300 net calories a day?

graciesparklesgrace
graciesparklesgrace Posts: 16 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
after checking my intake vs my exercise i see i’m eating around 300 net calories a day. I eat around 1400 calories & after my gym sessions my apple watch says i burn 1100 calories. So that means i have a net of 300. Is that the same as if i were to of only ate 300 calories and no exercise? is that healthy? Should i up my cals & loser exersice? what should i do? Also, i’ve noticed my protein levels are low (i’m trying to keep as much muscle as possible) but ive been strength training a lot more than i ever have. Will i still lose muscle? Thank you!

Replies

  • aokoye
    aokoye Posts: 3,495 Member
    Yes this is the same as if you were to only eat 300 calories and did no exercise and no it is not healthy. You need to up your calories - which is to say, you need to eat back your exercise calories. Yes you will still lose weight if you eat said exercise calories back. If you don't you will, among other things, lose muscle and sooner rather than later you're going to start feeling the effects of being so undernourished.
  • mph323
    mph323 Posts: 3,565 Member
    Are you losing weight as expected? You don't say what your goal is but if you are not seeing a too-fast drop in weight you are eating more than you think or are expending fewer calories in exercise. If your weight is dropping too fast (more than 1% total body weight weekly) you mostt definately need to eat more to stay healthy and fuel your activity.
  • graciesparklesgrace
    graciesparklesgrace Posts: 16 Member
    spiriteagle99 wrote: »
    If you don't eat enough calories, your body will burn muscle instead of fat. You may also start losing hair. You won't have the energy you need to fuel your exercise. You are also a lot more likely to stop trying to lose weight because it is too difficult and you are tired of being hungry, weak and angry. Think long term. You want to find a way of eating that is sustainable for the rest of your life. Otherwise, you'll just gain back everything you've lost.

    wait, your body will only lose muscle instead of fat? is that actually correct? thank you very much for your feed back!
  • Machka9
    Machka9 Posts: 25,559 Member
    confidenceinrain wrote: »
    What are you doing in strength training that is burning 1100 calories, and for how long?

    Good question.
  • mph323
    mph323 Posts: 3,565 Member
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    mph323 wrote: »
    Are you losing weight as expected? You don't say what your goal is but if you are not seeing a too-fast drop in weight you are eating more than you think or are expending fewer calories in exercise. If your weight is dropping too fast (more than 1% total body weight weekly) you most definitely need to eat more to stay healthy and fuel your activity.

    I was wondering the same thing - Gracie are you losing as expected or faster or slower?

    For how long have you been doing this?

    Another good question.
  • aokoye
    aokoye Posts: 3,495 Member
    Other question - what exactly are you doing at the gym @graciesparklesgrace and how much time are you spending there? I assumed that you were doing more than strength training, but that could have been an incorrect assumption. Even if it wasn't, going to the gym is fairly non-specific in terms of what you actually are doing there.
  • Seffell
    Seffell Posts: 2,244 Member
    How long have you had the watch? It takes several days to adjust.
  • ChandlerLaverty
    ChandlerLaverty Posts: 3 Member
    Hey just to be clear your Apple Watch calculates your active calories burned (from working out) and it also can calculate your resting calories burned. So don’t be terrified that you’re undernourished and your hair is falling out because you’re probably actually perfectly fine and your body is expending 1100 calories TOTAL for that day.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    When you look at your Apple watch after your gym session, is it saying your daily burn so far is 1100 calories?

    That doesn't mean 1100 burned during a workout.

    FYI - syncing the Apple Health account directly to MFP will lead to incorrect figures on MFP for adjustments.
    Use the Pacer app and unsync MFP to Apple directly.

    Oh - 3 pillars to maintain muscle mass in the face of a deficit.

    Resistance training - enough protein - reasonable deficit.

    You can do any of one those poorly enough (or a combo) that your body will not rebuild the muscle it is breaking down everyday as part of normal process.
    So you do lose muscle mass - it's not specifically burning it for fuel because of undereating instead of normal fat and carbs.
    It's just normally broken down and can be used as fuel along with the normal.
    Not enough food can prevent body from building it back up to where it was - it may need those limited resources on more important organs it's trying to protect from undereating.

    That's when people end up as a smaller version of their original fatter self - still flabby but good weight range - skinny fat.
    As hard as it is to add muscle - it's much easier to do things right to prevent the loss in the first place.
  • idioblast
    idioblast Posts: 114 Member
    Is the 1100 calories your "Move" total for the day? Because that includes all extra calories from movement during the day, not just a dedicated workout. Do you have the Activity app on your phone (I can't remember if I added it or if it was automatically added when I paired my watch)? It's the app that has the activity rings and when you swipe left on the "Move" section with tell you your total calories for the day so you can compare to your intake to get the deficit for the day (I wish I could see this same information directly on the watch). That's what I usually do now since I can't find a good third party app to translate Apple Watch to MFP.
  • funjen1972
    funjen1972 Posts: 949 Member
    Well, this thread was resurrected from the dead!

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