Calories per day

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Good morning....Just curious if anyone had any info about calories per day. This app says I should be at 2300 per day but I feel like I should be around 2000. Also, anyone have any luck with macros or had success with that vs just staying a deficit? Lastly, does anyone do a refeed day where they go up some in calories. Obviously, lots of questions and the information out there is broad. Just curious what has worked and not worked for people. Thanks

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  • wunderkindking
    wunderkindking Posts: 1,615 Member
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    I'm 5'5", weigh 126-ish, and am lightly active most of the time. I eat roughly 2000 calories (average) a day to maintain. The only macro I care about is protein and that's for satiety and muscle retention. Fat and carbs fall where they will.
  • UberAya
    UberAya Posts: 94 Member
    edited November 2021
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    I've really only had success with calorie deficit, other approaches have failed for me. I do focus on taking in at least 20% of my calories from protein...mainly because otherwise left to my own devices I will eat foods that tend to leave me hungry. It's when I'm not satiated that I end up falling off the wagon.
    And 20% still leaves you plenty of room to enjoy the occasional (reasonable/controlled) splurge on not-so-healthy-yums.

    For the calories per day - one thing that comes to mind for me is I don't like to place reliance on the "activity" estimates in the built in calculations. I find if I rely on Fitbit calorie burn estimates or other algorithms...it tends to spit out a higher number of calories available and then I wind up not losing. I prefer to eat roughly my BMR, and make the deficit in movement and exercise. Otherwise I'm either starving or not losing.
    So my work around is to set my goal calcs at sedentary and a 1lb per week loss to sort of force the MFP daily goal value to align to my BMR. It's a tried and true target for me, but everyone is different. There is, unfortunately, a bit of trial and error that goes into figuring out what works for you individually.
  • philomen2
    philomen2 Posts: 3 Member
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    That sounds good. What if you are diabetic like me?
  • J72FIT
    J72FIT Posts: 5,948 Member
    edited November 2021
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    puddy310 wrote: »
    Good morning....Just curious if anyone had any info about calories per day. This app says I should be at 2300 per day but I feel like I should be around 2000. Also, anyone have any luck with macros or had success with that vs just staying a deficit? Lastly, does anyone do a refeed day where they go up some in calories. Obviously, lots of questions and the information out there is broad. Just curious what has worked and not worked for people. Thanks

    For myself, for calories I do 12-14 calories x my height in cm for cutting (10-12 for women). Maintaining it's 14-16 (12-14 for women). This assumes training 3-5 days per week.
    These numbers are estimates so make adjustments as necessary.

    Macros for me, are...
    Protein: 1.6g x goal weight in kg (2.3g when cutting)
    Fat: .45 x body weight in lbs.
    I fill the rest of my calories in with carbs and shoot for 15 grams of fiber per 1000 calories.

    Don't do a specific re-feed day, just loosen up and enjoy the weekends without being a total idiot.

    Depending on my goals at the time, I'll make adjustments up or down if necessary.

    Obviously there are a ton of ways to go about this, this is what works for me...

  • GaryRuns
    GaryRuns Posts: 508 Member
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    There are lots of calculators for this across the internet (just search for "TDEE calculator") but all of them, including what MFP gives you, are just estimates. Your metabolism, the amount of activity you perform during the day, etc., are all going to impact your daily caloric needs and no calculator can do more than give you an estimate because of the wide variation between individuals for those quantities. It's going to come down to you choosing one of those estimates, trying it for a few weeks, and seeing what your weight does, on average, then adjusting the calorie level accordingly.
  • springlering62
    springlering62 Posts: 7,809 Member
    edited November 2021
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    I’m in maintenance, older, pretty active female.

    I shoot for 2500 per day. If I feel particularly hungry, I recognize that my body needs it and permit (as in, I have the control to do it and to stop) myself to eat extra. That happens usually one day every week or two, meaning I ultimately average 27-2800 per day.

    I hold back extra calories just for that purpose instead of eating th all, every day.

    That might not work for everyone but it works for me.

    You’ll eventually get to the point where you know what your body needs and wants (within reason) - if you’re willing to invest yourself in listening to your body
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,868 Member
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    puddy310 wrote: »
    Good morning....Just curious if anyone had any info about calories per day. This app says I should be at 2300 per day but I feel like I should be around 2000. Also, anyone have any luck with macros or had success with that vs just staying a deficit? Lastly, does anyone do a refeed day where they go up some in calories. Obviously, lots of questions and the information out there is broad. Just curious what has worked and not worked for people. Thanks

    Why do you feel like it should be around 2000? Your calorie requirements are dictated by your stats and activity. I lose about 1 Lb per week on 2300-2500 calories per day.

    Macros don't really have much to do with losing weight. The only way to lose weight is being in a calorie deficit. There is no universally optimal macro ratio
  • GwynLeder
    GwynLeder Posts: 101 Member
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    I met with a neighbor who is a retired dietician. She recommended that I eat about 1150 - 1250 calories to eat to lose. that might be too little for some of you but I think 2000-2500 calories a day is way too many.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,737 Member
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    puddy310 wrote: »
    Good morning....Just curious if anyone had any info about calories per day. This app says I should be at 2300 per day but I feel like I should be around 2000. Also, anyone have any luck with macros or had success with that vs just staying a deficit? Lastly, does anyone do a refeed day where they go up some in calories. Obviously, lots of questions and the information out there is broad. Just curious what has worked and not worked for people. Thanks

    Counting calories while watching macros, or counting macros, works out to be about the same thing. That's because each macro has a typical calorie level, 4 calories per gram for protein and carbs, 9 calories per gram for fats. (Also, 7 calories per gram for alcohol, which isn't exactly a nutrient, just a thing with calories.)

    It's calories that relate directly to fat gain/loss. (Indirectly, nutrition may affect energy so influence calorie expenditure through fatigue or the like; or affect how full you feel so make it harder/easier to stick with a calorie goal. Also, nutrition is important for health and body composition, of course.)

    Through loss and in maintenance, I most often stick with my calorie goal, but sometimes eat over goal (occasionally way over goal) for some reason (whim!), but I don't do a structured refeed day. As long as I account for my calorie intake, my weight behaves as I'd expect based on that intake, on average over time. Water weight fluctuations can make scale results look whacky over a day or few, the fat gain/loss trends show up more gradually.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,737 Member
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    GwynLeder wrote: »
    I met with a neighbor who is a retired dietician. She recommended that I eat about 1150 - 1250 calories to eat to lose. that might be too little for some of you but I think 2000-2500 calories a day is way too many.

    2000-2500 might be too much for you, but I'd lose weight eating in that range . . . slowly, I admit, but I'm 5'5", female, around 125 pounds, will be age 66 in about a week, so it would be unhealthy for me to lose fast, if I wanted to lose (I don't, any more). 1150-1250 would be way, way too low for me, based on 6+ years of my own calorie-counting experience.

    That's why people are recommending that the OP use MFP or some other calculator to get a recommendation, then follow that recommendation for several weeks to get enough personal experience to fine-tune the goal. At least a calculator (like MFP) gives a person an average for people who are similar in size/activity/age/sex, as a starting point. Most people are close to that similar-people average, but some are farther off. We know the OP is male, but we don't know how tall, heavy, active, or old. Severely undereating increases health risks, and we wouldn't want to be recommending that!

    My experience or your experience or any other one person's experience - at best - may be close to average for people like us . . . at worst, it may be pretty far off average. I hope your goal works out great for you: It would be helpful to have access to a personal friendly dietitian! 🙂 Most of us have to start with the calculator estimates, adjust from there on our own.
  • springlering62
    springlering62 Posts: 7,809 Member
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    GwynLeder wrote: »
    I met with a neighbor who is a retired dietician. She recommended that I eat about 1150 - 1250 calories to eat to lose. that might be too little for some of you but I think 2000-2500 calories a day is way too many.

    I’ve dealt with two dietitians. The first early on, who suggested MFP and gave me some very helpful basic tips and suggestions to enhance my initial loss.

    I had four phone sessions with a dietician from my health insurance- the last one just yesterday. I declined any additional sessions.

    Not to come acrost as a know it all, but I’ve reached the point reading and participating here, that I feel like I know as much (more ) about my nutrition than she did. Granted, these were phone sessions. She hasn’t met me in person or seen me. It got the point she was asking me leading questions to answer myself because she just couldn’t provide any advice. I felt like I was giving her pointers.

    She also mentioned in passing that she is a personal trainer. I felt like some of the advice she offered me to eat for my training needs was way off base, too.

    I dunno. Maybe I’m the dietician’s unicorn, maybe she didn’t believe some of what I was telling her about my activity level, calorie goals, nutrition needs, but I wasn’t getting anything useful.

    I have found, during this whole weight loss and maintenance process, that listening to my own self, weighing advice and suggestions from the boards, listening to what the dietitians offered, creating a balance was the best thing for me.

    Unless you are really short, I think the typical rote physician/dietician advice of around 1200/day is lazy. Physicians I get because they don’t have the time to train for nutrition. That’s someone else’s domain.

    I’m 5’7 and starting weight was well over 220. I
    began with a goal of 1470, increased to 1700 (advice of first dietician) , then 1900(insistence of trainer), and still lost weight consistently- seventy pounds the first year. Granted, I’m very active, but not so much when I started.

    It’s your responsibility to monitor yourself and make sure you’re eating enough. You get the one body. Abusing it by under feeding it to lose rapidly is, IMHO, as bad as abusing it with alcohol or toxins like cigarettes. No matter how fab your doc or dietitian are, you’re the ultimate judge of where that line is.

    TL:DR. Listen to your body
  • wunderkindking
    wunderkindking Posts: 1,615 Member
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    I am 5'5 and somewhere in the 125-128lb range (and 5'5"). When I'm particularly active, I eat something like 2500 calories a day. When I'm not overly active/just going about my lightly active live it's somewhere in the neighborhood of 2000.

    I acknowledge full well that calorie needs are individual -

    but calorie needs are individual and the only way you can dial in to YOUR numbers are to look at how many calories you ate and what your weight did and by how much.

    Ie: Weekly report of calorie numbers and then add on 3500 calories per pound for every pound you gained (or subtracted 3500 per pound gained) and divide by 7. That's your rough daily goal. Only do it for a month because weight fluctuations happen.

    BODIES VARY.

    I would be HANGRY and probably faint if I tried to live on 1200 calories a day.
  • springlering62
    springlering62 Posts: 7,809 Member
    edited November 2021
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    There was a really stupid article in the WSJ this weekend that “3500 calories doesn’t equal a pound”.

    What it boiled down to was that a study showed weight comes off faster for heavier people but it as fast for lighter people, and that weight loss speed varies with current weight.

    Well DUH!!!!!
  • jshug00
    jshug00 Posts: 7 Member
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    GwynLeder wrote: »
    I met with a neighbor who is a retired dietician. She recommended that I eat about 1150 - 1250 calories to eat to lose. that might be too little for some of you but I think 2000-2500 calories a day is way too many.

    Oh, do not listen to that neighbor. That is terrible advice. Calorie restriction is proven to NOT work over the long term. Why did every Biggest Loser contestant gain the weight back? Why do hundreds of studies with thousands of people, mice, rats, dogs, etc., all indicate that calorie restriction and exercise will produce short term gains, but will almost always fail in the long run?

    Look into intermittent and extended fasting instead of calorie restriction. You will have better results and be healthier when done properly.

    Eat a full meal... whatever the calories are for you. (I never count calories because the term is outdated and useless to a modern understanding of nutrients and how the body processes nutrients differently.) Low carb, high fat, high protein diets are best, but are not necessary. I have been experimenting for months eating all nutrient categories and fasting in between. The most important key is to keep insulin levels low for as long as possible, which will increase lipolysis (fat burning). Any sugar, carbs, or proteins, will cause blood insulin to rise and will shut down lipolysis and put the body into glucose metabolism. You cannot burn fat when insulin is in the blood. Insulin tells the body to store food and the body will not store it and burn it at the same time. Your body is in Feeding mode (insulin in blood signalling "store nutrients") or Fasting mode.

    Also, CICO typically results in hangry behavior, bad attitude, malaise, tired/exhausted, and headaches worse than fasting headaches. This is because anyone who eats every day is always functioning on a glucose metabolism and when you severely cut calories while in the glucose metabolism, all of these side effects are likely to occur.

    The same is not true for extended fasting.