What's your daily calorie goal?

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trippsj3
trippsj3 Posts: 8 Member
in Getting Started
Hello community! I just started back up after 2+ years off. I have a 10month old and want to reboot my weight loss to get rid of this excess baby weight and then some. I updated my profile and want to know how realistic the daily calories for you have been. I have been recommended just over 2000 because I'm hoping to start exercising again. Have you found the recommendation to little or to much? Do you adjust depending on activity level (I put in lightly active) but I may not always be active depending on the day with my daughter, my life style right now is more sedentary. Just wondering what has worked best for others out there.
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Replies

  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
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    it sbeen pretty much spot on for me.

    what are your stats? why do you think it is too much?

    your activity level is activity before purposeful exercise.
  • puffbrat
    puffbrat Posts: 2,806 Member
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    MFP is always slightly low for me. I'm 5'6", currently 198lbs, 1560 calories/day. I am set to sedentary because I rarely get more than 6,000 non-exercise steps. I incorporate exercise separately. I would only adjust my activity level if I started really consistently getting more than 6000 steps/day before exercise. I don't adjust my calorie goal even though it is a little low for me because it is normal for me to eat anywhere from within goal to maintenance depending on what's going on in my life, so sticking with the MFP calorie goal buys me a very small buffer.
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 33,990 Member
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    2100, but I'm not trying to lose weight, I'm 5'8, 140ish.

    I'd say, just use that amount and log everything you eat as accurately as you can.

    Read these for some help with that: https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10621050/how-to-use-the-usda-food-database-mfp-food-database-for-accurate-logging/p1

    https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1234699/logging-accurately-step-by-step-guide/p1

    Then log your purposeful exercise in the Exercise tab here and eat a little more on those days.

    Do that for 4-6 weeks and make adjustments at the end of that time period depending on your rate of weight loss during that time. It's a science experiment that we all have to run using our own data.

    Persistence, patience and consistency is the way forward.
  • RunnerGrl1982
    RunnerGrl1982 Posts: 412 Member
    edited March 2019
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    If I'm totally sedentary @ 5'4 and 123lbs, I can lose weight on 1400 calories; which is close to half a pound/per week. Currently, at maintenance + exercise, I'm averaging 2050 calories per day to keep myself fueled properly.

    Everyone will have so many different answers based upon a multiple of variables. I'd recommend doing what @cmriverside suggested. That is truly your best course of action that will get you answers tailored to your own body and information/data you can adjust to over time.

    Edit: Typo #FAIL.
  • texasredreb
    texasredreb Posts: 541 Member
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    MFP is recommending 1290 calories/day for me right now. I marked myself as lightly active. I walk a lot for work (teacher) and I volunteer at an animal shelter where I walk dogs for 4 hours once a week. I'm only on day 2 so we'll see how it fleshes out (hopefully I don't flesh out-har!).
  • babydaisy81
    babydaisy81 Posts: 218 Member
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    MFP automatically sets me at 1200 calories, but I've read so many posts that go against it (my first time round followed 1200 as I didn't know any better, it worked but it stressed me out). This time I gave myself 1500-1800 calories. I've learned what my body can work with and what to eat and what not to eat, and make sure I am eating a clean diet with lots of nutrient rich foods and not so much of the other stuff. I was hard on myself the first time, this time I just want long lasting sustainable results, and trying to get as much exercise as possible. There are so many variables - trust your body and change if you need to.
  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
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    babydaisy81 wrote: »
    MFP automatically sets me at 1200 calories, but I've read so many posts that go against it (my first time round followed 1200 as I didn't know any better, it worked but it stressed me out). This time I gave myself 1500-1800 calories. I've learned what my body can work with and what to eat and what not to eat, and make sure I am eating a clean diet with lots of nutrient rich foods and not so much of the other stuff. I was hard on myself the first time, this time I just want long lasting sustainable results, and trying to get as much exercise as possible. There are so many variables - trust your body and change if you need to.

    No, you set MFP to give you 1200 calories based on activity level and deficit that you choose.
  • Sami1601
    Sami1601 Posts: 50 Member
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    Which calculator did you use?
  • Lemmon827
    Lemmon827 Posts: 27 Member
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    I'm 5'7 was 172, now 159. I aim for 1200 but I average 1300-1400. I am mostly sedentary but I have been trying to go walking more often.
  • amusedmonkey
    amusedmonkey Posts: 10,330 Member
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    I have my setting at sedentary, and I eat a base of 1600 calories plus any exercise calories that day. My actual average after is about 1800-2000 to lose slightly less than 1 pound a week. On high activity days it could be as high as 2500, but that's not very common.
  • ericadcruz32
    ericadcruz32 Posts: 48 Member
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    According to my settings I am allotted 1200. I chose sedentary because I had never seen the inside of a gym in my life. A week or so after starting MFP I started walking on an incline on the treadmill, pretty briskly. I log that burn and therefore get more calories. I don't eat them all back but I do eat a third or so.
    I'm 5'4"
    SW: 165
    CW: 153
    GW: 120
  • VegjoyP
    VegjoyP Posts: 2,721 Member
    edited March 2019
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    I am at 1310 a day. I am 46 and considered active
    I do not count in exercise for several reasons. My goal is based on my body and daily life. Iconsider exercise " extra" but find that calorie burn is very personal and the estimates are usually off. I personal train and worked with metabolic assesments using high tech equitment.
    We all need to find our own plan. If something works then stick with it. If not, question the methodology.
    I was maintaining for years at 1550. I ran marathons, weight train. Now I walk, weight lift and am older. I had been feeling bloated, and knew it was too much with my changing lifestyle. Now I am at 1310 and so far I feel much better. That's what was recommended.
    I feel the activity tracker accounts too many calories burned
  • zeejane03
    zeejane03 Posts: 993 Member
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    I'm a few years into maintenance, currently working on a few pounds of vanity weight (current BMI is at a 21.5, working down to 20.7). I'm 40/fairly sedentary and have a .5lb a week target. Calorie goal is around 1,350, which I'm hitting with minimal fuss.
  • tchiotos
    tchiotos Posts: 6 Member
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    I'm 5'2, 115 and I eat more calories than you with a sedentary lifestyle. If I eat 1,200 calories I start losing weight rapidly. Weigh your food, something isn't right. You technically need more cals than me too since you have 30something lbs on me.
    MFP "gave " me 1200 calories to lose 20 lbs, but at 1200 cals, five weeks to lose four pounds? that is insane! I didn't realize you could set it for the amount of weight you wanted to lose per week - I would set it at 1.5 as an average, but would expect to lose 3-4 lbs the first week, then dropping back to under 2 per week.
    I was just surprised that it factored such a slow rate of loss.
  • Pickle107
    Pickle107 Posts: 153 Member
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    I'm 5'3" and 145.5 lbs. I'm on 1200 daily because I'm extremely sedentary for health reasons. I'm currently 9 lbs down in 6 weeks which I'm very happy with. I go over target calories a couple of times a week when I daren't offend family if something special's been cooked. But I don't sweat it. Once I've lost 20 lbs, I'm aiming to increase my calories for a 0.5 lb loss for the last 10 lbs. Should take me until September which seems sensible.
  • PixelVoid
    PixelVoid Posts: 1 Member
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    Just for myself, I used TDEE, and got my Basic Metabolic Rate and calculated 75% of that, which put me around 1700 cals/d. I also do 40% Carbs and 40% Protein and my workouts is 30 minutes of lifting and 30 minutes HIIT Cardio. In Dec I was 233lbs, and now I'm at 199.6lbs. I've obviously gained some muscle mass as I can lift more and am seeing some muscle definition come through, so works out for me at least.

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