OK, I've heard before that a total reduction of 3500 calories will allow you to lose 1 pound. I'm confused at how you can calculate whether or not you are doing this.

I presume that what it means is that you want your body to be burning off 3500 more calories than you are taking in. Well how can you possibly determine how many calories your body burns off in a week. Is it different for different people? I weigh a lot, so will I burn off more calories than the average person in a day? and by how much? If there's an easy way to calculate this, someone please let me know.

I read a recommendation of lowering your normal caloric intake by 500 calories per day. Well, what if your normal caloric intake before a diet was extremely high by most standards? Will lowering it by 1500 calories a day produce 3 times the effect? Obviously exercising plays a part as well, but I'm just wondering.

These sound like stupid questions when I reread them, but I honestly am trying to figure out how to lose as much weight as possible in a week without losing all of my muscle and keeping healthy. People say you can't lose more than 1-2 pounds of fat in a week. Is that absolutely true for everyone, or does it vary by "weight class."

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

The are not stupid questions. They are part of the science of diet understanding. Here is a link that might help: http://tms.ecol.net/fitness/calfax.htm

You need a 3500 calorie reduction to loose 1 pound of fat. This reduction is over the amount of calories that your body needs to function. This is why it is said that you will gererally lose about 2 lbs a week. The recomend reducing food and adding daily exercise for a weight loss regime.

But the futher you are from your bodies natural desired weight the faster you will lose. That is why the last 10 lbs seem so hard to lose.

You can lose a lot more water weight without a calorie reduction by sitting in a sauna. You can also lose a lot of muscle fast by restricting calories only and not exercising.

I hope this helps.

Hi BigJohn,
This is something I calculate every day for myself. Here's how I do it.

I start by periodically entering my info into this form: http://www.diettalk.com/forums/announcement.php?f=87&a=38 (well I use the girls' one)

This gives me a number to start with. For me it's around 2500 calories.

I can assume that on average, my body burns 2500 calories simply conducting its natural processes, exercise aside.

Then I add to that number, the number of calories I burned through exercise. I get this number from the calorie readout on my pedometer, which I wear every day. I usually burn between 700 and 1200 calories through exercise. Let's say I burned 800 today.

2500 + 800 = 3300 calories burned today.

Then I have to eat. I keep track of everything that goes in my mouth at www.fitday.com which is free. This tells me how many calories I have consumed each day. I measure with measuring spoons and a food scale, and rely on labels and the built-in nutritional info on the site. Let's say FitDay tells me that I consumed 1500 calories today.

3300 - 1500 = 1800 caloric deficit

My caloric deficit is the difference between what I burned and what I consumed. In this example, I have a caloric deficit equal to 1800 calories, or 0.51 lbs. That means that in two days like this, I will have burned one pound of body fat.

Everyone's body is different, and some people burn fewer or more calories than these devices tell us, but it is a good GENERAL estimate.

By the way this is just an example used for demonstrative purposes, I'm not recommending a particular intake to anyone.

Hope this helps,
Nausicaa.

Well put Nausicaa :)

Thank you very much Nausicaa, this will be very helpful.

I am a tad confused.....

Ok so my Calorie Calculator for Females comes out to 2388 and like you - just using these other numbers as examples.

So just "living" I use 2500 a day and say I through exercise burn off 800 additional calories and I consume 1,500 calories via intake.

What happens to the first number tally in the Calorie Calculator for Females?

it was 2388 and
I ate 1,500 calories
then living calories and exercise calories = 3,300
so my total would be? + 588??????

I took the total of 2388 and 1500 and added them together and then minuses the 3300 and came out to a positive + of 588 - is this right?
If so that means I did not burn any calories off and stored 588 calories instead - right? :shrug:

Hi Beth,

I'll keep the numbers the same as the Calorie Counter gave you to avoid confusion: You add 800 to the 2388 in your example, which is 3,188 BURNED. Then you subtract 1500 that you ate from 3188, which is 1,688 calories burned MORE than you consumed.

Just divide 1,688 by 3,500 and you find out the fraction of a pound burned: 0.48 in this example, or almost exactly half a pound!

Make sure you add the Calorie Calculator calories to the Exercise calories, and then subtract the Food calories. Then divide by 3500 for the decimal value (0.25, 0.48, or whatever) that tells you how much of a pound is gone in a day.

Got it ! Thanks a bunch :D

Geez this post totally confuses me... I think Nausicaa explained it extremely well....I use Fitday PC which is an awesome tool and I always set my metabolism as sedentary..(where it asks you how many hours you sleep, are standing etc.. sitting activities etc).which gives me a lower caloric allowance per day but then it works better for me as I do not gain if I stay within the boundaries and exercise some then I lose :)I am a tad confused.....

Ok so my Calorie Calculator for Females comes out to 2388 and like you - just using these other numbers as examples.

So just "living" I use 2500 a day and say I through exercise burn off 800 additional calories and I consume 1,500 calories via intake.

What happens to the first number tally in the Calorie Calculator for Females?

it was 2388 and
I ate 1,500 calories
then living calories and exercise calories = 3,300
so my total would be? + 588??????

I took the total of 2388 and 1500 and added them together and then minuses the 3300 and came out to a positive + of 588 - is this right?
If so that means I did not burn any calories off and stored 588 calories instead - right? :shrug:

It's really hard to tell if you are making these calculations correctly as there are so many individual variables. Fitday PC or other nutritional software or calorie counters online are only as good as the data put into them, but they are a good starting point if used correctly.

The 500 cal reduction a day idea does NOT mean reducing from where you are now, it is, as nausica posted, a reduction of 500 from what you burn just living. Most people overestimate how much they are burning. Exercise helps but to be safe, it's good, like Lulu, to consider yourself sedentary (although on WW, I do use the activity points I earn through exercise, but I'm not looking to lose weight quickly).

A quick rule of thumb that's been used for decades is that for weight loss, assuming you have a healthy metabolism that's not shot by repeated dieting (as I tend to have), is to multiply your desired weight goal by 10 if you are sedentary, 15 if moderately active and 20 or more if extremely active. This gives you a quick idea of how many cals to eat a day to produce a goal and it's very accurate. For instance, if you want to reach a goal weight of 150 and are sedentary, eat 1500 cals per day to reach that.

The flip side of all this is if you cut cals too much and/or exercise too much, weight loss will slow because of a lot of complex metabolic issues that have to do with survival mechanisms kicking in causing plateaus and other nasty things.

And yes the rate of weight loss does vary because of weight class and other individual factors. There's no particular virtue for every individual in only losing 1-2 pounds a week, that's just a safe average. Some people really should be able to lose more than that especially in the beginning stages of a diet ... but health and safety should always be the primary goal of weight loss and more than 1-2 pounds a week should only be a goal for some individuals and all this should be supervised by a health professional. :)

All of the above is my opinion only, based on looooooonnnng years of losing weight! Huzzah! Have a great day everyone!

I use this website:

http://www.dietitian.com/ibw/ibw.html

You enter in all your specific information, and it gives you quite a bit of information on your daily calorie needs and you can have it recalculate based on your weight loss goal (e.g., lose 1 pound per week versus lose 2 pounds per week).

Thanks for the website jezebel - has lots of info

I read about an interesting take on calorie intake today. It suggested varying your calories, up and down, by a few hundred on a daily or weekly basis so your metabolism doesn't plateau and it's constantly trying to adjust to your eating habits.

Bigjohn, this is the concept behind some diets that have you eating a lot one day, very little the next, and so on. If you vary your calories by, as you say, a few hundred per week, you are unlikely to have any problems (although it may not be enough to prevent the plateau you mention). On the other hand, if you follow one of the diets that bases itself on this concept, it's important to add up your calories for the week as a whole and divide by 7, and make sure that it is STILL at the correct amount for losing weight. Just eating 400 calories one day and 3000 calories the next is not going to make you lose weight (sounds obvious and yet I have seen people try to do this).

Although there may be something to the varied calorie intake thing, it's probably not a bad idea to make sure that you are getting the nutrition you need every day (i.e., not starving yourself) and never overeating junk (you could think of it as: if you have a higher calorie day, you should be eating more lean protein or vegetables for example).

The idea that the metabolism plateaus is the idea behind the so-called starvation mode. This doesn't usually happen right away. For example I lost weight for 90 days without plateauing eating very low calorie and having 1 day every 2 weeks where I had one larger meal (but still under 1800 calories per day). It allowed me to have a social life that approached normal. But anyway, plateauing is a personal thing, it depends on your body.

I plateaued constantly on the low-carb diet, for example, for months at a time. Whereas a "plateau" on low-calorie for me is 4-5 days.

Just personal experience, as always.

jezebel, i entered my stats at that site and it's telling me to eat 3,700 calories per day to lose 2 lbs per week. I don't get it....

BigJohn - there is an inactive DT member that lost almost 200 lbs doing that calorie thing you posted about.

She ate around 1500 - 1600 for 2 days and then the 3rd day ate about 1,000 - 1,200 and then 4th day 1500 - 1600 again and so on.

Now don't get me wrong she also exercised like 2 hr or more a day and drank about 3 liters of water, but she "swore" by that up and down calorie plan.

jezebel, i entered my stats at that site and it's telling me to eat 3,700 calories per day to lose 2 lbs per week. I don't get it....

Hmm, I just tried entering a few different activity levels, and it seems to be having a higher effect on calories if I add more hours of moderate & heavy exercise.

I think her definitions of moderate & heavy exercise are probably not what we think of as moderate & heavy, she should probably define them a little more clearly. Perhaps if you assume "Moderate" is more like "vigorous" (jogging, aerobics, or walking uphill with load) and that "Heavy" is more like running marathon, sprinting, super heavy weights, mountain climbing etc., then it will give less inflated calories?

I didn't encounter this problem because I only have one hour of heavy exercise a day, the rest is light activity (chores, walking dogs, etc for 4 hours), or sedentary (work & commuting for 11 hours, sleep for 8 hours). I think her website is probably geared toward less active people like myself (e.g., typical american).

I used the website recomended. This is what I got. I was told to eat about 2300 a day to lose 2 lbs a week. Which is what I try to do now.


Below are my results.

Your Data
Measure: US
Age: 28 years
Gender: Female
Height: 5' 9"
Weight: 240 pounds
Pregnant: No
Breast feeding: No
Activity level:
(hours/day) 6 hours - Sleep
15 hours - Very Light / Sedentary
2 hours - Light
1 hours - Moderate
0 hours - Heavy

Calorie distribution: Fat 30 percent
Protein 10 percent
Carbohydrate 60 percent

Weight goal: Lose 2 pounds per week
Elbow breadth: 2 3/8 inches
Waist circumference: 50 inches
Hip circumference: 42 inches


Healthy Body Weight Range: 131- 160





Healthy body weight range is: 131 to 160 pounds
You are at an unhealthy weight


Explanation
This is a healthy weight for you based on your height, gender and pregnancy status.
The weight range does not consider your level of fitness. If you are an athlete, your weight goal based on your percent body fat would be a better indicator of what you should weigh.


You have a medium frame size for your height

Explanation
Your skeletal frame size is most easily measured where there is little overlying skin and muscle, such as at your wrist or elbow. The elbow breadth could be more accurately measured by placing a calipher (a pliers-like instrument used to measure thickness), on the prominent bones on either side of your elbow.
Persons with a small frame should weigh closer to the lighter end of their healthy body weight range.
Persons with a medium frame should weigh toward the middle of their healthy body weight range.
Persons with a large frame should weigh closer to the heavier end of their healthy body weight range.

Body Mass Index: 30
Explanation
Body Mass Index calculates how much body fat you have.
Lean BMI means you have a low amount of body fat. If you are an athlete, this can be desirable. If you are not an athlete, a lean BMI can indicate that your weight may be too low which may lower your immunity. If your BMI and body weight are low, you should consider gaining weight by eating more food and exercising to increase your amount of muscle.
Healthy BMI means you have a healthy amount of body fat for your age.
Overfat means your amount of body fat is too high which puts you at risk for heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, gall bladder disease and some cancers. You should consider losing weight by eating less food and exercising to decrease your amount of body fat.
If you are a trained athlete, your weight based on your measured percent body fat would be a better indicator of what you should weigh. If you entered a current percent body fat that is lean, you will not get a BMI calculation.

Waist to Hip Ratio

Ratio: 1.19 - Apple shape: increased health risk

Explanation
This tells you where most of your body fat is located.
Apple shape (a ratio of .80 or greater) means your body fat is located above your waist which indicates a higher health risk for diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and some cancers.
Pear shape (a ratio of less than .80) means your body fat is located below your waist which indicates a lower health risk, but fat located in the lower half of the body may be harder to lose during weight loss.

Your Nutrition Facts

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Calorie Daily Value 2,300 Calories from Fat 690
Total Fat 77 g
Saturated Fat 25 g
Cholesterol 300 mg
Sodium 2,400 mg
Potassium 3,500 mg
Total Carbohydrate 345 g
Dietary Fiber 25 g
Sugars 57 g
Protein 57 g

LoL, the calorie website said the amount of protein I got today was an unreasonably high percentage of my protein, fat, and carb percentages and told me to recalculate. Not my fault I ate salmon twice today.

Jezebel I think you are right, well, I was thinking I do get heavy exercise, since I do all-day hiking in really difficult terrain at least once a week and I re-started my heavy lifting at the gym (well, heavy for me... I'm a girl)... but you are probably right that I should put that down as Moderate.