[nelnel]

I am new to caorie counting and I went to a few websites to find out how many calories I should be having a day and they all said around 1800 a day to loose a pound a week (I have alot to loose). However I am having a hard time getting that much. I have been having around 1200 a day (and I have been keeping track of everything that I eat with fitday and I have been very anal about it lately). My main concern is that I don't want my calories to be so low that I start to loose muscle instead of fat. I am eating alot of food and not feeling hungry, I have been drinking the 8/8 of water plus extra and working out daily with a PUSH Dvd. I weigh myself daily and am loosing about a pound a week (which is fine). Like I said before my only concern is that I want to make sure it is the fat I am loosing. Any help would be awsome.

[purplepansy912]

hmmm.. any suggestions?

[Lyria]

I have gotten away with eating as little as 800 calories a day and not felt hungry while doing it.

However my body certainly knew that I wasn't giving it enough and my weight loss actually slowed (not to mention other nasty side effects )

When I upped my intake to a more reasonable 1300-1400 range (to lose about 1 pound or 1/2 kg a week) the weight actually began to slide off.

These days in maintainence/very slight weight loss I eat around 1600-1800 calories a day and on a heavy exercise day sometimes 2000 (though that isnt all that often)

I does depend a lot on the individual and some foods will fill you up more than others for a lot less calories. If you should be taking in a few more then switch to something a little more calorie dense and don't be afraid too. Something like a handful of nuts where you'd get excellent nutrition and good fats etc.

Liv

[Meg]

Hi Nelnel! Kudos to you for understanding how important it is to lose FAT and not just lose weight! Preserving our muscle is soooo important for keeping our metabolisms running high and for looking tight and fit when we get to goal.

The best way to make sure that you're losing pounds of fat and not muscle is to weight train while you're losing weight. Your goal is to maintain the lean body mass that you have and maybe even add to it, if possible. And that means lifting weights!

Your weight training should be accompanied by clean eating and enough protein to help build and repair muscle. You want to make every calorie that you're eating as nutritionally dense as possible - really get a lot of nutrition 'bang for the buck' out of every calorie. I don't think that low calories by themselves will cause you to lose muscle, but low calories + poor nutrition and/or no exercise to maintain muscle mass WILL result in muscle loss.

As you're losing weight, it's a good idea to keep track of your body fat percentage so you can tell what you're losing: pounds of fat or pounds of muscle. It will probably be some of both, but the goal is to minimize the muscle loss as much as possible. Have you ever had your body fat % checked? Do you belong to a gym? Have a Tanita scale?

Best of luck to you -- I'm so impressed that you're aware of the importance of muscle to your long term success!