So 1200 calories is wrong? Confused!

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  • Nancy_AZ60
    Nancy_AZ60 Posts: 99 Member
    1200 is good, you will lose
  • madamepsychosis
    madamepsychosis Posts: 472 Member
    So, if MFP recommending 1400 calories for me per day because I exercise a lot? I noticed on the days I do exercise, my calorie allowance goes up however many calories I burn. So, there are days where my allowance is up near 1900. Man, I couldn't imagine 1200 calories per day....kudos to you.

    No. MFP doesn't include the amount you exercise into your calorie allowance. You have to add that in yourself, hence why when you do exercise, your allowance goes up. Because MFP doesn't include it in your deficit originally, it wants you to eat those back. Some people do eat them back, some people don't. The 1400 calories MFP gives you are based on your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate - what you'd need if you stayed in bed all day), but also on what lifestyle you plugged yourself in as having. If a 5'5 150lb woman who leads a sedentary lifestyle puts in her stats to lose 1lb a week, she'd get a smaller calorie allowance than a woman of the same height, weight and goal who works in a job where she's on her feet all day.
  • Shayztar
    Shayztar Posts: 415 Member
    It depends on your size and what your BMR and TDEE calculates to if you want to be as exact about weight loss as possible. As other people have said, your goal in such a short amount of time might also be attainable, but to what end? You might gain it or some of it back again. 1200 will allow you to lose weight, but it is unhealthy to eat less than that. I eat 1800 calories a day, plus I try to eat back my exercise caloires as much as I can. I am continuing to lose weight fairly consistantly. When I was eating 1200 I was grouchy and hungry ALL THE TIME. And I stopped losing weight after I lost the initial 15 lbs.

    Consider researching dieting according to your BMR and TDEE if you are wondering why some people are telling you 1200 is unhealthy.


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  • cmccorma
    cmccorma Posts: 203 Member
    You don't have a lot to lose actually. I started at 173 at 5'2". I have lost 14 pounds in two months. I think 20 pounds in two months for someone with a lot less to lose might be difficult without exercise.

    Edit to add I have eaten 1,200 calories a day for 55 days (consistently). A little inconsistently before that!
  • sheryllamb72
    sheryllamb72 Posts: 163 Member
    I'm on about 1200 cals per day, and normally with exercise, end up with about 1500/1600 cals to eat per day and I normally never eat all of my daily cals. I've usually got about 200/300 left over at the end of the day.

    When I say exercise, I mean just walking for 45 minutes to an hour every day in my lunchtime. I'm too busy to do any proper exercise, but walking is great. I've lost almost 2 stone since 1st Jan.

    I would say that 1200 cals per day is a weekly loss of about 2lb with a bit of exercise (walking).....that's that I was losing anyway. I've only got 2lb to go which will probably be when I weigh in on Sunday morning, and then I've reached my goal.

    Good luck. :wink:
  • xarla16
    xarla16 Posts: 84 Member
    If you read a lot of posts in the topics, you will find people who say 1200 is to few calories and that you won't lose weight. What I know is that I have been eating 1200 calories for 50 days, and I have lost 17 lbs. I have way more energy than I do normally and I'm never hungry. Everyone's body is different, but it's working for me.
  • Helloitsdan
    Helloitsdan Posts: 5,564 Member
    1200 is good, you will lose
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  • meshashesha2012
    meshashesha2012 Posts: 8,329 Member
    let's see i lose on anything that less than my maintenance (which is around 2200). there's no way i could consistently eat 1200 calories and still be able to get through my workouts.

    id rather eat 1600-1800 and not get lightheaded when i'm lifting heavy things over my head than to eat 1200 calories and catch the vapors halfway through my sprint HIIT sessions

    oh i'm 5'5, 40 and 202 pounds
  • Di3012
    Di3012 Posts: 2,247 Member
    It's all about WHAT you eat, not just the calories. Protein, veggies -- low carb, low fat!

    False!
    Low fat was debunked.

    Fat helps with the absorption of vital micronutrients and people will lose more weight on a high fat and high protein diet as opposed to carbs.

    That poster was correct in that it IS about what you eat though.

    So many times on MFP people post threads saying something along the lines of "I am short on my calories today, I still have 1,200,200 left, what should I do?"

    The answer is invariably something such as "eat pizza" "eat sweets" "eat spoonfuls of peanut butter" - basically eat rubbish just to make up the calories...... - was this not the exact thing people were doing that maintained their weight at a heavy level or worse still made them pile the weight on?

    ps peanut butter is fine, but eating it by the spoonful just to make up the deficit in calories? Can't be doing with all that.

    Eat your meals, do not binge, do not snack just for the sake of it. Do your exercise, log everything.
  • scriehl
    scriehl Posts: 94 Member
    Honestly, stop listening to anyone else's guidelines about how much you should be eating. YOU need to figure out how much your'e comfortable eating every day, enough that you won't be starving or unhappy, but little enough that you'll still be losing weight - however quickly or slowly.

    Listen to YOUR BODY, not anyone else's recommendations. If you keep eating 1,200 a day and decide that's too little and you want to be able to eat more, okay, up it to 1,400 or 1,500. If you start eating 1,500 for a while and notice you're losing much slower than you'd like, okay, find a happy medium at 1,350. But bottom line trust your own self to be able to decide the number that's good for you.

    Well said. Also, if you are doing a lot of housework and chasing kids around, that IS exercise girl. You can definitely log that and allow your body more calories if you feel that needs adjusting. Good luck to you. :)
  • taso42
    taso42 Posts: 8,980 Member
    The answer is invariably something such as "eat pizza" "eat sweets" "eat spoonfuls of peanut butter" - basically eat rubbish just to make up the calories...... - was this not the exact thing people were doing that maintained their weight at a heavy level or worse still made them pile the weight on?

    No, consistently eating above TDEE did that. Nothing wrong with eating pizza or sweets or anything else so long as it fits the macros.

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