First, refeeding is a specific way of eating with a specific goal.

What I'm talking about in this thread is simply eating sane. People go around eating far too few calories and I'm talking about reversing that. In my world, that's not refeeding. But that's not important to this discussion either.

I've actually seen people lose weight while ramping up their calories.

On the flipside, I've seen people gain too.

But never ridiculous amounts, assuming intelligent tactics are used.

If someone is dieting using a huge deficit and they're realizing success. it's hard to get them to 'see the light.' If someone is dieting using a huge deficit and they're plateaued, it's easy to 'get them to see the light.'

Whatever the case may be, it's simply a matter of ramping up the calories steadily while tracking the metrics and tweaking exercise. There's no clear cut way of going about it. It's a tough & feel process based on individual response.

Thanks for printing the formula. It works for me, except for the exercise factor. At my age/weight/sex (59/215/F) my BMR calculation comes out to 1613, or 1913 at "sedentary" (about right). But when I try to add in the exercise factor, I come out with way too high a calorie count.

I exercise 5 or 6 days per week, typically an hour of ice skating or biking. I would characterize that as "moderate exercise." But the calculation for "moderate" adds a calorie burn of almost 900 per day! There's no way that can be right. According to the calorie estimators I've checked, an hour of biking or skating at my weight should burn 600-700 calories (which seems to match my experience).

Am I misunderstanding the levels of exercise implied by the descriptions?

It's not just exercise.

It's all activity.

*sigh* Must be nice. You have a high metabolism, and that's wonderful. Not everybody does. You may find that your metabolism slows down A LOT when you hit middle age. Mine sure did.

I'm still not sure how you could be losing 2 pounds a week by cutting out 250 calories a day and exercising. You'd have to be burning an additional 750 calories per day, 7 days a week, for that to work. That's some exercise program! Or maybe you have actually cut back your calories more than you realize.

Eating too much can quite simply be a habit, and it does take some "starvation" to cut it back to healthy proportions.

Food is essential though to good health.


Great post! I enjoyed reading it!

I've read monkeys on a starvation diet live longer.

first, @ Carthonn. You're almost there! Kudos! Now onto why I started to post:

I'm on the master cleanse... yeah, I know. On day 6 of a 10 day program. I'm not really doing it for weight loss though (honest). I'm doing it in preparation for a new phase in my life (birthday is coming up). I'll admit, though, that I AM digging the weight loss side effects.

BUT

I'm worried that the cleanse is totally crashing my metabolism - that is, in the longer run I'm actually getting bad weight side effects and not good ones

Anybody cleanse or do a fast and succesfully bounce back without a lagging metabolism?

Im thankful for your knowledge Steve!!! Lots of good stuff..

You're welcome.

Hey Girlsix just wanted to say that I did the master cleanse and completely crashed and burned I did it for 9 days and then had to stop because I got really bad tonsilitus and my housemates staged an intervention. To be honest I didn't eat particularly healthily afterwards but I still put on weight at an astonishing rate, gave me some really bad stretch marks. It took about 3 months for my metabolism to recover and the for the weight to start coming off again. Hope your experience works out better than mine, if you stick to healthy stuff when you finish I'm sure it will

Great information,best wishes to everyone

Tell her to ditch the fad diets and temporary way of thinking and start thinking about how to make this a lifestyle.

Actually, tell her to sign up here so she can educate herself.

While I appreciate your kind words, I can't help but notice your link. In it, you're advertising the sort of fad diets that trip everyone up.

Also, there's misinformation about calorie expenditure and muscle mass that I saw after 5 seconds of looking.

The link will be removed.

Okay hello there! I'd like to say thank you first to Steve because that was very informative and I like to read up on anything dealing with calorie counting. But it began to get me worried. I think I know what I'm doing is sound, but I could use a double check or reassurance from some people on this board that I feel are trust worthy and know their facts!

I'm at 5'7", 156ish, 19yr old with a 1559ish BMR. I round it down to like 1550 needed calories and I think my sedentary intake is like 1600ish. I never really feel comfortable going down below that number (1550) until my weight starts to decrease and then it'll be 1500, 1450 and so on. Should I continually eat slightly above or at that caloric intake and just exercise my way through weight loss? Is this the correct way? I don't want to be unhealthy and I don't want to starve myself in a drastic measure. I dunno, I just need a little clarification.

Thank you so much!

Well you're more then welcome. Thanks for taking the time to read the thread.

I have a couple of random thoughts:

1. You ask if this is the "right way." There is no right/wrong when it comes to this. What's right is a method of doing things that works for you in such a way that a) it provides you with the results you're looking for, b) is maintainable for life, and c) doesn't cause you a lot of grief - preferably you enjoy what you're doing.

2. A fat loss plan is quite simple. It's when you start programming for someone who wants to increase strength/power, has an injury to consider, has a few imbalances, wants to cut a little fat, and needs to peak for a big competition in three months that "personal training" gets hard.

The way I look at fat loss is this:

a) pick your calorie goal. This should never be a complex issue as your calorie needs are going to change with time based on your weight, activity etc. The first step is determining your maintenance, which is not BMR. Maintenance is BMR + activity + digestion of food.

There are many ways of finding your maintenance but a good ball park is 14 calories per pound of bodyweight.

b) from there, create a deficit. I like the idea of eating as much food as possible while still losing weight. That seems to be the most sustainable approach for a lifetime. Something like a 20-30% deficit from the above calculated maintenance is a good starting point. You're current intake of 1550 puts you at approximately a 30% deficit so that's good.

c) Track your progress and respond according to feedback. If things aren't heading in the right direction, it's really no reason to get worked up. Simply troubleshoot the issue and take advantage of those around you, including people on this very forum. The cool thing about this that some people tend to forget is this process is very flexible. If something isn't working within 2-4 weeks time... it's not like we invested a ton of time and money into an impossible task. We simply have to be light on our feet and willing to roll with the punches.

d) Once a caloric goal is decided, we need to be sure to account for nutritional value of the foods that comprise said calories. Nutritional quality goes a long way in health, preservation of muscle, hormonal factors that regulate metabolism, satiety, etc. Be sure to think of more than just calories. I'm sure you know this already but it's worth mentioning.

A lot has been discussed here in the stickies about nutritional quality but if you want elaboration, simply ask.

***

The above calorie range factors in exercise. It's assuming you're moderately active with exercise. So lifting some weights and doing some cardio is a good idea.

Weights add to your caloric expenditure. More importantly, it stimulates muscle maintenance which is what gives us the shape and leanness that many of us are shooting for.

Cardio buffers the calorie deficit. Without it, you are forced into eating less food.

Both weight training and cardio obviously have other positive influences such as health, strength, performance, etc.

The application of weight lifting and cadio is another topic unto itself as how to apply each to your given situation depends on your experience, your exact goals, your body, etc.

I feel like I'm throwing a lot of generalities your way without answering your questions... I simply want to be sure you grasp the "foundation" before throwing the walls up.

That intake, with exercise factored in, should provide you the deficit required to realize weight loss. I don't like that term, weight loss. I much prefer fat loss as each have very unique differentiations that are quite powerful.

.

You're certainly not starving yourself. That said, it's hard to determine the health status of a plan based solely on calories. The nutritional quality of the foods comprising said calories is critical.