Calorie Deficit - Too big?

[BHB1982]

I've been on a mission for the past month. I recently purchased a BodyBugg to measure how many calories I expend during each 24 hour period. I also track every meal and measure my calorie deficit each day.

My trainer wants me to be at a 1000 calorie deficit per day and she'd like me to stay as close to that as possible. The problem is that I find I'm having larger deficits. One day this week it was 1300, today it was 1700. Does anyone know if there is a negative to such a large deficit? I'm eating 5 times a day already.

In the first month I lost 12 pounds and 9 inches. So I'm obviously doing something right, but could such a large deficit be negative?

Thank you for any advice!

[pierini]

Time will tell and answer your question. In general, I think most of us are overfed. Your answer will come by your fitness performance and the energy level you have in your normal daily activities.

I am eating less food now than I have in a long time. I did experience some loss of strength and strength endurance but found that my body has an amazing ability to adapt and so does yours.

Eat the least amount of food to have the most amount of energy and strength if that makes any sense. Listen to what your body is telling you and less to what you read and what other people tell you and you'll do fine.

[CallieDurbrow]

As long as you are eating enough to support your training plans and you feel that you are energized, I don't think you will have a huge problem. If you start to plateau and stop seeing results it's either time to re-evaluate your nutrition or to change up your workout. If you are with a trainer the workout part should be no problem. Be sure to eat enough of the right stuff, that's the key. Lean meats, veggies, fruits, low fat dairy, nuts, and whole grains. Stay away from the starches and empty calories.
Good luck!

Too much of a deficit can be an issue if your body freaks out, thinks it's starving and decides to hold on to everthing it can. But since you're losing weight, you obviously don't have that problem. As long as you're losing weight and feeling good in and out of the gym, don't worry.

[minime]

I wouldn't freak out about it too much, but don't fall into the trap of trying to create larger and larger deficits. 1000 calories is a good deficit, and if you are using the body bugg than it is a pretty good estimate of your calories out. so, stick to what your trainer says if you can.

[bodyshop20]

I would go for 500 under daily needed cals, fast off is fast on.
Lose fat slow you will keep it off longer

[Shannon Clark]

One thing you don't mention is what your current weight/body fat is and the composition of your diet.

That is an incredibly large deficit to be running and it may be alright if you're significantly over weight right now.

With that type of deficit, I'd also strongly recommend you're getting 1.5 grams of protein per pound of lean body mass. This is critical to help prevent losing muscle mass, which would slow your metabolism down over the long run.

Also, since I'm willing to guess the carb intake is pretty low in your diet (unless you have a maintenance of 4000+/day), you might want to consider implementing carb refeeds every so often too.

This will help offset the metabolic slow-down that could happen on such a lowered calorie intake and help normalize the thyroid hormones.