Calorie deficiency??

meganrrodriguez3
meganrrodriguez3 Posts: 21 Member
edited November 20 in Health and Weight Loss
How many calories do you have to be in deficiency to start losing?? Is it a big number? A small number? Or do you just have to be consistent with the calories you take on and burn??

Replies

  • Ready2Rock206
    Ready2Rock206 Posts: 9,487 Member
    Did you enter your info into MFP and get a calorie goal? If not start there. Then eat that amount.
  • meganrrodriguez3
    meganrrodriguez3 Posts: 21 Member
    I did. I stay under and then I do my exercises. Sometimes I may eat a snack but I'm always under my calorie intake. My exercises give me more calories I can eat but I never easy the full amount.
  • jennybearlv
    jennybearlv Posts: 1,519 Member
    A small number. Anything below your maintenance calories, or the amount you burn through exercise plus being alive, will eventually add up to a loss. A pound is 3500 calories. So if you were to log all your food and exercise perfectly and you ate 500 calories under your maintenance calories you would lose 1 pound in a week. 500*7=3500. This is the same number MFP will give you if you set it to lose 1 pound per week.
  • try2again
    try2again Posts: 3,562 Member
    Every 1/2 lb a week requires an average 250 calorie/day deficit.
  • meganrrodriguez3
    meganrrodriguez3 Posts: 21 Member
    jennybearlv wrote: »
    A small number. Anything below your maintenance calories, or the amount you burn through exercise plus being alive, will eventually add up to a loss. A pound is 3500 calories. So if you were to log all your food and exercise perfectly and you ate 500 calories under your maintenance calories you would lose 1 pound in a week. 500*7=3500. This is the same number MFP will give you if you set it to lose 1 pound per week.

    Ok. Gotcha. I'm still new to all of this and I'm trying to learn as I go along. Thank you.
  • meganrrodriguez3
    meganrrodriguez3 Posts: 21 Member
    try2again wrote: »
    Every 1/2 lb a week requires an average 250 calorie/day deficit.

    Ok that's good to know. For example I ate about 1250 calories. Exercised which allowes me an extra 1000 or so calories. I ate a small snack and now I've got 950 calories left. Am I on the right track?
  • try2again
    try2again Posts: 3,562 Member
    But any deficit you have, no matter how small, will eventually result in weight loss if you ultimately average less calories than you burn.
  • meganrrodriguez3
    meganrrodriguez3 Posts: 21 Member
    try2again wrote: »
    But any deficit you have, no matter how small, will eventually result in weight loss if you ultimately average less calories than you burn.

    Ok. I just wasn't sure if the deficit had to be a specific number or just smaller than what you're supposed to eat. Thank you for your help
  • try2again
    try2again Posts: 3,562 Member
    meganrrodriguez3 wrote: »
    try2again wrote: »
    Every 1/2 lb a week requires an average 250 calorie/day deficit.

    Ok that's good to know. For example I ate about 1250 calories. Exercised which allowes me an extra 1000 or so calories. I ate a small snack and now I've got 950 calories left. Am I on the right track?

    You've got the right idea, but unless you are an elite athlete, it's unlikely you burned an extra 1000 in exercise. MFP burn figures are highly inflated. Even half that sounds like a lot. I did 60 minutes of aerobics today for which MFP gives a burn of 490, but I only logged half that and think it was generous. What kind of exercise are you doing?
  • try2again
    try2again Posts: 3,562 Member
    meganrrodriguez3 wrote: »
    try2again wrote: »
    But any deficit you have, no matter how small, will eventually result in weight loss if you ultimately average less calories than you burn.

    Ok. I just wasn't sure if the deficit had to be a specific number or just smaller than what you're supposed to eat. Thank you for your help

    But realize the calorie allowance MFP gives you has your deficit built in. You shouldn't try to come in under that.
  • meganrrodriguez3
    meganrrodriguez3 Posts: 21 Member
    try2again wrote: »
    meganrrodriguez3 wrote: »
    try2again wrote: »
    Every 1/2 lb a week requires an average 250 calorie/day deficit.

    Ok that's good to know. For example I ate about 1250 calories. Exercised which allowes me an extra 1000 or so calories. I ate a small snack and now I've got 950 calories left. Am I on the right track?

    You've got the right idea, but unless you are an elite athlete, it's unlikely you burned an extra 1000 in exercise. MFP burn figures are highly inflated. Even half that sounds like a lot. I did 60 minutes of aerobics today for which MFP gives a burn of 490, but I only logged half that and think it was generous. What kind of exercise are you doing?

    I do about an hour or so of swimming. Laps and light aerobics. I thought that was a lot myself. So I don't figure that it's completely accurate but gives me a foundation to go on.
  • try2again
    try2again Posts: 3,562 Member
    edited July 2017
    meganrrodriguez3 wrote: »
    try2again wrote: »
    meganrrodriguez3 wrote: »
    try2again wrote: »
    Every 1/2 lb a week requires an average 250 calorie/day deficit.

    Ok that's good to know. For example I ate about 1250 calories. Exercised which allowes me an extra 1000 or so calories. I ate a small snack and now I've got 950 calories left. Am I on the right track?

    You've got the right idea, but unless you are an elite athlete, it's unlikely you burned an extra 1000 in exercise. MFP burn figures are highly inflated. Even half that sounds like a lot. I did 60 minutes of aerobics today for which MFP gives a burn of 490, but I only logged half that and think it was generous. What kind of exercise are you doing?

    I do about an hour or so of swimming. Laps and light aerobics. I thought that was a lot myself. So I don't figure that it's completely accurate but gives me a foundation to go on.

    The general recommendation is to eat back half and tweak according to your actual results over time. Hope it goes well for you! :)
  • meganrrodriguez3
    meganrrodriguez3 Posts: 21 Member
    try2again wrote: »
    meganrrodriguez3 wrote: »
    try2again wrote: »
    meganrrodriguez3 wrote: »
    try2again wrote: »
    Every 1/2 lb a week requires an average 250 calorie/day deficit.

    Ok that's good to know. For example I ate about 1250 calories. Exercised which allowes me an extra 1000 or so calories. I ate a small snack and now I've got 950 calories left. Am I on the right track?

    You've got the right idea, but unless you are an elite athlete, it's unlikely you burned an extra 1000 in exercise. MFP burn figures are highly inflated. Even half that sounds like a lot. I did 60 minutes of aerobics today for which MFP gives a burn of 490, but I only logged half that and think it was generous. What kind of exercise are you doing?

    I do about an hour or so of swimming. Laps and light aerobics. I thought that was a lot myself. So I don't figure that it's completely accurate but gives me a foundation to go on.

    The general recommendation is to eat back half and tweak according to your actual results over time. Hope it goes well for you! :)

    Ok. Thank you very much.
  • haroldrios1692
    haroldrios1692 Posts: 90 Member
    anything less that what you burn daily in calories and you are in a deficit and start to lose weight. The amount of that actual deficit can vary. A healthy and sustainable range is usually anywhere from minus 200-500 calories. Of course you can move those numbers in any direction. They key is to do a gradual calorie deficit. If you lost one pound a week you'd be in a great position to achieve your fitness goals. hope that helps.
  • meganrrodriguez3
    meganrrodriguez3 Posts: 21 Member
    haroldrios1692 wrote: »
    anything less that what you burn daily in calories and you are in a deficit and start to lose weight. The amount of that actual deficit can vary. A healthy and sustainable range is usually anywhere from minus 200-500 calories. Of course you can move those numbers in any direction. They key is to do a gradual calorie deficit. If you lost one pound a week you'd be in a great position to achieve your fitness goals. hope that helps.

    Thank you so much.
  • DoNotSpamMe73
    DoNotSpamMe73 Posts: 286 Member
    1500 and below is good for most people. It allows if calories are incorrect.
  • mlsh1969
    mlsh1969 Posts: 138 Member
    try2again wrote: »
    But any deficit you have, no matter how small, will eventually result in weight loss if you ultimately average less calories than you burn.

    This is exactly right
  • jennybearlv
    jennybearlv Posts: 1,519 Member
    edited July 2017
    DoNotSpamMe73 wrote: »
    1500 and below is good for most people. It allows if calories are incorrect.

    That would depend on many different factors. Running and lifting every other day while I was morbidly obese would have left me miserable on 1500 calories. I would have lost really fast, but I would have no energy. I find it much better to do the math and set a reasonable deficit.
  • estherdragonbat
    estherdragonbat Posts: 5,283 Member
    edited July 2017
    Yeah, my base calories to lose 1lb/week are 1380 (I'm 5'3" and sedentary), but I find I feel deprived on that few. It's not that I'm necessarily hungry. I can find satiating foods. But I feel I have much less leeway to eat the foods I want. Along the lines of 'If I want to have soup with a sandwich for lunch, then I'm probably going to have to give up rice with my stir-fry for supper or ditch the sweet and sour sauce I wanted to use.'

    Eating back half my exercise calories puts me in the 1600-1800 range most days and I feel a lot less restricted that way. If anything, I'm losing a little faster than MFP says I should be. (Averaging 1.5/week but I'm 55 away from goal, so not concerned.)
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