So what exactly is "Very Active" -- and should I really be eating 2050 cals per day?!

I know that some form of this question gets asked pretty much every day, but this is just driving me nuts.

I'm 5'6", 27yo and right now hovering between 179-181. I've been this weight for about 2-3 weeks now. I exercise pretty intensely 5 days a week, with a total of about 3 1/2 - 4 hours of exercise a week with about 2 hours of strength training and the rest as interval cardio (if anyone is familar with The FIRM line of exercise videos, I rotate through my stash of about 20 different workout videos). I have been been exercising since January, and I can really start to tell the difference in both my strength and stamina, however I have only lost about 4 pounds since I started seriously counting calories in mid-March.

I'm zig-zagging my calories, but I'm trying to average about 1600-1700 a day. I eat lots and lots of lean protien, beans, fruits, salads... I'm not perfect. Goldfish crackers are a weakness, and I usually have a few small pieces of chocolate for dessert every night. 

Using the calorie count tools it says that with Moderate Activity I should be eating about 1750 cals a day to reach my goal weight sometime in November, and with Very Active I should be eating more like 2050. I'm reluctant to call my routine "very" active--I'm a student and I spend most of my day sitting in class or working at my computer. 

I can definately feel my muscles are much more toned than when I started in January, and thought that maybe some of weight I would expect to be losing could be explained away by that.. but at the calorie deficit that I've been at I should have lost about 5ish more pounds than I have. There's absolutely no way I have put on 5+ pounds of muscle in a month. Am I just not eating enough? I'd really hate to increase my intake and then start gaining weight, but I just don't understand how I'm holding on to this weight. Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

If you get no other exercise other than the videos, you're moderately active.  BUT you say you're a student.  How do you get to classes?  If you walk to school or if you take the bus but then have to do a fair amount of walking around campus, you may well be 'very active'.  Do you do any sort of extra curriculars that involve standing (e.g. school productions - either participating or working on sets, etc.)?  Do you have a part time job that involves standing/walking?

I started off at 178 pounds and had a roughly similar activity level to what you're describing (a little less formal exercise, but more standing/walking/gardening), and I found 1700 cals/day average worked really well for me.  I have since raised both my calories and my activity level (incorporating heavy lifting; as I understand it, The FIRM is more light lifting with cardio?), but that's what worked for the first 20 pounds/4 months.

I am also confused about the activity levels. If I drop my activity setting to sedentary, and add in my exercise, according to their calculator I am still burning way more than my body is actually losing. I should be losing 2.7 # a week if I go by the numbers, which is way too fast, but if I bump up my calories, I stall. I'm sorry this isn't really a reply to your question, but I am in the same confused boat as you.

I am no expert, but all the numbers we use here on this site are "estimates" based on averages.  If you log your weight regularly you should really pay more attention to the trend line than the actual numbers on the scale, since there is so much variability from day to day it can get hard to understand whether you have really lost or not.

Even on the intake side of the equation, it is really hard to know exactly how much you are eating--there is always some room for error (how much cheese was really in that omelet I ate this morning?).

So, to really know how much you burn and how much you really eat, you need to continue for a long enough period (probably at least a month), then, if the trend says you are losing a pound per week, you know that you are burning 500 calories more per day than you ate.  Go back and look at your food log, add 500 calories, and that is what you really burned, and you know know your actual burn rate and can make adjustments either to your food intake (most reliable) or your activity (harder to make big differences).

The exercise/burn numbers are very approximate.  Different people (even with the same age/height/weight/gender) will burn different numbers of calories doing the same exercise based on things like: how fit they are to start with (more fit = less calories burned), how much effort they're putting into it (more effort = more calories burned), are they running/biking with or against the wind or up/down hills or on a treadmill in a gym. 

Also, unless you're weighing your food, it's very likely you're underreporting.  What most people think a tablespoon of peanut butter looks like is significantly more than what a tablespoon of peanut butter is.  A bowl of cereal is highly unlikely to be one serving.  It's normally at least two (unless you weigh it into the bowl).  So there could be discrepancies on that end too.

When all's said and done, though, if you're losing a pound a week (for example), that's something to be happy about - and it's not worth worrying about why CC says the math works out to 2.5 pounds per week because you've found a good balance.  If you get to a point where you're plateauing, then it's time to figure out where the mistakes are.

Well I'm sure that there is wiggle room in both my calorie counts and my approximate burn. I do however have a food scale, and weigh out most of the portions of food that I eat, so I'd like to hope my intake estimations are relatively accurate. 

I also have been keeping an eye on the trend line, but it has completely flattened out since I have not gained nor lost weight in about 2 weeks. I know I'm getting too much exercise to go to a 1200 calorie diet.. but i just don't get why I'm not losing any weight when I know that I've been very good about a workout routine and have been eating at a calorie deficit for over a month now. 

How is your water intake?  Check it here:

http://nutrition.about.com/library/blwatercal culator.htm

If you're taking in less than you should, you could be retaining water in your tissues like nobody's business.  I've seen people increase their water intake and, after about 1 week or so of the body retaining MORE water (and the scale creeping up), it finally relaxes, figures the "drought" is over, lets it go, and several pounds can drop off all at once.

Too much caffeine can increase your need for water; any alcohol will drastically increase your need for water; exercise/sweating increases your need for water; ingesting sodium increases your need for water.  It's so, so easy not to drink enough and end up retaining.

Hello,

We have pretty similar stats - I'm also 27, 5'6.5", about 170.5 lbs, and a student  =P

I'm quite active and I find that if I average about 1800 or 1900 calories a day I can lose weight fairly steadily but I have to be careful not to go below that or my body freaks out after a couple of days and I end up over-eating.

Have you tried using a heart rate monitor to show you exactly how many calories you're burning during exercise? I got one recently and it really sets my mind at ease to know for sure that I am burning as much as I had previously estimated. If you're able to buy one or borrow one for a while, it might help you to see if there is a problem with your calculations or not.

I hadn't really thought of getting a heart meter. Maybe I'll look into that. I work up quite a sweat when I'm working out and hadn't really thought anything more about it. I'm trying to take everyone's advice and look for other signs of weight loss (a lot of my clothes have started fitting better lately), but I think I am going to try and up my calorie intake for a week and see where that gets me. 

Thanks again for the advice everyone.

Heart meters are great and some of them have built in calorie counters, so you see what you are burning. Great for HRIT. I loved the water advice too, our bodies are built to survive, so it makes sense that they wouldn't want to let go of what used to be scarce resources.