I'm 6.5 months out and have lost around 85 pounds. I was eating around 1200 calories a few months back but my weight loss was really incredibly slow. I then had some stress at home and without meaning to was consuming from 600-800. Now I have on average around 700-900 but I can't seem to get back to the 1200 I was aiming for before. My weight loss really sped up on less calories, even though my exercise routine stopped due to stress at home. I'm really worried about my hair because I'm thinking if I was eating slightly more, maybe my hair wouldn't be falling out so much. You can't notice it to look at me but if i pull my outer layer of hair up I can see some new thin hairs growing close to my scalp.

Does it make a huge difference to hair loss if I am at 800 or 1200 calories? My mum wants me back at least up to 1000 but psychologically it's hard now. I've accidently noticed my weight loss speed up when I eat less and now I'm trying to keep it at a maximum of 800. I heard a while back that people lose more if they eat more and I was aiming at 1200 then but the weight loss was about a pound a week so for some reason the 700-800 calories pushed it to 3 pounds a week, even though I wasn't doing exercise.

I'm not sure what to do. Is 800 really very low?

My surgeon says 600-800 calories a day during the losing stage. Hair loss isn't from too few calories as we are burning our fat if we need more caloies to fuel our metabolisms. Some common causes of hair loss are anesthesia, major surgery, thyroid problems, and rapid weight loss. Most of us have 3 of the 4, so no wonder we lose hair. Your hair will grow back over time.

Protein will matter more than calories, and so will time (generically). For hairloss, that is. Neither may matter if your hairloss is the result of body trauma, and not a deficiency. It's pretty unusual for hairloss to last much longer than a year, if that helps you feel any better.