How to Really Lose Weight
You've probably heard of a plethora of diets that all have one common goal: lose fat and weight. Some of these diets may be very effective in losing weight, but there is more to the equation than what the diet says.
Set Point
There is a famous show on Tv watched by many called "Biggest Loser". As many of you know, the show is based around individuals with extreme pounds of weight, mainly consisting of fat, make big changes in their activity level and nutrition to lose weight. By the end of show, which in reality has a very quick time run (only a couple weeks), it seems ridiculous to imagine any of the contestants had such high amounts of fat and overall heavier body. All these individuals were successful in losing weight, yes, but only in the short term.
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Why does this matter? Well, it all centers around a concept known as a set point. A set point is the weight that the body of an individual likes to stay around. In other words, one may have a set point of 145 pounds, so their weight often stays around this value. The body does so by increasing hunger when one's weight begins to drop below the set point. This is why you will feel hungrier while on a diet. The opposite (suppression of hunger) occurs when the body raises above the weight. The set point was designed to tell the body an ideal weight would be based on its body composition, level activities, and other factors. This set point can change over time, but slowly: a quick change from the set point is seen as a threat to the body functioning properly.
Bigger Loser competitors, therefore, are quickly losing weight, but they are not resetting their set point. What happens? Many, if not most, eventually gravitate back to their previous weight and are forced to start the process over again. Many studies and reports have confirmed this, showing a large percentage of biggest losers returning back to their weight after the show ended.
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This shows that you need to be self-aware of your weight loss. We all want to lose weight as quickly as possible, but if you want to maintain your new weight, you need to get there in a slower manner. Other tips to help maintain at this weight until your set point drops is to continue your activity levels while on the weight loss, as well as healthy eating (you should do this regardless of weight loss or not, but it is especially important when maintaining recently loss weight). Some examples of increased activity levels is resistance training (lifting weights), cardiovascular work (running), and just general increased moving around during the day.
How do you want to lose weight?
This question may be confusing when you first read it. Think of this: when you are losing weight, what is the body actually subtracting from inside the body to lose this weight? In other words, what is decreasing in mass? Usually, the ideal option would be fat. A common correlation in individuals with an abundance of weight is that they often have higher body fat percentage levels. In other words, the makeup of their body that is fat is usually at a higher-than-needed level. So, as they lose weight, they should also decrease their body fat percentage by burning off fat stores within the body.
There is an important distinction between weight loss and fat loss. The two are not necessarily the same. The body can lose weight in other ways: such as decreasing water volume in the body, breaking down muscle, etc. All these achieve the goal of weight loss. In individuals who are overweight, they should specifically target fat loss. When this distinction is finally made, one can make effective, healthy weight loss. Those who don't make this important distinction are satisfied when they only see the number go down on the scale. Their abundant fat levels may still be present at a higher percentage, in which case normal functioning of the body can be impeded.
The Biggest Factor for Weight Loss (Not Dieting)
Although diets may help in losing weight, remember that not all weight loss is equal. The main goal of weight loss should be decreasing body fat percentage, or simply put fat loss. You don't want the body to target water volume or muscle mass or anything else besides fats as the things to decrease to lose weight. How do you tell the body to decrease fat stores then? To do so, the body needs to know that the muscle and everything else may remain within their proper state. The only way to cause this "realization" is to use these components in your every day life: by using them, you show your body that they are indeed important. So, to use muscle mass, you must exercise. To some, this may not be music to their ears. If they want to really burnt fat, however, they need to exercise. If you begin to exercise after dieting, you get additional benefits in terms of weight loss. The energy expenditure of the body has increased significantly, and, due to the muscles being used, more energy is used from the fat stores. Many studies have shown that diet, along with exercise, have shown improved benefits to dieting alone. After interviewing Dr. Unger, a Biology Professor at Lebanon Valley College, she, too, confirmed the most important factor to lose weight is exercise and diet. So, although you may not want to hear that you should exercise, you must do so to see highly beneficial results.
Since this website is focused specifically on diet, there will not be much information about exercise. Briefly, however, I'll dive into exercising. Exercise comes from two main fields: resistance training (lifting weights) and cardiovascular training (sprints, long distance running, biking, etc.) Resistance training mainly develops and improves skeletal muscle strength, i.e. the muscles that you can voluntarily control to move around. Although resistance training focuses heavily on skeletal muscle, studies have also supported resistance training as beneficial to cardiovascular (heart) strength in pumping blood to the body. Resistance training improves cardiovascular health because it is actually a form of cardiovascular, or cardio, training, termed HIIT. HIIT is high interval intensity training. This style of training requires short bursts of max, intense amounts of energy and effort followed by a short rest or sub-maximal movement and effort. The individual then follows with another short burst of max effort followed by rest, going on and on until the workout ends. Other forms of cardio are longer in duration; therefore, they require moderate intensity and effort for longer periods. Both give numerous health benefits, but, if you have goals involved with strength and/or size, you may consider following a resistance training-style more than endurance-like. There are numerous websites online where you can learn more about resistance training. Some recommendations of mine include athlean-x.com, jeffnippard.com, and glutelab.com.
