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Calculating your Calorie Needs
How then, does calorie deficit work? Calorie deficit is essentially calorie intake lesser than calorie output, which means consuming lesser calories than the body expends. The next question is then, how do I know the number of calories I need for my daily activities. You can be as specific to go to a doctor to get some tests done and get the results. Or you can visit a website and just key in the details to calculate your Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE). Because I’m a cheapo and I try as much as possible to go for free things, I use this website. 1kg is around 7700 Kcal. If there is a calorie deficit of 300 Kcal everyday, in one month’s time, you will be able to drop an ~1kg. This 300 kcal could come from a mixture of activities — eating less and exercise. In my own experience, diet has played a bigger role in creating calorie deficit than exercise. A 30-min jog could burn about 350 calories for me. But as I exercise more, I get hungrier more quickly and eat more which in turn puts back the calories I lost. If I cut down on my food, the weight drops faster.
Calculating your Calorie Input
Next, I use the app myfitnesspal and key in whatever I eat and exercise on a daily basis, even down to a chocolate square or a chicken nugget. There are some who track and weigh all their food but this is too time-consuming for me. For me, logging in my food intake daily is to give me an awareness of how much calories each portion of food has. That handful of nuts that you grab? It is sneakily high in the calorie count. How about that big bowl of leafy vegetables? Vegetables are filling and adds little to the calories. You can do this for about a month and that is where you start to be more conscious of what you are putting into your body.
I also weigh on a daily basis and get an average. Don’t get alarmed when you ate more today and the next day the scale jumps. You are doing this for the long-haul and one big meal will not spoil all your consistent efforts daily. If you are on a calorie deficit consistently, there should be a downward trend in your weight. Does that mean you can eat McDonalds everyday as long as you keep within your calorie deficit window? Yes, but that doesn’t mean that you will get enough vitamins and nutrients. Besides, the high fat and sugar content will leave your body craving for more. Some days your weight may spike a little, but generally it should be going downwards. If you are not, then relook at your food intake and the TDEE. Tracking weight loss is a consistent adjustment and your bodies are dynamic. Some days you are more stressed and just have more water retention. Food that you input may also not be accurate — quantity, type etc.
Conclusion
For weight loss to be sustainable, a long-haul approach has to be taken. Those weight loss fast (starving, liquid diets) measures can work, but it can also mean the rebound is fast and can come back with a vengeance.
A short post for today. Remember, weight loss = calorie deficit. If there is demand, will share more on this topic in future.
Eat well and be healthy!
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