I need to eat more to loose weight?

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  • AReasor
    AReasor Posts: 355 Member
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    Also, to those starting out, it is really confusing at first. So many opinions and ways go about your weight loss. Keep at it! You will figure out soon enough what calories your body needs, eating back exercise calories, etc. You will find what works for you like we all did, trial and error.
  • mzhokie
    mzhokie Posts: 349 Member
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    For me, I tend to lose more if I at least maintain a 1200 net calories a day. I listen to my body too. If I'm hungry I try to eat them all back. If I'm not really hungry, seem to have eaten enough.... I will work on 1200 net. So some days I might be having a deficit of only 500 calories and some days it might be 600-700 calories because I didn't eat every single exercise calorie back. Still I'm losing more weight since I started paying attention to the net calories.

    I read that if you go below 1000 net calories even just one day during the week, your body will go in starvation mode and lower your metabolism. It might explain the 3 weeks I had where the scale didn't move. I upped my exercise during that time because the scales weren't moving. I cut calories because the scales weren't moving. Then I did more reading.

    But remember some of the estimates for exercise on MFP are a bit over estimated. I have a pedometer (Fitbit) and I get on a treadmill..... both my pedometer and the treadmill say I burn less calories than what MFP says. I wish I was burning as many calories as MFP claims for a 30-40 min workout. Plus the Fitbit sight has updated to also help you with daily calorie limits too. I like the combo of Fitbit and MFP..... (I found MFP because of Fitbit, their food data base are horrible)
  • ebony__
    ebony__ Posts: 519 Member
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    For me, I tend to lose more if I at least maintain a 1200 net calories a day. I listen to my body too. If I'm hungry I try to eat them all back. If I'm not really hungry, seem to have eaten enough.... I will work on 1200 net. So some days I might be having a deficit of only 500 calories and some days it might be 600-700 calories because I didn't eat every single exercise calorie back. Still I'm losing more weight since I started paying attention to the net calories.

    I read that if you go below 1000 net calories even just one day during the week, your body will go in starvation mode and lower your metabolism. It might explain the 3 weeks I had where the scale didn't move. I upped my exercise during that time because the scales weren't moving. I cut calories because the scales weren't moving. Then I did more reading.

    But remember some of the estimates for exercise on MFP are a bit over estimated. I have a pedometer (Fitbit) and I get on a treadmill..... both my pedometer and the treadmill say I burn less calories than what MFP says. I wish I was burning as many
    calories as MFP claims for a 30-40 min workout. Plus the Fitbit sight has updated to also help you with daily calorie limits too. I like the combo of Fitbit and MFP..... (I found MFP because of Fitbit, their food data base are horrible)

    Wow ok cool. I've very rarely been getting up to 1000 net so that's going to have to change.
    Yeah I think I really need to get a hrm. There's an inbuilt one on my exercise bike and the calories burnt are a lot less than what mfp says so I'm usually over cautious but maybe I'm being a bit over cautious. Going to monitor the next 2 weeks keeping my cals a bit higher and more consistent.

    Thanks everyone for the suppOrt
  • pullipgirl
    pullipgirl Posts: 767 Member
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    I use this calculator http://www.fitnessfrog.com/calculators/calorie-calculator.html

    Then subtract about 20% of the total and that's how many calories I eat
  • jamiesadler
    jamiesadler Posts: 634 Member
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    I started at the 1200 MFP recommends and ended up increasing to 1750. i am feeling a losing much better now.
  • Wilson336
    Wilson336 Posts: 76
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    Think of it this way. You will still lose weight if you eat less than 1200 calories a day, but since you are not taking in enough calories, your body will begin breaking down your muscles and devoting more of of your "energy" to just surviving. So you will end up tired, feeling weaker, and overall not as healthy in the long run. It is much safer to keep the calories up over 1200 and work in more exercise to help you lose weight and tone muscles.
  • taso42
    taso42 Posts: 8,980 Member
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    reassurance?

    Want reassurance?

    Seek out all the highly successful and fit people who we're lucky enough to have as members of this website, and look how they eat.

    In contrast, check out the physiques of people who chronically undereat, and look at the sorts of posts they make, e.g., "help, i'm stuck, can't loose weight", etc.....
  • skipcody
    skipcody Posts: 1 Member
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    Sounds weird but the idea is that your body goes into starvation mode and holds onto the weight. Think of it this way your Metabolism needs to be working to burn calories but to keep it working you need to feed it. If you have ever watched the Biggest Loser you will find that many try to eat less but those are the ones that continue to lose fewer pounds. The coaches continually remind their team that they need to eat to lose. Keep on Keeping on you can do it.
  • ebony__
    ebony__ Posts: 519 Member
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    I get the gist of how the metabolism works and nutrition even had to do a few classes of it in my Anatomy & Physiology unit, ... its just that it was never dealt with In calories so the part thats difficult to get my head around (even when you know the facts) is that I feel like im eating healthy suffieciant nutritous meals that fill me up... but i still need to eat more, so i feel like im eating a really healthy amount (even checked with a gp), but > im here because i want results and am happy to play around with the numbers until i find the right balance for me, and what I have been doing evidently was not right for me :) Thanks again everyone.
  • chestnutbrown
    chestnutbrown Posts: 53
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