight loss is a little less than 1/2 lb per day. It certainly seems to me that the 11.1 number is a darn good number to use.0
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What MFP gives me is 1,530 (I choose sedentary). Because I started walking 20k steps a day, I'm probably supposed to be having around 2000 a day. I'm a bit short too (5'4 and 102-104lbs), so the low number motivates me to keep moving haha0
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My activity varies wildly day to day. Some days I bike for miles and walk for miles and miles, other I just laze around. It's pretty hard to get an average.
Don't do TDEE method then - MFP eating back exercise calories would seem a much better fit.
TDEE method would be hopeless for me, varies too much day to day, week to week and even season to season.0 -
JeromeBarry1 wrote: »Try multiplying your weight (that you want to maintain) by 11.1 and see what you think of the product as your maintenance calories in a sedentary life. At my weight this morning 254, the product is 2819.4. On my good days, I consume 1200-1300 calories. My average weight loss since Jan 25 is nearly .5 lb per day. Look at the math. My daily calorie intake is 1600 less than my sedentary needs. 1600 is a little less than half of 3500. 3500 is the calorie loss that loses 1 lb. My avg daily weight loss is a little less than 1/2 lb per day. It certainly seems to me that the 11.1 number is a darn good number to use.
Are these numbers accurate? You are running a 1600 cal/day deficit and losing about 0.5 lb/day? This is far too aggressive, unhealthy, and not something you should be advocating on these boards.
Your 11.1 number gives me a target of 1210 calories which is below my BMR, so no, this is not a darn good number to use...
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My activity varies wildly day to day. Some days I bike for miles and walk for miles and miles, other I just laze around. It's pretty hard to get an average.
Don't do TDEE method then - MFP eating back exercise calories would seem a much better fit.
TDEE method would be hopeless for me, varies too much day to day, week to week and even season to season.
I agree with this. If your activity is so varied OP, then why not set up your stats and goals in MFP and track/eat back your exercise?
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I'm sorry. I meant my BMR is 1880 and my maintenance calories is 2600.
I'm not exactly sure how much I want to lose. I weigh 248 and want to be somewhere between 140 and 160 (I keep changing my mind but I'm not too worried about that right now.) So let's say 98 lbs. That would put me at 150.
Then set up MFP with accurate stats and a goal to lose 1.5 or 2 lbs/week. Accurately track your food, when you exercise, log and eat back a portion of those exercise calories. When you get to 200 lbs probably change your goal to lose 1 lb/week.
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You might want to post in the 'lose weight' section and not the maintenance section.0
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I agree with OP. The maintenance calories for a smaller, lighter person are pretty low. I'm 5'1.5", and I use a Fitbit HR and am in maintenance. It's a rare day that I get over 1500 calories, and I'm fairly active, typically walking 10,000 steps a day. I'm on vacation this week and was "rained in" yesterday, and did a van field trip food tour. My Fibit showed me using only 1200 for the day, and I know I out-ate that on the foodie tour.0
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I agree with OP. The maintenance calories for a smaller, lighter person are pretty low. I'm 5'1.5", and I use a Fitbit HR and am in maintenance. It's a rare day that I get over 1500 calories, and I'm fairly active, typically walking 10,000 steps a day. I'm on vacation this week and was "rained in" yesterday, and did a van field trip food tour. My Fibit showed me using only 1200 for the day, and I know I out-ate that on the foodie tour.
oh boy. Well Cheers to us small folk! I'm so thankful my taste buds have grown from the more standard-americanized palate I used to have..
I'm going to figure out my fitbit today! I'm definitely going to keep a very low baseline and eat back exercise calories. It's been working for me for about a year now (slowly losing, now i can transition into maintaining soon) at least so I could certainly do it for life as long as a food and activity logger exists in some manner
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nordlead2005 wrote: »If you've been losing weight you should have kept accurate records and you wouldn't need an online estimate to set you up to maintain..
B-but that's what I've been using MFP for! I'm terrible at manual record keeping. I'll get there. I'm currently 6lbs away from my stretch goal but I want to get into maintenance mindset.
I just think... eating 1400 calories a day is kinda bleh! Social meals are calorie dense, I'll just always have to eat very lightly. I am just a small person living in a tall people world. People tend to think I'm under eating but they don't understand I can't do 2000 calories to maintain.
First make sure that is your real calorie need. It sounds a bit low.
Then don't compare yourself to others. You don't care what others may or may not think! Unless they can see that you are underweight, they have no business suggesting that you are undereating. As long as you are satisfied and healthy, you are eating what's right for you. Your perception may also be skewed by your old normal portions, if you have been overweight.
For reference (and that's what you asked for), I'm 45, female, 5'3", 122-127, quite sedentary, and maintain on 1775. I feel happy eating that amount of food. I'm totally satisfied, I think I eat what's right for me now. I feel different. The full feeling now isn't like it was, it's more of a "total body and mind satisfaction" instead of "stuffed, can't move". I used to eat very unstructured at times, and it takes time to adjust to regular meals and appropriate portions. I can still eat a lot more than I do (at least most days, but it varies; for the last few days I've been sooo full), but I can easily choose not to. And it doesn't matter if I overeat now and then, because I don't do it all the time anymore.0 -
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN.
I'm a 5'11" male. 224lbs. I shoot for about 1800 calories a day. Been coming down from about 250lbs. My trend app says at my current rate of loss (.8lbs a week) I'm eating 422 calories below my TDEE. Let's do the math on that. So my TDEE is 2222. That's insanely low. "Oh but you're probably sedentary and practically move as much as someone in a coma." Nope. I work out 4 days a week. It's total crap. The whole "you get to have pizza and ice cream and still lose weight" thing is out the window. None of that for me. Salmon. Broccoli. Chicken. Broccoli. More chicken. Yawn.0 -
My TDEE at goal weight (based on current daily expenditure) will be 2050.0
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Using the IIFYM calculator, my TDEE is 2439 calories per day. No, that certainly doesn't discourage me. My eating today, the past 2 days, and the next 3 days will be 1200-1300. If I go out to a restaurant Sunday my eating might get as high as 2000 calories. I've utterly failed and cheated a couple of times since I started this in January and I didn't exceed 2400 calories either time.0
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CalorieCountChocula wrote: »AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN.
I'm a 5'11" male. 224lbs. I shoot for about 1800 calories a day. Been coming down from about 250lbs. My trend app says at my current rate of loss (.8lbs a week) I'm eating 422 calories below my TDEE. Let's do the math on that. So my TDEE is 2222. That's insanely low. "Oh but you're probably sedentary and practically move as much as someone in a coma." Nope. I work out 4 days a week. It's total crap. The whole "you get to have pizza and ice cream and still lose weight" thing is out the window. None of that for me. Salmon. Broccoli. Chicken. Broccoli. More chicken. Yawn.
I'd say, you are probably eating more than you think.0 -
CalorieCountChocula wrote: »AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN.
I'm a 5'11" male. 224lbs. I shoot for about 1800 calories a day. Been coming down from about 250lbs. My trend app says at my current rate of loss (.8lbs a week) I'm eating 422 calories below my TDEE. Let's do the math on that. So my TDEE is 2222. That's insanely low. "Oh but you're probably sedentary and practically move as much as someone in a coma." Nope. I work out 4 days a week. It's total crap. The whole "you get to have pizza and ice cream and still lose weight" thing is out the window. None of that for me. Salmon. Broccoli. Chicken. Broccoli. More chicken. Yawn.
I'd say, you are probably eating more than you think.
I weigh and measure my food. I know you're giving the stock MFP answer but save it for the newbies. I've lost 140lbs and have been doing this for yearrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrs. I'm not eating bags of chips and pizzas by accident or eating 1 cup of cereal that really equals 7 cups because I took a heaping scoop.0 -
CalorieCountChocula wrote: »AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN.
I'm a 5'11" male. 224lbs. I shoot for about 1800 calories a day. Been coming down from about 250lbs. My trend app says at my current rate of loss (.8lbs a week) I'm eating 422 calories below my TDEE. Let's do the math on that. So my TDEE is 2222. That's insanely low. "Oh but you're probably sedentary and practically move as much as someone in a coma." Nope. I work out 4 days a week. It's total crap. The whole "you get to have pizza and ice cream and still lose weight" thing is out the window. None of that for me. Salmon. Broccoli. Chicken. Broccoli. More chicken. Yawn.
I'd say, you are probably eating more than you think.
Probably, or go to the doctor and show the doctor the logs.
Also, I eat 1700 calories (not for maintenance) and have been known to have ice cream and pizza.
To the topic of the thread, when I first realized what my maintenance calories would be if sedentary, it bummed me out. But then I realized if I'm reasonably active (including walking) it's really not bad. I think it would be a challenge for me if I didn't have the option of being active.0 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »CalorieCountChocula wrote: »AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN.
I'm a 5'11" male. 224lbs. I shoot for about 1800 calories a day. Been coming down from about 250lbs. My trend app says at my current rate of loss (.8lbs a week) I'm eating 422 calories below my TDEE. Let's do the math on that. So my TDEE is 2222. That's insanely low. "Oh but you're probably sedentary and practically move as much as someone in a coma." Nope. I work out 4 days a week. It's total crap. The whole "you get to have pizza and ice cream and still lose weight" thing is out the window. None of that for me. Salmon. Broccoli. Chicken. Broccoli. More chicken. Yawn.
I'd say, you are probably eating more than you think.
Probably, or go to the doctor and show the doctor the logs.
Also, I eat 1700 calories and have been known to have ice cream and pizza.
Been to the doctor. Literally no problems other than highish cholesterol and obesity. I just don't lose weight at the same rate as most people. It's crap.0 -
JeromeBarry1 wrote: »Using the IIFYM calculator, my TDEE is 2439 calories per day. No, that certainly doesn't discourage me. My eating today, the past 2 days, and the next 3 days will be 1200-1300. If I go out to a restaurant Sunday my eating might get as high as 2000 calories. I've utterly failed and cheated a couple of times since I started this in January and I didn't exceed 2400 calories either time.
Why are you eating so few calories?0 -
I'm trying to set myself up for maintaining for life and I just want to know how much other people eat to maintain. Mine seems so low, it's almost depressing!
Are you generally active? Do you exercise regularly? These things make a big difference. When I was truly sedentary, my TDEE was around 2,300 calories...with more general activity and regular exercise it's around 3,000. I have a desk job, so to an extent there are some things out of my control...but outside of work, everything is in my control.0 -
I agree with OP. The maintenance calories for a smaller, lighter person are pretty low. I'm 5'1.5", and I use a Fitbit HR and am in maintenance. It's a rare day that I get over 1500 calories, and I'm fairly active, typically walking 10,000 steps a day. I'm on vacation this week and was "rained in" yesterday, and did a van field trip food tour. My Fibit showed me using only 1200 for the day, and I know I out-ate that on the foodie tour. oh boy. Well Cheers to us small folk! I'm so thankful my taste buds have grown from the more standard-americanized palate I used to have..
I'm going to figure out my fitbit today! I'm definitely going to keep a very low baseline and eat back exercise calories. It's been working for me for about a year now (slowly losing, now i can transition into maintaining soon) at least so I could certainly do it for life as long as a food and activity logger exists in some manner
My wife is 5'2"ish and she maintains on a range of about 2000 - 2300 calories. She's an avid runner and lifter though...plus we have two young kids that we chase around and outside of our desk jobs, we're always up and about cooking or cleaning or fixing stuff or doing yard work or playing with the kids in the park or walking around the zoo, etc. Basically we end up spending very little time on our butts outside of work.0 -
I chose MFP over doing TDEE.
When I looked it up there were 3 formulas that are all accepted for calculating TDEE. And the output is significantly different. Since it takes into consideration all your exercise for the week and divides it up. It assumes you can eat TDEE everyday and it will balance out. That worries me as my weeks are not the same. I was doing cardio with limited weights about 5x (30min) sessions / week. So 2.5 hours. Then I went to splitting strength every other day with cardio in between. I bounce between 5-6 workouts a week. So now about 5 hours a week of workout time. We walk at night a lot. We go hike or bike some weekends. This doesn't all fit neatly into TDEE. We log them all into MFP though.
I setup MFP and went a little low. So my number to maintain is something like 1920. So I can eat back some of my workout calories every day I workout. Not all but a chunk. That keeps me at maintenance +/- 3lbs. WE log all our food info, weigh a lot, eat cleaner. Having numbers each day that more reflect how each day went feels more comfortable. Even if it is only a mental thing.
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CalorieCountChocula wrote: »AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN.
I'm a 5'11" male. 224lbs. I shoot for about 1800 calories a day. Been coming down from about 250lbs. My trend app says at my current rate of loss (.8lbs a week) I'm eating 422 calories below my TDEE. Let's do the math on that. So my TDEE is 2222. That's insanely low. "Oh but you're probably sedentary and practically move as much as someone in a coma." Nope. I work out 4 days a week. It's total crap. The whole "you get to have pizza and ice cream and still lose weight" thing is out the window. None of that for me. Salmon. Broccoli. Chicken. Broccoli. More chicken. Yawn.
It's all relative (though I do realize this is on the low side for a male with your stats. And awesome job on the weight loss so far!). For me, maintenance is (I hope; I'm currently gradually increasing calories) around 1700-1800 with exercise. I ate 1350/day to lose weight, so 1800 sounds pretty good. I can definitely fit in pizza and/or ice cream with 1800/day, as long as serving sizes are reasonable.
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I never know what to set my activity level to on those TDEE sites.. The only exercise I do is walking, and I "try" to aim for 15kms (9.3m) 7 days a week, not always successful though. So I usually pick lightly active.0
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Christine_72 wrote: »I never know what to set my activity level to on those TDEE sites.. The only exercise I do is walking, and I "try" to aim for 15kms (9.3m) 7 days a week, not always successful though. So I usually pick lightly active.
I never know what to pick either! I walk about half that, but strength train-and choose lightly active. It's usually about right. I'd say if you're losing/maintaining/gaining at the rate you have set, you made the right choice. It is annoying though, I'm always tempted to choose "active" but when I see the calories it gives me...I know it's a bit high.0 -
Christine_72 wrote: »I never know what to set my activity level to on those TDEE sites.. The only exercise I do is walking, and I "try" to aim for 15kms (9.3m) 7 days a week, not always successful though. So I usually pick lightly active.
Same here. I usually have to "extrapolate" my activity level from how much I eat and my weight/height/age/gender. This one is brilliant, bordering clairvoyant, though; I plug in "very light" "physical activity at work or school" and "light" "physical activity at leisure time", and get the exact amount of calories I eat on average: http://www.precisionnutrition.com/weight-loss-calculator0 -
CalorieCountChocula wrote: »CalorieCountChocula wrote: »AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN.
I'm a 5'11" male. 224lbs. I shoot for about 1800 calories a day. Been coming down from about 250lbs. My trend app says at my current rate of loss (.8lbs a week) I'm eating 422 calories below my TDEE. Let's do the math on that. So my TDEE is 2222. That's insanely low. "Oh but you're probably sedentary and practically move as much as someone in a coma." Nope. I work out 4 days a week. It's total crap. The whole "you get to have pizza and ice cream and still lose weight" thing is out the window. None of that for me. Salmon. Broccoli. Chicken. Broccoli. More chicken. Yawn.
I'd say, you are probably eating more than you think.
I weigh and measure my food. I know you're giving the stock MFP answer but save it for the newbies. I've lost 140lbs and have been doing this for yearrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrs. I'm not eating bags of chips and pizzas by accident or eating 1 cup of cereal that really equals 7 cups because I took a heaping scoop.
Well I still have doubts, because you're not logging everything. Those days you are eating 1000 calories under your goal, well, there's no way to know if you're not just eating 2000 calories extra and just not logging them. And I'm the first to know that it's very easy to think you're doing so well but to actually end up eating much more than you think when you're not logging everything.
So yeah... I still think you're eating more than you think. And I see you just reduced your goal a couple weeks ago, so it really doesn't mean anything that you haven't lost more since.
Also... exercising 4 days a week, even for an hour, isn't much if you're not active the rest of the time.0 -
OP, my TDEE is pretty low in the winter time (1650-1700), because I'm very inactive. It's a few hundred calories higher when the weather warms up. My method for maintaining is a deficit during the week, so I can go higher on the weekends. It makes it easy to enjoy social events where there is a lot of food and drink involved.
Definitely start using your Fitbit so you can get a better idea of what your weekly average is.0
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