Short woman trying to figure out calories - former Weight Watchers member

I am 5’1” and also did weight watchers flex points in the past. I follow the weight watchers Good Health Guidelines but track calories in myfitnesspal. My start weight is 170ish and I and down 12 pounds so far. My food diary is public.

I don’t currently have a Fitbit but use my iPhone to track steps. If I walk purposely for exercise I manually enter it in myfitnesspal and am sure to note the start time so I don’t accidentally double track. I only eat my exercise calories if I am actually hungry. I have my profile set as sedentary since I work in an office.

im 5'2 and eat 1,200 on rest days. I dont have a lot to lose though, only about 10lb. if you have more to lose your daily calorie needs are probably a bit higher.

At one point years ago I was double tracking weight watchers and Myfitnesspal. My daily points at that time were 20. The days I ate exactly 20 in weight watchers I landed around 1000 calories. I remember my observation at the time was that the extra 200 calories I got on myfitnesspal were likely the weekly bank of points on weight watchers. Using Myfitnesspal, I like to look at my calories on the nutrition tab as the weekly view to see how I am doing on balance.

I usually have one day per week that is higher in calorie due to dining out or a special event of some sort. The weekly view really helps keep it in perspective for me so that I don’t feel like giving up if I go over on one day

I recommend sticking to the 1200 myfitnesspal gives you as your daily goal. The lowest I go is 1000 and only if I am truly not hungry and have met my minimum dairy and veggie servings for the day. My focus is not solely on weight loss but also on overall health

witchaywoman81 wrote: »

Mari22na wrote: »

WW circa 1960's was 1200 cal for women. That's never really changed regardless of point system variations on a theme. Back then you couldn't game the system by eating through all of your points with artificially sweetened multi-cr@p. You could only eat the foods listed in the menu plan - weighing and measuring portions.

MFP does not support eating under 1200 cal aday either. When you add your activity, everything is figured for you. Don't overthink it. Just start with 1200 and you can bump that up with your activity levels.

I tried the WW in 2015. I resented the point system and it backfired for me. Good fats came with a penalty, including greek yogurt but the artificially sweetened multi-cr@p was rewarded. I don't use any sweeteners. The weekly weigh-ins...I felt like I was with a herd of cattle using a cattle prod.

WW lifers don't graduate. They keep going forever.

I can motivate myself, track my food and save whopping boatloads of money by using MFP. I've had success here since 2016.

You are very wise! The reason I think I’m overthinking it is twofold:

1) with all of my previous weight watchers experience, i don’t really have a good understanding of how many calories my body actually needs.

2) I’m getting a LOT of “extra” calories from Fitbit. For example, today I took roughly 10,500 steps and mfp is giving me 900 “extra” calories based on my
Fitbit activity. That number doesn’t seem to change when I alter my minimum calorie goal (eg I changed from 1200 to 1000 to experiment)

What activity level did you choose on MFP? What does FitBit say your total calorie burn is?

The adjustment is the difference between what MFP thinks you would burn in a day, based on what you entered for stats and activity level, and what FitBit says you actually burned. Large adjustments usually mean that your activity level is set to Sedentary, when you aren’t. MFP won’t let you set your goal at 1000 cals, so that’s why you don’t see a change.

If 10k or more steps a day is typical for you then you aren’t Sedentary, you are lightly to moderately active. Changing that setting will increase your baseline calorie target in MFP and then the adjustments will be smaller. If you still are concerned with accuracy then eat back only 50-75% of the adjustment until you determine how accurate they are for you, ie do you lose at the desired rate you’ve chosen after about 6-8 weeks?

MamaNess2018 wrote: »

I just wanted to point out that in MFP you can turn off the addition of calories for the steps you take. I like to keep a steady baseline goal for myself and burning extra calories to be a bonus toward my progress. So I went into settings and turned off the adjustment for steps. You can still see your steps but it just doesn’t add calories to your daily goal

Why would you want to ignore something that is designed to keep you at an appropriate calorie deficit for the amount of activity you engage in?

As a wise rabbit once said, “The winner is the one who eats the most and still loses the weight”

I am so sorry that I’m not giving advice but your picture caught my eye. Steviiiieeee, super excited to be seeing Fleetwood Mac later this year in concert! Good luck with your weight loss!

witchaywoman81 wrote: »

WinoGelato wrote: »

witchaywoman81 wrote: »

Mari22na wrote: »

WW circa 1960's was 1200 cal for women. That's never really changed regardless of point system variations on a theme. Back then you couldn't game the system by eating through all of your points with artificially sweetened multi-cr@p. You could only eat the foods listed in the menu plan - weighing and measuring portions.

MFP does not support eating under 1200 cal aday either. When you add your activity, everything is figured for you. Don't overthink it. Just start with 1200 and you can bump that up with your activity levels.

I tried the WW in 2015. I resented the point system and it backfired for me. Good fats came with a penalty, including greek yogurt but the artificially sweetened multi-cr@p was rewarded. I don't use any sweeteners. The weekly weigh-ins...I felt like I was with a herd of cattle using a cattle prod.

WW lifers don't graduate. They keep going forever.

I can motivate myself, track my food and save whopping boatloads of money by using MFP. I've had success here since 2016.

You are very wise! The reason I think I’m overthinking it is twofold:

1) with all of my previous weight watchers experience, i don’t really have a good understanding of how many calories my body actually needs.

2) I’m getting a LOT of “extra” calories from Fitbit. For example, today I took roughly 10,500 steps and mfp is giving me 900 “extra” calories based on my
Fitbit activity. That number doesn’t seem to change when I alter my minimum calorie goal (eg I changed from 1200 to 1000 to experiment)

What activity level did you choose on MFP? What does FitBit say your total calorie burn is?

The adjustment is the difference between what MFP thinks you would burn in a day, based on what you entered for stats and activity level, and what FitBit says you actually burned. Large adjustments usually mean that your activity level is set to Sedentary, when you aren’t. MFP won’t let you set your goal at 1000 cals, so that’s why you don’t see a change.

If 10k or more steps a day is typical for you then you aren’t Sedentary, you are lightly to moderately active. Changing that setting will increase your baseline calorie target in MFP and then the adjustments will be smaller. If you still are concerned with accuracy then eat back only 50-75% of the adjustment until you determine how accurate they are for you, ie do you lose at the desired rate you’ve chosen after about 6-8 weeks?

Ok, this is is interesting. I played around with the activity levels and this is what I get:

Not very active: 1200
Lightly active: 1200
Active: 1260
Very active: 1550

I might try using one of the other settings and turning off my “extra” calories from Fitbit.

What rate of loss did you choose? Those numbers have nothing to do with the FitBit. Those are just coming from MFP and are am estimate of how many cals MFP thinks you’ll burn, just from daily activity, and then subtracting cals based on your goal rate of loss. 1 lb/week = 500 cal deficit, 1.5 lb = 750 cal, and 2lb = 1000 cal deficit from your baseline. The reason you don’t see a change between Sedentary and lightly active is that MFP won’t go below 1200 cals, so it’s trying to subtract your deficit from your baseline but it’s putting you below 1200 so it rounds it back up.

Not sure why you would turn off the FitBit adjustments? They are still relevant and on days when you exceed the basic cals MFP would expect for one of those settings, that means you are more active than expected and thus would still account for those cals in your total for the day. It’s just that if you start at a higher baseline - the adjustments will be smaller - but the total cals you burn, which is what FitBit measures, are still relevant.

What you do need to do is make sure you enable negative calorie adjustments for days that you are less active than normal.

I misread some info on how the fitbit works with myfitnesspal, so I deleted what I wrote earlier.

However you decide to proceed with the fitbit, make sure you give you adjustments time to see results. How hungry or full you will give you a quick response if you are eating too few or many calories. The scale and body measurements will show if you need tweaks after a couple of weeks or so.

kballsocc wrote: »

I don't think it would. The daily calorie goal is your starting baseline. The fitbit is adding calories based on your activity level to your starting baseline.

I would keep your starting baseline at 1200, pick an activity mode, and pick a weight loss goal rate then eat based off of that number. If you feel like the added calories are high then don't eat all of them back.

HOWEVER, if you pick that you are active AND you have your FITBIT adding in all the calories it measures I think that would be double counting. Setting your mode to sedentary and having the fitbit add in calories makes the most sense to me. If fitbit gives you 800 extra try eating 400 back and see if you are hungry or full, see if the scales moves downward and then adjust.

No, FitBit doesn’t double count. Again - FitBit and MFP work as a true up between what MFP thinks you would burn and what FitBit says you actually burned.

Using the OPs recent numbers - at active her calorie target is 1260. Let’s assume she chose 1 lbs/week which means that MFP thinks her baseline cals that she burns for an active lifestyle are 1760. Based on what she said earlier she’s seeing FitBit cal adjustments of around 800. That means FitBit says she’s burning 2560 cals in a day (2560-800=1760). If she changes her setting to very active then MFP set her goal to 1550, still with a deficit of 500 cals that means MFP thinks her baseline cal burn for very active is 2050 cals. Her total cal burn for the day of 2560 means that she would get an adjustment of 510 cals from FitBit. Now with negative adjustments enabled, on a day where OP isn’t as active, let’s say she’s ill or on a long road trip, if FitBit says she only burned 2000 cals, with that active setting, she would see -50 as her adjustment.

I don’t know whether FitBit is overestimating her cals or not, the best way to know is to pick a number and stick with it for a period of time but OP is NOT Sedentary and since she’s already skeptical of large calorie adjustments, advising her to stick with a setting and goal that is going to purposely keep those adjustments high is going to continue to create confusion and doubt.

All I can say is that automatically distrusting a device without getting actual results doesn’t make sense. I’m a 5’2 female over 40 with a desk job and my TDEE according to FitBit and actual results is 2200-2300 because I’m active. Choosing Sedentary for me would also result in huge adjustments, but because I asked and took the advice on here I chose an activity level that is appropriate for my 12-15k steps/day so that my adjustments were representative of my activity above and beyond my standard day.

witchaywoman81 wrote: »

Again, what rate of loss did you choose?

What does FitBit say your average calorie burn is for the last 30 days?


Have you read the FAQ in the FitBit user group?

I chose 2 lbs/week. My Fitbit says I've burned an average of 2700 calories/day over the past month.

I have not read the FAQs; I didn't know about them, but I'll go take a look. Thanks!

2 lbs per week is pretty aggressive for the weight you have to lose, 1-1.5 lb/week would be a better goal for you. Losing quickly and at low cals compared to your activity can have adverse effects: loss of lean body mass (aka becoming skinny fat), fatigue, hair loss, sallow skin, brittle nails, etc. eating at a modest deficit appropriate for your activity also helps ensure a smoother transition when you get closer to maintenance.