Are You Eating Less And Still Not Losing Weight?
A typical complaint that many have is they are consuming less though not shedding pounds. What a lot of them don’t realize is that consuming less sometimes isn’t really enough.
If you’ve been eating less though not shedding weight, consider these other vital keys to weight loss.
Quality is equally as important as quantity; if not more vital. What do you believe would occur if you ate nothing except 1,200 calories worth of chocolate every day? Would you lose weight on such a diet? Probably not. You require certain nutrients to achieve a healthy weight. It isn’t enough to simply eat a little bit less.
Also vital to consider is the chemical chain reaction that is caused by certain foods you eat, especially those with a high glycemic index. The Glycemic Index is a measure of the elevation in blood sugar levels particular foods cause. Simple carbohydrates like white sugar, white bread, white pasta, and so on all have a really high glycemic index. When you eat them, your blood sugar levels rise quickly, triggering a flush of insulin to be released by your pancreas. The insulin’s job is to process the sugar so it can be used for fuel for the body, and anything that isn’t utilized for fuel gets converted to fat for subsequent usage. But that is not all – the more sugar you eat, the more insulin your body produces, and excess insulin in the blood vessels is thought to contribute to the storage of fat in the body also. Of course, this kind of cycle is an exceedingly bad one to be mixed up in if you are trying to shed some weight.
Next, consider where else your calories could be coming from. You could be eating less, but are you drinking a lot of sweetened beverages? Alcohol? Perhaps you are eating less during meals but still snacking? Or perhaps you’ve been cutting meals and then binge eating when you sit down to your one meal a day? Take a closer look at everything that goes into your mouth and you might find the perpetrators that are hindering your weight loss.
Lastly, another thing worth considering is just how much less you are eating. Does “eating less” mean you are eating little food each day? If so , you may have cut your calories down too low and your body has now gone into starvation configuration to attempt to protect itself against famine. It’s important to eat enough calories so that your metabolism stays running strong. For the general public that’ll be 4 to 6 meals totaling 1,200 to 3,000 calories each day – it’ll vary depending on your age, gender, height, and current weight. There are tons of good calorie calculators online; visit a few of them and enter your info to get a rough idea of how many calories you must eat every day.
HealthStatus.com has the best calories burned calculator with over 125 different activites listed. HealthStatus also has over 30 other interactive tools for you health including an daily energy expenditure calculator.