You Asked: ''How Do I Create a Calorie Deficit or Burn More Calories Than I Eat?''

What activities could I start doing I dance sometimes I just started dancing but I need to do something else Report

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One of my goals this year is to keep it SIMPLE, I like this article because it's clear what to do. Yet, the body is complicated so the result will not be as linear as the math equations above. Got it! Report

wow! another inspirational story Report

Thanks, this helps me to understand. Report

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Simple, great advice Report

Thank you. Report

"one pound of fat is made up of roughly 3,500 extra calories"

This is sort of misleading in that it suggests that we lose fat when we diet. We actually lose glycogen and water before we lose fat. It's only when we hit the "weight loss plateau" when our bodies have depleted our glycogen reserves. Report

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I think I am only going to actually lose weight if I feel hungry most of the time. Maybe this is just craving, but that's what it feels like. I know that I am eating plenty not to starve to death, but I often just feel like eating, so comfort eating, really. And then the weight creeps up, or stays static. Only feeling a bit hungry loses weight for me
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I didn't know much about weight until I weighed 350 pound's at 5'9, I really didn't know what was wrong with me,...then I went on the Atkin's Diet, and had seen it worked on other people, but didn't really know if it was right for me, still I proceeded to try it and fortunately it worked, yet I didn't know that diet's were personal lifestyle's...until just recently I was researching blood type's, and that you had to get tested to know your blood type, so I got tested and my result's were Blood type O+, meaning I'm a Hunter type and should eat red meat's, before I would just eat fast food with red meat, but now this diet is telling me I should eat only red meat and certain fruit's and vegetables, sound's fair to me, I quit eating dairy, eggs, potatoes, wheat, grain's, lenti's, which most have lectin's which can damage your stomach lining after time, and I quit smoking, so that's been a big achievement for me so far. Report

I resorted to weight loss surgery in a desperate attempt to lose weight because it seemed no matter what I did, I just couldn't lose. In 2011, I got the surgery, and over the course of the next 4 years (and 5 more surgeries from complications!) I only lost 31 pounds. I started to discuss with the surgeon a different surgery as I was not satisfied with the results of this one. Being both naive and ignorant, I assumed that because I'm fat, I must eat too much. (In reality, I gained the weight from medication.) I thought maybe the gastric bypass would be better, having assumed that that surgery was more about malabsorption. Turns out, with every bariatric surgery, the main goal is food restriction (eating less). I assumed the surgery, exercise, and eating as little as possible was the answer. So when the surgeon asked incredulously that I wasn't having any restriction with my chosen surgery, I told him that, in fact, I was having just fine restriction. But I still thought the less food, the better. Anyway, so the surgeon asked how I was eating, and I said, "Once, maybe twice a day, if that..." He was shocked, and said that I needed to talk to the dietician, and that I should be eating SOMEthing every 2-3 hours. Now, I rarely get hungry. It wasn't uncommon for me to go a day or two forgetting to eat, just because I wasn't hungry. Starting to eat every 2-3 hours was really hard for me. 99% of the time I'm force-feeding myself. But the surgeon and the dietician said, even if it's just half of a cheese stick or a bite of yogurt, ingest SOME healthy source of calories every 2-3 hours to keep your metabolism going. Seems really super-de-duper counter-intuitive, but I decided to give it a try. One year of eating every 2-3 hours (not even counting calories, btw) and exercising as I had been (walking 2-3 miles a day at 4mph, or biking 8-10 miles a day) and I've lost an additional 49 pounds! Imagine the weight loss had I done that from the very beginning of the surgery in 2011. Or better yet, not had the surgery at all and just started eating smaller, more frequent meals/snacks. Report

I find that creating a cal deficit diet does not really work to well for me because I was suggested to eat between 1,200-1,500 cals here on sparkpeople. But was suggested to eat no less then 1500 by another health & fitness guy.

I personally think that creating a cal deficit diet is the worse thing to do to your body specially if you want to lose weight. I personally find for me if I dont worry bout cals and just eat healthy and work out at lest once a day for at lest 20-30mins I lose weight.

If I eat the suggest cals 1,200-1,500 and work out for 20-30 mins a day I feel sick. at worse I gain weight if I stick to the suggested cal in take here and at best I just stay the same weight.

So it really depends on the person and how their body responds. My body went into Starvation Mode when creating a small 500 cal deficit in my diet. Report

DGT812 - How satisfied are you from your 1600/day in/2400/day out regimen? Seems to me you'd spend a lot of time hungry (or even "hangry"). Report

i eat approx 1600 calories per day. i burn approx 2400 calories per day. that is a 800 calories deficit x 4-1/2 days is 3500 calories which equals 1 pound of weight loss. Report

One thing I have noticed recently is that when I was cutting calories and did not reach my BMR requirement I did not lose weight. Once I focused on getting at least the lower end of the BMR requirements I noticed weight loss again. I think the body goes into "starvation mode" when you do not eat enough. Report

Note the last paragraph also - for many of us, the equation is oversimplified. I'm consistently in a calorie deficit (as measured by my SP food tracker and my BodyMedia activity tracker) but I don't consistently lose weight. Somewhere, there's more to it. Report

Lifestylewitch, your nutrition tracker does increase your calories when you exercise, to keep you in the right calorie range to lose a bit of weight each week. However, you can change this option by going to your Start Page, then to Account/Email Preferences. I have mine set to stay the same no matter how much exercise I do. It works better for me. I (try to) eat to lose weight, and exercise on top of that to hopefully lose a little extra! For a moderate exerciser like me this works well; however, if you are tended to go all-out with exercise and burn hundreds of calories a day through exercise, then you probably should keep your tracker the way it is.
Hope this helps! Report

FL2Piece, my comment wasn't aimed at you. I see 1200 calories suggested for women all the time, as if it's the norm. If a person is sedentary, and small, that's probably all the calories they need. But I see a lot of comments on here by women who work out everyday and based upon the calorie intake they describe, they're not getting enough macronutrients to fuel their bodies.

Our bodies are highly adaptable, so we can survive on near-starvation calorie intake for quite some time. But it's not optimal.

And I completely respect that every body is different. I'm one of those people that gets really irritated when I read comments telling people that they should never eat an item because of their personal experiences. Life doesn't work that way.

I apologize if I came across as preachy or insulting. That was not my intent. My hope is that people will research, educate themselves, and make well-reasoned decisions. We only get one body and one life; they both need to be handled carefully. Report

!200 was an example used to answer a question. Nice easy numbers. I'm 67 years old, 5'3" and retired. To maintain my overweight status, I would be in the 1500 to 1800 calories per day category. To lose weight I need to stay in the 1200 to 1300 calorie per day range. No need to cringe--everyone is different. Report

I cringe when I read recommended calories as low as 1200 per day. Unless you're very small, that's too little calories to support an active lifestyle.

I'm 5'6", 175 pounds, and I believe a healthy weight for me is about 145 pounds. My BMR is 1500 calories. I have a desk job, but unless I'm doing research or writing, I'm never seated for more than 20-30 minutes at a time. I commute by bike several days a week, and I'm training for triathlon, so I walk or run four or five days a week and I swim a couple days a week. If I followed SparkPeople's recommendations for my calorie intake, I would lose weight very quickly. But I would also lose strength and endurance, and I would be miserable. (Which would mean The Hubs would be miserable, too.)

Food is fuel. Eat enough to fuel your life. Exercise enough to keep yourself strong and healthy. And enjoy your life. If you're always crabby because you feel deprived, is it really worth it? Report

My understanding of the question..Say your daily calorie allowance is 1200 to lose weight. That is a healthy allowance. If you eat 1200 calories, but exercise for 200 calories that creates a net of 1000 for the day which is below the 1200 allowance. If you go too far below the daily allowance your body isn't getting enough nutrition and can actually make your burning capability slow down. If you stay at the allowance recommended for you to lose weight even with the exercise deducted you will lose. As I said, this is my understanding of the numbers game. :-) Report

I agree. Please explain. Report

I don't get it. I am told I need to burn more calories than I eat, yet when I enter an exercise my calories allowance on the food tracker increases because I have to take in enough food to support the exercise. I am so very confused. If I am only taking in say 800 calories a day and burning say 200 is that going to hep me lose weight? Or am i spose to eat 1200 calories a day and burn 300 to lose weight. I am very confused Please help me understand Report