calories in/out

People with lower calorie needs can lose weight, they're just going to lose it more slowly and accurate logging will be important. You don't need a 500 calorie deficit to lose weight, you just need a deficit.

If you are exercising regularly, your calorie needs are higher than your resting calorie needs -- this is another factor to consider when determining your deficit.

Smaller people often have a deficit that is smaller than 500, like 250. A pound a week likely isn't a realistic goal for you, but that doesn't mean that you can't lose weight.

Using scoobysworkshop.com, I got this for you - assuming you are lightly active, 22 years old and female.



That is not eating back exercise calories. So if you eat the 1344 + exercise calories, you should end up around that 1584.

Trust the process. Log accurately. Use a food scale. Give it 6-8 weeks. If you aren't losing approximately 1 pound per week (any more than that is too much for you at your current weight), adjust from there.

Changed the age to 44...



Again, this is counting exercise calories, which MFP does not do.

luvbug1995 wrote: »

Should have mentioned my age 44, premenopasal but refusing to show my age.

You initial post sounds like you're just getting started. That suggests to me that you're despairing based on a theory about what will happen. Frankly, that's a waste of time.

First, your theory, considered as such, is incorrect. I plugged your stats into a standard multi-formula Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) and Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) calculator. Your stated BMR (RMR), 1344, is in the range that the calculator estimates. But, as others have said, your BMR is what you'd burn in a coma.

According to the calculator I used (sailrabbit), if you have a normal office job kind of life (i.e., sedentary) your TDEE would be more like 1400-1600. Add your exercise, it's more like 1700-1900.

So, 1200 calories would have you losing .5-1 pound a week. You don't want to be losing faster than that, anyway, with so little to lose. (Part of resisting aging is hanging onto as much existing muscle as possible; losing weight too fast risks that.)

But all of the above is still a theory . What do with theories? We test them.

So, set up your MFP profile, and put in that you want to lose 0.5 pounds/week (youth-protecting choice ). Log your eating accurately. On days you exercise, log that and eat 50-100% of those calories, too (picking the percent based in how confident you are that the exercise estimate is accurate). Do this for a full menstrual cycle, plus a little.

Then you'll have something better than a theory: You'll have data. If you're losing too fast, eat more. If you're losing too slowly, eat less, eat back a smaller percent of exercise, exercise more, or some conbination.

Don't worry about theories. Go by results. At age 61, 5'5", weight in the 120s, the calculator says my BMR should be 1000-1100, and sedentary TDEE 1300-1400 (1700-2000 with exercise). Gloomy theory, right? Trouble is, it's false. I actually lose slowly at 1800 (before exercise) and maintain my weight closer to 2100, plus eat 200-300 exercise calories most days on top of that.

Who knows, maybe you'll be lucky, too. Either way, you don't know until you test it out. The calculators just give you a starting point estimate, not a true-gospel answer.