TIRED..PLATEAUD...SCALE NOT MOVING !!!FOUND MY ANSWER !!!!

Is it okay if I increase my calorie intake little by little? I'm not sure if its good or bad to surprise my body by suddenly upping my cal by 400-600.

April 2012 I worked out hard. I ate as little as possible.. Netting 1200 calories...PLAIN OLD STARVING !! All that hard work and and I only lost 2 lbs. the entire month. Some people said switch your routine other said eat less,try low carbs ...NONE OF THAT WORKED for me. Then one of my pals started the group EAT MORE TO WEIGH LESS.. Bam !!!! I found the answer for me. I lost the 1 lb I gained plus 2 more lbs after a 2 week metabolism reset.This is not a one size fit all journey.What work for you may not work for me !! I read the topics ,threads and watched the videos they have available that suggested upping my calories...YES...eating more food to lose the weight. I could not rap my brain around it...BUT it was the one thing I had NOT tried..I figured why not...I did a metabolism reset which means move your calories to maintenance which is your tdee total. I gained one lb so I figured my body was responding to the increased calories. Then I did a 15 % cut which is your tdee total minus 15 percent which totaled 2009 calories per day for me. I rounded the number to an even 2000 calories a day.GUESS what the weight is coming off again !!!

YOU can get your bmr and tdee numbers on www.fitnessfrog.com


I TRY LIVE BY THESE PRINCIPLES NOW...

I should never net below my bmr
1.Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) quantifies the number of calories your body burns in its idle statesuch as sleeping.


I should not splurge over my tdee...
2.TDEE - Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) quantifies the number of calories you burn in a day. This measure is best estimated by scaling your Basal Metabolic Rate to your level of activity. TDEE is critical in tailoring your nutrition plan to desired fitness goals.

IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS GO TO THE GROUP "" EAT MORE TO WEIGH LESS '''

MFP pal Anewlucia started the group EAT MORE TO WEIGH LESS ....I copied and pasted this information below from one of her threads that may helpful.

What is BMR?
Your basal metabolic rate, or BMR, is the minimum calorific requirement needed to sustain life in a resting individual. It can be looked at as being the amount of energy (measured in calories) expended by the body to remain in bed all day!

What is TDEE?
TDEE is the common abbreviation for Total Daily Energy Expenditure which is a metric to calculate the amount of calories your body needs to function in a day. This is quite similar to BMR; in fact, you need your BMR to calculate your TDEE; but your TDEE accounts for your average daily activity as well to give a figure truer to your specific situation. Basically, the TDEE calculation relies on categorizing your daily activity into one of the metrics' predetermined groupings:

Sedentary - desk job and little to no exercise
Lightly Active - light exercise/sports 1-3 days/wk
Moderately Active - moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/wk (****SIDE NOTE - even if you have a desk job most people fit right here when you workout 3-5 days a week)
Very Active - hard exercise/sports 6-7 days/wk
Extremely Active - hard daily exercise/sports & physical job or training
Once you have determined where you fit in on the TDEE activity rate scale, this activity rate is used to weight your BMR giving you a more accurate assessment of how many calories you really need throughout the course of the day.

Here is a link to a site that you plug in your information and it will provide your BMR and TDEE along with your Cut value (again, if you workout 3-5 times a week select "Moderate" and the "Select Your Goal" option you will select is "Lose Fat - 15% caloric reduction.

You can get your bmr and tdee number from here :http://www.fitnessfrog.com/calculators

So now, you should have your BMR, TDEE, and Cut Value (TDEE - 15%)

Here is a video that talks about this in great detail that hopefully will clear up any questions you may have:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYi9xjIRvbY&feature=g-all-u

If TDEE is figured out correctly, then exercise cals don't *have* to be eaten back because, technically, TDEE figures them in. The underlying factor here, is that most people underestimate their activity levels, (for fear of being told to eat "too much") and then proceed to under eat. If a person is burning 1000 cals/day in exercise, then that should be figured into their TDEE, meaning their TDEE should be AT LEAST 1000 cals more than their BMR. If this is not the case then they are undercutting themselves on the cals. So a person w/a BMR of 1300, that puts up 1000 cal burns should have come up w/a TDEE calculation of 2400 or more. So any situation where a person is not getting those calculations, they should be eating back some of those exercise cals.

So if you come up w/BMR=1300, TDEE=1800, you need to either A)eat back some cals, or recalculate your TDEE to include the *actual* burns that you're getting.

So to cut using *true* TDEE figures, you'd just eat a flat TDEE (-15%), as long as TDEE is correct. It should be fine. But if you are using MFP's calculations, or are not getting a TDEE that includes the amount you burn each day *plus* BMR, you need to eat back some exercise cals.