Calorie goals?

[The_L1985]

I'm a bit troubled by the calorie goal my FitBit is giving me. I need to lose about 30 lb, but when I picked the 2nd option, it's saying I should eat no more than 1189 calories/day--which is below the "starvation limit" of 1200 cal/day. I shudder to think what the "hard" and "very hard" options must have said! What do you do when your recommended calories via FitBit are TOO low?

[SunsetRunner]

---

@The_L1985 wrote:
I'm a bit troubled by the calorie goal my FitBit is giving me. I need to lose about 30 lb, but when I pickedthe2nd option, it's saying I should eat no more than 1189 calories/day--which is below the "starvation limit" of 1200 cal/day. I shudder to think what the "hard" and "very hard" options must have said! What do you do when your recommended calories via FitBit are TOO low?

---

How tall are you? Male or Female? How much do you weigh now? What is your diet, generally?

Knowing the above, will enable someone to provide help.

[Raviv]

Also, are you active at all?

As your activity increases, so will the allowed calories.  I'm a 5'6" woman that currently weighs 187 (should be around 145) and my goal as far as calories can vary anywhere from 1100 to a little over 1400 calories.  I have my plan intensity set to "Kinda hard," which is 750 calories below my calories burned.

[SunsetRunner]

---

@Raviv wrote:

Also, are you active at all?

As your activity increases, so will the allowed calories.  I'm a 5'6" woman that currently weighs 187 (should be around 145) and my goal as far as calories can vary anywhere from 1100 to a little over 1400 calories.  I have my plan intensity set to "Kinda hard," which is 750 calories below my calories burned.

---

The physiological formula for females is 3.5 x height (in inches) less 108.

That works out to 123 lb. (at 10% to 20% body fat) and 1,295 calories for that weight.

This is the level of calories that you should eat, plus some for exercise (if you want).

Calories s/b complex carbohydrates (grains, vegetables, fruit) and a bit of meat.

[Raviv]

Thanks, but I'm doing fine.  Don't need Pritikin advice.  We've already had a discussion about nutrition, and we don't agree.  So...

[Raviv]

Stop!

"My way" has lost me 9 pounds in 3 weeks, despite damage to neck/spine and my metabolism being messed up from over-exercise (aka: "work"), so back off!

You are totally overstepping your bounds and need to learn to leave people alone that don't want your advice.  Namely me.

[SunsetRunner]

---

@Raviv wrote:

Stop!

"My way" has lost me 9 pounds in 3 weeks, despite damage to neck/spine and my metabolism being messed up from over-exercise (aka: "work"), so back off!

You are totally overstepping your bounds and need to learn to leave people alone that don't want your advice.  Namely me.

---

@Raviv

Yes, I will try to remember not to respond to you.

Perhaps you could reciprocate by not jumping into my responses/conversations.

[Raviv]

---

@yarddog wrote:

@Raviv

Yes, I will try to remember not to respond to you.

Perhaps you could reciprocate by not jumping into my responses/conversations.

---

You do not own any conversations.  I am free to reply as much as anyone else, so I will solve the problem by blocking.

Have a wonderful day.

[SunsetRunner]

---

@The_L1985 wrote:
I'm a bit troubled by the calorie goal my FitBit is giving me. I need to lose about 30 lb, but when I picked the 2nd option, it's saying I should eat no more than 1189 calories/day--which is below the "starvation limit" of 1200 cal/day. I shudder to think what the "hard" and "very hard" options must have said! What do you do when your recommended calories via FitBit are TOO low?

---

I have been thinking about this a lot too. I have my intensity at "very hard" which is a 1000 calorie deficit. On my day off if I am completely sedentary it'll say I should eat only 900 calories... this scares me! I'm a 167 lb female and 5'4", lightly active according to Fitbit premium. 

I am interested in knowing what @Heybales would say about this. 

[Heybales]

---

@The_L1985 wrote:
I'm a bit troubled by the calorie goal my FitBit is giving me. I need to lose about 30 lb, but when I picked the 2nd option, it's saying I should eat no more than 1189 calories/day--which is below the "starvation limit" of 1200 cal/day. I shudder to think what the "hard" and "very hard" options must have said! What do you do when your recommended calories via FitBit are TOO low?

---

So by end of day only burning 1689 calories, about.

So either short and/or not that active - or it's near the start of the day.

If you are shorter, then sadly weight loss is going to be a bummer.

You have smaller calorie range, less margin for error, more margin for body being stressed, ect.

Like, the block calorie deficit method means a bigger deficit % when you just plain burn less calories daily.

Like for you, 20% deficit, which might be better, would be 337 deficit, right between 250 and 500 basically.

So you could just stay at 500 in the settings, and try to go over eating goal by an even 150 calories daily.

But if you have less than 20lbs to lose already - I'd suggest just go to 250 cal deficit goal, because even 20% could be pushing your luck on getting stressed out body.

While 1200 is the recommended minimum for average (height/weight) sedentary woman to get all her minimum nutrients in with average diet, you may be less than average.

Then again - I always recommend don't do bare minimum anyway. And if not sedentary it doesn't apply either.

I recall a couple case studies where they could indeed get all their nutrients in with only 800 calories. But instead of vitamin or mineral deficiency - they had negative side effects of calorie deficiency.

(I say negative, because for most people, being forced to eat a smaller amount than possible is not a good road to long success or happiness with enjoying food)

Then again, I'm sure we all know people that overeat to huge amount - and because of their choice of foods are vitamin or mineral deficient - though obviously not caloric deficient.

So basically, eat more than goal by 160 calories, or better yet, set goal to 250 cal deficit.

Or notice if it goes up by the end of the day as your actual calorie burn becomes known.

[Heybales]

---

@Emchuw wrote:

I have been thinking about this a lot too. I have my intensity at "very hard" which is a 1000 calorie deficit. On my day off if I am completely sedentary it'll say I should eat only 900 calories... this scares me! I'm a 167 lb female and 5'4", lightly active according to Fitbit premium. 

I am interested in knowing what @Heybales would say about this. 

---

I'd suggest that if non-exercise days are that low - 1000 probably isn't reasonable deficit anymore.

With around maybe 40 lbs to lose perhaps, 500 would be more reasonable now.

That would give you 1400 then.

26% deficit on non-exercise days = 1 - (1400/1900)

20% deficit on big exercise days burning say 600 = 1 - (2500/2000)

Other days being between.

Would want 250 cal deficit at about 15 lbs left, maybe 10 lbs if you keep an active high daily burn.

[DharmaGirl5]

I've read you shouldn't go below your basal metabolic rate which you can calculate here:

http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator

Mine is 1478.

[LCHFmom]

If you are interested, I would suggest reaching out to your physician or your local gym to see if either of them have a body composition analyser.  I am familiar with the Inbody series. Sadly, I cannot use the formulas that can be found online, as they calculate my metabolic rate wrong - by a LOT. 

If you are concerned about achieving your best, I would suggest / recommend you obtaining what YOUR rate is , rather than using a generalized formula.   Granted, I am merely one example - But look at the terrbile gap in my rate below.   Hundreds of calories off.... 

http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator/#result   - 1560

InBody device at Dr office -- 1130   

Just a thought ..... 

[Heybales]

---

@LCHFmom wrote:

If you are interested, I would suggest reaching out to your physician or your local gym to see if either of them have a body composition analyser.  I am familiar with the Inbody series. Sadly, I cannot use the formulas that can be found online, as they calculate my metabolic rate wrong - by a LOT. 

If you are concerned about achieving your best, I would suggest / recommend you obtaining what YOUR rate is , rather than using a generalized formula.   Granted, I am merely one example - But look at the terrbile gap in my rate below.   Hundreds of calories off.... 

http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator/#result   - 1560

InBody device at Dr office -- 1130   

Just a thought ..... 

---

I'll just mention one caveat to getting a bodyfat % estimate. Not familiar with potential accuracy of that one compared to DEXA or Bodpod or hydrostatic. Usually easier and cheaper means less accuracy.

But it is better than just getting an RMR test done only. I think much more useful.

If you don't get a decent BF% test also, you'll never know if the RMR is actually correct for the amount of LBM you have.

It may appear low compared to others your gender, age, weight, height - but it's actually at expected range when based on BF%, because for some reason you have less LBM than average. Which could be the result of many yo-yo diets in the past.

The other big problem with an RMR only test can actually make the situation worse.

By your own eating levels, you can cause your RMR to go down, to be suppressed, to be smaller than it needs to be.

So then if you do the test and get a low figure, what you do with it matters.

If you assume you have a massively lower RMR compared to healthy at a given LBM, and you base diet on it - then you could keep making a situation worse by chasing it in to the ground always eating less and less or exercising more and more to compensate.

If you use it to decide that you need to get a healthy body back and get the burn back up, prior to taking a reasonable diet next time - then you can make the situation better.

What's nice with having a BF% and LBM figures instead, and a corresponding BMR to go along with it - you can tweak your height on Fitbit so it's using the same BMR, instead of based on age, weight, height, gender.

Here's formula if curious.

height=

gender male : (BMR-5-(10*CW)+(5*age))/6.25

gender female : (BMR+161-(10*CW)+(5*age))/6.25

BMR = BF% estimate BMR

CW = Current Weight in kg

height = centimeters (divide by 2.54 for inches, do the math for feet and inches to enter on Fitbit)

[jwm1]

I am also tracking calories for weight loss, but I keep finding errors in the food/caloric table. I double check a lot of items. For example, last night I had a Wendy's Apple-pecan chicken salad and I checked the count on the Fitbit table vs Wendy's and the error was significant. THE Fitbit table was under by 200. Doesn't help to track calories if they bad numbers. I sent email with my concerns but only got back the token - thank you for sharing.

Seems to me, that it would be very helpful to have an area where the errors could be reported, and the calorie tables fixed.  People that are using this function need accurate numbers. If users are willing to help debug the errors, wouldn't you think the programmers would be glad of the help.  None of the errors I reported in my email have been fixed.

Caution all you calorie counters.

[iMike]

I think that's "net calories," meaning that's what you end up with after you subtract the calories burned against the total consumed.  That's how it was explained to me.

[Raviv]

---

@jwm1 wrote:

I am also tracking calories for weight loss, but I keep finding errors in the food/caloric table. I double check a lot of items. For example, last night I had a Wendy's Apple-pecan chicken salad and I checked the count on the Fitbit table vs Wendy's and the error was significant. THE Fitbit table was under by 200.

---

You're going to find that with any calorie database that relies on public contributors.  My Fitness Pal has the same issue, which is why you want to double check anything before you enter it.

Another thought.  Wendy's has 2 different sizes of their salads - full and half - so maybe it's possible that they were talking about the half order (like I usually get) instead of the full size, and just didn't mention "half" in the name of the food.