How Many Calories Should I Eat to Lose Weight?
Do you often ask questions like, do calories contribute to gaining weight? How many calories should I eat to avoid getting fat? If yes, continue to read this post to identify how many calories you should eat to lose weight.
If you are overweight and willing to shed some extra mass, you are probably concerned about the number of calories you consume every day and how consumption contributes to weight gain or loss.
Losing weight may become a problem if you do not maintain its adequacy. So, does weight gain depend totally on consuming extra calories than sufficient?
Before you understand whether calories help you reduce weight or how many calories you should consume to lose weight, let's first understand what calories are in weight management.
Read ahead to understand how calories alter your weight, what role calories play in weight management, and why their role is so important.
Why Can Losing Weight Be Difficult But Necessary?
Gaining weight may be effortless but shedding extra fat is perhaps one of the most challenging tasks. You may try several tips and techniques available on the Internet only to fail in achieving weight loss.
If weight is not maintained to the adequacy, you will likely develop several internal and external physiological problems. Before you even realize it, having gained extra weight can drown you deep into falling prey to illnesses and serious ailments.
Here is a list of issues you may encounter when you gain weight, and it crosses the normal range.
● Your energy is stored in the form of fats, leading you to lack energy
● You get tired early
● Your body is flooded with toxins
● Your blood cholesterol level rises
● You become prone to diabetes
● Obesity can lead to heart problems
● You become intolerant to heat
● Breathing becomes difficult
● You develop a deficiency of various essential nutrients
● You develop dehydration
● You look older than your age
● Walking small distances becomes hectic and unachievable
● Muscle cramping becomes usual
● Nausea and diarrhea become frequent
● For females, menstruation is disturbed, including all of the above
What Role Do Calories Play In Weight Management?
Losing weight may appear to be one of the most challenging tasks globally. Nonetheless, if you know the role that calories play in weight management, it becomes pretty easy to lose weight.
You can also calculate the number of calories you consume daily to manage the number of calories you intake to lose weight faster and effectively.
Calories play a vital role in weight management. If you want to lose weight or even keep your weight to the desired amount, you must try to attain caloric balance. If you do not know what caloric balance is, then this post will come to your rescue.
Caloric balance is attained when the number of calories you intake equals the number of calories you burn. The number of calories you burn through a workout equals the number of calories you consume.
Calories also contribute to weight gain. When you consume calories, and they do not burn, the excess calories are stored in the form of fat, hence aiding in weight gain.
In case you want to lose weight, you are required to burn the excess calories stored in the form of fat and the existing calories to a certain level where you do not become calorie deficient on an abnormal level.
What Should Be The Daily Intake Of Calories?
Burning calories may result in weight loss and help you achieve your desired weight. However, excess burning of calories may result in adverse consequences. Therefore, it is recommended that you understand how much calorie intake daily is sufficient.
On average, how many calories an individual should consume depends on the age, levels of physical activities, and metabolic rate. It varies from person to person based on their physiology.
Nonetheless, the recommended daily intake on an average in men is 2500 calories, while for women, it is 2000 calories. This too varies based on age, metabolic rate, and physical activity of the individual.
If the weight is different from the average recommended weight, the number of calories may differ from 2000 to 1500.
Do Calories Contribute To Gaining Weight?
People who want to gain muscle generally increase their calorie intake. It is remarkable how altering the number of calories consumed can help you adjust weight, enabling you to lose or gain weight by following the calories you intake.
Calories help in weight reduction while also aiding in gaining weight. An individual tends to gain weight if the amount of calories consumed is more than the number of calories the body burns through exercise and metabolism.
If you keep track of the number of calories you consume for 3 to 4 weeks, it becomes convenient also to keep track of how it will affect your body weight.
Suppose the consumed amount of calories is more than the number of calories you burn through physical activities and metabolism. You are very likely to gain weight as the excess calories are stored as muscle.
Is It Possible To Lose Weight Based On The Amount Of Calories You Consume?
As mentioned earlier, keeping track of your calorie intake will aid weight loss and weight gain. It is based on the number of calories stored in your body after you burn some through exercise or metabolism.
To lose weight, you should first track down the calories you consume regularly. Continue this practice for a few weeks. This will help you track down the average intake of calories, helping you decide how much you should cut down to avoid gaining muscle.
To lose weight, you must burn more calories than you consume. Once you know how much is your routine intake of calories, it becomes much easier to understand how many calories you should cut.
How To Calculate Calories To Lose Weight?
Keeping a count of calories you consume is the first step towards weight reduction. In case of gaining weight, keeping track of your calorie consumption is a prerequisite. Nonetheless, the question remains, how to calculate calories to lose weight?
You can find several apps and websites that help you provide calorie calculators. If you do not wish to use these apps and websites, you can also calculate calories manually on your own.
Here is how you can calculate calories in food. Since 1 gram of protein equals 4 calories, the same is for carbohydrates. There are 3500 kilocalories in one pound. Therefore, calculating the number of calories depends on how much protein, carbohydrates, and fat the food contains.
Once you know how much protein is present in the food, multiply it by 4. Do the same for carbohydrates since 1 gram of carbohydrates equals 4 calories. Fat's equivalent amount of calories is 9 calories per gram of fat.
Fat, carbohydrates, and protein are the macronutrients that account for all the calories present in the food item. Multiply the caloric equivalent of each macronutrient. The product you get from each macronutrient indicates the contribution of calories each macronutrient gives.
Do You Need To Burn Calories To Lose Weight?
Try whatever you want, and switch to any diet you like. Nevertheless, if your target is to lose weight, it cannot be done without burning the already existing calories in your body.
We opt for several habits when trying to lose weight through the intake of calories. In doing so, we sometimes make the wrong choices. There are a few things that you must know to reach your target weight by cutting off a certain amount of calories.
It is recommended that you consult your health adviser before cutting off some calories from your diet. Nevertheless, the following tips may help you ensure a specific cut down on your calorie intake.
● Avoid over-snacking
— snacking may not be all bad, but sometimes frequent consumption increases the number of calories we consume, and if they are left unburnt, it may result in weight gain.
Unless you want to gain weight, snacking between meals is your thing, using an unhealthy pattern. However, to lose weight and avoid consuming more calories than you can burn, you should avoid snacking between meals.
● Avoid drinking your calories
— the juices and drinks that we usually consume contain incredibly high amounts of calories. Drinking a single serving of juice or soda that may be 12 ounces or 355mL will add 150 calories to your regular calorie intake.
If your target is to lose weight, avoid drinking beverages such as soda or bottled and canned juices. They contain a high amount of calories in them, and just by consuming a single serving pack, you will be taking in more calories than you can burn.
Drink water instead. It keeps you hydrated and aids in weight reduction, but it also helps satiate calorie cravings.
● Eat fruits and vegetables that help burn calories
A long list of foods available on the Internet helps reduce weight by burning excess calories. These foods include fruits and vegetables, apple cider vinegar, herbs, and spices.
Consuming low-calorie foods or foods that help burn calories can help you lose weight and manage an adequate target weight of your choice.
Can Weight Be Lost Only Through Intake Of Calories?
You may wonder whether you can lose weight by monitoring calories alone or not. If such is the case, then the answer to your query lies ahead in this post.
Reducing the number of calories you consume per day is an effective method to reduce weight. Taking control of your calories may help you stop gaining any additional weight, but you will need to burn your calories to shed some extra fat.
Burning the already existing calories while maintaining the adequacy of how many calories you consume may help you stop gaining any extra muscle.
However, it is not enough unless you burn the excess calories stored in your body. Diet alone may not help you shed extra fat but will help you maintain an approximately fixed weight.
How Many Calories Per Meal Should You Consume to Lose Weight?
As mentioned earlier, the amount of calories that an individual should consume to maintain the adequacy of weight entirely depends on a person's levels of physical activities, age, size, height, and nutritional requirements.
Nonetheless, there are some recommendations based on which you can limit your calorie intake and monitor it as per your desire. Another factor that plays a role in average calorie intake is gender, and men and women require different amounts of calories to lose weight.
An average male individual of age range 19 to 30 years needs 2,400 to 3,000 calories. To lose weight, individuals of this age group are recommended to take 1,500 to 2,500 calories.
The recommended calorie intake for males aged 31 to 59 is 2,200 to 3,000 calories. To lose weight or maintain adequacy, they should consume 1,500 to 2,200 calories on a daily scale.
For male individuals above the age of 60, the recommended calorie intake is 2,000 to 2,600 calories which should be reduced to 1,500 to 2,000 based on their physiological conditions and weight.
In women, the average calorie intake for 19 to 30 and 31 to 59 varies from 2,000 to 2,400 calories. In case of weight reduction, the calorie intake should be 1,400 to 2,000 depending on the individual's physiological conditions and weight.
The Final Word!
Losing weight may not be that difficult if you understand how to track your calories.
Once you master calculating your daily calorie intake, it becomes easier to understand how many calories you should consume daily and how much you should cut to attain your desired weight.
Reducing calorie intake may not be sufficient, as burning calories is necessary to lose weight. However, some physical activity, foods that help burn calories, and monitoring your calorie intake can help you lose weight faster and more effectively.