The world in which we live is a seemingly obesity prone place, just look at the statistics that you read in the media. There are a few obvious answers to the question of why some people struggle with weight and others don't, including eating too much, drinking too much, skipping meals etc.
I don't think they're the most important things.
From my own experience many different shapes and sizes of people come to me, and they all have problems with their weight. The quantity and quality of the diets I see do not seem to correlate well with how much fat they want to lose, or are losing.
Yes, there is almost always a history of poor food habits, but these often have improved to the point where their food journal does not indicate someone who is struggling like they are.
People are doing the right things but not losing weight!
Let's look at things which are consistent with obesity prone people
- Yoyo dieting
- The people who seem to be most lost are those who have 'done everything'. They have done all the diets, all the exercise programmes, even hired multiple trainers. But each time they make a resolution to change they find themselves plateauing and regaining it all back.
- Age
- As people age, it becomes harder to control weight. This is evident in all populations purely through observation. At the same time we all know young people who eat loads of junk but have good body composition.
- Low energy levels
- This one is always there, in my experience people who struggle to lose fat always comment that they have low energy levels.
These factors are something which I have been aware of to a degree but unfortunately have never given enough conscious thought; never enough to actually link them together.
So we've got people who constantly relapse on diets, people who are older, and people who don't have a lot of available energy.
It seems obvious now, doesn't it?
No?
They have a metabolism which has adapted to being underfed.
Yes underfed, when people are young, they eat what they want and they get enough calories to stay alive. In fact many have more than enough calories to stay alive. But in terms of nutrients they don't get enough.
So what does the body do to deal with this, it slows down the metabolic rate. Meaning that the body doesn't need as many nutrients to stay alive. Every single day the body is using less and less calories creating a continually larger energy excess, which is stored in the body as fat.
When they decide enough is enough they lose weight through cutting calories, and it works.
But what happens to their metabolism? It slows down even more.
Skip forward a twenty years or so.
The person is now at breaking point, it seems whenever anything other than broccoli goes into their mouth they put on weight. Even though they are consuming only rice cakes and water their weight won't shift.
The fact is they are in a supremely efficient state, where nothing short of starvation will alter their body composition. What happens next?
Well if they have any sense they'll come to us.
We encourage these types of clients to eat more, 5 meals per day for starters. We aim to put them at as much of a metabolic advantage as possible. We get them interval training instead of traditional cardio training to boost it even further. Until the point where they are begging us to reduce their food.
Answer this question:
Who is going to have an easier time losing weight; someone maintaining their weight on 1000kcal per day or 3000kcal per day?
At this point they have tonnes of energy, the cravings have halted and for the first time in years they actually feel good. Then we alter their diet slowly, eeking out every bit of that fast metabolism they have worked for.
And then it stays off for good.
So tuck in to some good food. You have my permission.
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