Eating too little or too much to lose 2lb min a week

acebanditcat
acebanditcat Posts: 28 Member
edited November 21 in Health and Weight Loss
Quick question..

I've increased by exercise alot. I originally started on 1200 cals a day and did no exercise. I sit at my desk all day and do approximately 3,500 steps per day and I'm 19st.

For the last two weeks my steps have been over 10,000 every day (with the exception of last saturday)
I do swimming, zumba circuits and a gym work out. So i increased it to 1500 per day

This is an example of the calories I have eaten so far this week. and the calories i've done by doing exercise

SAT - EATEN 1265 EXERCISE 453
SUN - EATEN 1129 EXERCISE 1747
MON - 1733 EXERCISE 1103
TUE - 1294 EXERCISE 1389

Last week was more or less the same and i lost 0.5lb! So as I have three days left until i get weighed should I
be dropping back down to 1200 or increasing it higher than 1500

Confused!!



Replies

  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
    At your weight, you should eat more in the neigborhood of 1600-1800 calories, but you need to make sure you do that, and not more, by weighing and logging correctly.

    Water has weight. Water weight will always fluctuate. Increase in physical activity will often make you retain water. Sometimes the weight of retained water, or digesting food in your system, will outweigh the amount of fat you can lose in a week.

    Exercise doesn't burn many calories compared to what you can safely cut from your food intake, and the numbers stated are often inflated. I would eat back no more than 75% percent of those calories.

    I recommend appropriate calorie goal, consistent and accurate food logging, exercise for health and enjoyment, buying your own scale and using it daily, and patience.
  • acebanditcat
    acebanditcat Posts: 28 Member
    I weigh and measure everything i have and its entered here on MFP. Nothing is ever estimated... not even a lettuce leaf. Water is measured and I drink over 2ltrs a day. My activity is tracked with my MISFIT 2 which measures not only my steps but also my swimming which is linked to MFP. I also have an iwatch. I use the Walkmeter app which also links here to MFP

    When I ate 1200 cals I felt full. Now at 1500 cals I'm finding I'm trying to find things to eat and if I up it to more
    it would be worse.

    I was doing slimming world before and there is no limit to certain foods so measuring wasnt a requirement. Thats why in my first week I lost 11lb. without doing exercise.
  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
    i think you need to be more patient....
  • cheryldumais
    cheryldumais Posts: 1,907 Member
    I don't know what you were eating on Slimming World but sometimes what happens is a big water loss. 11 lbs in a week is crazy. I suggest you are losing fat now but replacing some of that lost water. Give it a few more weeks for things to even out and you should see a steady loss. I will say though that your exercise calories seem a bit too high. I would count half until you can see the results then adjust accordingly.
  • SezxyStef
    SezxyStef Posts: 15,267 Member
    acebanditcat wrote: »
    I weigh and measure everything i have and its entered here on MFP. Nothing is ever estimated... not even a lettuce leaf. Water is measured and I drink over 2ltrs a day. My activity is tracked with my MISFIT 2 which measures not only my steps but also my swimming which is linked to MFP. I also have an iwatch. I use the Walkmeter app which also links here to MFP

    When I ate 1200 cals I felt full. Now at 1500 cals I'm finding I'm trying to find things to eat and if I up it to more
    it would be worse.

    I was doing slimming world before and there is no limit to certain foods so measuring wasnt a requirement. Thats why in my first week I lost 11lb. without doing exercise.

    only thing you need to do is make sure you are using the correct entries then based on what you say.

    Eating more calories isn't hard you just choose different foods...like a beef burger instead of a chicken burger.

    however the 1/2lb weight loss could be for a few reasons.....

    as long as you are sure your correct in your logging then it's on the CO. Perhaps try eating 50-75% of those calories back and see how that goes.
  • acebanditcat
    acebanditcat Posts: 28 Member
    i lost 11lb 4 weeks ago. The excercise i do is roughly an hour in the gym, then a 45 minute zumba then an hour or sometimes two hours swimming. I may also add a 30 walk in my lunch hour at work.
    On slimming world some of the free food items - ie. eat unlimited would include, potatoes, rice pasta and noodles. Most meat and fish is unlimited too. Tho i didnt eat them often (the potatoes rice etc) but would eat a lot of fruit and alot of vegetables and meat and fish.

    The stats I stated are from here on MFP after everything is logged and the fitness tracker has synced.
  • acebanditcat
    acebanditcat Posts: 28 Member
    the stats are calories consumed and calories burned. I dont know what Net calories mean
  • SezxyStef
    SezxyStef Posts: 15,267 Member
    acebanditcat wrote: »
    the stats are calories consumed and calories burned. I dont know what Net calories mean

    net calories are total consumed-total burned=net calories so in essence on Saturday you ate 1265 -453=812 net calories...

    you should be netting at least 1200...
  • animatorswearbras
    animatorswearbras Posts: 1,001 Member
    Assuming you're weighing everything and logging accurately it sounds like you've gained water weight from increased exercise, your muscles retain water to repair when doing new exercise. The burns seem quite high however you're not eating those cals back so you're definitely not overeating. I would also up my cals a bit, don't sweat the gain it happens to everyone when starting a new routine and may take a few weeks to even out its perfectly natural so panic not. Do you feel satisfied on the cals you are on at the moment? You don't have to punish yourself and overrestrict other wise you'll end up on the crash diet yoyo cycle. x Fuel yourself I'd definitely say 1500cals consumed absolute minimum xxxx

    Also you mentioned slimming world are you tracking your "free foods" because they aren't free on MFP they count towards your consumed cals. x
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,454 Member
    I would say - look at whatever foods your were eating at 1200 and just eat more of those to getup to 1600-1800 total. When you went up to 1500, did you start adding in more treats or more carbs? That will mess with hunger. I have a level of carbs I stay under or I will get much hungrier. I can add more fats or protein and usually not affect hunger, but carbs mess with me.

    Then relax about the weekly weigh-in. I know that's easier said than done, especially if you are weighing in front of other people - which I have never understood - but it sounds like you have some specific weigh-in day. (?) As long as you are consistently doing the right things, the weight is going to come off, but it won't be every week and it won't be the same number-drop every week. Stay the course.
  • acebanditcat
    acebanditcat Posts: 28 Member
    i do go to Slimming world still for my weigh ins. But I dont regard anything as free food. I weigh everything as i was concerned on portion control,. So for example my lunch today consisted of 40g of lettuce (6 cals) and 264g of ready cooked chicken tikka (264 cals) lighter than light mayo (30g) So 476 for lunch.

    I had set 1300 for this week and my week starts saturday, however sunday i decided to change it back to 1500 for this week as this was my target the previous week
  • timtam163
    timtam163 Posts: 500 Member
    acebanditcat wrote: »
    i lost 11lb 4 weeks ago. The excercise i do is roughly an hour in the gym, then a 45 minute zumba then an hour or sometimes two hours swimming. I may also add a 30 walk in my lunch hour at work.
    On slimming world some of the free food items - ie. eat unlimited would include, potatoes, rice pasta and noodles. Most meat and fish is unlimited too. Tho i didnt eat them often (the potatoes rice etc) but would eat a lot of fruit and alot of vegetables and meat and fish.

    The stats I stated are from here on MFP after everything is logged and the fitness tracker has synced.

    Unlimited potatoes and meat? That seems illogical...
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  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
    suzannesimmons3 wrote: »
    timtam163 wrote: »
    acebanditcat wrote: »
    i lost 11lb 4 weeks ago. The excercise i do is roughly an hour in the gym, then a 45 minute zumba then an hour or sometimes two hours swimming. I may also add a 30 walk in my lunch hour at work.
    On slimming world some of the free food items - ie. eat unlimited would include, potatoes, rice pasta and noodles. Most meat and fish is unlimited too. Tho i didnt eat them often (the potatoes rice etc) but would eat a lot of fruit and alot of vegetables and meat and fish.

    The stats I stated are from here on MFP after everything is logged and the fitness tracker has synced.

    Unlimited potatoes and meat? That seems illogical...

    And pasta and rice and mugshots, fruit vegetables, muller light yogurts, fish...the list is practically endless.

    It's all very low fat stuff though, that's where the calorie reduction comes from. I only know this because it's popular at work at the mo!
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,454 Member
    Jeebus. I could put a dent in a bag of potatoes. I guess it's the stuff you would want on it that causes the problem. But, lowfat yogurt and salsa on potatoes is pretty good. Still - I could easily eat 1000 cals of that.
  • acebanditcat
    acebanditcat Posts: 28 Member
    I spotted something! As I have a fitness tracker it counts my steps and sends it to MFP but sometimes I've also put down that I've done Zumba. So am I doubling up and MFP thinks I'm doing more? I've done it twice
  • jayemes
    jayemes Posts: 865 Member
    I know with a fitbit you can mark what times you were doing actual exercise and it won't count your steps during that time frame toward your step count
  • tashygolean730
    tashygolean730 Posts: 92 Member
    I honestly do not sync my fitness trackers with MFP. I use an online TDEE calculator to determine my goals based on my activity level and eat those calories every day. I average 15,000 steps a day and do pilates four days a week. I use moderately active on the TDEE calculator and manually update my calorie goals in MFP. I find this to be much more accurate for me because trackers and exercise equipment can be way off with actual calorie burns.
  • DX2JX2
    DX2JX2 Posts: 1,921 Member
    While understanding the need to eat a certain amount of net calories is the most important first step, note that when you do start to eat back your exercise calories, your burn estimates are way too high.

    1100 calories per day in purposeful exercise is huge. Most of us will not approach that level. For reference, that's the equivalent of running something akin to 11 miles.

    Safe bet for eating your exercise calories is to eat back half of what your tracker/MFP tell you that you burned through the exercise. In reality, burning something like 400-500 per hour doing moderately intense cardio work is much more realistic.
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