The more i've been reading here, the more i've been surprised to find loads of people saying that they couldn't lose weight until they started eating more. or upping their calories is what got them off a plateau.
so how do you figure out how many calories you need to maximize your weight loss without sending your body into starvation mode? yes i know that it's individual to the person, size, and goal, but i feel like i've seen a wide variety of calories ranges thrown out there and am confused.

as background, i can only get to the gym max 3 times a week. right now, my workout routine is as follows:
on mon/wed i am doing 2 to 2 1/2 miles of intervals and then 2 to 2 1/2 mile tempo jog, for a total of somewhere 4 1/2 miles. with a 5-10 minute walk afterwards to cool down. i'm trying to work up to 5 miles jog. and then free weights for about 10-15 mins.
fri is my short gym day so i might do a slow warmup jog of 1/2 a mile to a mile to warm up, then try a faster mile (about 8:30), then walk for a while until i get antsy. (anywhere between 10 and 30 mins depending upon what time i'm supposed to go out that night). then maybe 10 mins on the free weights.
on other nights when i'm not going out (maybe 1-2 nights a week) i try and do situps, pushups, butt exercises in front of the tv for maybe an hour, but at a very leisurely pace. (i AM watching tv, after all.)

fitday recommended something like 1600 calories for the mon/wed type gym days. and 1250 for those non-gym days. i've been using this more as a guideline than a hard and fast calorie prison. so basically just keeping to a range between 1200 and 1800, trying to keep non-gym days at the lower end of that spectrum. does this seem reasonable? am i doing this right??

to find the right choice is actually just the work of "trying".
I think everyone does the same thing. That is using a website that they somewat trust, and find the calories that the website recommend as a guideline. (as for you is fitday, and 1250 - 1600 calories). They will keep going for that calories for a while (maybe a month to be more accurate) and see if they lose weight. If they do then it's a right choice, if they don't then they'll try to either lower or upper the calories abit (like, 100-200 calories). And just try with it until you find the right number.

And besides, as you keep losing weight, you'll need to find magic number again (few times) ^^ Hope you can find your # soon, good luck.

It takes me forever to figure out my correct calorie balance so that I lose weight but don't feel tired. Adding calories to heavy workout days is a great idea, and something I do. I'll usually eat my carbs right after the workout so that I get some energy back quick. Keep trying and adjusting, it's really the only thing that works!

That seems reasonable to me, but like others have said it will take experimentation to find the right balance.

I started out with a 1250-1350 calorie range and no exercise, then went to more accurate 1200-1300, then went up to 1300-1400, increasing here and there as I increased exercise. Lost at different rates at each combination, some pretty slow, some faster than I wanted. Was still losing up until I reached 1800 cals with exercise several days per week. Oddly, one week I increased to 2050 cals per day average with less exercise and starting losing again. It got very complicated!

I did learn that I really needed a food scale and had to weigh everything to make sure I was accurate on my calorie counts - I was eating a lot more than I thought at first.