It’s easy to believe that your fat loss timeline will represent a steady amount of lost weight each week, provided you stick to your strategy. After all, how often do we hear that a healthy diet means losing 1 to 2 pounds per week? The trouble with that estimate is that a healthy weight loss strategy causes the body to go through a number of phases along the way. While you might lose that number of pounds on average, it may not look nearly as consistent as you’ve come to assume.
(more…)If you’re trying to reduce, then seeing a lower number on the bathroom scale for no reason may seem like a gift, but it’s important to know the causes of weight loss in females when they seem unexplained. While it is likely that you’ve simply lost some water weight after having been retaining, if it is significant or persistent, it could indicate the presence of an underlying medical condition.
(more…)Losing weight is hard. That’s no real mystery to anyone. After all, obesity is at an all time high in the United States. It’s not because people don’t want to drop the pounds. It’s because it can be quite difficult to do so.
According to research, there are some very specific reasons that losing weight is hard. There are times when it can feel as though your body is working against you. Science shows that in certain ways, that is actually the truth.
Losing weight is hard because your own body can start to fight against the efforts you’re making. The reason is that your body doesn’t know it’s overweight or obese and doesn’t know that losing weight will lead to improved overall health. It doesn’t know that losing weight can reduce the risk of a number of different types of chronic illness.
What your body knows is that you’re suddenly eating less. The body responds to fewer calories by triggering certain hormones that can lead to weight gain. This is problematic because one of the things most people need to do in order to lose weight is to reduce the number of calories they eat on an average. It also explains why it’s not just a matter of willpower to be able to successfully reduce the number of daily calories you’re eating. The body is actually working hard to try to convince you to do the exact opposite of what your doctor has recommended.
The key to overcoming the challenge that losing weight is hard has to do with understanding your body’s reaction and working with it instead of against it. If drastically reducing calories makes you hungry, it’s possible to learn about the types of foods that help to fill you up without overdoing it with your calories.
For instance, by eating a better balance of macronutrients and improving your fiber intake, you can fill your stomach and use slow-release energy that will last longer and keep you from experiencing powerful hunger pangs or cravings.
It’s for this reason that starvation diets and extreme diets typically fail. The body’s design will resist them and work against them. Instead, the more successful strategies will frequently involve long-term balanced eating with careful focus on learning how to eat flavorful, filling foods. It will also usually require additional exercise in order to burn off more calories and body fat.