Question about amout of calories...

doodlebugs25
doodlebugs25 Posts: 9 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hi. I’m Julia. I’m not a newbie to working out but I do have a question for you woman about the calories that mfp tells you. I want to loose weight and st the same time gain muscle. MFP has got me at like 1300 calories but every other website says with my bmr and working out that I should be consuming around 2000 calories but good clean food. Have any of you woman had success with higher calories and still loosing and gaining muscle? Thanks.

Replies

  • sardelsa
    sardelsa Posts: 9,812 Member
    What are your stats? If you are fairly lean already, actually losing weight and gaining muscle are not as likely compared to if you have a lot of weight to lose. However, following a proper resistance program and getting adequate protein will be your best chance to retain muscle in a deficit at the least.
    Alternatively, if you are at a good weight for your height and just want to lose a bit of fat and gain a bit of muscle, recomp is a great option. So eating at maintenance, lifting, getting enough protein. I have dabbled in recomp a bit with good results (provided I wasn't too lean already).

    More information about your stats would be helpful.
  • doodlebugs25
    doodlebugs25 Posts: 9 Member
    Those are my stats on MFP. I’m 5’4 and 142lbs.
  • sardelsa
    sardelsa Posts: 9,812 Member
    Ok then I would go with the first option. Keep a small deficit, you *might* be able to build some muscle but the goal is more retaining it. As mentioned MFP does not include exercise calories so you want to eat at least a portion of them. Or you can go with the other calculator (which is total calories or TDEE) and adjust from there. I would also aim for a minimum of 0.8-1g per lb goalweight of protein.
  • doodlebugs25
    doodlebugs25 Posts: 9 Member
    So should I change something in my goals to make this work better for me? Thanks for the advice.
  • kimny72
    kimny72 Posts: 16,011 Member
    doodlebugs25 wrote: »
    Hi. I’m Julia. I’m not a newbie to working out but I do have a question for you woman about the calories that mfp tells you. I want to loose weight and st the same time gain muscle. MFP has got me at like 1300 calories but every other website says with my bmr and working out that I should be consuming around 2000 calories but good clean food. Have any of you woman had success with higher calories and still loosing and gaining muscle? Thanks.

    Just to add, the MFP calorie goal is your NEAT, not your TDEE. With MFP, you're expected to log your exercise and eat back those calories. So your MFP goal is actually 1300 + exercise calories. You might also have set your activity level too low.

    I am 5'4 (and one half!) and I started at 145. I lost @ 0.5lbs per week eating 1500 cals, which was @ 1350 + exercise calories.
  • sardelsa
    sardelsa Posts: 9,812 Member
    I would aim to lose 0.5-1lb per week at most. 1.5lb is a bit much for your goal since you have less than 20lbs to lose.
  • Panini911
    Panini911 Posts: 2,325 Member
    edited March 2019
    agree that 1.5 pds rate of loss a week is too high considering you have so little to lose. i’d go with 0.5 or max 1.

    too fast with less to lose can lead to losing muscle not just fat
  • doodlebugs25
    doodlebugs25 Posts: 9 Member
    Thanks for the answers yes I probably do need to go change that. Seems a bit much for me.
  • doodlebugs25
    doodlebugs25 Posts: 9 Member
    So I updated it to loose 1 lb per week and it set me at 1600 plus I get about 400 to 500 workout calories a day so 2000 is my calorie limit does this seem ok now?

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