So, I have recorded everything I've eaten in the last 45 days and my daily weight. I feel like that's enough of a sample size to see if the number of calories I am eating matches with the amount of weight I've lost.

Over 45 days, I have averaged a NET calorie intake of 1000/day. I checked the amount of calories I need to maintain my weight and it is about 1800. That's a reduction of 800 calories per day or 5600 per week. Divided by 3500, I get about 1.5 which is, in fact, the amount of weight I have averaged in loss over the last 45 days. (Throwing week 1 which was higher because of the initial loss of reducing food intake.)

Well, congrats, Annie, you are exactly average apparently. BUT, seriously?!? I have to NET 1000 calories per day to lose 1.5lbs a week??? Sigh...better keep running!

So, in maintenance, I will almost double my net calories? That sounds very triggering to me for rebound weight gain. I guess I'll cross that bridge when I get there, which at this rate will take 4 months for where I think I want to stop. Well, at least I'll get there. It does work, just slowly and requires a lot of running and an eagle eye on portions and calories. I'm 45 days in now so in another 45 days, I'll be 10lbs down. I can do that. I just did. I can do it again.

I haven't done the math, but I'm 1 inch shorter than you and that sounds about right to me. It sucks that us shorties have to eat so little to lose weight. I sigh to myself every time I read "OMG! You cannot possibly eat 1200 calories a day! That's too little!" because at 5ft tall 1200 calories a day is a reality.

I would love to be "running average" in that way. I have over a year's worth of data and whenever I do the math it shows that I have to make a larger deficit than the 3500/pound. Sometimes I find it unfair, probably in the same way emurph mentioned about the amount of calories needed for shorter heights. But it is what is it; we can only work with what we've got.

And, yes, you can do it! You've done wonderfully already. And surely just the fact that you're thinking about how to handle maintenance bodes well for your success once you get there.

Short people unite! I do 1200-1350 cals/day with very light exercise (3 x 20 min walks)At 1200 I lose 1.5-2 lbs/week. At 1350 I lose 1/2 a pound. Such a small window!

45 days is a good start. Still - you could easily be retaining water now, or when you started tracking. 3-4 lb swing wouldn't be out of the question at your size.

Lets take water out of the equation for a moment though. You say "net" deficit but a 1,000 kcal daily deficit would result in 2lb a week fat loss, not 1.5. The challenge?

It's exceedingly difficult to track one's daily burn. A large number of factors can confound these efforts. Tracking exercise calories burned is impossible outside of a lab, best you can do is estimate. Furthermore, what you maintain at can be radically different than what you would expect based on what you lose at. Just as an example - if you look at spa and neat (on the output side of the energy equation) they can be affected by the intake side both in amount and macronutrients.

Ultimately - all you can do is track intake and see what happens. Assuming your activity doesn't massively vary week to week I think it's a waste of time trying to calculate calories burned. I tracked religiously and wore a gowear fit for 90 days. I found for me the calculators of what you would expect were off to the tune of about 500 calories. But for maintaining I've found the calculators are fairly close to accurate. If you look at the studies from which these calorie caculators were created you'll see that the smaller and larger people have more deviation from the average and there are more outliers at the top and bottom too.

Long story short ...

There is a range you lose at - a range you maintain at - and a range you gain at. Track your intake, track your weight, and realize it's never going to be an exact science.

You don't have to eat so little you need to move more all day long.

emurph - YES! I think this is what I am realizing. I am a little person and the "rules" for everyone else don't apply to me. Oh well. I guess I'll just keep on keepin' on.

thistle - thanks!

Fluffy - YES! United! I'm glad there are some of you "shorties" on here with me that understand.

John - I know that it's hard to predict the exercise burn. It is definitely an inexact science which drives me crazy because I want numbers to be black and white! My average overall calories are about 1200/day. So, if we take out exercise, I have a deficit of about 600/day. And yes, 45 days is still a pretty small sample size so maybe there are other things going on. More gray in this thing that I'm trying to make black and white. I will say that I think my exercise calories are pretty close to accurate. I have read in a lot of places that running burns about 100 calories per 10 minutes and the machine and the couple websites I've referenced seem to echo that. But, who knows what it is for me since I am smaller. I usually record 95 calories/10 minutes. I don't record my lifting calories burned or any other calorie burns in a day that aren't specifically exercise - the "moving more" part. It's just too hard to quantify. I don't like eating calories back, but on the other hand I don't think it would be a good idea for me to actually consume only 1000 calories per day, every day - short or not.

Quilter - I do move a lot during the day, I just don't know how to record it. I'm reluctant to use a fit bit or body bugg because I hear all the time how inaccurate they are. I could exercise more to counteract the added calories, but then I have even more variation in trying to figure out how many calories I'm burning. I find that if I let my daily calories go up to 1400, my loss just about stalls out. I honestly think 1400 will be pretty close to maintenance level for me - or at least 1400 net with 1600 gross.

I'm not really wanting to change anything, just dealing with the reality of what trying to lose weight is at my height/weight. See you on the treadmill and the veggie line...lol

Rather than trying to figure out my "net" calories, I prefer to use the calorie calculators that already factor in activity level. Most of these calculators give me a maintenance figure of about 2,000 cals if I'm "moderately active." Which means that eating 1,500 cals and keeping up a moderate activity level will allow me to lose about one pound per week. My experience over 4 decades of yo-yo dieting has corroborated these figures.

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