[:::Dan!elle:::]

My daily goal is to not go over 1400, and usually it's right at 1200. Today I didn't even break 1000, that's with eating half of a brownie But I had a tuna sandwhich for lunch and that didn't even put me up to 300 calories. Is there such thing as too little calorie intake, without starving yourself?

[Kris2you]

I think there is. I mean I have always read that if you take in to little, you actually gain weight? Maybe Tonya or Teresa can answer better but if you go below 1200, it does hurt you more than it helps. I usually try to take in 1200 and sometimes it is harder than other days kwim?

[Babymakingprincess]

EAT MORE!!!!!!!! You want your metabolism all fired up to help you loose weight!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You MUST eat to loose weight!!!!
If you calculate your basal metabolic rate (BMR). You can find this information online by putting in your height, weight, age and activity level. Your BMR determines how many calories you need to eat a day to lose weight...
http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator/


Remember to re-calculate your BMR everyfew lbs. THe only thing about the BMR is, it doesn't take into consideration how muscular or not you are. You'll need about 100 more calories, plus or minus, depending on your body make-up

Once you calculate your BMR, you can use a really good website, sparkpeople.com to track them and figure out how many you're eating daily...

Hope this helps!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[TeresaSuperMama]

1000 calories is really on the low side. I would try and eat more as well. I usually aim for 1200-1500 calories a day, but honestly only loosely calorie count. For the most part I just try to eat 3 healthy meals a day and 2 to 3 snacks depending on my appetite for the day. I just looked at your food journal for yesterday and quickly saw the problem. Where is your breakfast girly? You have to eat breakfast and that was definitely too little food! Now, obviously people do lose weight when they starve themselves or their wouldn't be emaciated looking children in Africa, however, losing weight by eating too little calories you will slow down your metabolism and you will not have the calories to build muscle which will help reshape and define your body.

[:::Dan!elle:::]

Ok I looked at that site and it said that I need 1600 calories to lose weight, but I use calorie-count.com and it told me to be able to reach my goal date that I need no more than 1400. Yesterday was just...well a fluke? I didn't mean to not eat enough calories, I just didn't realize it until I entered in everything that night. If I'm hungry, I'll eat something. But I try to make it something with very few or no calories-carrots, banana, an apple, etc. I don't think I'm as hungry because I'm always full on water-I drink 100 ounces a day. I am also very hard on myself (or so DH says) and am desperate to lose this weight, so I feel guilty when I eat a snack.

[Babymakingprincess]

i'm hard on myself too- and was so desperate to lose weight. It's coming of fnow. It's really a numbers game... calories in, calories out.
If you're eating well, and excercising, it's come off- slowly but surely!!!!!!!!!

[TeresaSuperMama]

It's really hard not to want to just eat nothing so it comes off faster, but what you'll find is that it'll work for a short time, but then your metabolism slows down and even though you are eating very little you're losing at the same pace you would have eating healthy. That and if you're not eating enough calories it'll be harder to build up muscle which in the long term will help speed up your metabolism, help shape your body, and make yourself look and feel better all around. It's okay to have a bad day now and then where you don't eat as much, as long as that doesn't become your routine.

[TrainingWithTonya]

Okay, I will try to stay off my soap box as much as possible, but if I sound a bit preachy in this post, I apologize now. This is a hot button topic for me because as a trainer and nutritionist, I have to de-program people daily about eating too little.

Without your individual stats, I can't tell you how many calories you need to eat in order to lose weight, but I can say that unless you are 107 pounds of lean body mass (thats total body weight minus body fat) and completely sedentary 1400 calories isn't enough! I don't use most of the calorie counters online because they don't take into account activity level or lean body mass. According to the calorie counter posted, I only need 1650 calories per day, but when figured correctly as a good nutritionist would figure it based on my lean body mass and activity level, I actually need around 3000 calories per day. Major discrepency! My body would go into starvation mode if I were to only eat 1650 calories per day. That starvation mode line is different for everyone based on their individual body composition and what they do activity wise. In order to be accuate in your calorie determinations, you have to do your body composition. Your body fat percentage is NOT BMI. BMI (body mass index) is actually a ratio of height to weight and doesn't take into account muscle mass and fat mass. As muscle burns 35-50 calories per day, figuring your calorie needs has to include your muscle mass. There is a simple formula for figuring your calorie needs, but you have to get that percentage of fat first and convert it to pounds. I'll use myself as an example to help you figure it out. Just substitute your numbers in here and you might want a calculator.

194 pounds / 18% body fat
That means I'm 34.92 pounds of fat (194 x .18) and 159.08 pounds of lean body mass (194 - 34.92).

Take lean body mass (159.08) and multiply it by 24 (3817.92), then divide by 2.2 (1735.418182).

Next, multiply by your activity level: Sedentary 1.2, Lightly Active 1.5, Moderately Active 1.6, Extremely Active 1.7, or Athlete 1.8

Personally, I use the Moderately Active and the Athlete (because it depends on the day as to how much activity I do) to get a range, so I get between 2776 and 3124 calories per day.

The other way of doing it is to multiply by your activity level not counting exercise and then add in extra calories for the activity you do, but you have to know exactly how many calories you burn during those activities to get an accurate number and most people don't know that.

Those numbers are typically considered maintenance numbers (which is what I'm doing because I don't want to lose any of my muscle), but if you are wanting to cut some so that you burn fat faster, then you can subtract no more then 20% of those total calories. So for a weight loss plan for me, I would multiply my numbers (2776 and 3124) by .80 (80%) to get where I need to be for weight loss. That would be between 2221 and 2499 calories per day as my lowest possible amount of calories. That would give me a range of between 2221 and 3124 as to being within my calorie needs. That's too big of a range for me, personally, so I stick to the higher numbers and still lose body fat when I stick to it and my exercise.