Dieting 101: Calories/Food

[mtomm[$]]

Angie asked in another thread about what % of fat she should be getting in her diet.

Unfortunately, % don't help us much when deciding on the amount of a nutrient each person needs.

The best way to find out how man fats/protein/carbohydrate you need each day is to use your current weight and your lean body mass. This way you aren't comparing yourself to a 250 lb weight lifter! It should depend on the make-up of your body and not some number someone pulls out of their ... hat. The formula of 1 gram per pound of lean body mass is well documented. You can trust me on this part.

Lean Body Mass Calculator

My LBM is 108 pounds.

For protein requirements when dieting you need at least 1 gram of protein for each pounds of lean body mass.

From there I figure I need 108 grams of protein each day (1gxlbm).

For fat you need .5 gram for each pound of lean body mass or 54 grams for me.

Fill in the rest of your calories with carbohydrates to keep you comfortable and happy.

If I am eating 1600 calories a day that works out to 432 calories of protein and 486 calories of fat.

BUT ALL YOU REALLY need to worry about it the macro totals for each day. And those are minimums so if you eat more than that of each you are fine. Carbohydrates do funny things to people and everyone has a different comfort level (blood sugar highs/lows) so you may choose to up the protein or fat and get fewer carbohydrates.

Carbohydrates are not essential like protein and fats so you can manipulate them higher and lower to fit your needs.

Make sense?

[mtomm[$]]

And one other thing:

your body doesn't care where the calories come from. Fat doesn't make you fat. Too many calories = fat. Too few calories = weight loss.


It also doesn't care where the deficit comes from. But it is almost impossible to exercise off a poor diet.

[lynnzop[$]]

Okay, so if my LBM is 124 (that's horrible), I need 124g of protein a day and 62g of fat? That seems awfully high. But if I wanted to get to a LBM of 108, I should drop my intake to that amount (108g protein, 54g fat) and fill in the blanks with carbs?

[mtomm[$]]

NO NO NO you want a HIGH LBM, that is the GOOD stuff. I'm jealous of your 124 that is SO GREAT.

You are trying to INCREASE or at least maintain your 124 LBM.

ETA: on that calculator be sure to choose your sex. 124 seems kinda high, did you choose female?

[thinkerlady[$]]

So the idea is to find out the LBM. That is the minimum amount of protein. Divide that in half, to find the minimum amount of fat. Ok--how do I convert grams to calories?

Do I just select the total calories per day?? I have heard lots of stories--1000, 1200, 1500?? What is a good starting point?

[lynnzop[$]]

mtomm said

NO NO NO you want a HIGH LBM, that is the GOOD stuff. I'm jealous of your 124 that is SO GREAT.

You are trying to INCREASE or at least maintain your 124 LBM.

ETA: on that calculator be sure to choose your sex. 124 seems kinda high, did you choose female?

Oops, I pretended I was a man. Now it's 109. So you can quit being jealous.

[mtomm[$]]

lynnzop said

Oops, I pretended I was a man. Now it's 109. So you can quit being jealous.

Well, yes that makes me feel much better!

Angie, all you need to determine now is how many calories you need to eat each day. This is also dependent on your body weight. And you can take 12xBW to get a rough estimate.

THE best way to know a good dieting calorie range is to track what you are eating currently everyday without trying to limit calories. If you aren't losing/gaining you'll know your maintenance calories. Subtract 10-20% from those calories and aim for those calories everyday. Get in your minimum protein and fat grams and fill in carbs and your golden.

Here is an example of last Wednesday when I ate exactly 1500 calories:

Total:		1500
Fat:	68	611	42%
Sat:	24	217	15%
Poly:	14	124	8%
Mono:	25	228	16%
Carbs:	115	425	29%
Fiber:	8	0	0%
Protein:	108	434	29%
Alcohol:	0	0

Somedays I'll have higher protein and lower fat or higher carbs and lower fat but as long as I get the minimums I'm good.

[mtomm[$]]

Oh, and don't look at my fiber I'm really bad about getting in all my 25 grams. Aim for 25 grams fiber.

[thinkerlady[$]]

Ok Margo, I did that. Now the LBM = minimum protein, and half of that is minimum fat grams. Do I convert the grams to calories? Or just let fitday do that for me??

I think I am starting to get it, but bear with me, sometimes I am a slow learner.

[theworm[$]]

feel better - mine is 105

[mtomm[$]]

Let's not worry about our LBM it is very difficult to increase that number unless we start taking steroids and none of us is going to do that. We CAN increase it by lifting heavy (for you) weights but lets just worry about keeping what get got okay.

The sucky thing about dieting is this little scenario that I made up in my head to help me remember a few important things:

We think: I am dieting. I'm getting healthy and doing great things for my body.

Our body thinks: Oh, my goodness she is trying to STARVE me to death. I'm going to do everything I can to live.

We think: I'm going to feel so good with this extra FAT off.

Our body thinks: I'm going to die! Let's see, fat really is easy to keep around because it doesn't use hardly any energy (calories) but that dang muscle just burns it up! I'll use muscle and fat to make up the energy difference.

We step on the scale: cool! I've lost 2 pounds. (But two pounds of what?)

Body says: Cool, I can lower my metabolic rate because I weigh less and it will take less energy to keep me going, Whew! I'm not going to die.

BUT we lift around some heavy weights.

Body says: Wait! She is using this muscle. It must be very important. I better use fat for my energy today instead!

Cool. We've fooled our body into losing weight and keeping our muscle!

Yeah for us!

[theworm[$]]

my body doesn't think as much as yours

[mtomm[$]]

Ha! The problem is our bodies don't think like we do!

[emeleel]

My body thinks it really, really loves junk food.

[MiracleMax]

According to the calculator my LBM is 111 lbs, but I was actually measured with calipers about a month ago. I can't remember what we came up with, but I want to say it was higher, around 122, but I could be wrong. I'll try to find the paperwork and see what it actually was.

Although, when I look at the percentage, it sounds about right, so maybe I'm just remembering incorrectly.

[mtomm[$]]

I'm sure there would be a variance between your calipers reading and the online calculator. I'd probably say the caliper one would be more accurate but you could just average them and call it close enough. Or go with the bigger one.

[MiracleMax]

Went back and checked my paperwork, and I was right, according to the calipers I have 122 lbs LBM, which isn't great, but isn't bad. I'd like to get the percentage of body fat down though.

[mtomm[$]]

I bet you can't have very much body fat!

[mtomm[$]]

I bet you can't have very much body fat!

[MiracleMax]

More than I'd like. I'm on the high end of the "healthy" range for my age/height. I'd like to get it down to at least the mid-range if I can. I go back for another assessment around the end of August, so we'll see where I'm at then.