I think I'm doing it wrong. Example:

Today I woke up and had the second half of my salad from the other day. 220 calories. Then I had 1 cup of pasta salad, which was 300 calories.

Then I exercised, and burned 200 calories, which put me at 320.

Now, in my mind, since I just burned 200 calories off, I'm back at 320, and still have 1157 calories left for the day before I reach my mark of 1477. Is that wrong? Should what I burn not even play a part in what I eat?

After I burned the 200 off, I had half a sandwich which came into about 120 calories, and then later on, dinner, which was a hamburger, plus bun and pickles.

I don't subtract what I burn from my daily calories.

For me, if I have planned to eat 1500 calories, I eat 1500 calories no matter what exercise I do.

Yeah, what Onederchic said.

Exercise is great. Exercise is essential. But your calorie count stays the same for the day whether you exercise or not.

Definitely do not take the deficit of a workout and calculate it in to your caloric intake. You are going to confuse yourself for sure! Set your calorie limit and write down everything you eat. you shouldn't necessarily eat less if you don't exercise for the day (my opinion only).

So if it's, say, 3PM and I've eaten 300 calories, and went and exercised and burned off 200, it doesn't matter? Sorry, my idea seemed to make sense to me since people kept telling me, "it's 3pm and all you've eaten is is 300calories? You're starving yourself, blah, blah," even after I explained that I still had dinner to eat, and a night time snack.

Calorie burn calcs are less precise than food calcs. You are are actually burning calories just breathing, so at what point do you count all movement including purposeful exercise? I think it your food calories should be a known count and then see how exercise helps with weight loss overall. I would not use calorie burn calcs at all unless you are an athlete who is trying to eat enough to keep up your energy.

But it is important that you do what makes sense to you and what is sustainable. Wishing you the best.

When you eat your calories doesn't really matter, though it is unhealthy to starve all day and then eat 1200 calories of pizza at night--your calories do need to be healthy, whenever you eat them.

But no, I don't eat back my exercise calories: I'd rather my body burn that much more fat. The only exception I can think of is that if you increase your overall exercise program (like go from 3 days a week to 6 days a week, or add weight training) you may want to up your calories--and protein--a bit to compensate just because you will suddenly be starving.

Thanks for setting me straight everybody. Maybe that's why the scale hasn't budged in a couple days! lol.

You will drive yourself crazy trying to figure out "patterns" of only 2-3 days. The contents of your intestines will shift that around! You've gotta look at a rolling 2 week average to see what's actually happening.

Seriously, wondering why you haven't lost weight in 48 hours is like trying to figure out what it "means" that a guy answered the phone after 3 rings this time and 4 rings last time. It's meaningless data that will drive you crazy.

I weigh every day. I only record every 2 weeks. I don't see a problem with it. It really isn't "driving me crazy" it's just something that I like to do. It's feels good to be able to not be afraid of the scale.

That's good for those who can do it, for me though the scale became an obsession and I drove myself bonkers with it so I no longer use it as a tool. I do weigh but very rarely and very randomly and I am much better off, but again, I am just speaking for myself

I don't eat back my exercise calories. However, on days that I workout I do drink my 130 calorie protein shake.

I weight everyday, too. I much prefer it. But shifts of a pound or two over 48 hours don't mean anything. If you change what you are doing after 2 days because you haven't lost any weight, you are as likely to change something that is working as you are to change something that isn't. A two day pattern, all by itself, isn't reason enough to make changes.