How Many Calories Should I Eat
Everybody hates unwanted fat in the body as it is the reason of a number of life threatening diseases. In order to lead a healthy lifestyle, it is better to keep a watch on your diet and eat right. Earlier, the calorie track was often neglected by nutritionists and it was not before the 20th century that the idea became popular. Now, a lot of people are aware that they need to maintain their per day calorie intake however they don’t have adequate knowledge about how many calories should they eat. Today we will clear the question that How many calories should i eat?
Historically, the calorie measurement of a particular food was carried out by burning down the food in a machine into ashes with subsequent measure of the amount of heat and ash produced by the process indicating the food’s energy level. From then on, people have started calculating the calories they intake and the level of activities they have to carry out in order to burn them.
The calories requirement varies from person to person. It depends on a person’s sex, age, and level of activity. The activity levels can be categorized as sedentary, moderately active, and active. Let’s look into what does each refers to.
Sedentary lifestyle includes light activities only. The day-to-day work falls under this category.
Coming to moderately active; this refers to a lifestyle that requires physical activity equal to walking around 1.5 to 3 miles a day at a per hour average speed of 3 to 4 miles, along with the light physical activity carried out in order to perform routine day-to-day tasks.
A lifestyle is said to be active if in addition to work done associated with day to day activity, physical activity equal to walking more than 3 miles per day at an average speed of three to four miles per hour is also carried out.
The chart below indicates the amount of calories which a person should intake depending on multiple factors as described below:
| Gender | Age(years) | Sedentary | Moderately Active | Active |
| Child | 2-3 | 1,000 | 1,000-1,400 | 1,000-1,400 |
| Female | 4-8
9-13 14-18 19-30 31-50 51+ |
1,200 1,600 1,800 2,000 1,800 1,600 |
1,400-1,600
1,600-2,000 2,000 2,000-2,200 2,000 1,800 |
1,400-1,800
1,800-2,200 2,400 2,400 2,200 2,000-2,200 |
| Male | 4-8
9-13 14-18 19-30 31-50 51+ |
1,400
1,800 2,200 2,400 2,200 2,000 |
1,400-1,600
1,800-2,200 2,400-2,800 2,600-2,800 2,400-2,600 2,200-2,400 |
1,600-2,000
2,000-2,600 2,800-3,200 3,000 2,800-3,000 2,400-2,800 |
A balanced diet should contain adequate amount of carbohydrates, fats, and proteins. Once one knows how much calorie he’s required to intake he should be wise when deciding what to eat. Food containing fiber keeps the belly full for a long time thus saving the person from consuming extra calorie. Proteins and carbohydrates have around 4 calories per gram while fats have double.
In order to have a wide window of calories for the rest of the day, one should have light breakfast –for instance having egg white and vegetable. This will let the person have sufficient amount of calorie left to spare throughout the day.
Having healthy lifestyle doesn’t require one to starve himself. Depending on his activity level, he has to consume adequate calories in order to have enough energy to carry out the tasks.
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