Drink Water– I know what you are thinking, this is so obvious, and you have heard it many times before … but are you actually drinking enough water? Water is the most important nutrient for your body, it helps all metabolic and chemical reactions happen in the body. It aids in digestion, flushes out fats and toxins, hydrates your skin, fights fatigue and boosts your overall mood. You can get all these benefits from simply drinking 8-10 glasses of water per day. You will be amazed at how much better you feel by just switching out your sugary and/or drinks with calories for water. When you just start drinking water, you are also cutting out a lot of liquid calories. Have you ever looked at how many calories are in your soda or Gatorade? Do you really think you need that much sugar? The only liquid your body requires is water, so why not give it what it wants? If you hate plain water, you can drink unsweetened tea, which is mostly water but provides a little caffeine and other beneficial ingredients like l-theanine. You will be surprised by how much weight you can actually lose when you quit drinking your
calories.
Avoid FODMAPs– FODMAPs or Fermentable Oligosaccharides, Disaccharides, Monosaccharides, and Polyols are short chain carbohydrates and sugar alcohols that are very poorly absorbed by the body. These FODMAPs produce symptoms like gas, bloating, stomach pain, diarrhea and constipation. If you start limiting your intake of these or eat a low-FODMAP diet you could have less gas, less bloating, less diarrhea, less constipation and less stomach pain. Some common FODMAPs to avoid are apples, milk, ice cream, broccoli, beans, bread, pancakes, beer and high fructose corn syrup.
Avoid Foods that Cause Inflammation– As many people know, inflammation is the root cause of many health problems from heart disease, diabetes and even obesity. New research is coming out that is showing that obesity might just be a low-grade systemic inflammatory disease, therefore increases your risk of heart disease, diabetes and other chronic diseases. Common foods that cause inflammation are: dairy, gluten, sugar, alcohol, peanuts, corn, fried foods, boxed food and night shade vegetables like tomatoes.
Start Walking 30 Minutes A Day– People think that they need to do these crazy circuit workouts or lift huge amounts of weight when they first start getting active to lose weight. These often make clients never come back to the gym because they are so sore or so fatigued from the first workout that they never want to do it again. The best way to start losing weight is just by simply going for a brisk 30-minute walk. Walking is one of the best ways to burn fat as the more oxygen you take in during exercise, the more fat you will actually burn. You would be surprised how much weight one can lose from walking and how little effort it actually takes. You can watch your favorite show for 30 minutes on the treadmill or enjoy nature with your family and your dog for 30 minutes that will have tremendous health benefits.
Subsite an Unhealthy Snack with a Protein Shake– If you have noticed yourself reaching for Rice Krispy treats or a candy bar during the middle of the day, substitute with a healthy alternative a protein shake. It can be whey, pea or egg protein powder mixed with water or almond milk that will be quick and easy. Not only will the protein shake probably be less calories than this unhealthy snack, but it will also have more nutritious benefits. First, protein takes the most energy to digest out of any other macronutrient such as fat or carbohydrates. This energy to digest will help speed up your metabolism. Protein is required for proper functioning for every chemical reaction in the body’s cells and tissue, it is also incredibly important for protein synthesis, which causes muscle growth. The more muscle mass one has on their body, the more calories they will burn because muscle requires more energy than fat.
Eat an Early Dinner and A Late Breakfast-If you stop eating at around 8pm and do not consume your first meal till around 12pm (noon), you will have fasted for around 16 hours. This is called intermittent fasting and it has become very popular for very good reasons. Fasting has been shown to reduce oxidative stress and inflammation, increase weight loss, reduce insulin resistance and initiate autophagy (explained below). It may also enchance cognition, extend your lifespan and prevent cancer. The most important benefit of fasting is that it starts autophagy. Autophagy happens during starvation periods and cells start consuming weaker cells. These autophagosomes go around your body and start eating misfolded proteins, intracellular pathogens and starts recycling new material and regrow cells. This is basically a self-cleaning of your body, which can have profound health benefits. This is why fasting has been around and a big part of cultures for thousands of years.
Figure Out your BMR– Your Basal Metabolic Rate or BMR is an estimate of how many calories you’d burn if you were to do nothing but rest for 24 hours. You can figure these out through extensive blood tests or get a pretty good estimate from this website. Once you have your BMR subtract 500 calories from it to get an idea of the number of calories you would have to eat in order to lose 1 to 2 pounds per week. One pound is 3,500 calories so you are going to have to be negative that many calories in a week to be down just one pound. When weight loss is started many people lose a ton of weight at the start. People think that this is fat, but it is typically water weight. When one starts to reduce their glucose intake, water is also released. For every 1 ounce of stored glycogen, 3 ounces of water is also stored. This is why many dieters re-gain their weight so quickly because it was not actual fat loss, but water loss. For this reason, slow and steady dieting always wins the race and lifestyle changes are way better than diet fads.
Figure Out Your Marcos-After you have the number of calories you are allowed to eat per day for weight loss, the next thing you need to do is figure out how many grams of protein, carbohydrates, and fats you are allowed. I like to start my clients at 35% carbohydrates, 40% protein, and 25% fat. You can play around with these percentages but keeping your protein always higher than your carbohydrates is a good rule for weight loss. Figuring this out is very easy. Let’s say my BMR is 1,000 calories to make it simple.
Protein: 1,000 x 40= 400 calories. There are 4 calories in 1 gram of protein so take 400/4= 100 grams of protein for the day.
Carbs: 1,000 x 35= 350 calories, there are also 4 calories in 1 gram of carbohydrates, 350/4= 87.5 grams of carbohydrates per day.
Fats: 1,000 x 25=250, there are 9 calories in 1 gram of fat, 250/9=27.7 grams of fat per day.
Macros for the day are 100 grams of protein, 87.5 grams of carbs, and 27.7 grams of fat. This is how a nutrition label on the back of all food is figured out, this is why high fat items have so many calories.
Track Your Food with A Simple Phone App-Once you have calculated all of this information, download the phone/computer app called MyFitnessPal. In MyFitnessPal you can enter all these numbers in the settings and it will track it for you. You can type in the search bar to find any food from fast food, to boxed food, to basically anything you have eaten, and the information is already in there for you. If you are too lazy to type and find the food, all you have to do is scan the bar code and it will automatically enter it in there for you, tracking is as simple as that, takes maybe 5-10 minutes out of your day.
Keep Things Simple– Everyone makes weight loss way more challenging than it needs to be. Instead of drinking calories, hydrate your body with water. Instead of that fast food meal, cook some chicken and rice. Eating healthy is actually way cheaper than going out to eat. A packet of chicken is around $8-10 that can last one week, and a pound of rice is about $2. That right there is food for a week and costs about the same as one fast food meal. If you do not know how to cook, you can buy a rice cooker and a crock pot. Those items both do not take any cooking skills or work, all you do is put it to the temperature your recipe says and take it out when it is done. Healthy smoothies are also very easy, you can freeze spinach and throw it in there with other healthy ingredients like protein powder, almond milk, and your favorite fruit, and you will not taste it at all. There are hundreds of incredibly easy recipes online that are healthy. It comes down to how bad you actually want to succeed to lose weight. Do you want to keep feeling tired, fatigued, and not confident in how you look? If you answered no, all it takes is a few simple steps like the ones listed above and you can fit into your old jeans in a few week’s time and be a new you!