New Here - Question about exercising and eating... sorry a bit long.

ericmeyer330
ericmeyer330 Posts: 8 Member
edited December 19 in Introduce Yourself
A bit of background... after 7 years of failed “diets” - I decided to join a gym and do group training (circuit training). Started this back in October 2018 and 233#s. We did assessments about a month ago and I was 231, but body fat percentage is down 4%. 4 weeks later - still at the same weight. Talked to the trainers and they think that I am not eating enough - so started logging food and exercise here (wear a chest monitor at the gym and log in those stats). My net carbs per day was about 1300 after exercise. So I upped my food intake to 2400-2500 calories per day. I feel better have more engery but am miserably full all day OR feel like I could eat everything in the house.
I eat greek yogurt, eggs, fruit, vegetables, chicken breast, pork filets, protein shakes, almond milk (regular unsweet and chocolate). Any ideas?
MFP says I should eat 1740 calories without exercise and I usually burn about 600-900 calories while working out. Example: yesterday 1740 calories needed - 2174 food eaten + 808 exercise calories = 374 left. There is no way that I can eat that much food in a day - even if it was bad food.

Replies

  • quiksylver296
    quiksylver296 Posts: 28,439 Member
    Do you use a food scale?

    http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10634517/you-dont-use-a-food-scale/p1
  • Keladelphia
    Keladelphia Posts: 820 Member
    edited February 2019
    If you weren't losing weight it's not because you weren't eating enough calories despite what your trainers said. I would start with MFP's recommended caloric intake of 1740. MFP's exercises burns are notoriously over inflated so maybe eat back half of those calories so if MFP says you burned 808 through exercise you would eat 2144 for the day. Weigh/measure your food and select proper MFP entries to ensure your calorie counts are accurate and most of all stick with what you choose for a few weeks to see what the real result is. If you still aren't losing you'll need to scale your calories down not up. If you start losing too quickly after a few weeks you'll increase them a bit to ensure you aren't losing too quickly.

    Edit to add- the types of foods you are eating are perfectly fine, though nutrition is absolutely important it truly does come down to calories in<Calories out for weightloss.
  • ericmeyer330
    ericmeyer330 Posts: 8 Member
    Thanks - will work on using a scale. Good idea - didn’t think of that one.
  • erickirb
    erickirb Posts: 12,294 Member
    "4 weeks later - still at the same weight. Talked to the trainers and they think that I am not eating enough -"

    That isn't how calories work... if you eat less than you burn, you lose weight... at first, some loss might be masked by increased water retention due to new exercise. but that should have balanced out after a couple weeks.

    Most likely, you are eating much more than you think you are, if anything you need to eat less, not more!!
  • ericmeyer330
    ericmeyer330 Posts: 8 Member
    edited February 2019
    Thanks @Keladelphia . I enter my own exercise values because we do circuit training full body workouts - some are reps and some are times - it’s easier to manually enter the values that they chest monitors give at the gym (MyZone). Good to hear that at least my trainers realized that I wasn’t eating enough. I’ll scale back the food a bit to see if it helps with the full feeling and or the starving feeling. At least I know that I am close to the right track - just need some tweaks.
  • ericmeyer330
    ericmeyer330 Posts: 8 Member
    edited February 2019
    @erickirb the first week of eating the same that I had for months and logging my food would leave me at a 800-1,000 calorie deficit after exercise - I did this for over 2.5 months and didn’t lose anything. This would tell me that at some point my body was storing food to burn later as I wasn’t getting enough energy. This is the first week of eating 2400 calories to see if it changes anything - just tired of the back and forth full/hungry feeling.
  • lynn_glenmont
    lynn_glenmont Posts: 10,097 Member
    ericmeyer330 wrote: »
    @erickirb the first week of eating the same that I had for months and logging my food would leave me at a 800-1,000 calorie deficit after exercise - I did this for over 2.5 months and didn’t lose anything. This would tell me that at some point my body was storing food to burn later as I wasn’t getting enough energy. This is the first week of eating 2400 calories to see if it changes anything - just tired of the back and forth full/hungry feeling.

    No, really, it doesn't work that way. If you didn't put enough gas in your car for a trip, would you expect the engine to stop using gas before you ran out, but for the car to keep moving? If you kept spending more money than you were making, would you expect your wallet or your checking account to refuse to relinquish cash, while you continued to miraculously have your rent and utilities and credit card bills paid?

    It takes energy for your body's systems (circulation, respiration, digestion, neural systems, cellular-level activity, etc.) to function, and it takes energy you to stand up and walk around. You don't get those things to happen without paying for them in energy.
This discussion has been closed.

Categories