Weight Loss 101: It's All About the Numbers
Written by Vanessa Moseley
I naively believe I can teach you how to take care of yourself and make a living at it. I believe in education and the adage saying we should “teach a (wo)man to fish”, particularly within the context of do-it-yourself preventative health. I see it as doing my microscopic part to buck the system in hope that we might start acknowledging the true potential of natural health care and demanding some reasonable effort be put into using it to improve the health of a society conned into a slow suicide over fast food and “healthy” marketing ploys.
With that off my chest, I’ll get back “on message” now. ☺
Sustainable weight loss boils down to one simple rule. No tricks, no gimicks, no plans, shakes, or bars are needed. In fact, your better off without any of them. Weight loss is the simple result of a consistent calorie deficit. It all comes down to calories in vs. calories out. As long as you use more calories than you consume, you’ll loose weight. One pound of fat loss requires a deficit of about 3500 calories. This is a manageable number to spread over a week, which is why healthy weight loss programs won’t promise you much more than a pound a week of fat loss. Like everything thing else, it’s a numbers game.
Healthy weight loss takes time and consistency, and will yield longer lasting results via a more holistic approach. You will be re-training the body to metabolize food more efficiently by encouraging change in lifestyle and body composition. In this process, you will pick up the habit of incorporating activity and/or workouts into your daily routine. The more often (and harder) you work out, the more your body will naturally steer you toward healthier food choices to further increase function and ability. In this way, health becomes a self perpetuating habit.
Unhealthy, or crash and blimp weight loss plans will shed your pounds quickly. Instant gratification always feels good, but you’re putting your body chemistry and regulatory systems into a state of shock which is sets you up for a yo - yo relationship with your weight. In addition, most of us won’t want to spend much time with someone whose not eating carbs because they’re trying to get through their days without the body’s primary source of fuel. They may feel alright in the beginning, but it won’t take long for them to turn into Oscar the Grouch. When the dieter (inevitably) resumes eating carbs, the body will be so energy starved that it will immediately store everything they eat as fat in preparation for the next round of starvation. There are no winners with this game plan.
This leads us to a common next question. Does it matter what I eat? Well, technically no, realistically yes. Confused? Good.
Technically, the body will always respond to a calorie deficit by dropping weight. In the numbers game, a calorie is a calorie is a calorie, wether it came from a twinkie, pizza, or broccoli. You can have your 2000 calories per day in chips or cupcakes if want, and you’ll still loose the weight, but people are rarely able to stay within their calorie limits on low quality food because it is calorie dense and unsatisfying, so people never feel full and they underestimate the addictive qualities of these foods. If you do manage to stay within your calorie parameters, you’ll likely end up feeling starved and tired, and I doubt you’ll be making it to the gym feeling like that.
Let me go out on a limb and assume that one of the reasons you want to loose the weight (or at least a benefit of having to loose the weight) is that you want to look and feel better than you do today. If this is the case, it absolutely matters what you eat. If you are going to seriously demand change from your body, then it’s only fair that you make sure that body is properly fueled. Think of your body as a state of the art BMW. You get only one in this lifetime after all. Would you put some nasty, watered down, lead ridden gas in the tank and expect it to accelerate like a BMW should? Of course not. If you want to loose weight, try to think of your food as fuel instead of a pleasurable necessity. Make sure you’re maximizing your nutrients and getting all types of foods in healthy proportion. Learn to love your veggies because they give you the nutrients your body can’t get anywhere else. Eat your carbs! But keep the portions in line with your activity level over the coming hours, and change your carbohydrates to healthy, slow burning ones. Eat nothing fried and nothing white (except cauliflower). Brown rice is always a good option. It’s not as heavy a hit in the carb department as potatoes or pasta, but it’s enough to give a light meal satisfying body. If you’ll be sedentary or going to sleep soon after, have little to no carbs. Aim to get the bulk of your calories into the body early in the day and taper down your eating in the afternoon and evening. You should not be eating any heavy meals after mid-afternoon. You can indulge a little in the hours before your workout: your body will need the energy. If your working out really, you can indulge after too.
A final must for weight loss is appropriate hydration. Hydration can be uncomfortable at first if you don’t typically get enough water; and most people don’t. The bladder capacity will improve within a week or two, and since fat is water soluble, you’ll shed it a lot faster if you’re thoroughly hydrated. Since it’s quite common for most people to mistake thirst for hunger, before you cave to that urge to toss whatever’s nearby down the hatch, chug a glass of water and see if that takes care of it. Either way, I recommend downing at least one, preferably two glasses of water before each meal. Your chances of overeating will drop dramatically.
More about nutrition and eating schedules will follow in this blog. Feel free to contact me with any questions or topics you’d like discussed.
In Peace and Health,
V. ☺
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