Quote:
Originally Posted by Michou
I see so many comments all over the net about gaining weight if I reduce my calorie intake and that I should increase it to 1500.......general comments without any consideration of the reality of the person dieting. If I were to listen the 16 pounds I have just lost would be instead a weight gain of 5 pounds and I would consider myself a failure or one of the few people on the planet that eat nothing and gain weight by miracle.
They say in general that we need to consume 2000 calories a day but is it my reality?
I did the calculation, according to my gender, age, height and weight and level of activity to maintain my weight at 147 I need to eat no more than 1435 calories a day, mind you my work makes me a couch potato. I know I can move more, walk etc which I do but I will talk later about that.
I should not eat below 1200 calories a day under no circumstance because again I will gain weight but to loose 1 pound a week I must eat 80% of 1435 which brings me to 1148 calories. Yet many people are still insisting I should eat 1500.
My bmr is 1196 and I am supposed to eat 1148 to loose one pound, I am sure that I will enter starvation within a few minute of posting this message.
As far as exercise I am looking right at this moment I have burned 136 calories just walking around the house, again I should add those and make sure I eat them, I do not want to starve. Yet the machine telling me how many calories often calculate wrong and is so generic that it does not take my personal history to base the calorie burned.
Also I am told that I can eat fried oreos (I do not know what they are), fries, pies, ice cream, drink wine, as long as it stays within my calorie allotment. Fine but that junk full of fat is the reason why I am where I stand at the moment.
I should snack also, because I do not want to enter the starvation thing, I have never snacked in my life, I should run to the peanut butter jar.
Ok so I am being melodramatic and I am also smiling writing this but what. i want to say is that you are probably not a failure and you should not be made to feel that way, you just need to get the information relating to yourself not someone else.
Go and calculate your TDEE and check your numbers you might be surprise of the results
:0)
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Unfortunately, you yourself are contributing to the misinformation in your post:
1) The "calculation" that you did, presumably, your TDEE, is only an estimate of the daily calorie needs of the individual. It is based on averages, just like the recommended daily calorie requirements of USDA or the NHS for example. TDEE calculators are not that reliable primarily because people who use them tend to over or under estimate their activity levels.
2) It is not that you should not eat below 1200 cals per day per se. The "recommendation" is that you should not eat below your BMR, which for most people, is 1200 or above - even for sedentary, older women (e.g. yours is 1196, practically 1200).
3) You do NOT have to eat at 20% below TDEE to lose weight. Any person eating below TDEE will (or should, unless there is some serious anomaly in that person) lose weight so eating at 5%, 10%, 20% and more below TDEE will result in weight loss.
4) As for adding back exercise calories, no, you DON'T add back exercise calories if you are using the TDEE - x% formula to lose weight. As far as I am aware, no sites pushing this method of weight loss requires the individual to add back exercise calories.
5) And the 1500 cals intake, this is the first time I'm hearing that we should eat 1500 cals to lose weight. Who has said this?
6) Finally, starvation mode. Well, I won't even begin to write a sentence about this touchy subject. Simply put, viewpoints on starvation mode depend on how a person defines "starvation mode" in the first place.
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Apart from the above, I agree with you on the rest of your post and I especially agree with the fact that we all need to find out what is right way of eating (WOE) for us individually.