MomOfJoey

I just ate a bowl of 5 grain hot cereal with .5 Tbsp of honey and some dried fruit. That would bring you in right to ~300 calories depending on how much fruit you put in. I am so full now I have no idea how I will eat the rest of my calories for the day!ctu ETA: it was actually about 220 calories.

Question about juicing: doesn't the act of running a whole food through a juice eliminate positive parts of the food, mainly the fiber? Isn't it better to eat the whole food? Not that juice isn't a delicious and healthful supplement to a healthy diet, but it's not the nutritionally the same as eating the fruit or…

I am 40 and had my son when I was 37. I was never overweight before, and could always eat whatever I wanted. I lost all my baby weight because of breastfeeding, but had to eat a high calorie diet to maintain weight while nursing. Then, once my nursing decreased but my diet remained the same, I put it back on. I want my…

Polar flavored seltzer over ice! There are so many flavors, and they are zero calories and tasty over ice. Plus the quart of ice water I drink during my workout (for real-- I couldn't work out without it), I am good for the day.

This is good to know, since I do 120+ squats with weights 3 times a week, and I feel like that must burn lots of calories. I really want to know how many!

I kind of gleaned that having both would be best, but that's like $150 total... hmmmm.

Now who's rude?

Gaining muscle helps you lose weight. You want to replace fat with muscle. In order to do that, you have to do strength training along with cardio, which means lifting weights. It will not make you muscle bound. Quite the contrary, it will help make you a more efficient burner of calories in the future, so that you will…

Now that is easy advice to follow. I can totally do 1600 calories a day. Is working out for 60 minutes 6 times a week overtraining, is the next question. I could roll it back to 5 days a week. And, is it 1600 calories every day, even non-workout days? The other question is, why is it when I put my info into MFP, say I want…

Is it really necessary to be unpleasant about it? Honestly, look around at these forums. There are people eating 1200 calories, not eating back exercise calories. They swear that is the right way. You have people saying eat 2000 calories. They say you will wreck your metabolism if you don't do it their way. You have people…

So how much do you need to maintain weight? Is that TDEE? Let's say that's 2000. If I subtract 30%, that's 1400. Then do I eat back exercise calories too? That's 1700 calories per day.

My results at 1200 + exercise calories = 1500-1600 was to lose 5 pounds fast, then nothing. So the decision is-- eat more or eat less? Different people give different answers. Of course I'd love to eat more it it would really work. ETA: and does "eat more" mean eat like 300 calories more, or like 800 calories more?

That would be eating 1400-1900 calories a day, which is a pretty big spread. Now, I was looking at heybales' method, which says I should be eating more like 2000 calories a day. So you can see, there is no consensus even among the "experts" here. So maybe it's not rocket science, but it's not a no-brainer either.

Because I lost that 5 lbs in the first 3 weeks and haven't lost ANY since then! It's stressing me out bigtime.

5'0" and a teacher. It's not exactly a desk job though I do spend a good bit of it sitting. I walk around I guess. I have a toddler so I do some walking around ;)

I really cannot exercise more than an hour a day. That's all the time I have, with working full time and a toddler to raise. So that is that. I already do cardio, lifting, and resistance in that hour, pretty evenly split. Maybe I am logging my calories inaccurately? I just don't know.

CaseRat, I looked at your formula and it said I should be eating ~1550 calories. So that's what you do, regardless of exercise?

Yet it stays at 1200 even when I change my goal loss from 2 lbs to 1 lb to .5 lbs. So you can understand my confusion.

I told it 2 lbs at first, then 1 lb. It didn't matter, my base was still 1200, as MFP won't go lower than that. How can I know what my daily calorie deficit is, if I don't really know what I expending each day to begin with? Am I sedentary, lightly active? I work out for an hour 6 times a day but I have a sedentary job.…

It is way confusing for me too. I am following what MFP says, but after losing an initial 5 lbs, I haven't lost anything, though I have lost inches off my legs, which are not fat. So I am trying to figure out what to do here. Eating more? Eating less? I cannot work out more than I am, and I am being pretty careful about…

I am still perplexed, though. I might just be dense. Is my BMR 1200? MFP says that is what I should be eating per day. I eat back exercise calories. So why I am I still losing muscle? How much more should I be eating? This is what is scary for people, and frustrating. You put in your humbers, you get your calorie…

I have been talking to people on here, and reading up. Also, working my @$$ off and not losing any weight, but losing inches on my calves and thighs, which were not fat. Oh noes, I thought. I am losing the wrong parts of my body. Something's wrong. So now I am kind of angry at MFP. 1200 is not really a good place to set…

OK, so BMR is the calories you would burn if you do absolutely nothing. Don't get out of bed. You're in a coma. So let's say that's 1200. On a normal day, you walk around, cook dinner, carry bags, climb stairs, etc. Say that burns 1000 calories in the 16 hours youu are awake. That's not a lot for a whole day. That means…

Of course there is benefit. Early man nursed until ~4 years old. But the "full benefit" being really the baseline. Anything beyond that continues to offer nutritional, immune system, and emotional benefits. It can be very daunting to hear "do it for 2 years" when you feel like quitting at 5 months. Make it to one year if…

I agree that two years is ideal, but a vanishingly small percent of women make it to that point. It's a great goal if you can make it. If not, striving for 1 year is a good idea. But this is a personal decision, so you have to do what's right for yourself. If the OP wants to conntinue and needs support, it's out there.…

This is the truth-- it is hard to let down for a machine. Your baby is probably getting a lot more when he nurses than you are getting when you pump. Is he meeting his weight benchmarks when you take him to his pediatrician? If so, then I wouldn't worry about measuring every drop of milk. Just nurse whenever he wants to…

I can tell you all my BF horror story-- my first day care provider told me I wasn't giving my son (4 months at the time) enough pumped milk. So I pumped like MAD. I lost 20 lbs in 2 months, a scary amount of weight. Then my pediatrician told me the day care lady was nuts, and to cut down. Of course, I gained all 20 lbs…

There is a big difference between this number and the number you get from www.fit2fatradio.com/tools/bmr That site tells you, if your BMR is 1200, and you are moderately active, like working out 3-5 times a week, you should be eating more like 1900 calories. So which is it? There is a whole meal's difference between 1200 +…

I would like to know this too.

OK, I'm just starting to try to figure this out, so correct me if I'm wrong: my Katch McArdle BMR is ~1200. That means, if I just lay in bed in a coma, I need 1200 to maintain my organ functioning. That is not counting walking around, thinking, lifting up my kid, grocery shopping, etc. So add that to your BMR, plus…