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It comes down to how much (measured in calories) you eat. Not 'what'. Set MFP to lose .5 to 1 pound per week. Choose a reasonable activity level based on your job/hobbies/life. Accurately & honestly log your calories in using a food scale for solids. Exercise is important for fitness and other reasons. And it factors into…
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Some people have medical reasons to be wary of carbs, such as diabetes. Others may feel more satiated/full eating a low carb/high fat diet. But the truth is, carbs don't matter for weight loss unless you're eating so much of them that you are not eating at a deficit. You do need to be aware that some foods have more…
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In general, accurate & honest food logging. If you've stayed the same more or less for 6 months, then you're averaging maintenance. Cut your calories slightly, and be consistent with your logging.
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Ps-for snacks, it may help to mix your macros. Such as having some peanut butter w/ your carrots or apple slices. Personally if I eat carrots or apples my hunger is not satiated. But adding something with fat/protein, even in a small quantity, changes that.
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Are you using a food scale? I ask because a chicken/veggie/bean/rice/grains salad for 250 calories would limit you to a small amount of food considering rice/grains are more calorie dense. And if you're not using a food scale then you are likely taking in more food than you think for your other meals, snacks. To aim for .5…
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Water weight and still some of the extra food mass in your body. Within 24-48 hours at least 1/2 of that will be gone.
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More details? Specifics would help you get targeted advice. When did you start trying to lose weight by eating less calories? What was your weight then? What is your current weight, height, activity level? (How active are you in your job/hobbies.) How many calories a day do you eat? Do you log/track your calories every…
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For fat/calorie boost: Cook with olive oil. Eat nuts. Add avocado to your salad/sandwich/dish. Use full fat dairy instead of low fat/skim. For protein: increase your portions of lean meat/dairy.
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For cardio, walking is great. You can do it almost anywhere. :) As for equipment, you don't need much but having a good pair of shoes is wise. (Good defined as suited well to your arch/gait.) For weight loss, accurately & honestly logging your food while eating at a deficit will allow you to lose weight over time. SEt up…
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This is a good point. If you were to eat 100g of carrots or 100g of red cabbage or 100g broccoli stems, the 100g carrots would be about 45 calories (going from memory but I think that's about right) while the 100g broccoli or cabbage would be a little less. SO if you weigh it and log it all as carrots, you'll err on the…
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I am not sure if horseback riding would be considered cardio? If not, then heart rate is not going to give an accurate calorie burn. Heart rate is useful in estimating burn for steady state cardio, where you have multiple major muscle groups working for an extended period of time.
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If you are giving yourself credit for an extra ~300 calories for a 90 minute hike, I do NOT think you are being too generous. For comparison, I am similar weight so our BMRs are going to be similar. My Fitbit gives me credit for about 5 calories burned per minute for a brisk walk ~3.8+ mph. Negating for BMR/standard…
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Most likely is you are not eating at a deficit. Are you tracking your calories, or simply have you changed the types of foods you eat? But some other questions. What was your weight 2 months ago? What is it now? Has it changed at all?
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I would log the horse back riding. Fitbit is not going to be accurate when it thinks you are walking or running and you are actually doing a different activity. I believe the Fitbits are fairly accurate when used as intended. But if you inadvertently rely on it when it has inaccurate data, there is little hope that it will…
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I think you mean that muscle takes up less space than fat, so losing fat at the same time as gaining muscle: scale stays about the same, but the body is leaner. This really does not happen when eating at a deficit, but as the OP didn't indicate anything about food intake habits and did mention clothes fitting better…
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Its simple. Less packaged products and more cooking from fresh ingredients. Store bought, prepared foods are going to be high in sodium in most cases.
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Not weight related, but healthy living related.. Last night my daughter wanted to make a new pasta recipe she'd found online. I went along with it, and rather than making plans to eat my own meal, I kept track of the ingredients/quantities and AFTER eating a reasonable (to me) portion I entered the items into recipe…
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Not 'what' but 'how much'.
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I think this is a different scenario. Refer to my example above, but with this added detail: MFP expects me to burn 1800 per day. BUT if I log exercise in MFP, that changes the MFP expectation. Lets say I log a 150 calorie workout. Now MFP expects my total burn to be 1800 + 150. So if Fitbit is showing I burned 2055 total,…
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A negative adjustment is for when you are less active than mFP expects. Say MFP thinks I will burn 1800 calories a day based on lightly active. But tomorrow I'm a couch bum and only burn 1550 according to my Fitibit. With negative adjustments, MFP would tell me to eat 1550. (I'm in maintenance.) WIthout negative…
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Not a 'diet' at all, or anything to do with weight loss, but I know of someone who won't eat anything white. No mayo, ranch dressing, white cheese, cauliflower. He can't explain why. It totally grosses him out.
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Google will lead to many. You can also go very basic and start by looking up your BMR. Then multiply that by 1.2 to 1.25 to get a basic daily energy use for sedentary, no exercise. That would be the most basic TDEE. WIth extra daily activity (such as active hobbies, job) or cardio exercise: burning more.
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My theory... Logging 1200 and estimating portions, the 1200 is probably like 1500+. When someone 'increases' their calories they panic at the idea. So aiming for 1275, but being more accurate, and actually eating 1275: may result in weight loss as intended.
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About how much energy do you use per day? I don't know your age, but for 30 years old your BMR would be about 1520. If sedentary and little/no exercise you would use about 1900 per day. So 1300-1500 would mean 1 pound per week on average. And if you are estimating your portions, then you think you're eating 1300-1500 but…
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Also I think there is often mistakes made between causation and correlation. Take this scenario: Jane has been eating at 1250 calories for 10 whole days and the scale has not moved. Someone tells Jane to eat more. Jane eats 1500 and the next day, the scale is down 1 pound. Eating more caused Jane to lose weight? No. The…
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Some of it comes from facts that get misunderstood or exaggerated. Some comes from the simple fact that we learn over time. Once it was believed that smoking was good for you! And some comes from marketing ploys intended to sell a product or generate hype.
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Two points. 1st if you have a typical car -which uses gas as its fuel source- then you must drive it faster in order to complete X distance in 10 minutes instead of 20. You'll use more gas per mile. If you're exerting more effort, you'll burn more calories per minute. 2nd - there is consideration for what happens in the…
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Note also that one detail about how MFP relays Fitbit's info, is that MFP assumes you will be sedentary/active/whatever-you-selected for the rest of the day. So if you ARE highly active in the morning, some of that adjustment will go away as the day moves on. And overnight. Example... Assume my bmr is 50/hour. And based on…
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I'd make sure my Fitbit had accurate height/weight/gender/age info. Fitbit estimates your calorie burn based on your movements, so if it has your info wrong, then it would be going off an erroneous BMR and that could affect what Fitbit thinks you have burned during the day.
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I have a different way of thinking about it - in that I don't consider it a 'cheat'. IMO you cannot cheat yourself. You make choices. :) When I was losing, I'd sometimes have a day where I would eat at maintenance. And sometimes I'd choose to eat OVER maintenance. I figured eating at maintenance was an extra 500 cals (when…
