Many people go about trying all kinds of diets and programs without getting any effective and long term weight loss. Unfortunately,approximately 85% of people who lose weight, eventually put it back on again within a year. Here is a list of the top 10 reasons on how to get long term and sustainable weight loss.
The golden rule of sustainable weight loss is to lose only fat while sustaining or even building on your existing muscles. Any principle that is in violation of this rule will result in incorrect weight loss which is not sustainable nor healthy. This golden rule makes-up the essence of correct weight loss. Read “What is Correct Weight Loss” for more information.
1. Avoid Starvation Diets -Undertaking any type of diet that requires you to starve or miss meals is not going to work in the long run. Starvation type diets include diets where you reduce food consumption considerably. These type of diets violate the golden rule by causing you to lose muscles instead of fat. To learn more about the effects of starvation diets, please read “Dieting without exercise to lose weight“. Activating the starvation response is setting you up for rebound weight gain sooner than later.
2. Dieting without exercise - Almost half of the weight loss in a diet without exercise could be attributed to muscle loss and this clearly violates the golden rule above.
3. Omitting Weight Resistance Exercises - These type of exercise help to burn fat and build muscle over the long run. The process of muscle building is very energy intensive and a lot of these calories come from the fat reserves in your body. Women need not worry about building excessive muscles as they lack the hormones to do so. Women who still have their doubts should read
- “Weight Loss Myths – Women who do weight resistance training, build large muscles”
- “Women and Weight Resistance Training”.
4. Focus on cardiovascular type exercises - Cardiovascular type exercise includes exercises where one is exerting at a steady rate. This could be swimming, jogging, cycling or walking, just to name a few. These type of exercises must complement a weight resistance exercise regime and must not be the main exercise itself. While these exercises do help burn calories, they do nothing to build up your muscle mass which violates the golden rule. As a result, someone who suddenly has to stop the cardiovascular exercises for some reason or another will find themselves very quickly piling on fat. For further reading on the effectiveness of cardiovascular exercises for weight loss, please read
- “Jogging – The losing battle to fight weight loss”
- “Why jogging is a losing battle for weight loss”
- “Swimming – Another losing battle for weight loss”
5. Treating weight loss and fitness as a goal - Upon reaching their target weight, a lot of people return to the very lifestyle that made them gain weight in the first place. Exercise time is also very quickly displaced by other more pressing matters. Weight loss and fitness is a lifelong journey rather than a short term goal. For many people, reaching their weight loss goal is the pinnacle and actually the start of the weight regain.
6. Weekend binging – A lot of people put in lots of effort into their weight loss initiatives only to regain all lost weight on the weekends. People are generally more disciplined from Monday to Friday as they go about their routines. People usually let themselves go on the weekends when spending time with family and friends. During the early phase of the weight loss initiative before the target weight goal is reached, people are usually much more disciplined on weekends. For further information on weekend weight gain, please refer to “Are you putting on too much weight on the weekends”. No amount of weekday exercise will be able to compensate for weekend binging.
7. Over emphasis on low carbohydrate diets - A lot of people go on a low carbohydrate diet to lose weight. This type of diet does not require much exercise to produce some decent amount of weight loss. Eventually the body adapts to the low carbohydrate diet and the weight loss plateaus. When this happens, a person loses motivation to remain on the low carbohydrate diet which is extremely difficult to sustain in the long term. When one starts consuming carbohydrates, the weight usually returns with a vengeance.
8. Using some quick fix weight loss method – A lot of people are attracted to quick fix weight loss methods. The promise of losing weight without the effort of exercise or too much dieting is difficult to resist. A lot of these quick fix weight loss methods revolve around removing water from the body. The simplest form is sitting in a sauna to the more advanced form of using diuretics. The weight loss is attributed to water. There is no loss of fat. The body regains all water and even goes to the extent of over compensating by storing more water than required by the body. This over compensation is attributed to the body’s survival system that sees the water shortage as a threat to life and attempts to store water to prepare for future droughts.
9. Not allowing enough time to reset the internal weight set-point – The body has an internal weight set-point which it will fight tooth and nail to maintain. While experts claim that its very difficult to change one’s weight set-point, I disagree. I believe that maintaining one’s new weight for a period of 6 months or more would re-set one’s weight set-point. the body accepts one’s new weight as the new setting to maintain. For further reading about this topic, please look at “Your body’s weight set-point and Oprah’s weight gain.”
10. Over consumption of alcohol – Alcohol consumption retards the process of fat loss. Over consumption of alcohol results in an increase in the stress hormone cortisol. Once someone has reached their weight set-point, he or she could get away with occasional drinks but overdoing it could start bringing back the weight rapidly. For more information about the effects of alcohol on weight loss, please read “Effects of Alcohol on Weight Loss – Part 1″ and “Effects of Alcohol on Weight Loss – Part 2″.
Tags: weight loss, correct weight loss, sustainable weight loss, golden rule, starvation, diet, exercise, life, muscle loss, fat loss, weight loss myths, cardiovascular, swimming, jogging, cycling, muscle mass, cardio exercise, fitness, goal, health, weekend binging, low carb, low carbohydrate diet, weight set point
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I really like the fact that you mentioned the fact that our bodies have internal “set-points” that govern what weight we tend to be. Re-setting that point is difficult, and like you pointed out, takes time. Thanks for the reminder.