If you’re doing everything you can but you’re still not losing weight, these strategies can help you.
Outwit restaurant food.
Calories in restaurant meals stack up quickly because restaurants typically serve more than three times the amount of one serving of food. But you don’t have to become a hermit to eat healthily. You can ask for your food at restaurants to be especially cooked with no or less oil, request a menu from the restaurants in advance, or choose healthy foods at a buffet or party.
Take your time.
The more time you take to eat, the fewer calories you’ll inhale in the first 5 minutes of mealtime, so try to spend 20 minutes at the dining table. Getting pleasure from your food can actually help you lose weight because you probably won’t need so much to feel satisfied. On the other hand, you’ll put on weight when you’re doing something else while eating. But a great way to lose weight is to make a fantastic dinner and sit down and truly enjoy it.
Fight off stress.
You may find that you eat more when you’re under stress. Eating may activate natural painkillers in your brain, helping you feel relaxed. You’re more likely to grab comfort foods, which are usually higher in fat.
Here are some ways to keep stress under control.
- Accept imperfection. Try not to control every aspect of life.
- Get enough exercise, eat well and hold on to positive emotions.
- Listen to some soothing music.
- Get up and dance.
- Tell a joke.
- A friend may be the perfect motivator for you.
- Go online. Look for sites that include food diaries, personal feedback, weekly lessons and emotional support.
- If you’re likely to overeat certain snacks, ask a family member to hide them somewhere you won’t find them easily.
Lose a little weight at first.
At first, concentrate on losing the first few pounds. Moderate weight loss will give you lower blood pressure, lower lipids, lower blood sugar and more self-esteem – and it’s an easier goal than trying to lose all that weight at once.
- Pace yourself. People who lose 2 kilograms (5 pounds) or more in a week lose water, not fat, so try to lose just a kilo (2 pounds) a week. Depending on how much you have to lose, it could take as long as 6 months to lose 10% of your body weight in a healthy way, but that means you’re more likely to maintain your new weight.
- Look for other evidence. It may take a while to see results on the scales, but you’ll feel your body getting stronger and healthier immediately after you start eating well and exercising.
- Work on maintenance. Once you lose your initial goal of 10%, maintaining it for 6 months will continue to improve your health and make it easier to avoid weight regain.
- Do it again. If you have more to lose after you first 10%, continue to set the same goals until you’ve reached a healthy weight.
Disregard fad diets.
It’s hard to keep up a low-calorie diet for obvious reasons: it’s uncomfortable to be hungry. Think of starving as holding your breath underwater – you can do it for only so long before you gulp for air. To succeed at weight loss, you don’t have to give up fine food taste — you just have to be a selective gourmet.
When you lose weight from starving, your metabolism may decrease as a result. This means that even though you’re eating fewer calories, you’re also burning off fewer calories. When you go back to eating foods higher in fat or calories, you’re more likely to put on fat instead of muscle. With this new efficiency, you may put on weight more quickly, and it may take longer to lose weight in the future.
Yo-yo dieting also may put your health at risk if you already have health problems. A diet of only 800 calories a day could result in lower immunity, an irregular heartbeat, irregular menstruation, a lower sex drive, lower metabolism, loss of lean body tissue, headaches, fatigue, dry skin and sleeplessness.
But even when a diet allows you to eat plenty of just a few types of food, your health will suffer. Any time you eliminate food groups, you lose out on the nutrients they provide. And some diets require you to eat foods high in saturated fat, which isn’t good for your heart.
Your best bet is to stick to eating plans that include reasonable amounts of variety of foods and don’t allow you to lose more than 1 kilogram (2 pounds) a week. A satisfying meal of hearty portions of vegetables has fewer calories than some meals recommended by fad diets.
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