Trouble w/ BMR and TDEE. Help me please!?

tasteofvanilla_
tasteofvanilla_ Posts: 4 Member
in Getting Started
So I’ve been trying to find the right amount of calories for me to eat to be able to lose weight. My maintenance calories is about 1800. I heard to lose weight you’re supposed to subtract 500 calories at the most from your maintenance calories. For me, it ends up being around 1300-1400 calories. However, my BMR is always between 1500-1600 calories. I get way too full with the 1300-1400 calories I’ve been eating. But I don’t want to under-eat and not get the amount of calories I need for the day. What numbers should I even follow? Help please!

Replies

  • JMcGee2018
    JMcGee2018 Posts: 275 Member
    You get too full on 1400? Then how did you gain the weight in the first place? Women can usually eat down to 1200 with no ill effects, which would set you up to lose more than a pound a week. Some people advise not eating below your BMR, but I'm not sure if there is any science supporting that. Stay above 1200 and you'll be okay.
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,345 Member
    As above says, don't complicate things, plug in your stats on this app and go by the calories given.
  • steveko89
    steveko89 Posts: 2,215 Member
    tinkerbellang83 wrote: »
    If you get too full on 1300 calories then you probably are either logging wrong.

    I agree this is most likely. It's very very easy to underestimate portions if you're relying too much on estimations for serving sizes and not using a food scale. I'm not sure how you arrived at your maintenance TDEE calories or BMR number but I find TDEE - Deficit = Target calories to be the easiest way to think about it; BMR doesn't really mean much, IMHO. As @tinkerbellang83 said, put your stats into MFP and set to 1lb/week loss rate (which is a 500 cal/day deficit).

    The MFP defaults are sufficient for most people to lost weight effectively. Try that for a few weeks (at least three, six would be better to capture a full menstrual cycle) and accurately weigh yourself at least weekly. If at that point you've not seen any weight loss reassess your calorie level and settings.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,876 Member
    tasteofvanilla_ wrote: »
    So I’ve been trying to find the right amount of calories for me to eat to be able to lose weight. My maintenance calories is about 1800. I heard to lose weight you’re supposed to subtract 500 calories at the most from your maintenance calories. For me, it ends up being around 1300-1400 calories. However, my BMR is always between 1500-1600 calories. I get way too full with the 1300-1400 calories I’ve been eating. But I don’t want to under-eat and not get the amount of calories I need for the day. What numbers should I even follow? Help please!

    If your BMR is 1600 calories, there's no way in hell your maintenance calories are only 1800 calories unless you're literally doing nothing all day.

    Just plug your stats, etc into MFP and let MFP calculate your calorie target.

    Also, eating below your BMR is really only an issue if it's substantially low and or your calorie intake is very low and then you're doing a whole bunch of exercise on top of that and not fueling that activity.

    If you're getting full on a paltry number of calories, that is an indication that A) you might not be logging very accurately; or B) you're just eating a bunch of really low calorie stuff like veg in high volume and that you've cut too much fat.
  • kimny72
    kimny72 Posts: 16,013 Member
    Understand that calculators can only give you a starting point, and it sounds like you are using different calculators so that can add to the confusion.

    Why not just use MFPs numbers? Put in your stats, choose a goal of one lb per week, and get your calorie goal. Log accurately and consistently - weigh out your portions, double check the accuracy oft he entries you are using in the database, and log every single thing (whole foods, packaged foods, beverages, condiments, cooking oils, cheat meals, etc).

    It is not likely a full grown adult woman would get too full to eat on 1300 calories. There are 2 possibilities - either you have made a big change to your diet and it is taking a couple of days for your body to get used to digesting these new foods, or your logging is off. All of us went through a period of learning to log correctly, it's definitely a skill that requires practice in the beginning, but becomes second nature eventually.

    Read the posts pinned to the top of each board, and good luck!
  • tasteofvanilla_
    tasteofvanilla_ Posts: 4 Member
    I have been eating lots of low calorie foods so that is why I get full. I will try not to overthink it, and stick with mfp to calculate my calories. Thank you so much for the advice, this helps a lot!
  • janalo55
    janalo55 Posts: 50 Member
    tasteofvanilla_ wrote: »
    I have been eating lots of low calorie foods so that is why I get full. I will try not to overthink it, and stick with mfp to calculate my calories. Thank you so much for the advice, this helps a lot!

    I would advise you to adjust this. I have done it before... when I was on WW, I ate a lot of 0 or 1 point foods so that I could continue to feel "full". Problem is, when I started slipping back into eating what I really wanted, I had not adjusted portions and learned portion control. So I was still eating a lot, but they were no longer 0 or 1 point foods and I gained back all of the 92# I had lost. There were other factors, as well, including health issues, but part of it was simply that I had never concentrated on learning to eat less because I just nearly stuffed myself with low calorie foods. For me, it is important to teach my mind, and my body, that the portions you get in a restaurant are really just about right for 2 people, and adjust what I eat at home the same. Portion control has helped greatly as I've lost 75# of those pounds again.
  • klauss_torres
    klauss_torres Posts: 14 Member
    Never go below your bmr. What you want to do is reduce your calories from your tdee. Once you know your BMR, you can calculate your TDEE by multiplying it as follows: By 1.2 if you exercise 1 to 3 hours per week By 1.35 if you exercise 4 to 6 hours per week. By 1.5 if you exercise vigorously for 6 or more hours per week.

    a moderate calorie deficit of 20 to 25%. Of the total tdee, anything more is starvation.
    This means that you want to set your daily calorie intake at 75 to 80% of your calculated total daily energy expenditure (TDEE). For example, my average daily TDEE is about 3,000 calories, so when I want to lose weight, I set my intake at about 2,300 calories

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