Is it OK to have negative net calories?

ashleymashley02
ashleymashley02 Posts: 107
edited October 3 in Food and Nutrition
I have been striving to have negative net calories.. is that good? I eat about 1300 calories and burn about 1400?
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Replies

  • melaniecheeks
    melaniecheeks Posts: 6,349 Member
    What makes you think that might be good?
  • adjones5
    adjones5 Posts: 938 Member
    You should try to get in some more calories
  • chefswife67
    chefswife67 Posts: 145
    Bump..
  • Artemis_Acorn
    Artemis_Acorn Posts: 836 Member
    I have been striving to have negative net calories.. is that good? I eat about 1300 calories and burn about 1400?

    No. That's bad.
  • rockylucas
    rockylucas Posts: 343 Member
    Thats not good. That's HCG diet followed by a colon cleanse levels of insanity right there :/
  • McKayMachina
    McKayMachina Posts: 2,670 Member
    Nope. Eat your exercise calories. Search the forums about it.
  • voluptuous_veggie
    voluptuous_veggie Posts: 476 Member
    That's excellent if you're trying to kill yourself slowly and painfully.
  • spammyanna
    spammyanna Posts: 871 Member
    No, it's not good.

    You should eat more.

    And end up with at least 1200 positive calories.
  • cowboydan43
    cowboydan43 Posts: 306 Member
    Nope that isn't good. MFP already gives you a deficit!
  • charityateet
    charityateet Posts: 574 Member
    .. is that good?

    NO.
  • SergeantSunshine_reused
    SergeantSunshine_reused Posts: 5,382 Member
    say good bye to all of your muscles. You will look *skinny fat*
  • JamesonsMommy
    JamesonsMommy Posts: 771 Member
    I was doing the same thing.. All was good until i ran myself into the ground and was sick and layed up for about a week... Now i eat most of my exercise calories
  • chauncyrenayCHANGED
    chauncyrenayCHANGED Posts: 788 Member
    Hi Dear! Your net calories should be 1200. Try to get as close to this number as possible every day. Good luck to you!
  • HeidiMightyRawr
    HeidiMightyRawr Posts: 3,343 Member
    No, that's not good. It's the equivalent of burning 100 calories and eating nothing all day! MFP recommends a net calorie intake of 1200.
  • JennLifts
    JennLifts Posts: 1,913 Member
    You might lose something, but its going to be a lot more muscle than if you did it reasonably.
  • papa5280
    papa5280 Posts: 80
    Would you ask the question, "Is it OK to eat absolutely nothing?"

    What you're asking is the same...but worse.
  • LorinaLynn
    LorinaLynn Posts: 13,247 Member
    Very bad idea. You'll get burnt out quickly and it's very likely that weight you lose will be from your lean muscle mass, not from the fat you want to lose.

    Please keep in mind that your body is a calorie burning machine. It's always burning calories, even while you're sleeping. Look up your BMR under TOOLS. That's about what your body is burning if you stayed in bed all day. Add the exercise you're doing, and it's like only having enough gas in your car to go 100 miles, and expecting it to go 200.
  • Pebble321
    Pebble321 Posts: 6,423 Member
    The short answer: NO.

    The slightly longer answer: the idea of "burn more calories than you eat" is correct, but you have to allow fir the fact that your body burns calories just getting through the day - you need energy (calories) to breathe, digest, pump blood, talk, walk.... In other words, to stay alive. The estimated number of calories that I need to get through a regular day is about 1800 - and that's before I exercise.
    Creating a huge calorie deficit by exercising so much and eating so little is not going to be healthy or sustainable in the longer term.
  • Teliooo
    Teliooo Posts: 725 Member
    This IS NOT GOOD. MFP alread runs you on a deficit before you even exercise. You will seriously harm your body doing this.
  • CaWaterBug8
    CaWaterBug8 Posts: 1,040 Member
    http://shouldieatmyexercisecalories.com/ should suffice.
  • Teliooo
    Teliooo Posts: 725 Member
    You might lose something, but its going to be a lot more muscle than if you did it reasonably.
    Correct, and as soon as you starting eating more again, the weight will pile back on. This is why Fad diets do not work.
  • moushtie
    moushtie Posts: 371 Member
    Please remember, while you're burning off 1400 calories with exercise you are choosing to go out and do, you will be burning off the same again simply by fueling your vital organs, your brain, heart, and lungs and maintaining your muscles. Do you want to find out what happens if those vital functions don't have enough fuel to do their job properly? I sincerely hope not.

    MFP already builds in a deficit into your daily allowance, you don't need to be burning off every calorie you eat with extra exercise.
  • ellzeez
    ellzeez Posts: 5
    Exactly what RubyBelle said.

    I can't imagine how hungry I'd be if I did THAT much exercise and ate THAT little!

    Don't exercise so much, I'm sure if you stuck with the MFP calories, that will give you a deficit anyway!
  • FitToBeFab
    FitToBeFab Posts: 537 Member
    I'm going to say it's not good but I'm also going to say that I can see how you'd want it.

    It's very tempting and exciting to drop a bunch of weight in a short amount of time, but you body needs food to function. It can't live off of stored fat forever! In fact, it won't live off of stored fat for very long and pretty soon it'll think it's starving to death and hold on to every last cell it can. Thus, you won't lose anything.

    All over the forums you'll see people say "You should have at least xxx net calories left!" My advice is to consult your doctor. And to eat more :smile: You should have some net calories left, probably around 1200 (not really sure where that magical number came from, but it seems to work! When I wasn't losing, I noticed my net calories were around 900, so I ate more, and my body restarted and dropped weight).

    Edit: WOW! A lot of people responded in the time I took to write my post! So, yeah...what they said.
  • ashleymashley02
    ashleymashley02 Posts: 107
    How the heck do you get that many calories in in one day? That would be eating like 2500 calories? Unless I go to mcdonalds lol.. and I don't think thoes are the calories I should be eating! anyone who wants to friend me and look at my food diary and help me I would really appreciate it!
  • capriciousmoon
    capriciousmoon Posts: 1,263 Member
    How would you have enough energy to do anything?

    You'd probably be able to go just fine for a bit, anywhere from a few days to weeks, and you would lose weight. Starving like that has bad effects on your mood and energy levels though, and after a while you'd probably be so hungry that you would end up binging and gaining a lot of the weight back... so it's a lot of hard work and pushing yourself for nothing.
  • anubis609
    anubis609 Posts: 3,966 Member
    Well, if the term "exercise bulimia" sounds like a good thing to you, then by all means keep your calories in the negative. When you slowly start becoming increasingly lethargic, irritable, physically, and [eventually] mentally dysfunctional, you may want to reevaluate your goals at that point.

    Until then, the rest of the community will simply tell you "no, it's not a good thing" in the meantime.
  • jbudge1
    jbudge1 Posts: 62 Member
    How the heck do you get that many calories in in one day? That would be eating like 2500 calories? Unless I go to mcdonalds lol.. and I don't think thoes are the calories I should be eating! anyone who wants to friend me and look at my food diary and help me I would really appreciate it!

    Mix in some protein shakes, almonds, and peanut butter. You can get to 2500 pretty easy.
  • SergeantSunshine_reused
    SergeantSunshine_reused Posts: 5,382 Member
    How the heck do you get that many calories in in one day? That would be eating like 2500 calories? Unless I go to mcdonalds lol.. and I don't think thoes are the calories I should be eating! anyone who wants to friend me and look at my food diary and help me I would really appreciate it!

    Add olive oil to all your veggies and meat, nuts, avacado
  • reepobob
    reepobob Posts: 1,172 Member
    How the heck do you get that many calories in in one day? That would be eating like 2500 calories? Unless I go to mcdonalds lol.. and I don't think thoes are the calories I should be eating! anyone who wants to friend me and look at my food diary and help me I would really appreciate it!

    My diary is open...I have ZERO problems eating...I am on maintenance and am consuming around 2800 calories a day and burning on average about 600...everything I eat is clean...no junk...
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