MFP decreased my daily calorie goal: now what?

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sweetsierra
sweetsierra Posts: 15
in Health and Weight Loss
I have been struggling to stay around the 1400 calories a day goal that I started out with. Actually, most days I go over (and some days I go over by a lot), but I am still losing weight, When I reevaluated my goals, since I have lost about 70 lb & figured my needs had changed, now I'm down to 1200 calories a day! I have no idea how I am going to go down that low. I feel like I am going to be starving all the time! Maybe I just need more calories? What would you do in this situation?

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  • ishallnotwant
    ishallnotwant Posts: 1,210 Member
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    You can manually up your cals to stay around the range you have been eating, or even a bit above it. Do you have your MFP set to lose 2 pounds per week? If you lower it to .5 pounds per week you will get more calories.
  • sweetsierra
    sweetsierra Posts: 15
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    I changed it back to 1400 calories. It says I should lose 1.5 lb. a week now. I just want to keep losing and not slow down too much, or I will get discouraged! :(
  • ishallnotwant
    ishallnotwant Posts: 1,210 Member
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    Slow and steady wins the race. :flowerforyou:
  • greatisbecky
    greatisbecky Posts: 7 Member
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    Out of fat, carbs, and protein, fat has the most calories per gram. Fat is 9.4 kcal/g whereas the other two are both 4.1 kcal/g. (kcal is just the 'correct' term to use but they are what we just call regular calories.

    So if you want to be able to still eat a lot of food, the best way to do it is avoid a lot of high fat foods in your diets. Actually no fat/low fat items are great bc you don't take in a lot of calorie dense foods, which leaves you many calories to eat of fish, chicken, vegetables, whole grains, and fruit.

    I have this super intelligent kinesiology professor this semester who performed a recent study on what substances actually convert to fat in our bodies. They put people on NO fat diets and found out if they didn't eat fat, then they lost a lot of fat. Summarizing now: only fat converts to fat, not just anything you eat in excess.

    He also said that the people on the NO fat diets had to actually eat QUITE a lot of food everyday just to reach their average healthy caloric goal.

    I'm not saying to give up fat completely bc that is not very healthy, we all need fat for energy storage and other bodily stuff. I'm just saying that by lowering your fat intake and eating other things, ESPECIALLY vegetables (superrrrr good for you to get all the vitamins you need), then you can still eat a good amount of food.

    Right now I'm limited to 1200 cal/day on MFP. I thought it would be super hard but after I learned that in class and applied it to my diet, I'm not really hungry during the day and I eat like 5 small meals to keep me satiated throughout.

    Also cardio exercising, even just making sure I walk for a bit, sheds some calories do I can eat more.

    I know you can do it bc I did it. I lowered my daily caloric intake to a number I thought unfathomable. But once I was informed, I was able to make smart and healthy choices without starving every day. I really hope this helps you bc it changed my way of thinking about food. Good luck :)
  • ishallnotwant
    ishallnotwant Posts: 1,210 Member
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    Please be discerning when reading advice from people on the forums, OP. Excess calories will make you gain weight, whether they are fat or not. A lot of diet myths are passed around on this site. It's crazy. If you are losing right now, doing what you are doing, don't change anything until you are ready to.
  • greatisbecky
    greatisbecky Posts: 7 Member
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    I was just trying to pass on what the newest findings are. My professor has worked with the brightest exercise phys scientists of the nation and often works with NASA and astronauts dealing with skeletal muscle loss up in space and how to maintain healthy bodies. It I didn't want to provide all his credentials...
    I was shocked too when I heard of this only fat converting to fat but the studied was done on rats and humans and it all came out the same. I honestly still wouldn't believe it if it hadn't worked for me and my parents also. They followed these guidelines and lost over 70 pounds combined since January.
    I've dedicated 4 years to studying this stuff and I'm just trying to help.
  • Martucha123
    Martucha123 Posts: 1,093 Member
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    Just accept that the smaller you get the less calories you burn doing the same activities,
    so you will be losing less while eating same.
    that is natural and healthy aproach
    the smaller you get the slower weight lost should be
  • 714rah714
    714rah714 Posts: 759 Member
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    If your still losing then don't change a thing regardless of what MFP or anybody else says.
  • heathermarie517
    heathermarie517 Posts: 105
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    Interesting! Thanks!!
    Out of fat, carbs, and protein, fat has the most calories per gram. Fat is 9.4 kcal/g whereas the other two are both 4.1 kcal/g. (kcal is just the 'correct' term to use but they are what we just call regular calories.

    So if you want to be able to still eat a lot of food, the best way to do it is avoid a lot of high fat foods in your diets. Actually no fat/low fat items are great bc you don't take in a lot of calorie dense foods, which leaves you many calories to eat of fish, chicken, vegetables, whole grains, and fruit.

    I have this super intelligent kinesiology professor this semester who performed a recent study on what substances actually convert to fat in our bodies. They put people on NO fat diets and found out if they didn't eat fat, then they lost a lot of fat. Summarizing now: only fat converts to fat, not just anything you eat in excess.

    He also said that the people on the NO fat diets had to actually eat QUITE a lot of food everyday just to reach their average healthy caloric goal.

    I'm not saying to give up fat completely bc that is not very healthy, we all need fat for energy storage and other bodily stuff. I'm just saying that by lowering your fat intake and eating other things, ESPECIALLY vegetables (superrrrr good for you to get all the vitamins you need), then you can still eat a good amount of food.

    Right now I'm limited to 1200 cal/day on MFP. I thought it would be super hard but after I learned that in class and applied it to my diet, I'm not really hungry during the day and I eat like 5 small meals to keep me satiated throughout.

    Also cardio exercising, even just making sure I walk for a bit, sheds some calories do I can eat more.

    I know you can do it bc I did it. I lowered my daily caloric intake to a number I thought unfathomable. But once I was informed, I was able to make smart and healthy choices without starving every day. I really hope this helps you bc it changed my way of thinking about food. Good luck :)
  • sweetsierra
    sweetsierra Posts: 15
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    Thanks....I'll just keep chugging along. It's not broke yet, so I'm not gonna fix it! ;)

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