You should have never went under 1500 calories in the first place.....that's not healthy for anyone

The only thing you might have proven is that you might need to brush up on your math. Countless studies have proven that in order to lose weight you must be in a caloric deficit, and vise versa for gaining weight. So if you are losing weight there are two options here: 1. You re miscalculating your caloric intake. 2. Your TDEE is higher than the number of calories you are putting in. So please, no more voodoo talk - read a book. Thank you.

A calorie deficit is totally what s needed, the reason you struggled to get as lean before is because your metabolism was running so slow due to the tiny amount of energy being fed in as opposed to the high level of energy being expended, when these extremes are made the body needs to survive and so it adjusts it metabolism to preserve the only form of energy it can rely on and that is body fat. Youve obviously continued to repair the situation and admirably so by training and eating smarter, clean or dirty calories are calories, but now because of engaging in resistance work therefore forcing the body to build muscle and so increase it resting metabolic rate. I was in the same situation for the last 2 years prepping for shows, not enough calories in and way to much cardio, my metabolism was truly messed up and so when i did at first increase my calories i gained a tonn of fat, and so for the past year i have been slowly increasing my calorie load to a high enough level so that now while i am prepping for my 3rd show i had somewhere to drop it back to without it falling so riciculously low, i am actually heavier, leaner and still eating carbs and doing no cardio at all. Occasionally i may do a very quick HIT cardio session maybe once a week if i feel i need it or if im not lifting weights that day. But i guess the take home message here is people need to stop concerning at first with getting cut or lean, but instead, of eating a good solid healthy diet, yes lots of natural foods from across the food groups, eat to build and repair, then after time maybe even upto a year, then start to look at either increasing some activity or reducing some calories to create a better deficit in order to lose some body fat. Rome wasnt built in a day, and so this has to be a lifetyle! Hope some of this makes sence, cos now when i read it back im wondering if this may get missunderstood. Either way thanks for reading :)

totally agree with #eladophir, calorie is just unit of energy and quantity of the calories is important.

yes...great!