Eating exercise calories

tamreneemfp
tamreneemfp Posts: 7 Member
edited November 16 in Health and Weight Loss
I'm at 1200 calories and burn around 300-600 calories a day 6 days a week (give or take a day) I was told not to eat back exercise calories but I'm afraid I'm not eating enough. Should I be eating those calories back? Don't you need a 500 calorie deficit?

Replies

  • Unknown
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  • lynn_glenmont
    lynn_glenmont Posts: 10,097 Member
    Who told you not to eat back exercise calories?

    Was it someone who knew you were using a site that bases your calorie goal on your energy needs absent exercise?

    MFP is designed with the intention that you increase your calorie intake when you exercise. Most people recommend only eating 50% to 75% of your exercise calories, in case your estimates of exercise calories are inflated.

    Ifyou want to lose a pound a week, you need a 500-calorie daily deficit, but that's already built into the 1200-calorie goal that MFP gave you.

    If you told your weight, height, age, activity level, and gender, we could give you more specific input.
  • TimothyFish
    TimothyFish Posts: 4,925 Member
    If it makes you feel better, you can set your calorie goal to your maintenance level and then not eat your exercise calories. It makes no difference. It is just a different way of looking at it. However, the MFP works is that you set it up so that you have a calorie deficit and then exercise adds to your daily goal so that your deficit remains the same.
  • CattOfTheGarage
    CattOfTheGarage Posts: 2,745 Member
    If you are using myfitnesspal's calculator to set your goal (which you must be if you're on 1200 calories) then that goal does not take any account of exercise. You need to log exercise and eat those extra calories. If you don't, you are undereating.

    If you don't want to be bothered logging exercise, you can use the TDEE method instead, where the starting number already includes an allowance for exercise. This will give you a higher goal to start with. There are lots of TDEE calculators online and you can enter that number manually in myfitnesspal.

    Tl:Dr 1200 calories with no allowance for exercise is too low. You either need to log exercise or use a higher goal.
  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
    Eat them, exercise cals taste the best
  • tamreneemfp
    tamreneemfp Posts: 7 Member
    It was actually a nutritionist that told me a few years not to eat the calories back. I noticed that if I don't eat the calories back it would say you would lose eat 5lb in five weeks. Then if I ate the exercise calories it would be like I lost one or 2 pounds in five weeks. That's what has been confusing me.

    Because of the fact that I'm barely losing any weight made me think that maybe I'm not eating enough. That's why I wanted to check on here because I had a feeling my fitness pal already created deficit but wasn't sure and I was getting so confused.

    Thank you so much love for your input it's been very helpful. Going to eat my exercise calories and see if there is a difference. getting so frustrated! Ugh.
  • tamreneemfp
    tamreneemfp Posts: 7 Member
    wyzgu5arh53r.png

    Posting an image of my calories and exercise calories yesterday.
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  • tamreneemfp
    tamreneemfp Posts: 7 Member
    I know you are probably all going to tell me I didn't eat enough! Correct? Lol
  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
    tamreneemfp wrote: »
    It was actually a nutritionist that told me a few years not to eat the calories back. I noticed that if I don't eat the calories back it would say you would lose eat 5lb in five weeks. Then if I ate the exercise calories it would be like I lost one or 2 pounds in five weeks. That's what has been confusing me.

    Because of the fact that I'm barely losing any weight made me think that maybe I'm not eating enough. That's why I wanted to check on here because I had a feeling my fitness pal already created deficit but wasn't sure and I was getting so confused.

    Thank you so much love for your input it's been very helpful. Going to eat my exercise calories and see if there is a difference. getting so frustrated! Ugh.

    MFP works using a NEAT method, so it gives you a calorie deficit before exercise, so there is no reason not to eat them.

    that being said, you need to make sure you are accurate in your calorie counting. do you weigh everything you eat with scales? how do you measure your calorie burn?
  • tinkerbellang83
    tinkerbellang83 Posts: 9,140 Member
    tamreneemfp wrote: »
    It was actually a nutritionist that told me a few years not to eat the calories back. I noticed that if I don't eat the calories back it would say you would lose eat 5lb in five weeks. Then if I ate the exercise calories it would be like I lost one or 2 pounds in five weeks. That's what has been confusing me.
    .

    I imagine that the advice given would be based on your eating at your maintenance level as @TimothyFish mentioned and was not based on you already eating at a deficit. Most people would agree that you should eat around 50% of your exercise calories back for a few weeks to ensure that you're not over-estimating calorie burns (if you're still hungry no reason not to eat a little more) and then review it after you've settled into a few weeks of it to see if you need to adjust up a little more.

  • tamreneemfp
    tamreneemfp Posts: 7 Member
    I do you weigh my food and I use the barcode to scan. I also have an Apple Watch so I am able to set all my workouts on my watch to get a more accurate calorie burn.
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  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
    tamreneemfp wrote: »
    I know you are probably all going to tell me I didn't eat enough! Correct? Lol

    eating too little doesn't stop you losing weight, its just bad for your health.

    if you're not losing then you are underestimating your calories eaten, overestimating you calories burnt, holding on to water weight for various reasons, or in a VERY small number of cases have metabolic problems stopping you from losing. its pretty much always a mixture of the first 3...
  • RGv2
    RGv2 Posts: 5,789 Member
    I posted the below yesterday as well, so it's a copy pasta and yes many are going to tell you that you didn't eat enough because that's not enough to sustain my 5 year old.

    The user (Joe) in this case enters in all of his information and daily activity into MFP. MFP spits out a number to lose Joe's goal of 1lb per week. Now remember....MFP does not include daily exercise when you enter in this daily activity information. MFP indicates that with Joe's entered information, he maintains on 2000 calories, so to lose 1lb per week, Joe should eat 1500 cals per day.

    2000 maint cals - 500 cal deficit = 1500 daily cals to lose 1lb per week.

    Now, let's say that Joe mixes in a run everyday that equates to a 300 calorie burn.

    2000 maint cals + 300 exercise cals = a new maintenance of 2300 cals

    2300 new mant cals - 500 cal deficit = 1800 cals to lose that same 1lb per week.

    Things to keep in mind is that this is all an estimate. Most start by eating back 50-75% of their exercise cals back for a few weeks, track progress and adjust from there. Keep in mind, the closer you are to your target weight the more those exercise cals become important. The bigger the defict when you're closer to target can cause a massive crash and burn because you aren't fueling properly, along with loss in muscle mass...where, you'll lose weight but at the sacrifice of muscle so you may not change your BF% all that much.
  • tamreneemfp
    tamreneemfp Posts: 7 Member
    RGv2 wrote: »
    I posted the below yesterday as well, so it's a copy pasta and yes many are going to tell you that you didn't eat enough because that's not enough to sustain my 5 year old.

    The user (Joe) in this case enters in all of his information and daily activity into MFP. MFP spits out a number to lose Joe's goal of 1lb per week. Now remember....MFP does not include daily exercise when you enter in this daily activity information. MFP indicates that with Joe's entered information, he maintains on 2000 calories, so to lose 1lb per week, Joe should eat 1500 cals per day.

    2000 maint cals - 500 cal deficit = 1500 daily cals to lose 1lb per week.

    Now, let's say that Joe mixes in a run everyday that equates to a 300 calorie burn.

    2000 maint cals + 300 exercise cals = a new maintenance of 2300 cals

    2300 new mant cals - 500 cal deficit = 1800 cals to lose that same 1lb per week.

    Things to keep in mind is that this is all an estimate. Most start by eating back 50-75% of their exercise cals back for a few weeks, track progress and adjust from there. Keep in mind, the closer you are to your target weight the more those exercise cals become important. The bigger the defict when you're closer to target can cause a massive crash and burn because you aren't fueling properly, along with loss in muscle mass...where, you'll lose weight but at the sacrifice of muscle so you may not change your BF% all that much.

    Thank you so much this is been so helpful. You guys are awesome!! I'm going to start today and hopefully we'll see some nice changes
  • Spliner1969
    Spliner1969 Posts: 3,233 Member
    According to your screenshot above, no you did not eat enough. If I were you, I'd have eaten an extra 300 of those 600ish calories back. Stick to 50% of the exercise calories, and if you find after a month or so that you're losing weight too fast, eat more of them back. It just depends on how accurate the calorie burn might be. Typically they are over-inflated.
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