Not Understanding Net Calories

What are your calories in vs out? Is it possible you are double counting a fitness tracker?

Net calories on the app should be positive.

LtHammerhead wrote: »

Eating more than budget. For example, let’s say you have a budget of 1500 calories and eat 1850, you are 350 over budget or -350.

Not really. On MFP's homepage, having negative net calories means severely undereating, since net calories should equal the calories goal MFP gives you.
In your example the remaining calories are negative (not the net calories).

From OP's other thread, I seen to remember there's a synced tracker, that might be inflating calorie burns. But it needs to inflate burns for a LOT to justify a negative net calorie intake. Or perhaps something is being double counted.

lgfrie wrote: »

It's very, very unlikely you had net negative 350 calories for a whole week. That would be less than zero calories, as in, eating zero calories and then doing 350 calories of exercise. You'd be gnawing your own arm off after a week of that. There's a terminology issue here. Why don't you tell us how many calories you ate and how many you burned off with exercise, and we can take it from there.

I'd suggest reading this thread as well from OP:
https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/comment/45899624

Net calories are how many you consumed after exercise calories are accounted for.

Negatives mean you exercised off every calorie you ate and then some.

BAD.

dragon_girl26 wrote: »

lgfrie wrote: »

It's very, very unlikely you had net negative 350 calories for a whole week. That would be less than zero calories, as in, eating zero calories and then doing 350 calories of exercise. You'd be gnawing your own arm off after a week of that. There's a terminology issue here. Why don't you tell us how many calories you ate and how many you burned off with exercise, and we can take it from there.

Wait...now I'm confused. Showing a negative number like in OP's example above means they have eaten 350 calories over their net and not under (usually a green positive number) , right? Or am I getting this wrong and we're talking about something else?

If she's actually talking about the net calories, a negative net calorie intake would indicate under eating.

Lets say MFP gives the OP a target of 1200 calories...that target is 1200 net calories, not gross. If she exercised and burned...300 calories and she ate those back, her gross calorie intake would be 1500 calories, but her net would remain 1200. If she ate 1200 calories and exercised 300 calories and didn't eat those back, her gross calorie intake would be 1200 calories, but her net intake would be 900 calories. If she eats 800 calories gross (CI) and exercises 1000 off (CO), her net calorie intake would be -200 calories

A negative net calorie figure would indicate that basically the OP is exercising off every single calorie she consumes and then some. Whether or not this is truly the case is unknown and I would be skeptical...this is often a combination of eating very low calorie and exercising, but overestimating exercise calories burned...but still, estimation errors aside, a net negative calorie intake would be indicative of a very low calorie intake combined with excessive exercise.

DancingMoosie wrote: »

Open your diary and we will be able to help you more specifically...

Exactly!

It's really hard to diagnose a problem with numbers when you can't see the numbers in question, especially with some doubts about the terminology being used.

So far you have had suggestions you are over-eating, under-eating, massively under-eating.

I had -7 calories in my diary yesterday and that is because I ate 7 calories MORE than I was supposed too...
This is probably the case here also.

sijomial wrote: »

dragon_girl26 wrote: »

sijomial wrote: »

DancingMoosie wrote: »

Open your diary and we will be able to help you more specifically...

Exactly!

It's really hard to diagnose a problem with numbers when you can't see the numbers in question, especially with some doubts about the terminology being used.

So far you have had suggestions you are over-eating, under-eating, massively under-eating.

Yeah, this is the issue for me. I understand what cwolfman is saying above, but the way OP phrased the question (and writing the number specifically with the negative sign, which is what I usually see when I overeat my net calories daily) is what's throwing me and making me think they are overeating.

Please open your diary, OP, or post a screesnhot or something.

I'm currently showing -625 net on my home page as I've logged 625 calories of exercise but haven't logged any food at all.

Which would be some serious under-eating if I actually wasn't eating....

This. That first big number is just calories left for the day. It's what turns red when you go over. What's circled is *NET* calories. Just like with income - gross is what you make, net is what you take home after various deductions.

dragon_girl26 wrote: »

lgfrie wrote: »

It's very, very unlikely you had net negative 350 calories for a whole week. That would be less than zero calories, as in, eating zero calories and then doing 350 calories of exercise. You'd be gnawing your own arm off after a week of that. There's a terminology issue here. Why don't you tell us how many calories you ate and how many you burned off with exercise, and we can take it from there.

Wait...now I'm confused. Showing a negative number like in OP's example above means they have eaten 350 calories over their net and not under (usually a green positive number) , right? Or am I getting this wrong and we're talking about something else?

The word "net" is used in various places in various ways in different parts of either web MFP or the phone/tablet apps. To me, it's hard to tell exactly what OP is referring to. Like others, I think the likeliest interpretation (in context of several other threads by the OP) is that she's under-eating, but it's hard to be sure. It's not even obvious whether she means 350 for the whole week (added over 7 days) or 350 each and every day of the week, though I think it's the latter.

cwolfman13 wrote: »

dragon_girl26 wrote: »

lgfrie wrote: »

It's very, very unlikely you had net negative 350 calories for a whole week. That would be less than zero calories, as in, eating zero calories and then doing 350 calories of exercise. You'd be gnawing your own arm off after a week of that. There's a terminology issue here. Why don't you tell us how many calories you ate and how many you burned off with exercise, and we can take it from there.

Wait...now I'm confused. Showing a negative number like in OP's example above means they have eaten 350 calories over their net and not under (usually a green positive number) , right? Or am I getting this wrong and we're talking about something else?

A negative net calorie figure would indicate that basically the OP is exercising off every single calorie she consumes and then some. Whether or not this is truly the case is unknown and I would be skeptical...this is often a combination of eating very low calorie and exercising, but overestimating exercise calories burned...but still, estimation errors aside, a net negative calorie intake would be indicative of a very low calorie intake combined with excessive exercise.

OP, I know you said in your other thread you wanted to lose as much as you can as soon as you can, but this is not the way.