Do you count your BMR into your daily calories burned (energy output)?

reinixpb · October 2019

Any help or suggestions I appreciate it. I'm trying hard to get a better grasp at understanding this to manage my weigh loss in a healthy manner. I'm confused whether or not you have to count your BMR as part of your daily burned calories.

According to most calculations my current BMR is around 1500.
I have set my daily calories for 1300 and I'm doing combination of high speed incline walks and light body weight that go around 800 to 1300calories burn per day. I do that routine 4 to 5 times per week and take 2 to 3 days of rest.

ceiswyn · October 2019

Why would you NOT count your BMR as calories burned? They’re calories that your body is using, so you need to fuel them. At least, if you like having basic metabolic processes like heartbeat and immune system.

If your body needs 1500 calories to maintain basic functions, plus you are exercising 800-1300 calories per day, and you are only eating 1300, then you are in a 1500 calorie deficit. That is a deficit that is not even recommended for the morbidly obese. You are seriously undereating and risk serious damage to your body.

What’s your height, weight and gender? How much weight do you have to lose? Did you know that you can just put your stats and your exercise into MFP, select a rate of loss (1 lb per week is appropriate for most) and it will calculate an appropriate deficit for you?

Unknown · October 2019

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lgfrie · October 2019

I would recommending backing up a bit. Go to the MFP goals tool. Bang in your age, weight, height, blah blah, and your weight loss goal, which it will let you choose an amount from 1/2 to 2 lbs per week. From that data, it will spit out your target calories to eat to lose the amt of weight per week that you instructed it. Eat those calories. Also, eat 1/2 to all of your exercise calories. Don't eat less than that, it's unhealthy. MFP's goals tool assumes you will eat back your exercise calories IN ADDITION TO alllllll of the calories it told you to eat with its calorie target.

That'll put you on a sound footing and you'll lose weight at an appropriate pace.

At least for me (and many others, I hear) MFP's goals too is a very accurate predictor of weight loss. If you input your data and it tells you to eat 1600 per day to lose 1 lb per week, and you eat that 1600 plus allll of your exercise calories, you can pretty much take it to the bank that you'll lose 1 lb per week.

Eating less calories than you should, especially while exercising hard, is just a recipe for feeling deprived, starving, giving up, and starting all over after a ferocious binge. Save yourself the time and trouble. Let MFP give you an appropriate calorie level and then hit it consistently.

reinixpb · October 2019

I entered all my info into MFP and originally it said i should eat 1200 cals but after talking to a friend, she said that was too low and I should increase it to 1500, but I figured if I eat less it be better, so i ended up adjusting it to 1300.

As for how I know how much I burn, I do 60 minutes on treadmil on incline and machine averages 750-925calories burn. Plus I do half hour of weightlift routine. And lot of walking from runing errands and daily stuff.

Unknown · October 2019

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ceiswyn · October 2019

reinixpb wrote: »

I entered all my info into MFP and originally it said i should eat 1200 cals but after talking to a friend, she said that was too low and I should increase it to 1500, but I figured if I eat less it be better, so i ended up adjusting it to 1300.

As for how I know how much I burn, I do 60 minutes on treadmil on incline and machine averages 750-925calories burn. Plus I do half hour of weightlift routine. And lot of walking from runing errands and daily stuff.

MFP probably recommended you too low a goal because you selected too fast a rate of loss.

MFP adds exercise to your calorie allowance for a reason. Why did you decide to ignore that?

lgfrie · October 2019

reinixpb wrote: »

I entered all my info into MFP and originally it said i should eat 1200 cals but after talking to a friend, she said that was too low and I should increase it to 1500, but I figured if I eat less it be better, so i ended up adjusting it to 1300.

As for how I know how much I burn, I do 60 minutes on treadmil on incline and machine averages 750-925calories burn. Plus I do half hour of weightlift routine. And lot of walking from runing errands and daily stuff.

Well, there you have it. MFP gave you a baseline of 1200 calories, to which it anticipated you would then add your exercise calories, in this case 750. According to MFP, you're supposed to be eating 1950. Not 1300.

Realistically, though, you're not burning 750 and certainly not 925 on a treadmill in an hour. Those machines estimate calories notoriously high. Go browse "calories from treadmill" for a while and pick a number you're comfortable with. It's gonna be around 400-500, depending on treadmill speed and incline. Since you're also lifting weights, you should probably just top it up to 500 and consider that your exercise calories for the day.

But since you don't work out everyday, your average per day is probably around 400.

So, according to MFP you should be eating 1200 + 400 = 1600.

Which sounds about right.

Doing 1.5 hrs of vigorous workout on 1300 calories -- that is not wise at all. I'd discontinue that kind of extreme, punishing calorie restriction effective this minute.

lemurcat2 · October 2019

reinixpb wrote: »

I entered all my info into MFP and originally it said i should eat 1200 cals but after talking to a friend, she said that was too low and I should increase it to 1500, but I figured if I eat less it be better, so i ended up adjusting it to 1300.

As for how I know how much I burn, I do 60 minutes on treadmil on incline and machine averages 750-925calories burn. Plus I do half hour of weightlift routine. And lot of walking from runing errands and daily stuff.

MFP works on math. You presumably said you were sedentary and wanted to lose 2 lb/week, and MFP figured that your maintenance (without exercise) was 2200 cal or less, and so gave you 1200. That's supposed to be without exercise, and then when you exercise you add back calories. (And it's not reasonable for everyone to try to lose 2 lb/week.)

However, unless you are quite heavy and/or exercising super intensely, you aren't burning 750-925 cal on the treadmill. 750 cal would be running 8 or so miles in an hour for someone of 150 lb.

Scottgriesser · October 2019

MFP has settings to try and take into account your "And lot of walking from running errands and daily stuff."

From what I've read in the thread, you are using the site incorrectly. Looks like you are trying to fudge numbers to match an unrealistic/unhealthy goal.

Can't really say what is off without more info, but can say your exercise numbers are off. Significantly.

For example:
IF (and it is a gigantic if) your BMR really is 1500, then there is no way you are burning that amount of calories on a treadmill in an hour. No matter the incline. A 300lb person would struggle to actually burn that amount of calories in an hour mathematically. (Treadmill readouts are generally 150 to 200% higher than actual burn rates)

PAV8888 · October 2019

Scottgriesser wrote: »

IF (and it is a gigantic if) your BMR really is 1500, then there is no way you are burning that amount of calories on a treadmill in an hour. No matter the incline. A 300lb person would struggle to actually burn that amount of calories in an hour mathematically. (Treadmill readouts are generally 150 to 200% higher than actual burn rates)

The OP did not say "an hour" she said "a day" and there are a lot of people who think that it is a "great idea" to kill themselves at the gym for several hours a day to lose weight.

Mathematically, with a BMR of 1440 yielding a baseline of 60 Cal an hour... walking 2.9 to 3.5mph uphill 6% to 15% grade is code 17211 yielding a MET value of 8 or 480 Cal an hour. So the OP's numbers can be achieved by 2-3 hours at the gym, or with faster walking/almost running: 5mph at 3% is a MET value of 9.8 (code: 17235), yielding 588 an hour with a BMR of 1440

Now regardless of all that... it just sounds as if the OP is trying for a fairly large deficit. My suggestion to her is that she doesn't need a huge deficit to see results. She needs a reasonable deficit and enough time.

Large deficits have the magical propensity to create rebound weight gains, rage quits, feelings of resentment, and propagate the idea that losing weight can be a significantly different process than maintaining that loss long term.

The math reason that it very seldom makes sense to be eating below BMR is that normal sedentary settings are already a good 25% above BMR because even a sedentary person does more than sit in bed breathing quietly.

Since a reasonable deficit usually is limited to 20% of TDEE (25% while obese), math wise, it is very seldom the case where anyone who is not absolutely sedentary AND hitting top reasonable deficit would end up eating below BMR.

By virtue of exercise alone, the OP is not meeting the definition of sedentary. Of course on MFP, if using MFP per guided setup and as envisioned, your exercise is not part of your activity setting and you would be eating ALL of your actual net exercise calories on top of your base eating goal.

So say the eating goal was 1200 and your actual net exercise calories were 500... then you would be eating 1700.
Subject to your intake being counted correctly

Which leads us to generic advice:

--don't select 2lbs a week loss unless you have sufficient fat reserves to support such. Are you medically classified as obese? Is your TDEE in the high 3500 range? Then chances are you should not be choosing 2lbs a week.

--are you really sedentary? really? less than 5000 steps or an hour of non sitting / sleeping activity a day?

--are you using a food scale and double checking the entries you use?

--are you using a weight trend application to evaluate your progress?

--eat your MFP calories + 50% to 80% of your exercise calories
**less if longer duration exercise;
**more if shorter duration exercise
**less if activity setting above sedentary; more if activity setting is sedentary;
**near maximum if you are using a fitness tracker that is synchronizing correctly because the calories there do NOT represent exercise but are an independent estimate of your TDEE ...

and after 4-6 weeks evaluate your progress based on your logging, expected weight change, and your actual weight trend results and adjust... a little bit. And rinse, lather, and repeat.

Do you count your BMR into your daily calories burned (energy output)?

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