Calories a day???

I know it doesn't make much sense. But sometimes you have to eat more to lose weight. When I started with MFP I realized I wasn't eating enough....maybe up your calories to 1300 or even 1400 will give you that jump start you need. Good luck!

I'm 5'4'' and I eat 1200 or a bit more depending on how much I burn or how hungry I am. The person who told you you are not eating enough calories was probably talking about BMR and TDEE which you can look up and calculate but it can be confusing. People who have been on here for a while can better inform you or you can do a search and read an older thread. Good luck.

Hi Roxy. To be honest, you may need to experiment with it a while, if not able to see a dietician.

[Personal experience:]
To lose weight, (for most folks, including myself) there needs to be a slight calorie deficit.
Otherwise, can try to burn off the excess, but that can lead to muscle-gain and therefore some slight weight-gain for a while; this can be bad for the weigh-in boost you normally get from lost weight, so it may be better to wait on this until some weight has already been lost).
Never go below what's healthy. (If you ever go below 1000, it's probably unhealthy, ask a doc first).


[Actual advice:]
In this case, I would recommend that you take the approximate amount you've been eating (set up some "fake food diaries" to get a good idea of where that was, then delete them...be brutally honest with yourself when setting them up).
Take the calorie amount, then reduce it by a small amount you feel comfortable with. This small, seemingly-negligible amount does add up over time, but it's slow.
If you want to speed it up, you can try cutting out a few of those "bad favorites", which add up over time. This is much more difficult, but the results are faster.

MFP helps you calculate this - when setting up your goals it takes into account your height, current weight, age, and activity level and determines approximately what you would need to eat to stay at the same weight assuming no additional exercise/activities. Then you tell it what your goal is (1 lb lost/week, 2 lb lost/week, etc) and it calculates the deficit needed and gives you a calorie goal.

If you exercise you will create more of a calorie deficit than you need to meet your goal, that's why MFP "gives" you extra calories to eat on days that you exercise. For example, MFP calculates that I need 1400 cals/day to have a 1lb/week loss. I did a workout this morning and burned 188 cals (per my HRM). So for today I'm going to aim to eat 1588 cals so that I'm not creating too much of a deficit.

Struggling with an ED, I can say this is very difficult for me. I'm trying hard to up my intake to anything above 800, but I'm having trouble even hitting that mark to begin with.

I KNOW that it's unhealthy, it just seems like so much food.

To be honest, I'm a little jealous of the people who can eat 1200 and feel fine.

I totally get what you mean.
I try to only give the healthiest advice on here, but it's always best to see a doc/dietician & see what they say is fine for you.
My best friend in HS had an ED, I let her lean on me for emotional support, but she was doing the best she could: seeing a psychiatrist & getting the advice she deserved. The only thing I disagreed with at the time, is that they never pointed out that there could be some self-image issues (body dysmorphic - always thinking she's so heavy and yet being so, so thin; thinking she had so many skin issues, yet she looked just fine). And past life issues (which she refused to discuss with the psyc).
Keep being strong, there's always support, somewhere, somehow, if you need it

How do you work out how many calories you should have a day? I am 193 lb 5 ft 4 and having around 1200 calories, I was told by some one today that I'm not having enough calories, is this right? Please help

Try this - http://www.fat2fitradio.com/tools/bmr/