Calorie intake to maintain body weight

Question
hi i am 5ft5 and just over 8 stone. im not very active so i was wondering if you can tell me how many calories i shoud eat a day to maintain my weight. thank you

Answer
Emma,

Calorie needs depends on more factors than you give me. For example, a 20 years old moderately active female needs about 1800 Cal. a day while a 50 years old women with same physical activity needs only 1600 Cal. If the hypothetical females are sedentary, they need 1600 and 1450 Cal., respectively.

Also, a person on a low carbohydrate high-fat diet needs about 300 extra Cal. a day (comparing with someone on a low-fat diet) to maintain body weight, given the same amount of calories, the low carb dieter will lose weight.

To add to the problem, there's no consensus about the best formula to calculate the energy needs so different calculators will show you different results.

What's more, you cant truly know how much energy (calories) you are getting with anything at all. Please read these articles for explanation:

Calorie Controversies
http://atkinszone.com/2008/03/calorie-controversies.html

Calorie = calorie = calorie?
http://atkinszone.com/2008/03/calorie-calorie-calorie.html

Tanya Zilberter

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