Calorie 'sweet spot'
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addmorecloud
Posts: 78 Member
I want to say thank you thank you so much to Sarauk2sf and SideSteel, for this part of the Myfitnesspal community. I am 5'2" so most books and calculators put me at 1200 to 1400 calories but eating like that makes me resentful and angry. I've been lifting since November and was eating healthfully, but not counting calories. This was creating a veeeery slow recomp of losing about .25 pounds of fat per week and maintaining muscle mass (at least as well as I can tell with a tanita scale). Adding a couple of HIIT workouts a week sped things up slightly to about .5 pounds per week, but after reading some of the information on here I've been eating more protein and 1700-1800 calories and am losing 1-2 pounds of fat per week.
After always being the chubby sister as a kid, being a fairly slim, sporty teenager (but still hating the way I looked and not realising I was slim because being a chubby kid messes up your view of yourself) and then about a decade of slowly gaining weight, I feel like I've finally found the answers I need to gain control. I used to enjoy running, but it never 'worked' for me for losing weight. (With one naturally skinny sister and another that could easily drop weight by running this was very frustrating). I naturally have more muscle than them and before educating myself I thought this was a curse as it added to my size. How wrong was I?! Now I am ecstatic to start seeing more muscle definition as the fat reduces.
Plus the information was free! You guys cut through all the BS out there, through the kindness of your own hearts. You should feel very good about the difference you're making in people's lives. I'm not currently in a position to pay for training, but when things are a bit more settled financially for my family, I know I've found a trainer I can trust!
After always being the chubby sister as a kid, being a fairly slim, sporty teenager (but still hating the way I looked and not realising I was slim because being a chubby kid messes up your view of yourself) and then about a decade of slowly gaining weight, I feel like I've finally found the answers I need to gain control. I used to enjoy running, but it never 'worked' for me for losing weight. (With one naturally skinny sister and another that could easily drop weight by running this was very frustrating). I naturally have more muscle than them and before educating myself I thought this was a curse as it added to my size. How wrong was I?! Now I am ecstatic to start seeing more muscle definition as the fat reduces.
Plus the information was free! You guys cut through all the BS out there, through the kindness of your own hearts. You should feel very good about the difference you're making in people's lives. I'm not currently in a position to pay for training, but when things are a bit more settled financially for my family, I know I've found a trainer I can trust!
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Awesome!!
Congrats, and thanks for posting this!1 -
Good for you! And I totally agree with all of the above. Advice is always well thought out, educated, and you know it comes from a good place. Kudos to everyone here for everything that you do.1
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This is so awesome to read. I agree that these two, along with all other people that take time out to post here and help others are to be commended and I thank you as well!
I am still searching for that "sweet spot" that will get the scale moving downward. I'm 5'5" and have been slowly creeping up from 1200 cals over 2 months, and am at 1600 currently, not eating back exercise. The scale has been frozen @ 148-150 lbs for about 9 weeks.
I'm lifting SL 5x5 and have seen inches lost so I'm obviously getting positive changes but I would still like to lose 10-15 lbs. Congrats on your accomplishment and positive mental/emotional changes! That's what its all about IMO.1 -
Congratulations on your accomplishments too Kerryatoon! I used this calculator http://scoobysworkshop.com/calorie-calculator/ as recommended by Sarauk2sf in one of her posts to find how many calories worked for me. Exercise calories are already included based on level of activity. I'm an apple shape and didn't dare measure my waist when I started, but I cut a piece of string to show myself how far I've come. I was the same as you, even when the scale wasn't moving much I was steadily losing inches. My first goal is to get back into the healthy bmi range (I know it is extremely flawed for muscular individuals but still want to use it as a measure of health) I'm less than 4 pounds away!0
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@addmorecloud String eh? (link to article in The Telegraph) I think that you're spot-on looking at yourself as "yourself" and getting where you wanna go! (I'll also add in a hearty "me too!" for the appreciation of the resources that @Sarauk2sf and @SideSteel share with everyone)...
The article linked above may help you find additional use for your string as you chase that kinda-flawed BMI figure (I hope to follow in your footsteps soon -- lead-on!)0 -
@addmorecloud see.. when I go to that calculator it says TDEE-20% (which is a pretty aggressive deficit when I'm doing SL5x5 in my opinion) is 1760! This is pretty consistent with other very detailed calculators I've been referred to by MFP users. BUT that seems so high considering I haven't been losing for over two months at lower than that. ~shrug~ EVERYTHING I'm reading says to lose weight your cals in < cals burned. So how can increasing your cals result in losing weight? I don't get it. I want to try it but I need to understand how it works to have enough faith in it to stick with it. Can you please explain? Thanks for your time
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Kerryatoon wrote: »@addmorecloud see.. when I go to that calculator it says TDEE-20% (which is a pretty aggressive deficit when I'm doing SL5x5 in my opinion) is 1760! This is pretty consistent with other very detailed calculators I've been referred to by MFP users. BUT that seems so high considering I haven't been losing for over two months at lower than that. ~shrug~ EVERYTHING I'm reading says to lose weight your cals in < cals burned. So how can increasing your cals result in losing weight? I don't get it. I want to try it but I need to understand how it works to have enough faith in it to stick with it. Can you please explain? Thanks for your time
One of the first things your body does besides lose some glucose stores and water weight going into a diet (and that is actually lowering metabolism too) - is slow you down if the diet is too much for many factors.
When you start eating more reasonable, as in more, many will notice the energy level going up, you do more, you get better workouts, your TDEE goes up, and the deficit comes back into place - plus better transformation from actually good workouts.
And yes you could also go the direction of eat less and less and eventually you will start losing again. But a stressed out body usually doesn't get as much improvement from mediocre workouts then, and you'll deal with stress retained water weight freaking your mind out more potentially.
This is assuming your food logging is on track with accuracy.
And yes, that TDEE calc is using the exact same 1919 study by Harris as most other sites that list the same rough 5 levels. Some say days, some say hours, for weekly time.
Sadly it's only referencing workouts - not increased daily life. It assumes sedentary it appears. And actually MFP levels are based on much never research, and sedentary is higher now.
So if not a couch potato weeknights/weekends outside of your workouts, probably could bump even higher.
If you do have active job, and/or kids, probably even a level higher depending on what you selected.
Of course rough 5 levels leaves a lot for adjustment.
May have been time to come out of the diet anyway and move on up to potential TDEE.0 -
All those calculators always seem to say I'm ok with eating huge amounts yet maintaining weight, ala 2400-2500 calories/day. History says if I go much above 2000 on a regular basis I gain weight. I've never been able to make those calculators work for me.0
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Congratulations on finding your right spot. Aside from teh fact that I'm more pear shaped than apple, we have similar compositions (height and chunkiness).
However, I'm still gaining if I eat above 1600. It's frustrating. I've started lifting again for about 6 weeks now, and my clothes are tighter, not looser, eating at around 1600-1700. When I lost most of my weight (and clothing sizes), it happened when I was around 1400.
I apologize for highjacking your thread with this. I think it's pretty awesome you can eat at that level and see the results you're seeing. I agree that sidesteel and Sarauk2sf are some of the kindest, most informative folks around here (hell, on the entire Internet). Haybales, too 1
