How do calories work? I bike 5 miles, I lose ~120-150 calories. But a small snack can be more than that?

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Trying to lose weight and putting it in numbers is demoralizing. I’ve started riding a stationary bike for 5 miles and then doing minor weight lifting after and I maaaaybe lose 200 or so calories. Is that not a good exercise? I’ve been doing this almost everyday starting 2 weeks ago. But it’s starting to feel useless if it’s such a minor amount of calories burnt. Is this a good trend to continue? What am I missing?

Edit: everyone here has been incredibly helpful, and surprisingly consistent with one another. I feel much more confident about what I’m doing and what I need to do. Seriously, thank you all.

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Anonymous 0 Comments

Exercise to get become stronger/faster, but if you need to lose weight pretty much the only thing you should think about is eating less.

I’ll go further than that: don’t even really worry about “eating better”. Most diet fads and diet foods are ways to trick your body into fewer calories whilst still eating a lot, and they often fail. Literally just eat a lot less.

Eat one sandwich for lunch. Like just the sandwich, not a sandwich and a snickers and a pack of crisps and a slice of cake for an office birthday later. One sandwich and you’re done.

It sucks and it’s hard but when I internalised that I lost the weight.

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