1800-2000 Calorie Deficit too much?

[Raynoszs]

Howdy guys,

Now, I've been excercising and stuff for about a month (since I quit smoking)

At that time I was 82Kgs, I am now, 77.5Kgs with 25% BF (just got my aria scale today)

My main concern/question to all the gurus out there is, A 1800-2000 Cal deficit? Is it bad?

Heres the deal, I eat till I'm full, I monitor it on Fitbit App (every gram) and I've got the Fitibit Charge HR.

Here are some number for you:

Calories

Day        Eaten             Burnt                  Deficit

WED     1475               4182                  2707

THUR    1502               3812                  2310

FRI        1679               3449                  1770

SAT       1589               3639                   2050

SUN       1491              3304                   1813

Now, my main purpose is to lower body fat and get more toned. Ultimate weight of 70kg (which I think is healthy).

Am I doing it wrong, I do about 30minutes weight training and almost an hour of cardio each day. Some days it 20mins of HIIT followed by 20minutes cardio. Either way, I always have the energy to push myself whilst training.

So... If I don't feel hungry and am happy with my current progress... Is it ok to keep it as it is or will I hit some sort of wall and burn all my muscel?

BTW, I have at least 80g protein in my diet everyday (supplement by 2x Whey Shakes)

(P.S. Only had the Fitbit App, Charge HR for 5 Days)

Thanks for your input guys 🙂

[jogginjulie]

Eating less calories on a daily basis than your body requires just for living and breathing and doing an active physical job plus exercising is not good long term for anyone.  Listen to @Heybales.

[SunsetRunner]

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@jogginjulie wrote:

Eating less calories on a daily basis than your body requires just for living and breathing and doing an active physical job plus exercising is not good long term for anyone.  Listen to @Heybales.

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@jogginjulie

That is not what was said.

What was said was, to consume good nutrition with the calories you need at the weight you want.

I have been doing this for 35 years (as a near vegetarian), and was a competitive athlete until age

55 (road and cross-country, 16 to 18 min. 5 km. - depending on day and terrain), and still active as a

runner, never injured, and have a B.Sc. (with honors) and studied nutrition and quantitative analysis,

and am the C.E.O. and Chairman of a corporation specializing in evaluating healthcare expenses.

Listen to whoever you want.

[Raviv]

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@RivalDealer wrote:

Personally I feel like my body adjusted to the new low amount of calories being consumed and somehow manages to get by on much less, as if it has learned to be more thrifty.

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I noticed a similar thing with activity.  During my last job, I was literally walking 10-20 miles per day at a fast pace.  Basically my job involved driving out to a job site and then walking for 5 or 6 hours a day, all punctuated with episodes of running from dogs, throwing myself over block walls and climbing over piles of things.

After 6 years of doing that, it's what my body decided was my new "normal."  So now I have to be really careful and let my body come back to a regular person's version of "normal."  Our bodies are really good at conserving and, like you said, becoming "thrifty" with what we give them.

If you overtrain or undereat, your body will find a way to cope with it.  And not usually in a way that will make us happy in the long run.

[SunsetRunner]

@Raviv

No one should "under eat", but should eat at the level of weight you should be, plus exercise

calories (once you get to the weight you should be). In 35 yrs. it's been absolutely no problem.

Some "calorie restriction with optimal nutrition and exercise" will tend to improve longevity.

[Raviv]

And just to reply for other people, I do eat under the amount of calories I burn.  I just don't do it to excess.  I go for 750 calories below what I take in and I evaluate that number as well.

But you can increase cortisol (which can lead to health issues as well as weight gain) and cause problems over the long term with your metabolism if there is a very wide margin between the calories you take in and the calories you expend, mostly if you continue it over a longer period of time.

[Heybales]

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@Raynoszs wrote:

@Heybales

I dunno, my body feels happy getting 1/2 or less of what I burn...

My current BF is 25%

I've lost about 5kgs in 4 weeks (10lbs)

As far as energy levels, When I first started my fitness routine.

@Max speed I could run @ was about 6.2kmph - Now I can maintain 8kmph for my usual 30min run.

Max weight I could bench was 30kg, Which has now increased to 40kg (8rep*4)

Max weight I could curl was about 10kg per arm, which is now at 14kg per arm (8 reps*4)

Push-ups are much easier now, I used to barely manage 10, now I can hit 20, but stop at 15 to do more sets

My heart rate, resting is apparently 71-73bpm.

My work is outdoors, I'm out and about all day, I'm a phone tech, so I'm up the ladder, up poles, walking loops etc, So my days are pretty active...

I dont feel drained or lazy in the day time, if anything, these days I feel like I've got a boost of energy for my days. I do feel pretty wasted after my workout session (which is normal?)

I've only recently started the protein shakes to up my protein as per the 1gram per pound forumula (which is A LOT)

So yeah.. Should I force myself to eat more?? I mean, on my current diet, I am well and truely full, I have cut out refined sugars and sweets (ice cream, candy, kfc, takeways).

i guess I could add calories by adding junk back into my diet but that just doesn't seem right 😕

EDIT:

Oh and Ive checked the accuracy of my Fitbit Charge HR by comparing to a pulse oxymeter and the traidtional finger on wrist for 15 seconds. The Fitbit Charge is spoton, 1-2bpm range.

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Just keep strict watch then on your loss amounts.

If the math doesn't workout out over a couple weeks and is getting less and less despite same deficit - you are getting exactly what the video is talking about - metabolic efficiency.

The reference to HRM was not to the BPM - but rather the assumptions that are made to several key stats that it calculates so it can then estimate your calorie burn.

Of course the bpm is start to the potential accuracy - but it can still be way off for other reasons.

Can always test it.

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/774337/how-to-test-hrm-for-how-accurate-calorie-burn...

So what probably helps is your big daily burn is a large part of very low key fat-burning calories - so that helps.

As opposed to intense workouts causing that higher TDEE, burning more carbs, needing more recovery.

Also could be good genetic stock, already benefit from being male with better hormones.

But still keep an eye on it I'd suggest.

When it comes time to eat more, which I'm sure will come - redefine healthy eating perhaps to get more calories in.

For sustainable life changes, many go for 80/20 - 80% of calories nutrient rich foods, 20% what they want. 

[Heybales]

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@yarddog wrote:

@Raynoszs

The Youtube video provided by @Heybales is about a flawed and controversial experimental process,

using "shakes" to establish calorie intake (doesn't work, because there is no natural fibre) and providing

artificial "drug" injections of leptin (rest of your life presumably) is far from natural and not necessary.

---

You found out in the study details what the shakes are made of, and it's not natural fiber, but unnatural - like wood fiber? 

Well, that's natural actually.

I'm confused too as several others - what would having natural fiber have to do with the effect of shakes to control calorie intake, or nutrients?

Not aware of any nutrients that are effected in any meaningful way (more than 5%) by intake of fiber - usually the opposite actually happens, fiber sweeps out some before absorption.

And you didn't listen to the study details because you missed the point of the leptin and what was done regarding the injections and what was being said about it.

[Heybales]

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@yarddog wrote:

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@Bjorn wrote:

Hi @SunsetRunner,

I'm curious about some of what you wrote. Are you saying fibre is necessary for the body to utilize a calorie from what you've just consumed?

How does this apply to overweight/obese sedentary people who regularly drink sugary soft drinks from cans or franchises? They can gain so much weight from overconsumption of sugary drinks. Do these drinks have the fibre that qualifies caloric intake?

What is controversial or flawed about using a shake to establish calorie intake if one can gain so much weight from drinking sugary drinks (high calorie intake) and living very sedentary lives where they are not burning off any of what they've consumed? The test subjects received the calories they needed, and all the nutrients the study wanted them to have. This is something like what happens to people who are comatose and placed on an introvenus system, no? (I don't really know, I'm genuinely asking this. I'm not in the mood to google.)

Is the use of a multivitamin a taboo thing? Is it subject to controversial scrutiny?

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@Bjorn

Fibre is a natural constituent of natural foods, and (certain kinds) are necessary for the absorption

(removal) of excess cholesterol from your system. Fibre is also necessary to the proper functioning

and health of digestive system, promotes transit time, is preventive for many intestinal problems.

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Cholesteral is a part of all the cells in our bodies, hence the reason the body makes more than dietary intake would normally even provide.

So are you suggesting soluable fiber (since insoluable doesn't leave the gut) gets in the bloodstream, attaches to cholestrol, and then is brought back in to the gut for removal?

Or excess cholestrol was put in to the gut already, and the fiber gets it out - because it was going to stay in gut otherwise?

Ditto to positive gut working well though. And why some shakes even have fiber exactly made out of natural fiber.

[Heybales]

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@Raviv wrote:

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@RivalDealer wrote:

Personally I feel like my body adjusted to the new low amount of calories being consumed and somehow manages to get by on much less, as if it has learned to be more thrifty.

---

I noticed a similar thing with activity.  During my last job, I was literally walking 10-20 miles per day at a fast pace.  Basically my job involved driving out to a job site and then walking for 5 or 6 hours a day, all punctuated with episodes of running from dogs, throwing myself over block walls and climbing over piles of things.

After 6 years of doing that, it's what my body decided was my new "normal."  So now I have to be really careful and let my body come back to a regular person's version of "normal."  Our bodies are really good at conserving and, like you said, becoming "thrifty" with what we give them.

If you overtrain or undereat, your body will find a way to cope with it.  And not usually in a way that will make us happy in the long run.

---

Others studies that look at the adaptive thermogenesis effect are calling it metabolic efficiency now.

Thrifty is great term, implies not being cheap like me.

Because the effect was not just the resting or basal metabolism, but all day calorie burn, based on daily normal activity, even exercise more efficient, and even eating had the body obtain more calories from the food.

Outside of that effect though - don't worry about your daily activity - if the same weight your body likely got better at doing that daily regime, wasn't as much of a workout meaning not hard, but if same weight same calories burned at least.

[Heybales]

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@yarddog wrote:

@Raviv

No one should "under eat", but should eat at the level of weight you should be, plus exercise

calories (once you get to the weight you should be). In 35 yrs. it's been absolutely no problem.

Some "calorie restriction with optimal nutrition and exercise" will tend to improve longevity.

---

In general, if not a huge amount that needs to be lost - that's not a bad idea.

Prior to Fitbit and other activity trackers being around, I actually wrote a spreadsheet to assist doing exactly that by trying to nail a really good average TDEE figure.

Than apply future weight to it.

But if too much needs to be lost to healthy weight - you could get right back to an extreme deficit.

What many people don't like about it though that have a 10-40 lbs weight loss goal, is that the difference in TDEE calories between current and future weight aren't that great.

It's going to be a slow weight loss, especially at the end.

Coupled with not doing exercise that is really great at transforming the body in the first place, means all they see is slow scale changes, especially at the end.

Now, coupled with great resistance training body transforming workouts - it can work great.

[Raynoszs]

Dang, thanks everyone for all the great advice, Its a lot to take in..

So, today, I up'ed my calorie intake, as an experiment. I'll try and keep it up for the rest of the week and see how it goes?

Today I ate 2236 and burned 3834 so far. Well, its 11pm, so it'll probably only add another 50cal burned to the total.

Still at a deficit of 1598... Must say, All day I've been feeling full, almost uncomfortable at times.

I dunno, maybe the fitbit calorie burned charts are wrong? Maybe I'm not burning that many calories??

Surely, I'd feel hungry and want to eat like a pig if I was, yeah?

Plus, before making lifestyle changes, my previous diet that maintained 82kgs was as follows:

Chocolate Donut X2 for breakfast with Choc Milk

Candy bar morning snack

KFC or MCdonald large combo meal lunch

More candy bars

Half packet of biscuits with tea for afternoon tea time

No water in this diet, only Coke

Dinner would be takeaway, very very generous servings

Evening snack was usually a Magnum mini and Paddle Pop desert

+ 4 slices of bread and jam

Finally, about 40 cigarettes total since wake up - bed time.

No excercise except for my job

My current diet, which has been feeling much better has cut out all of these things. I only drink water and any snack I have is fruit or nuts.. So yeah.. Maybe my previous lifestyle was actually going through 3000+ calories a day, Just from work and stuff?

[sscarllet]

I don't know about the type of diet plan that your sticking to, but you do seem to be exersizing a whole lot.  Did you say 4 hours or so a day?  Is that all high impact, or are you including walks and things like that?  I'd be carful about doing more than 90 minutes or so of hard impact.  When you (people in general) start getting tired your form might not be as good and you could end up injuring yourself.  I've been down that road before myself and it put me out of the exersize game for months.  Therefore I stick to no more than 90 mintues of high impact and I'll take walks, do yoga or play with my Wii Fit or Just Dance if I want to keep going.  

[Raynoszs]

@sscarllet

lol 4 Hours a day would be killer 😛

High impact excercise is only about 60mins a day total.

However, my job is outdoors, I'm on my feet all day, climbing poles, ladders, walking loops etc (Telecommunications Tech). So, its about 8 hours of activity in a day (not high impact)

My Diet plan is fairly simple. Almost zero processed stuff, everything "natural" or shall I say, Organic (expect for my Caro and Gum)

Last night I had a magnum mini, felt so guilty.. lol but I was just trying to push my calories to 2300..

3 Times a week, I will go on a bike ride, nothing too exhausting, about 90minutes and 20kms on the bike.

Just a good cardio workout.

EDIT:

Just realized that my profile had many things set as private. I've unlocked it all now (hopefully) so everyone should be able to see my diet, calorie burned etc etc

[jogginjulie]

I wish I had a more active job....I'm stuck at a desk all day.

[Heybales]

Your body can easily be fooled in to not feeling hungry when you need food.

Couple weeks ago, I did 3 hr bike ride pretty intense, burned at least 3000 calories.

I had 600 cal lunch, and that was it before the ride. Nothing else all day. Rest day prior eating at maintenance, so I knew carb stores were topped off, which was whole point of rest day eating at maintenance.

Anyway, got done, and since I knew Sunday was rest day instead of another big workout, I knew I didn't need to do a fast post ride snack to start storing up carbs again. So I waited.

Took care of stats on ride, took shower, got distracted, and 2 hrs later still wasn't hungry.

Very tired though - gee, I wonder why.

I could have gone to sleep. Would have been interesting to see how my body recovered with nothing to do it with. But I have a brain smarter than my stomach, and knew I better eat if I wanted improvement from the workout.

So I did. And that actually got me hungry, even though I was about falling asleep eating it.

I would suggest increasing slowly in case your body has already adapted slower. Fitbit wouldn't be aware of that fact, and would still be reporting a calorie burn of what you could potentially burn, not what you body has slowed down to burn.

100 extra daily for a week at a time. Then another 100 for another week, ect.

And smart idea to see how many calories you likely maintained on prior.

You can pick a day in the past prior to using the Fitbit, and log an actual day with quanties just to see how many calories. And now exercise.

To lose fat, you only need to eat less than you burn my small reasonable amount.

To include muscle, make it unreasonable as you are doing.

If you were 350 lbs and burning 5000 daily, then 1500 would be reasonable. Neither is true now though.

It may take a bit, but usually when people start eating more with a reasonable deficit, their bodies speed up enough they actually get hungry.

[Booknerd88]

I stumbled accross this article this week that has made me revaluate my calorie deficit, I've been maintaining a 500 deficit through food restrition and 5 days a week of strength and cardio exercise and I haven't lost a pound in months.  I know its a women's site but the article applies to everyone.

https://www.girlsgonestrong.com/diet-damage-2/ 

"Initially, when there is the wrong kind of stress (or too much stress overall) on the metabolism, the body simply adapts to the new stress by down-regulating the metabolic rate. You see this time and time again when you start a new diet or increase your exercise and get results for a like a week, then nada. You’ve checked and double-checked My Fitness Pal, and it says you’re in a deficit. But with this down-regulation of your metabolism (that can happen very quickly) you simply aren’t burning as much as you think you are."

[Raynoszs]

@Heybales

True true, Well, This is now an on-going experiement for me, Slowly but surely, I'm increaseing my calorie intake.

Yesterday was a massive 2522 Calories! What a mission. (unfortunately calories burned was 4144)

I'm trying to increase my calories and I'll keep it up for the next 2 weeks and observe weight changes.

Currently, I think I've probably put on a little bit of weight (could just be water, hopefully).

I'll weight myself each day and track the results via weight/calories eaten.

I'll see how the gains/losses are and maybe I can nail down what my body actually needs and burns.

@Booknerd88

Thanks for the link to that article, its very interesting, a bit like the video @Heybales posted.

The human body is an amazing thing indeed.

Just feels so wrong having to eat 3000 Calories a day to lose weight

@SunsetRunner

I've also taken into consideration what you've said about eating for the weight I want to be (which makes sense to me) so I'll see how this little experiment of mine goes, if I noticed overall improvements with such a high calorie diet, it would seem my body is wired differently than I thought.

If I see negative effects, my next course of action would be to follow your advice 🙂

[Bjorn]

It would probably be wrong to eat 3000 calories to lose weight if you're
sedentary and only burning 2500. You're not sedentary though

[Heybales]

Since your big daily burn is from daily activity - your walking stride length and decent accuracy of steps comes in to play more than it would for mere mortals.

Now, if carrying extra weight around too, you likely are burning more than Fitbit is estimating, it doesn't know you weigh more then, it just thinks you may be walking longer stride but faster, so increased calorie burn given.

But is it the same as just carrying extra weight? Hmmmm......

I see an experiement in my future, or trying to find past workouts walking with weighted backpack - sadly I'm pretty sure I overwrote the calorie burn with manual workout entry. I'll have to see if last packbacking trip is good data still.

Are you commonly carrying around extra weight of 10lbs or more?

Other than that little caveat, it would also be confirming there are not extra steps seen from the type of work you do. You could have enough impact seen the device thinks you are taking normal steps and therefore giving normal calorie burn for walking a good clip - but you aren't.

You might pick a day where you recall some times doing something, and look at your activity graph per 5 min blocks, find the high step counts, and confirm they are correct for what you recall going on then.

And then since calorie burn is ultimately based on mass and pace, and pace is distance and time, the step stride length is important.

Have you ever done a treadmill just a tad faster than the serious pace you do at work (not exercise level pace), and confirmed the distance per Fitbit matches pretty close to treadmill?

Might be worth it.

Because there are reasons why your daily burn could be inflated.

For vast majority with average daily life, balance is obtained.

With your activity, it could be possible you are hitting the extremes to cause bad inflation with no balance.

This would effect ability to see what your goal weight would burn too.

Oh, to see what that eating level would be right now, if curious.

While looking at that daily graph, look at 5 min calorie burn while sleeping - divide by 5 - multiply by 1440.

That's your BMR they are using.

Take average daily burn per Fitbit / BMR = average daily METS, or activity factor.

Use this to get goal weight BMR - http://www.myfitnesspal.com/tools/bmr-calculator

Goal BMR x activity factor = future daily maintenance eating level

If your activity intensity stays the same. Where is that level at, just curious?

[Heybales]

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@Booknerd88 wrote:

I stumbled accross this article this week that has made me revaluate my calorie deficit, I've been maintaining a 500 deficit through food restrition and 5 days a week of strength and cardio exercise and I haven't lost a pound in months.  I know its a women's site but the article applies to everyone.

https://www.girlsgonestrong.com/diet-damage-2/ 

"Initially, when there is the wrong kind of stress (or too much stress overall) on the metabolism, the body simply adapts to the new stress by down-regulating the metabolic rate. You see this time and time again when you start a new diet or increase your exercise and get results for a like a week, then nada. You’ve checked and double-checked My Fitness Pal, and it says you’re in a deficit. But with this down-regulation of your metabolism (that can happen very quickly) you simply aren’t burning as much as you think you are."

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Good article.

Better language then this one.

http://strengthcoachtaylor.ca/uncategorized/blog-critique-the-law-of-thermodynamics-argument-is-bull...

And specific for women actually. Becuse you have more hormones to be messed with.

http://skepchick.org/2014/02/the-female-athlete-triad-not-as-fun-as-it-sounds/

And even body builders can get it. His program and method out is specific to them though and their timelines, not great idea otherwise.

http://www.t-nation.com/diet-fat-loss/truth-about-metabolic-damage

On almost any study looking at weight loss, when you read the details about participant selection, you'll find reference to fact they only want people with NO weight changes or attempts to lose in the last 6-12 months, or some range. Many will further comment it is because of exactly what we are talking about - it's accepted fact that it occurs.

Where the confusion comes in, is people tying the effects of actually starving to this "starvation mode" syndrome, which is different but has it's own effects. So many people throw out the baby with the bathwater.

Like the body doesn't start burning muscle to keep fat until actually starving for awhile.

You will lose mucsle if not careful of course because the body always breaks it down, and if not eating enough calories and/or protein and using the muscle, it just doesn't get rebuilt. Least used first gone.

But fat burning is not turned off for protection until well down the road of starving.

You can also keep eating less and less calories and eventually will start losing again.

But huge stress on the body at that point - so likely water weight gains from increased cortisol. That explains the "I only eat 1200 calories and gaining weight". Yep.

And the fact with too little calories, the repair from workouts will be about nil, so with little repair, the workouts become rather mediocre - so little progress. A body that has slowed down purposely isn't going to add improvements that require more energy to be expended in making and maintaining it.

And tryng to adhere to a diet eating so little, ugh. And maintenance so little, double ugh.

Good discusion - happens more than I think people realize, and depending on genetics and other life stress, possibly easier than they realize.

But, it's not an excuse to not verify logging accuracy of food eaten too. Though to wipe out a 1000-2000 cal deficit would be almost dishonest logging, not likely to happen.