How Many Calories to Lose Weight | Calorie Calculator

Every food label has nutrition information.  There are many important things to know when you’re trying to lose weight: grams of protein, carbohydrates, sodium, and especially how many calories per serving.  If you eat too many calories, you’re going to gain weight.  There’s no getting around it.  If you’re going to lose weight, you need to burn more calories than you take in.  It’s a pretty straight-forward principle that’s hard to avoid.

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But our bodies also don’t do well with too few calories each day, either. When it does, it feels a threat and stores calories. You can easily gain fat by eating too little or the wrong types of calories.

I’ve heard a lot of people say they can’t figure out why they can’t lose weight on their diet. They are always starving and they are eating like a mouse.

I fall into this category when I hit a plateau in my weight loss. My problem in the past hasn’t been eating too many calories. I’ve always seemed logical to me that if I’m hungry, I’m losing weight. My problem in dieting and proper nutrition planning is that I eat too little. It still is a problem for me if I’m not careful.

I know you’re thinking, “Why is eating too few calories a problem if you’re trying to lose weight?” Well, at first it isn’t a problem. You can go for a week or two and lose weight. But after a while, your body goes in to starvation mode and starts to store energy because it’s not sure when it’s going to get enough sustenance again. So instead of seeing pounds lost on your scale, all you get is a headache and a grumpy attitude from not losing any weight at all and hitting a plateau in your weight loss.

Here’s a great real life example that shows what I’m talking about…

My friend, Rick, was a record producer. He lived the rock star lifestyle. He showed up to the recording studio at 10 am. Worked until 8 pm. He was so busy, he didn’t make time to eat until 9 pm at night. As a result, he got fat. He found his way to a dietitian to help him lose weight. He was shocked to find out her recommendation for him was to eat so much that he actually felt like throwing up for the better part of the first two weeks. She recommended the proper amount of calories he needed to get through each day. (Not to mention not skipping breakfast and lunch and healthy snacks in between!) Once he started eating more calories the weight melted off. Before seeing the dietitian, he was in starvation mode. Once his body knew it was going to get enough calories to support its needs, it released the energy stores and he lost a lot of weight.

How many calories should I eat to lose weight?

I’m glad you asked! Wouldn’t it be awesome if there was some sort of calorie calculator you could just input some simple information and it would just tell you how many calories to consume each day? (See Form above)

Well there is. It’s called the Benedict Harris Equation. Here’s an explanation of what it is taking into consideration and how it comes to the numbers that it does.

First, we need to talk about BMR, or Basal Metabolic Rate. Your BMR is how many calories you expend each day at rest. It takes a lot to keep your organs working! So it’s important to know what your BMR is as a starting point. You might be surprised to find you’re not eating enough and have to ADD calories.

You need to create a 3500 caloric deficit in order to lose one pound of fat. You can either do this by exercise or eating less, or a combination of both. To lose one pound a week, you need to create a 500 calorie deficit per day for seven days. You can either burn 500 calories on a treadmill each day, etc., or eat 500 calories less per day, or burn 250 calories at the gym and eat 250 less calories a day. If you want to lose two pounds per week, you need to create a 1000 calorie per day deficit, and so on. Got it? Good!

Next you need to know how many calories you burn in the course of your daily activity level. Those who live a fairly sedentary lifestyle don’t burn nearly as many calories as an elite athlete. Determining this calorie expenditure is key, as well. (Note: athletes may need more calories than this calculator will show. Refer to Michael Phelps and his well-known 12,000 calorie per day diet! Seek the advice of a personal trainer or dietitian if you feel you aren’t getting enough calories whether you are an athlete or not.)

Is your head spinning yet with all this info? When I was originally researching caloric intake several years ago, I was totally lost, too, until my personal trainer friend, Tommy, introduced me to the Benedict Harris Equation. This equation is a great weight loss calculator to help you figure out how many calories to lose weight based on your Basal Metabolic Rate and physical activity levels. This will not be an exact measurement for everyone, but a great rule of thumb. Other factors can vary your BMR, like body fat percentage, certain medications you may be taking, health problems you may have, etc. Again, this is a great general rule of thumb you can use without having to spend money of devices that you wear that monitor calories spent.

Having said all this, you’ll notice that I don’t show how many calorie deficit you need to create to lose more than 2.5 pounds per week. That’s because most experts recommend not losing more than this per week on a long term basis. It’s possible to lose more weight than this at the beginning of your weight loss because you may lose a lot of water weight. But after that’s gone, your goal is to lose fat and losing more than 2.5 to 3 pounds per week can actually work against you in the long run in reaching a healthy weight. (There are a ton of other factors and issues that I’ll deal with in other articles regarding rapid weight loss.)

As you begin to lose weight, whether you are taking a fast or more steady approach (2.5 pounds per week or 1 pound a week) you should come back after you’ve lost between 5 to 10 pounds to re-evaluate your caloric needs as they will change with weight loss – which is a GREAT thing! Once you’ve reached your goal weight, you can again use this principle for weight maintenance by finding your ideal caloric intake for you specific activity level.

That’s about it. The Benedict Harris Equation is a great tool to help you safely lose weight. As always, if you have any questions please contact me.

About David Simpson

David Simpson is a writer, musician, fitness and wellness geek and the one behind SlimCotton.com. He lives in Lynden, Washington and is a very proud papa!