Lasting weight loss can occur when you make the right food choices, but how do you know which foods you can choose? While popular and fad diets give strict guidelines on food choices, the exact foods you eat can be guided as much by personal taste as by nutritional value. Controlling portion sizes, selecting the healthier version of a food, and striving to increase physical activity work together to cause weight loss.
Calorie Balance
The American Dietetic Association (ADA) emphasizes that getting to a healthy weight is all about balancing your lifestyle and your nutritional needs. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says one pound of body weight is equivalent to approximately 3,500 calories, so to lose at least one pound per week, you would need to reduce your daily calorie intake by 500 calories. Reducing intake of snack foods and sugary beverages is the easiest way to make that change, and you can read the nutritional facts about the foods you consume to see how many calories you save by making those simple changes.
The ADA also recommends gradually increasing exercise levels. Just 30 minutes of exercise on most days per week can help boost your metabolism, tone your body, and burn excess calories and fat. Weight loss exercise should be fairly vigorous, and you should try to build up to one hour to get the most results, the ADA recommends. Consult with your physician to safely begin an exercise regimen.
Fad Diets and Weight Loss
Merck defines a diet simply as a way people eat, whether or not for weight loss. Often, a diet to lose weight can become an obsession for people. Merck describes fad diets as offering extreme weight loss promises that often do not have sufficient scientific evidence to support them. Often, these diets recommend severe calorie or food group restrictions, which result in insufficient nutrient intake and could lead to medical problems. Weight loss, Merck contends, is achieved by making healthier choices, such as restricting fat and sugar; choosing nutrient-dense, low-calorie foods; and exercising to help burn up calories.
Types of Food
Making wise food choices is important for individuals whether or not they want to lose weight. Choosing the lower fat, lower sugar or lower sodium version of a food, such as choosing to consume reduced-fat milk rather than whole-fat milk, will result in cutting calories without making significant changes in the diet. The National Diabetes Education Project (NDEP) also recommends choosing reduced-fat mayonnaise and salad dressings, so you can still enjoy certain foods. It also suggests electing to eat heart-healthier fats, such as olive oil rather than butter. Choose whole grain carbohydrates, lean meats from which skin and extra fat have been trimmed, and more fresh fruits and vegetables, says the NDEP.
Portion Sizes
The NDEP encourages choosing smaller sizes of your favorite foods. It says you can enjoy your desserts, but choose to eat small bites of them or eat some other food that has similar food qualities, such as naturally sweet strawberries, before indulging in a small amount of strawberry ice cream. The savings of fat from the ice cream will cut down your overall fat and calorie intake, which leads to weight loss over time. The NDEP also points out that portion sizes have increased over the past 20 years, and learning to become satisfied with smaller portions of foods will benefit your health. Learn to eat half-sizes of your everyday foods, and you will cut down on your portions without sacrificing taste and choice.
Nutrients
Choosing nutrient-dense foods means selecting foods that provide lots of vitamins and minerals for the calories they provide. Non-nutrient-dense foods include junk foods that offer more fat or sugar than any other nutrients such as calcium, iron, vitamin A or vitamin C. Orange juice, especially one fortified with calcium, is more nutrient-dense than an orange-flavored beverage. The Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2005 describes the nutrient needs for individuals, and search-able databases such as Nutritiondata.com provide specific nutrient information about foods. Individuals at different ages and activity levels need different nutrients, the ADA emphasizes, so consult with your physician if you want to make significant changes to your diet.
Member Comments