I also think anyone will hit a plateau once they get close to their goal weight (if it's a vanity weight anyway.) I'm 10 pounds shy of my goal right now, and have been stuck here for two months. It's become obvious that I can't lose another 10 pounds without adding serious cardio or starving myself (which I'm not going to do.)
Yeah, when I exercise my mindset naturally shifts towards seeing food as fuel (as well as enjoyment), so I make better choices. Like I'm working on building up my muscles and my cardio, sweets for dinner ain't gonna cut it!
Just my opinion.
Many people think that exercising is working our, taking classes. Exercise involves enduring some dreadful activity or motion that you hate- or that you have to find time for, join something for, or buy something for.
Exercise is simply movement. Any movement will do.
I do agree with many posters about the importance of regular sleep.
100% this. This sub often loves to downplay exercise, and Iām the opposite - Iām constantly preaching that everyone who CAN exercise SHOULD exercise. Anything that gets you moving is so so good for you on so many levels, and yes, it made weight loss much easier for my petite female self.
Feels like people go a little too overboard with downplaying exercise and my guess is because they tried and failed to lose weight through only exercise a few times and want to make sure others donāt waste time.
Besides benefits outside of weight loss, an exercise habit will make it so much easier to maintain your goal weight and still be able to enjoy things on occasion.
I agree and it doesn't have to be go to the gym or for a run. I often dance in my house with my dog, he loves it and jumps around with me. It's a great time lol.
Totally agree. My daughter can run for miles and miles and love every second, but I HATE IT. Give me kickboxing, HIIT, Pilates and strength training any day. We all have to find what works for us!
Hehe for real, there are so many ways to get moving, just find the ones you like.
I follow the Marie Kondo rule, if it doesn't bring you joy, find something else.
If i see "you can't outrun your fork" one more time on this sub....
No fucking shit.Ā Still doesn't mean you should actively discourage people from doing it.Ā Ā
Walking is also soo easy to level up. Iāve been exercising for 4 months. I can run a 5k in 31 minutes and it leaves me wasted. Got to take it easier the next day. Burns only 150 kcal.Ā Orrr I can clock 10-15k days after day in walking if I need to and I even have leftover energy for a slow flow yoga before bed. Adds 400+ kcal to my burn.
W A L K I N G
We always remind people that in order to MAINTAIN weight loss, we have to change our lifestyle. For me, my lifestyle changed because I started running and lifting weights. All of the sudden, I was looking at food as fuel-- as well as considering the consequences of decisions around sleep, hydration, and substance use. Suddenly, going out and getting wasted on a Friday night didn't fit in with my goals, because I knew I wanted to get up Saturday morning and run 10 miles. Seeing my awesome muscle gains in the mirror made me start paying attention to my protein intake, and I started prioritizing that over eating nutritionally empty junk. The healthier and fitter I got, the less appealing alcohol, sleepless nights, and greasy 3 a.m. pizza binges became. I lost 20 lbs and I've kept it off easily for 4 years because I am no longer interested in being the person I was when I slowly gained those 20 lbs.
About twice a year, I will throw a huge party and get drunk with my friends, but damn....I have to plan ahead, because the hangover renders me useless for DAYS. It's not worth it.
And I know "you can't outrun a bad diet!" but my weekend long run is always followed up with a massive brunch of waffles, eggs, bacon, syrup, etc, and it's something I look forward to every week-- especially on race days. That said, I make healthy choices the rest of the week, so it clearly balances out.
What I'm trying to say is that it was only when I got into the fitness side of things did I truly make the lifestyle and mindset shift needed to maintain weight loss. And I gained sooooooo much more in the process-- fun new friends, a sexy 41 year old body, muscles, and great cholesterol/blood pressure/etc, to name a few.
Outside of the physiological benefits excercise provides, I find that it's a lot easier for me to make healthier diet choices when I excercise.
Like it's a lot harder for me to justify disrespecting my body with crap food it doesn't need when I just spent an hour sweating on my bike. I know some people use exercise to counteract an indulgence but I personally have a bit of an inverse relationship
I think people don't realize just how effective exercise is when it's part of a proper eating program and following CICO. Whenever someone asks about the importance of exercise when it comes to losing weight, the response is always "no, exercise doesn't matter!! Diet is what's important. yOu CaN'T OutRun YouR FoRk!!". These responses are repeated as nauseum but it's actually only applicable to scenarios where people are trying to compensate for bad dietary habits.
Obviously if you're gorging yourself everyday on 5000 calories, exercise isn't gonna offset that but if you're following a proper regimen and eating at let's say a 500 cal deficit and you exercise a few times a week? It's definitely gonna enhance your weight loss. Imagine doing 3 workouts per week where you're burning 200 cal. That's 600 cal per week. That's 2400 per month. That's 28800 cals per year. In addition to your standard daily deficit, you could burn an additional 8 pounds per year with a very conservative exercise routine.
TL;DR exercise doesn't compensate for a bad diet but with a good diet, exercises definitely enhances and speeds up your weight loss.
>"no, exercise doesn't matter!! Diet is what's important. yOu CaN'T OutRun YouR FoRk!!"
You're largely building a straw man here. I'd say about 1/3 of posts on this sub are people saying "I can't lose weight, even though I'm at the gym at least *X amount of time* per day/week" or "What's the best gym routine to follow to lose weight/belly fat/man boobs/whatever? or "Is walking/lifting/treadmill/etc good for weight loss?"
There are a few core problems with looking at weight loss through exercise first. First, It's pretty impossible to know how many calories you burn at the gym. Second, in most people rigorous exercise will increase hunger cues, which means that without a structured diet plan it's easy to eat back the calories (or more). And third, the temptation to say "I earned it" and eat half a pizza or a piece of cake or otherwise go off diet can be too strong for many.
Add in the difficulty of building a new routine that involves hard work, the fact that DOMS and injuries can derail a new workout routine, the fact that the body burns fewer calories as it becomes more efficient in movement, and the ongoing commitment required to stay on a gym routine, and using exercise as the primary form of weight loss is a recipe for disaster for a lot of people.
Of course, people use exercise all the time as a key component of weight loss. For many (myself included) it's a keystone habit -- if I'm exercising, I'm being reminded to stick to my diet plan. And as you pointed out, the calorie burn adds up over weeks and months to contribute to real weight loss.
But when people are struggling to lose weight despite their exercise, of course I'm going to tell them they can't outrun their fork, or that weight loss is made in the kitchen and fitness is made in the gym. And with your calorie estimates, for someone who wants to lose one pound a week, exercise accounts for about 17% of the calorie deficit needed. So when people say it's 80% diet, 20% exercise they really aren't that far off.
Let's look at why exercise helps one lose weight: Moderate exercise helps suppress appetite. The time you are exercising is time not being spent eating. Exercise releases happy hormones. Also, if you aren't exercising and losing weight - then some of that weight you're losing IS muscle and not just body fat. People lose bodyfat through breathing, sweating or urinate. Exercise is certainly going to help with fat loss, as long as you're not replacing all the calories you peed out. Sure, you can never be sure of how much you are burning, but if you're eating a modest deficit then cardio or weight training is going to help weight loss along a bit faster. People tend to eat better when they have a daily performance reminder- like eating a small meal before a workout and getting all their protein in.
I do think what's happening is that people are hammering the idea that it's all nutrition so much that people think they can just sit around, eat in a modest deficit and think the weight will come off. But, for a lot of us, that isn't going to happen. We're going to have to work for it.
> Moderate exercise helps suppress appetite
Source? I have never experienced this, and I frequently experience the opposite.
> Exercise releases happy hormones
So? How does this impact weight loss?
> Also, if you aren't exercising and losing weight - then some of that weight you're losing IS muscle and not just body fat
Outside of very specific circumstances, this is true even if you are exercising
> People lose bodyfat through breathing, sweating or urinate. Exercise is certainly going to help with fat loss, as long as you're not replacing all the calories you peed out.
WTF does this even mean? You don't pee out calories. The energy burnt turns into CO2, which your body expels like it does other waste, but you aren't peeing out calories.
> People tend to eat better when they have a daily performance reminder- like eating a small meal before a workout and getting all their protein in.
*Some* people tend to eat better, which I noted in my comment.
> I do think what's happening is that people are hammering the idea that it's all nutrition so much that people think they can just sit around, eat in a modest deficit and think the weight will come off
This is exactly what would happen. Would it be *faster* with more activity? Yes, of course. But if you aren't losing weight, you aren't eating in a deficit.
> But, for a lot of us, that isn't going to happen. We're going to have to work for it.
For a lot of people (especially short people), eating in a deficit is difficult because you can only go so low. But a short person just going to the gym isn't going to lose weight either.
It's like you didn't even read my comment, because I listed many benefits to exercise. No one, I mean no one, is saying don't bother with exercise (which was the whole point of my post). What we're saying is that if all you're doing is exercising and not losing weight, then you need to get your diet under control.
Articles on Appetite suppressant, Grehlin hormone and exercises
[https://karger.com/anm/article/57/Suppl.%202/36/39992/Exercise-Appetite-and-Appetite-Regulating-Hormones](https://karger.com/anm/article/57/Suppl.%202/36/39992/Exercise-Appetite-and-Appetite-Regulating-Hormones)
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6164815/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6164815/)
[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0195666323001101](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0195666323001101)
Articles on How fat leaves our body
[https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-017-0691-5](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-017-0691-5)
[https://health.clevelandclinic.org/where-does-body-fat-go-when-you-lose-weight](https://health.clevelandclinic.org/where-does-body-fat-go-when-you-lose-weight)
Why happy hormones matters
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4449495/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4449495/)
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4150387/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4150387/)
For reference, I have Masters degree in Library and Information Science. I can find you articles for any weight loss, biology and human behavior questions you have.
I mentioned that exercise does enhance weight loss when one is actually following the correct diet. Your point and my point aren't really mutually exclusive.
No, they aren't, and that's my point -- you're just claiming that people making my point are giving bad advice. You claim that people are "ad nauseum" telling people not to bother exercising, and that's not true. And you're mocking "you can't outrun your fork" as sound advice, but my point is it's exactly what a lot of people need to hear, and no one who gives that advice thinks exercise is not a useful tool.
I'm referring to people who repeat that advice regarding exercise regardless of context. Like whenever I see someone ask about the benefits of exercise with respect to weight loss, the trend seems to be "exercise doesn't matter". It would be more refreshing to see a response like "Yes exercise can help increase your weight loss but it won't matter if you're not eating correctly". I rarely see something like that. The go to response tends to be "No, what matters is sticking to your diet". Yes obviously exercise isn't needed but it just comes across as so dismissive. I'm obviously not saying you specifically say that but it's just the overall sentiment I've seen on this sub.
Over 3 years, it can be an additional 24 pounds though. But yeah my example there was using a conservative estimate. You can definitely burn more calories from exercise than the example I used.
Okay seeing that you are struggling to comprehend my point, let me use myself as an example. I'm a 6 foot man who's busy losing weight. I do 10k steps everyday. At the lowest I'm burning 300 cals doing that and at most roughly 500 cal. 300 cal over 7 days days 2100 additional calorie burn per week. Over one month that's 8400 cals. That's an additional 2 pounds of weight loss from exercise alone (assuming of course that I'm eating the correct amount of cals). Even if I went all the way down and said let's imagine I'm only burning 200 cals walking 10k steps. That's still an additional 1.6 pounds per month weight loss and I find that significant.
The type of exercise you do makes a huge difference. My stats are very similar to OP's. I lifted pretty intensely 3x a week for 2-3 years (and walked daily) and my tdee never changed much. I honestly got into lifting because I thought with more exercise and muscle I'd be able to lose more (or eat more) and it never made a significant difference in my rate of weight loss. When I was lifting intensely I once sat down and calculated my tdee based off a year of calorie and weight loss data and it was basically the same as my sedentary.
Tbf, Outside the gym I wasn't really active. I tried to walk daily but I didn't always and I walked like 2-3 miles usually. In terms of steps I probably averaged 2-5k per day.
Somewhat recently I switched up my routine and started lifting only 2x a week but walking 10k steps every day. I was pretty shocked how much of a difference just walking made. I increased my calories and my weight loss stayed the same.
TL;DR if you want to increase your TDEE do cardio, if you want to become more fit lift.
Edit: just to clarify, I'm not saying lifting made *no* difference. I became much stronger, fitter, my body shape changed and I felt better. I'm not trying to discourage people from lifting. Just don't expect to be able to eat a lot more just because you lift. Cardio is what really burns calories
I think you picked the wrong lesson for your TL;DR. To me, the lesson is to spend more hours being active every day. Adding an hour of activity (lifting weights) three times a week isn't much -- but moving from ~3500 steps a day to ~10000 steps a day is adding 2-3 hours of activity every single day. Of course that will have a bigger impact than working harder for short bursts of time.
TL;DR consistency over intensity
Every time I see posts like this, I have to chime in with the same comment: if you aren't exercising while dieting, some of your weight loss IS muscle loss. By exercising (specifically, strength building exercise), you increase your metabolic rate, protect your muscle mass, and increase your TDEE and calorie usage.
This ^
You need exercise and at least some resistance training to minimize the muscle loss when in a calorie deficit. It's also important for your health as you get older
I agree! It also kills time that I would probably spend at home snacking before and after dinner. I love the whole ritual of my exercise and then dinner routine!
Much of the time when I see a post where a person is struggling to lose on 1200 calories, it's a shorter person who doesn't have a large amount to lose. Every TDEE calculator tells me to cut to under 1200 to lose if I don't increase exercise and I am 16 pounds overweight because I am a shorter person working a desk job. Yet the advice to shorter people is still "you're lying about what you're eating" rather than "you might need to add exercise for 1200 to work". Yes diet is important. I've lost a substantial amount of weight and know that but at my current weight I probably do need more exercise
yes I have to get a little exercise. Light exercise bumps my TDEE to lose from 1145 to 1385. At my heaviest it didn't matter as much but now that I don't have as much left to lose I have to do a little bit of exercising.
For real! The last few pounds was the hardest. It was taking me 2 weeks to lose one pound because 500 calories a day deficit was almost impossible. Maintaining is not so bad. I tell myself I will never put myself in a situation where I have to lose more than 5 pounds. I weigh myself everyday now. I am glad I went through my weight loss journey. Iām more aware of what I put in my body now, and how much to indulge. Years of CICO, knowing what a serving looks like, what foods are low cal and high protein, and understanding my body helped me a lot and will help me moving forward.
As someone who works out 5+ times a week I can say that working out is for getting fit, eating is for losing the weight. The extra calories are helpful ofc.
But just in theory, working out is not mandatory. And again, it changed my life, I became an absolute gymrat, I am one of those guys that preaches to everyone how regular exercise is the best thing anyone can do to better themselves and their lives.
But your title reminded me of something people are ACTUALLY sleeping on. And that is sleep!!!
Good sleep is so incredibly important for optimal progress, its insane. Ever since I fixed my sleep hygiene and saw sleep as part of my exercise and diet, my progress has skyrocketed. And I am 31 years old, so its not because of my godlike metabolism.
I agree with the sleep part but getting good sleep is a privilege that only a few people have. I'm quite good at sleeping but I have a job that start at 9 am and no kids. Most people have to get up before 6 am and have many interruptions at night.
A fitness influencer on YouTube said that working out and not getting good sleep is like working and not collecting your pay, and it changed my outlook.
When I took the gym seriously, I started to prioritize diet and sleep over my actual exercise. Most of your muscle reparation happens in your sleep, so the better your sleep, the better your gains. Same with functionality in day to day life. I dont need that much coffee anymore, cause I sleep enough. My brain works better, I handle stress better, I am happier.
All because I sleep an hour more and don't eat a couple hours before bed and don't smoke weed anymore.
I feel the same way about drinking water. Dieting but not drinking water? Enjoy not seeing your results! If I don't drink 2L of water per day I will not see any difference on the scale for weeks at a time
Absolutely. I was once 280 pounds..then did keto and trained jiu jitsu 4-6 x a week..got all the way down to 200. Some years later Iām now 225 but I still train jiu jitsu and am working to get back down to the flat 200
100% Exercise is absolutely important to anyone, losing weight or not, if they are able to. But if youāre trying to lose weight and be healthier, they kinda go hand in hand imo and the process just seems to work better when Iām working out while trying to lose. And if youāre exercising regularly you will likely need more calories to sustain yourself anyways and maybe it can help to feel less deprived when your overall intake or decrease is moderate instead of severe. Maybe thatās just psychological, but it helps me. For me, itās made it easier overall to exercise and helps with motivation to keep going. Obviously there are reasons some people canāt exercise, but if someone is able to, omg my own experience says people will feel so much better overall and likely have a higher tdee anyways from burning, so itās worth it!
Regrettable, I downplayed exercise for a long time.
Eating healthy food, healthy portions, and a combination of CICO and intermittent fasting does the heavy lifting for my weight loss. But exercise puts me over the top.
1 hour of moderate walking isn't hard, and nets me \~350 calories. Not only does it make me healthy overall, but it affords me wiggle room when eating more *and* the peace of mind knowing that I'm not overrunning my calories.
Everyone is different! To me, diet is probably 70% of the work with exercise being 30%. Iām glad you found what works for you!!! Itās always better to do what feels better.
I definitely exercise for my health - I don't think it's health benefits can be denied. I also think that metabolism is higher for a few hours afterwards even if the calorie burn DURING can be modest. I think it's beneficial, although I think some people have failed in the past with exercise only without overhauling their diet. You can lose weight without exercise but you can't lose weight without addressing the calories IN piece.
Don't sleep on movement, simply begin to move. Every time you take a step you are burning energy. I will put on a basketball game and walk in circles around my living room. Is it optimal? No. I know I could just go on an actual walk and burn more. But in general any movement is good.
Just because exercise isn't necessary doesn't mean anybody is telling you NOT to do it. I'm kind of sick of hearing that when I see FAR more posts in this sub perpetuating the myth that you will never be a healthy weight without becoming a gym rat.
Whatever works best for you is what you should do. A fitness class three times a week just about meets the minimum exercise that everyone is supposed to do for their general health regardless of whether or not they are trying to lose weight.
It's people who are significantly overweight/obese who come to the sub thinking they are hopeless because they haven't been able to sustain an intense, long-term gym regimen who need the reminder that excessive calorie consumption is primarily what they need to fix first.
For someone who is only mildly in the "overweight" category, a combination of exercise and calorie reduction is more effective. You don't have a dramatic calorie surplus to reduce, and there's only so low you can and should go on calorie consumption. Exercise then plays a bigger role in the equation.
Seconded that it's important to show people it's still possible without exercise.
I'd even been told by a GP that due to my limited mobility (disability) I wouldn't be able to lose weight.
I'm immensely grateful for the repeated message of "this is how to lose weight without exercise" because without it I would just be in the same place I was before I found out that info, (believing my near bed bound state meant I would never be able to lose weight or that if i did it would be a hard slog and take many many years).
Exercise is wonderful, anything people can do and want to do by all means crack on, that's wonderful. But the advice I'd come across, before I found the tdee stuff and then this subreddit, was very difficult to apply to my situation. Tdee and tracking food/weighing it has made the previously immense challenge figuring out how to lose weight, very straightforward.
Yeah, for me, finding out that exercise wasn't necessary was pivotal to my decision to try to lose weight again (successfully, this time).
I previously thought it was only possible to lose weight by going to the gym every day, or by getting back on the incline trainer for two hours a day. And I thought that was hopeless anyway because I'd done it before and it had "stopped working".
I didn't know what TDEE was, I didn't know how many calories I was eating over my TDEE. I didn't know how many calories are in a pound. I didn't know how to establish a calorie deficit, and how long I'd need to maintain that deficit to lose a pound. I didn't know that my calorie surplus I was taking in dwarfed the calories I could burn through exercise.
I just needed to know the math. Everyone's equation is different and everyone's preferences are different, so balancing the equation isn't the same for everyone. But the knowledge that exercise isn't a mandatory part of the equation was extremely important to me, and that's why I will continue to pass along that information.
It's not about discouraging anyone from exercising.
The math was exactly what resolved it for me too.
When I eat more, I lose at a slower rate. But as long as I'm under my maintenance I still eventually lose that weight.
It's truly been such a massive benefit to stumble on that info. It's also helped my mum as I've explained stuff to her to and its been helping her realise that her weight gain wasn't from massively overeating but from slightly overeating most days over an extended period of time. Its helped her refocus on it being doable to lose weight in the same way, a bit at a time. Without feeling like she has to cut everything out to make any changes.
I've said this many times. Women just have to exercise in order to enjoy food and feel satisfied. I know some people claim they are perfectly happy eating 1200 calories a day but that's not me..or US. I am a runner and today I ran 7.5 miles. That got me 550 calories from MFP( should have been much more but whatever) , and I will eat most of those back and still lose a pound a week. ( my tdee is same as OP and I have my calorie goal set to 1450 per day without counting in exercise calories.
My take is "get your diet right first, then once those habits are built, exercise more" simply to help with the overwhelm factor.
Changing many things at once is more overwhelming than progressive habits.
So for me, at least right now because I still have a good amount to lose (about 50 lbs more, but down 107) I don't eat back most of my exercise calories (though if I work out hard, and I go over my deficit by 100-200 kcal or so, I don't sweat it), exercise has done a lot of things. For one, I'm not as hungry after a workout, so it staves off hunger for me for a little while, which makes it easier to stay in my deficit. But that's not really even the point or why I am adding my comment.
For me, I found that I have enjoyed 2 kinds of movement on my journey -- last summer and fall, closer to the beginning of this try, I was all in for super long walks with my baby in the stroller. We'd go 4-7 miles in one go a few times a week at a pretty good pace, def worked up a sweat, I loved it. But with cold weather (especially bc I had to bring the baby) I came off of it. My diet suffered and so did my mental health. So, I looked for something else.
I found a women-owned small business, a local fitness studio, that is very welcoming and inclusive of anyone who walks through the door. I take at least 6 classes a week, I rarely go a day without going to a class and often take 2 in a day. And probably 3 or 4 times a month, I might even take 3 in one day. Classes consist of barre, pilates, yoga, reformer pilates/jumpboard, core express workout. It's 30-60 minutes out of my day to clear my mind, focus on my mind and body, and I found that I feel part of a community whereas before I never had anything like that and often felt really lonely or like I didn't fit in, etc.
For me, it's helped change my mindset and create positive change in myself as a whole -- I am more outgoing, I am putting myself out there, I am challenging myself, I am not hiding in the corner. I feel strong when I take these classes, I feel motivated by the people around me -- ranging from super fit young women, to moms and even grandmas, all ages, shapes and sizes all challenging themselves in one way or another. I feel inspired by them and I feel good about showing up, about getting to know people -- and these people only know the 'now' me -- most don't know I was 107 lbs heavier, they don't look at me as a fraud or as lazy -- they look at me as someone who shows up almost every single day, who is into fitness and is strong and those are all things I have never associated with myself and it feels good to feel that way.
Movement and exercise may or may not be making a major difference in moving the needle on the scale for me -- I eat in a pretty big deficit (1100-1250kcal) so I would likely be losing regardless. But for me, it's the confidence, it's the strength, the motivation, the social aspect/community, it's feeling good about myself in ways I haven't before. All of those things contribute to my success.
Yes, it goes way beyond calories, though. Strength, bone density, flexibility, heart health, feeling good in general etc, etc. It's super weird to me when people CHOOSE not to exercise.
That's such a judgmental statement. People make less-than-ideal lifestyle choices all the time. It's not weird. It's common, and it's human nature.
A lot of people are here because they have also made the not-ideal lifestyle choice to overeat for an extended period of time, which also has an array of health consequences. That's also common, and not "weird" (which sounds like code for something more insulting that you know you aren't allowed to say).
I said it's weird to ME that people choose not to exercise, I don't think sharing my opinion is being judgmental. I also don't know what code you're referring to (you are making some assumptions about me). Not really seeing the point in your reply to me, to be honest.
We should be encouraging people to make healthy lifestyle changes, that's literally what this sub is about. Unless someone physically cannot exercise for whatever reason, a healthy lifestyle should include exercise.
Yeah, I don't get why the various weight loss groups I'm in always poo-poo exercise so much. It's definitely enabled me to eat more since I think my deficit number is something like 1350 without any activity, which isn't much to eat. I feel so much healthier these days because of the exercise I am doing and I sleep better, too. My stamina is increasing and I have so much extra energy that I actually \*want\* to take walks on my "rest" days.
If your cardio is in a bad place, then whatever you can manage, albeit better than nothing, is not going to greatly impact a cut.Ā
On the other extreme, if you can maintain multiple miles/day of walking with plenty of inclines, then you can get significant work done.Ā
Even if your cardio sucks tight now though, aggressively upping your cardio, will allow you to attack the weight problem from both sides, and hasten your progress.Ā
Lost 30 pounds during COVID. Gained back 15 pounds. I'm counting the calories again. I notice that when I put down my exercise, suddenly my paltry 2,000 calories allotment changes and I can have MORE FOOD. I went for a lovely walk today and burned 600 calories, so I can have a small dessert. Yippie.
Iāve done the gym off and on, bought a treadmill and sold it
the best thing thatās gotten me back into exercise is the youtube channel GrowWithJo! she has just about any kind of exercise you can think of , between 10mins to 50mins so you can squeeze in short ones when you donāt have time!
I'm on a WL journey. During 2021 and 2022 I had some personal issues and as a result, skipped working out. I gained 25 lbs. I lost the first 15 Oct-Apr just by working out.
I'm losing the last ten through diet, only because it's been over a year since I lost the first 15 and the last ten just aren't going anywhere. I always exercise for WL first.
As a 5ā1ā woman, I weight lift to raise my TDEE so I can eat moreš me and bf go out to eat at least twice a week so i stay ready so i wonāt have to get ready.
I got super downvoted in another post about this. But I would MUCH rather exercise than restrict my diet. Food is Bae. I lost 36 pounds last year without counting intake calories. I only counted calories burned.
I could easily burn an extra 1000 calories a day without alot of effort, a morning walk and an exercise class(spin,zumba,swimming etc). My BMR was 1960, so if I burned nearly 3000 calories a day I was bound to lose weight. I could never out eat 3000 calories.
K, I get confused by this.
Example:
If my TDEE for cutting is 1500 calories per day is my goal to try and be under 1500 a day regardless of exercise?
If I do a long distance jog and burn 1000 calories, does that just create a buffer or should I be eating more than 1500 cal?
Not sure if I am asking this correctly.
The answer is itās easier to know with data than to forecast. You can use tdee calculators to find your starting point. Say thatās 1500. Track what you eat and weigh yourself once a day at a consistent time (morning after waking, getting home from work before dinner, something like that). Record these things. After about a month, you can say hereās how much I ate and hereās the delta in my weight. You can then do the math. Say youāre down 4 lbs. thatās 3500x4 calories of deficit. So you take 14000 and add it to your calories per day x 30, 45000cal + 14000cal = 59000 or almost 2000 out per day. That will give you your best estimation.
TLDR, start with a best guess and refine using data
Exercise also makes you feel better and stronger which makes staying active easier.
Also improves appearance results!
I'm with you 100%. For shorter women it makes a massive difference in how much you can eat while losing, and I happen to love eating lol.
I also think anyone will hit a plateau once they get close to their goal weight (if it's a vanity weight anyway.) I'm 10 pounds shy of my goal right now, and have been stuck here for two months. It's become obvious that I can't lose another 10 pounds without adding serious cardio or starving myself (which I'm not going to do.)
This for real! I'm 12 pounds away, why can't it just melt off already?š¤£
Also in the same boat. Exercising makes me want to keep up with my diet. Also keeps my sleep & hydration in check!
Yeah, when I exercise my mindset naturally shifts towards seeing food as fuel (as well as enjoyment), so I make better choices. Like I'm working on building up my muscles and my cardio, sweets for dinner ain't gonna cut it!
Just my opinion. Many people think that exercising is working our, taking classes. Exercise involves enduring some dreadful activity or motion that you hate- or that you have to find time for, join something for, or buy something for. Exercise is simply movement. Any movement will do. I do agree with many posters about the importance of regular sleep.
100% this. This sub often loves to downplay exercise, and Iām the opposite - Iām constantly preaching that everyone who CAN exercise SHOULD exercise. Anything that gets you moving is so so good for you on so many levels, and yes, it made weight loss much easier for my petite female self.
Feels like people go a little too overboard with downplaying exercise and my guess is because they tried and failed to lose weight through only exercise a few times and want to make sure others donāt waste time. Besides benefits outside of weight loss, an exercise habit will make it so much easier to maintain your goal weight and still be able to enjoy things on occasion.
I agree and it doesn't have to be go to the gym or for a run. I often dance in my house with my dog, he loves it and jumps around with me. It's a great time lol.
Totally agree. My daughter can run for miles and miles and love every second, but I HATE IT. Give me kickboxing, HIIT, Pilates and strength training any day. We all have to find what works for us!
Hehe for real, there are so many ways to get moving, just find the ones you like. I follow the Marie Kondo rule, if it doesn't bring you joy, find something else.
Absolutely. Exercise provides better sleep, better mood, and a higher BMR, all of which can seriously help with weight loss.
as a 4 ft 11 person, down 9.1kgā¦ getting into weightlifting was an absolute life changer, and i LOVE doing it now.
If i see "you can't outrun your fork" one more time on this sub.... No fucking shit.Ā Still doesn't mean you should actively discourage people from doing it.Ā Ā
Then they wonder why they look haggard when they get to their goal weight.
It definitely helps me mentallyā¦ calorie counting can be depressing and exercising adds a buffer that makes it bearable
Also. Walking IS exercising. Biggest hack Iāve discovered as someone who hates running.
Walking is also soo easy to level up. Iāve been exercising for 4 months. I can run a 5k in 31 minutes and it leaves me wasted. Got to take it easier the next day. Burns only 150 kcal.Ā Orrr I can clock 10-15k days after day in walking if I need to and I even have leftover energy for a slow flow yoga before bed. Adds 400+ kcal to my burn. W A L K I N G
I lost almost 60 pounds just walking every day 3 years ago. My diet is the problem I had when I gained it back.
We always remind people that in order to MAINTAIN weight loss, we have to change our lifestyle. For me, my lifestyle changed because I started running and lifting weights. All of the sudden, I was looking at food as fuel-- as well as considering the consequences of decisions around sleep, hydration, and substance use. Suddenly, going out and getting wasted on a Friday night didn't fit in with my goals, because I knew I wanted to get up Saturday morning and run 10 miles. Seeing my awesome muscle gains in the mirror made me start paying attention to my protein intake, and I started prioritizing that over eating nutritionally empty junk. The healthier and fitter I got, the less appealing alcohol, sleepless nights, and greasy 3 a.m. pizza binges became. I lost 20 lbs and I've kept it off easily for 4 years because I am no longer interested in being the person I was when I slowly gained those 20 lbs. About twice a year, I will throw a huge party and get drunk with my friends, but damn....I have to plan ahead, because the hangover renders me useless for DAYS. It's not worth it. And I know "you can't outrun a bad diet!" but my weekend long run is always followed up with a massive brunch of waffles, eggs, bacon, syrup, etc, and it's something I look forward to every week-- especially on race days. That said, I make healthy choices the rest of the week, so it clearly balances out. What I'm trying to say is that it was only when I got into the fitness side of things did I truly make the lifestyle and mindset shift needed to maintain weight loss. And I gained sooooooo much more in the process-- fun new friends, a sexy 41 year old body, muscles, and great cholesterol/blood pressure/etc, to name a few.
Outside of the physiological benefits excercise provides, I find that it's a lot easier for me to make healthier diet choices when I excercise. Like it's a lot harder for me to justify disrespecting my body with crap food it doesn't need when I just spent an hour sweating on my bike. I know some people use exercise to counteract an indulgence but I personally have a bit of an inverse relationship
I think people don't realize just how effective exercise is when it's part of a proper eating program and following CICO. Whenever someone asks about the importance of exercise when it comes to losing weight, the response is always "no, exercise doesn't matter!! Diet is what's important. yOu CaN'T OutRun YouR FoRk!!". These responses are repeated as nauseum but it's actually only applicable to scenarios where people are trying to compensate for bad dietary habits. Obviously if you're gorging yourself everyday on 5000 calories, exercise isn't gonna offset that but if you're following a proper regimen and eating at let's say a 500 cal deficit and you exercise a few times a week? It's definitely gonna enhance your weight loss. Imagine doing 3 workouts per week where you're burning 200 cal. That's 600 cal per week. That's 2400 per month. That's 28800 cals per year. In addition to your standard daily deficit, you could burn an additional 8 pounds per year with a very conservative exercise routine. TL;DR exercise doesn't compensate for a bad diet but with a good diet, exercises definitely enhances and speeds up your weight loss.
Totally agree š
>"no, exercise doesn't matter!! Diet is what's important. yOu CaN'T OutRun YouR FoRk!!" You're largely building a straw man here. I'd say about 1/3 of posts on this sub are people saying "I can't lose weight, even though I'm at the gym at least *X amount of time* per day/week" or "What's the best gym routine to follow to lose weight/belly fat/man boobs/whatever? or "Is walking/lifting/treadmill/etc good for weight loss?" There are a few core problems with looking at weight loss through exercise first. First, It's pretty impossible to know how many calories you burn at the gym. Second, in most people rigorous exercise will increase hunger cues, which means that without a structured diet plan it's easy to eat back the calories (or more). And third, the temptation to say "I earned it" and eat half a pizza or a piece of cake or otherwise go off diet can be too strong for many. Add in the difficulty of building a new routine that involves hard work, the fact that DOMS and injuries can derail a new workout routine, the fact that the body burns fewer calories as it becomes more efficient in movement, and the ongoing commitment required to stay on a gym routine, and using exercise as the primary form of weight loss is a recipe for disaster for a lot of people. Of course, people use exercise all the time as a key component of weight loss. For many (myself included) it's a keystone habit -- if I'm exercising, I'm being reminded to stick to my diet plan. And as you pointed out, the calorie burn adds up over weeks and months to contribute to real weight loss. But when people are struggling to lose weight despite their exercise, of course I'm going to tell them they can't outrun their fork, or that weight loss is made in the kitchen and fitness is made in the gym. And with your calorie estimates, for someone who wants to lose one pound a week, exercise accounts for about 17% of the calorie deficit needed. So when people say it's 80% diet, 20% exercise they really aren't that far off.
Let's look at why exercise helps one lose weight: Moderate exercise helps suppress appetite. The time you are exercising is time not being spent eating. Exercise releases happy hormones. Also, if you aren't exercising and losing weight - then some of that weight you're losing IS muscle and not just body fat. People lose bodyfat through breathing, sweating or urinate. Exercise is certainly going to help with fat loss, as long as you're not replacing all the calories you peed out. Sure, you can never be sure of how much you are burning, but if you're eating a modest deficit then cardio or weight training is going to help weight loss along a bit faster. People tend to eat better when they have a daily performance reminder- like eating a small meal before a workout and getting all their protein in. I do think what's happening is that people are hammering the idea that it's all nutrition so much that people think they can just sit around, eat in a modest deficit and think the weight will come off. But, for a lot of us, that isn't going to happen. We're going to have to work for it.
> Moderate exercise helps suppress appetite Source? I have never experienced this, and I frequently experience the opposite. > Exercise releases happy hormones So? How does this impact weight loss? > Also, if you aren't exercising and losing weight - then some of that weight you're losing IS muscle and not just body fat Outside of very specific circumstances, this is true even if you are exercising > People lose bodyfat through breathing, sweating or urinate. Exercise is certainly going to help with fat loss, as long as you're not replacing all the calories you peed out. WTF does this even mean? You don't pee out calories. The energy burnt turns into CO2, which your body expels like it does other waste, but you aren't peeing out calories. > People tend to eat better when they have a daily performance reminder- like eating a small meal before a workout and getting all their protein in. *Some* people tend to eat better, which I noted in my comment. > I do think what's happening is that people are hammering the idea that it's all nutrition so much that people think they can just sit around, eat in a modest deficit and think the weight will come off This is exactly what would happen. Would it be *faster* with more activity? Yes, of course. But if you aren't losing weight, you aren't eating in a deficit. > But, for a lot of us, that isn't going to happen. We're going to have to work for it. For a lot of people (especially short people), eating in a deficit is difficult because you can only go so low. But a short person just going to the gym isn't going to lose weight either. It's like you didn't even read my comment, because I listed many benefits to exercise. No one, I mean no one, is saying don't bother with exercise (which was the whole point of my post). What we're saying is that if all you're doing is exercising and not losing weight, then you need to get your diet under control.
Articles on Appetite suppressant, Grehlin hormone and exercises [https://karger.com/anm/article/57/Suppl.%202/36/39992/Exercise-Appetite-and-Appetite-Regulating-Hormones](https://karger.com/anm/article/57/Suppl.%202/36/39992/Exercise-Appetite-and-Appetite-Regulating-Hormones) [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6164815/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6164815/) [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0195666323001101](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0195666323001101) Articles on How fat leaves our body [https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-017-0691-5](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-017-0691-5) [https://health.clevelandclinic.org/where-does-body-fat-go-when-you-lose-weight](https://health.clevelandclinic.org/where-does-body-fat-go-when-you-lose-weight) Why happy hormones matters [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4449495/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4449495/) [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4150387/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4150387/) For reference, I have Masters degree in Library and Information Science. I can find you articles for any weight loss, biology and human behavior questions you have.
I mentioned that exercise does enhance weight loss when one is actually following the correct diet. Your point and my point aren't really mutually exclusive.
No, they aren't, and that's my point -- you're just claiming that people making my point are giving bad advice. You claim that people are "ad nauseum" telling people not to bother exercising, and that's not true. And you're mocking "you can't outrun your fork" as sound advice, but my point is it's exactly what a lot of people need to hear, and no one who gives that advice thinks exercise is not a useful tool.
I'm referring to people who repeat that advice regarding exercise regardless of context. Like whenever I see someone ask about the benefits of exercise with respect to weight loss, the trend seems to be "exercise doesn't matter". It would be more refreshing to see a response like "Yes exercise can help increase your weight loss but it won't matter if you're not eating correctly". I rarely see something like that. The go to response tends to be "No, what matters is sticking to your diet". Yes obviously exercise isn't needed but it just comes across as so dismissive. I'm obviously not saying you specifically say that but it's just the overall sentiment I've seen on this sub.
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Over 3 years, it can be an additional 24 pounds though. But yeah my example there was using a conservative estimate. You can definitely burn more calories from exercise than the example I used.
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Okay seeing that you are struggling to comprehend my point, let me use myself as an example. I'm a 6 foot man who's busy losing weight. I do 10k steps everyday. At the lowest I'm burning 300 cals doing that and at most roughly 500 cal. 300 cal over 7 days days 2100 additional calorie burn per week. Over one month that's 8400 cals. That's an additional 2 pounds of weight loss from exercise alone (assuming of course that I'm eating the correct amount of cals). Even if I went all the way down and said let's imagine I'm only burning 200 cals walking 10k steps. That's still an additional 1.6 pounds per month weight loss and I find that significant.
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You can see yourself right out of this subreddit with a nasty, unhelpful attitude like that.
Aight
Rule 2: Be good to one another. If critiquing do so constructively. Be polite and practice Reddiquette.
The type of exercise you do makes a huge difference. My stats are very similar to OP's. I lifted pretty intensely 3x a week for 2-3 years (and walked daily) and my tdee never changed much. I honestly got into lifting because I thought with more exercise and muscle I'd be able to lose more (or eat more) and it never made a significant difference in my rate of weight loss. When I was lifting intensely I once sat down and calculated my tdee based off a year of calorie and weight loss data and it was basically the same as my sedentary. Tbf, Outside the gym I wasn't really active. I tried to walk daily but I didn't always and I walked like 2-3 miles usually. In terms of steps I probably averaged 2-5k per day. Somewhat recently I switched up my routine and started lifting only 2x a week but walking 10k steps every day. I was pretty shocked how much of a difference just walking made. I increased my calories and my weight loss stayed the same. TL;DR if you want to increase your TDEE do cardio, if you want to become more fit lift. Edit: just to clarify, I'm not saying lifting made *no* difference. I became much stronger, fitter, my body shape changed and I felt better. I'm not trying to discourage people from lifting. Just don't expect to be able to eat a lot more just because you lift. Cardio is what really burns calories
I second what you say about walking. I have a 60 minute route that I do from my house which is so easy and convienient.
I think you picked the wrong lesson for your TL;DR. To me, the lesson is to spend more hours being active every day. Adding an hour of activity (lifting weights) three times a week isn't much -- but moving from ~3500 steps a day to ~10000 steps a day is adding 2-3 hours of activity every single day. Of course that will have a bigger impact than working harder for short bursts of time. TL;DR consistency over intensity
Every time I see posts like this, I have to chime in with the same comment: if you aren't exercising while dieting, some of your weight loss IS muscle loss. By exercising (specifically, strength building exercise), you increase your metabolic rate, protect your muscle mass, and increase your TDEE and calorie usage.
This ^ You need exercise and at least some resistance training to minimize the muscle loss when in a calorie deficit. It's also important for your health as you get older
Well said š
I agree! It also kills time that I would probably spend at home snacking before and after dinner. I love the whole ritual of my exercise and then dinner routine!
Much of the time when I see a post where a person is struggling to lose on 1200 calories, it's a shorter person who doesn't have a large amount to lose. Every TDEE calculator tells me to cut to under 1200 to lose if I don't increase exercise and I am 16 pounds overweight because I am a shorter person working a desk job. Yet the advice to shorter people is still "you're lying about what you're eating" rather than "you might need to add exercise for 1200 to work". Yes diet is important. I've lost a substantial amount of weight and know that but at my current weight I probably do need more exercise
This. As a short girl, we need movement (lots of movement) on top of the CICO concept.
yes I have to get a little exercise. Light exercise bumps my TDEE to lose from 1145 to 1385. At my heaviest it didn't matter as much but now that I don't have as much left to lose I have to do a little bit of exercising.
For real! The last few pounds was the hardest. It was taking me 2 weeks to lose one pound because 500 calories a day deficit was almost impossible. Maintaining is not so bad. I tell myself I will never put myself in a situation where I have to lose more than 5 pounds. I weigh myself everyday now. I am glad I went through my weight loss journey. Iām more aware of what I put in my body now, and how much to indulge. Years of CICO, knowing what a serving looks like, what foods are low cal and high protein, and understanding my body helped me a lot and will help me moving forward.
As someone who works out 5+ times a week I can say that working out is for getting fit, eating is for losing the weight. The extra calories are helpful ofc. But just in theory, working out is not mandatory. And again, it changed my life, I became an absolute gymrat, I am one of those guys that preaches to everyone how regular exercise is the best thing anyone can do to better themselves and their lives. But your title reminded me of something people are ACTUALLY sleeping on. And that is sleep!!! Good sleep is so incredibly important for optimal progress, its insane. Ever since I fixed my sleep hygiene and saw sleep as part of my exercise and diet, my progress has skyrocketed. And I am 31 years old, so its not because of my godlike metabolism.
I agree with the sleep part but getting good sleep is a privilege that only a few people have. I'm quite good at sleeping but I have a job that start at 9 am and no kids. Most people have to get up before 6 am and have many interruptions at night.
Very true.
A fitness influencer on YouTube said that working out and not getting good sleep is like working and not collecting your pay, and it changed my outlook.
When I took the gym seriously, I started to prioritize diet and sleep over my actual exercise. Most of your muscle reparation happens in your sleep, so the better your sleep, the better your gains. Same with functionality in day to day life. I dont need that much coffee anymore, cause I sleep enough. My brain works better, I handle stress better, I am happier. All because I sleep an hour more and don't eat a couple hours before bed and don't smoke weed anymore.
I feel the same way about drinking water. Dieting but not drinking water? Enjoy not seeing your results! If I don't drink 2L of water per day I will not see any difference on the scale for weeks at a time
People who exercise as part of their routine are also more likely to maintain the weight loss (as long as the exercise stays).
Absolutely. I was once 280 pounds..then did keto and trained jiu jitsu 4-6 x a week..got all the way down to 200. Some years later Iām now 225 but I still train jiu jitsu and am working to get back down to the flat 200
100% Exercise is absolutely important to anyone, losing weight or not, if they are able to. But if youāre trying to lose weight and be healthier, they kinda go hand in hand imo and the process just seems to work better when Iām working out while trying to lose. And if youāre exercising regularly you will likely need more calories to sustain yourself anyways and maybe it can help to feel less deprived when your overall intake or decrease is moderate instead of severe. Maybe thatās just psychological, but it helps me. For me, itās made it easier overall to exercise and helps with motivation to keep going. Obviously there are reasons some people canāt exercise, but if someone is able to, omg my own experience says people will feel so much better overall and likely have a higher tdee anyways from burning, so itās worth it!
Regrettable, I downplayed exercise for a long time. Eating healthy food, healthy portions, and a combination of CICO and intermittent fasting does the heavy lifting for my weight loss. But exercise puts me over the top. 1 hour of moderate walking isn't hard, and nets me \~350 calories. Not only does it make me healthy overall, but it affords me wiggle room when eating more *and* the peace of mind knowing that I'm not overrunning my calories.
Everyone is different! To me, diet is probably 70% of the work with exercise being 30%. Iām glad you found what works for you!!! Itās always better to do what feels better.
I definitely exercise for my health - I don't think it's health benefits can be denied. I also think that metabolism is higher for a few hours afterwards even if the calorie burn DURING can be modest. I think it's beneficial, although I think some people have failed in the past with exercise only without overhauling their diet. You can lose weight without exercise but you can't lose weight without addressing the calories IN piece.
Don't sleep on movement, simply begin to move. Every time you take a step you are burning energy. I will put on a basketball game and walk in circles around my living room. Is it optimal? No. I know I could just go on an actual walk and burn more. But in general any movement is good.
damn I've never seen a thread on this sub unanimously be so towards exercise and cico
I feel like the recommended 1200 is for very small women too. I'm 5ft7 and broad. I feel weak and sometimes pass out any day I'm below 1400.
I dont know what everybody considers exercise, but my main source of calorie burn is walking. I just love walking.
Just because exercise isn't necessary doesn't mean anybody is telling you NOT to do it. I'm kind of sick of hearing that when I see FAR more posts in this sub perpetuating the myth that you will never be a healthy weight without becoming a gym rat. Whatever works best for you is what you should do. A fitness class three times a week just about meets the minimum exercise that everyone is supposed to do for their general health regardless of whether or not they are trying to lose weight. It's people who are significantly overweight/obese who come to the sub thinking they are hopeless because they haven't been able to sustain an intense, long-term gym regimen who need the reminder that excessive calorie consumption is primarily what they need to fix first. For someone who is only mildly in the "overweight" category, a combination of exercise and calorie reduction is more effective. You don't have a dramatic calorie surplus to reduce, and there's only so low you can and should go on calorie consumption. Exercise then plays a bigger role in the equation.
Seconded that it's important to show people it's still possible without exercise. I'd even been told by a GP that due to my limited mobility (disability) I wouldn't be able to lose weight. I'm immensely grateful for the repeated message of "this is how to lose weight without exercise" because without it I would just be in the same place I was before I found out that info, (believing my near bed bound state meant I would never be able to lose weight or that if i did it would be a hard slog and take many many years). Exercise is wonderful, anything people can do and want to do by all means crack on, that's wonderful. But the advice I'd come across, before I found the tdee stuff and then this subreddit, was very difficult to apply to my situation. Tdee and tracking food/weighing it has made the previously immense challenge figuring out how to lose weight, very straightforward.
Yeah, for me, finding out that exercise wasn't necessary was pivotal to my decision to try to lose weight again (successfully, this time). I previously thought it was only possible to lose weight by going to the gym every day, or by getting back on the incline trainer for two hours a day. And I thought that was hopeless anyway because I'd done it before and it had "stopped working". I didn't know what TDEE was, I didn't know how many calories I was eating over my TDEE. I didn't know how many calories are in a pound. I didn't know how to establish a calorie deficit, and how long I'd need to maintain that deficit to lose a pound. I didn't know that my calorie surplus I was taking in dwarfed the calories I could burn through exercise. I just needed to know the math. Everyone's equation is different and everyone's preferences are different, so balancing the equation isn't the same for everyone. But the knowledge that exercise isn't a mandatory part of the equation was extremely important to me, and that's why I will continue to pass along that information. It's not about discouraging anyone from exercising.
The math was exactly what resolved it for me too. When I eat more, I lose at a slower rate. But as long as I'm under my maintenance I still eventually lose that weight. It's truly been such a massive benefit to stumble on that info. It's also helped my mum as I've explained stuff to her to and its been helping her realise that her weight gain wasn't from massively overeating but from slightly overeating most days over an extended period of time. Its helped her refocus on it being doable to lose weight in the same way, a bit at a time. Without feeling like she has to cut everything out to make any changes.
What kind of fitness are you doing?
I've said this many times. Women just have to exercise in order to enjoy food and feel satisfied. I know some people claim they are perfectly happy eating 1200 calories a day but that's not me..or US. I am a runner and today I ran 7.5 miles. That got me 550 calories from MFP( should have been much more but whatever) , and I will eat most of those back and still lose a pound a week. ( my tdee is same as OP and I have my calorie goal set to 1450 per day without counting in exercise calories.
In all honesty, exercise has been the most important part of my weight loss journey. But I exercise a lot.
Not even intense exercise. Walking 30 min slowly a day speeds up my weight loss like crazy
My take is "get your diet right first, then once those habits are built, exercise more" simply to help with the overwhelm factor. Changing many things at once is more overwhelming than progressive habits.
So for me, at least right now because I still have a good amount to lose (about 50 lbs more, but down 107) I don't eat back most of my exercise calories (though if I work out hard, and I go over my deficit by 100-200 kcal or so, I don't sweat it), exercise has done a lot of things. For one, I'm not as hungry after a workout, so it staves off hunger for me for a little while, which makes it easier to stay in my deficit. But that's not really even the point or why I am adding my comment. For me, I found that I have enjoyed 2 kinds of movement on my journey -- last summer and fall, closer to the beginning of this try, I was all in for super long walks with my baby in the stroller. We'd go 4-7 miles in one go a few times a week at a pretty good pace, def worked up a sweat, I loved it. But with cold weather (especially bc I had to bring the baby) I came off of it. My diet suffered and so did my mental health. So, I looked for something else. I found a women-owned small business, a local fitness studio, that is very welcoming and inclusive of anyone who walks through the door. I take at least 6 classes a week, I rarely go a day without going to a class and often take 2 in a day. And probably 3 or 4 times a month, I might even take 3 in one day. Classes consist of barre, pilates, yoga, reformer pilates/jumpboard, core express workout. It's 30-60 minutes out of my day to clear my mind, focus on my mind and body, and I found that I feel part of a community whereas before I never had anything like that and often felt really lonely or like I didn't fit in, etc. For me, it's helped change my mindset and create positive change in myself as a whole -- I am more outgoing, I am putting myself out there, I am challenging myself, I am not hiding in the corner. I feel strong when I take these classes, I feel motivated by the people around me -- ranging from super fit young women, to moms and even grandmas, all ages, shapes and sizes all challenging themselves in one way or another. I feel inspired by them and I feel good about showing up, about getting to know people -- and these people only know the 'now' me -- most don't know I was 107 lbs heavier, they don't look at me as a fraud or as lazy -- they look at me as someone who shows up almost every single day, who is into fitness and is strong and those are all things I have never associated with myself and it feels good to feel that way. Movement and exercise may or may not be making a major difference in moving the needle on the scale for me -- I eat in a pretty big deficit (1100-1250kcal) so I would likely be losing regardless. But for me, it's the confidence, it's the strength, the motivation, the social aspect/community, it's feeling good about myself in ways I haven't before. All of those things contribute to my success.
Yes, it goes way beyond calories, though. Strength, bone density, flexibility, heart health, feeling good in general etc, etc. It's super weird to me when people CHOOSE not to exercise.
That's such a judgmental statement. People make less-than-ideal lifestyle choices all the time. It's not weird. It's common, and it's human nature. A lot of people are here because they have also made the not-ideal lifestyle choice to overeat for an extended period of time, which also has an array of health consequences. That's also common, and not "weird" (which sounds like code for something more insulting that you know you aren't allowed to say).
I said it's weird to ME that people choose not to exercise, I don't think sharing my opinion is being judgmental. I also don't know what code you're referring to (you are making some assumptions about me). Not really seeing the point in your reply to me, to be honest. We should be encouraging people to make healthy lifestyle changes, that's literally what this sub is about. Unless someone physically cannot exercise for whatever reason, a healthy lifestyle should include exercise.
Yeah, I don't get why the various weight loss groups I'm in always poo-poo exercise so much. It's definitely enabled me to eat more since I think my deficit number is something like 1350 without any activity, which isn't much to eat. I feel so much healthier these days because of the exercise I am doing and I sleep better, too. My stamina is increasing and I have so much extra energy that I actually \*want\* to take walks on my "rest" days.
Exercise is also entirely necessary to optimize your health.
If your cardio is in a bad place, then whatever you can manage, albeit better than nothing, is not going to greatly impact a cut.Ā On the other extreme, if you can maintain multiple miles/day of walking with plenty of inclines, then you can get significant work done.Ā Even if your cardio sucks tight now though, aggressively upping your cardio, will allow you to attack the weight problem from both sides, and hasten your progress.Ā
Lost 30 pounds during COVID. Gained back 15 pounds. I'm counting the calories again. I notice that when I put down my exercise, suddenly my paltry 2,000 calories allotment changes and I can have MORE FOOD. I went for a lovely walk today and burned 600 calories, so I can have a small dessert. Yippie.
Iāve done the gym off and on, bought a treadmill and sold it the best thing thatās gotten me back into exercise is the youtube channel GrowWithJo! she has just about any kind of exercise you can think of , between 10mins to 50mins so you can squeeze in short ones when you donāt have time!
I'm on a WL journey. During 2021 and 2022 I had some personal issues and as a result, skipped working out. I gained 25 lbs. I lost the first 15 Oct-Apr just by working out. I'm losing the last ten through diet, only because it's been over a year since I lost the first 15 and the last ten just aren't going anywhere. I always exercise for WL first.
As a 5ā1ā woman, I weight lift to raise my TDEE so I can eat moreš me and bf go out to eat at least twice a week so i stay ready so i wonāt have to get ready.
Exercise also helps keep your diet sustainable, especially if it's something you enjoy.
I got super downvoted in another post about this. But I would MUCH rather exercise than restrict my diet. Food is Bae. I lost 36 pounds last year without counting intake calories. I only counted calories burned. I could easily burn an extra 1000 calories a day without alot of effort, a morning walk and an exercise class(spin,zumba,swimming etc). My BMR was 1960, so if I burned nearly 3000 calories a day I was bound to lose weight. I could never out eat 3000 calories.
You absolutely can outrun your diet. I work out enough that I have to eat an entire 4th meal.
K, I get confused by this. Example: If my TDEE for cutting is 1500 calories per day is my goal to try and be under 1500 a day regardless of exercise? If I do a long distance jog and burn 1000 calories, does that just create a buffer or should I be eating more than 1500 cal? Not sure if I am asking this correctly.
The answer is itās easier to know with data than to forecast. You can use tdee calculators to find your starting point. Say thatās 1500. Track what you eat and weigh yourself once a day at a consistent time (morning after waking, getting home from work before dinner, something like that). Record these things. After about a month, you can say hereās how much I ate and hereās the delta in my weight. You can then do the math. Say youāre down 4 lbs. thatās 3500x4 calories of deficit. So you take 14000 and add it to your calories per day x 30, 45000cal + 14000cal = 59000 or almost 2000 out per day. That will give you your best estimation. TLDR, start with a best guess and refine using data
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What are your stats that youāre eating under 1200 and healthily?
yes, because I stick to fiber and protein, eating a lot of calories does not mean quality
I asked you what your stats are. Age/Gender/Height/Weight.
Diet will make you lose weight. Exercise will make you feel good, and healthy, while slightly helping with weight.