How many calories?

help! i'm desperately trying to loose at least 50lbs on my own. i may end up going the long haul on my own. but i need to at least get off 50lbs so that my insurance will cover lap band. (insurance issues is why i may try and do it all on my own) anyway, my question is, how do i know how many calories i should be taking in a day? per suggestion in a thread i made a couple days ago i've been trying to keep my calories between 800-1000. i've been doing that ok without having any hunger issues. but i'm concerned that i will just end up putting my body in starvation mode and loose nothing. i went to another site where you put in your info and it tells you how many calories you should be eating a day and it said i should be getting 1733 calories in. that seems high to me! my info: i'm 32 yrs old. i weighed 344 last friday at my consult visit. (i cannot weigh at home because i'm too heavy so no idea if i've lost/gained since then)  i have a mostly sedentary lifestyle. i don't have a job and spend most of the day at home on the computer. i have been walking at least half a mile a day. and yes, i know a nutritionist could help me out better. but, due to my insurance not covering nutrtionist visits i cannot afford that. that would be why i got in this fix in the first place. i've always felt that if i could just afford to get some help i could loose the weight. unfortunately not everyone can afford what it costs to visit a nutritionist and to do the costly weight loss programs like weigh****chers.

In the previous thread another person asked about the MD supervised weight loss as part of the qualification for any procedure. Have you checked with your insurance company to see if this is a possibility?  On our website, we see many people for supervised weight loss who are referred by their physician.  It's worth a shot. From your message, I understand that you are eating 800-1000 kcals per day and exercising a little.  If you want to keep your body from going into "starvation mode" you may need to bump up your calories a little (like to 1200 or so) AND increase your activity. Can you walk 2-3 times per day? Increase your distance? Mix in other activities? It sounds to me like you have a good plan to start with.  Work your plan and see what happens. Don't forget to use the resources here on OH and calorie counters that are out there. Another good step is to keep a food and exercise diary to help keep yourself accountable.  The more accurate your record keeping, the more likely you will be able to identify trends for 'stress eating' or 'boredom eating'. You are good to go - get started! We are still here to help. Danielle Halewijn RD eNutritioncare.com

How can you know what you should eat if you don't know what you do eat?  Why not use Fitday or something to track what you eat for a week?  Not limit just keep track.  Then eat 500 calories a day less to lose 1 lb in a week.  7 x 500 = 3500.  It takes 3500 calories of more output than input to lose 1 lb.  For most of my life I starved myself trying to eat 1200 calories a day.  I burn 10 calories a lb.  That means I should have weighed 120 lbs not 276 lbs.  Now I eat 1650 lbs and am alomost down to 165 lbs.  1650 calories is a lot easier to live on then 1200 calories.  good luck, Linda (accountant not a dietician)

ummm i said in my post that i was keeping my calories between 800-1000. of course, that thread is now old. i only did that per suggestion in another thread. shortly after, like after maybe a max of 3 days of me following that, i realized from reading that that was too few calories but did not know how many i should go for. now i'm keeping it at no more than 1500ish. still don't know if that is about right, but it's working so far because i've lost 15lbs. i'll be seeing my regular dr oct 9th and will see what she can tell me then because i haven't been able to find a straight and consistent answer either here, nor anywhere on the net. just recently i went to a website that told me i needed to eat 3500 calories a day. that's nuts. and i DO use fitday. i started a written food log back in august and switched to fitday like a month ago. everything i eat goes in there. all the exercise i do goes in there.