You probably know that in order to lose weight, you must cut back on high-calorie foods and fill your plate with healthy, low-cal options, such as fruits, veggies and whole grains. But sacrificing unhealthy foods is only part of the equation. Portion control and regular exercise also can help build a calorie deficit that will result in weight loss. Still, you should not go to extremes when cutting calories; for example, consuming only 1,000 calories a day is not healthy in most situations.
Caloric Intake vs. Expenditure
The basic rules of weight loss remain the same no matter how many calories you take in: If you expend more calories than you ingest, you eventually lose weight. As noted on the government's Medline Plus website, losing 2 pounds per week is possible with a 1,000-calorie-per-day reduction. If you're on a standard 2,000-calorie diet, ingesting only 1,000 calories per day would satisfy that equation and result in weight loss.
Lowest Recommended Intakes
Just because you have the ability to ingest only 1,000 calories per day doesn't necessarily mean that you should. Medline Plus notes that the lowest per-day caloric intake recommended for women is 1,200 calories. For men, the limit is 1,500 calories. If you drop below these levels, there's a good chance you're not giving your body all the nutrients and calories it needs just to get through the day.
Starvation Mode
When you don't provide your body with the calories it needs, it may go into "starvation" mode. In "Fundamentals of Sport and Exercise Nutrition," author Marie Dunford notes that very-low-calorie diets usually do more harm than good. The weight you lose is most often muscle mass, she notes --- not fat. Your body slows its metabolism to conserve calories, and, Dunford notes, it remains slow long after you end the starvation diet. Plus, these diets are very difficult to maintain; once you stop dieting, it's very likely you'll gain back whatever weight you lost.
Diet Plus Exercise
Instead of depriving yourself to hit the 1,000-calorie-per-day mark, create a hybrid solution that involves both calorie cutting and daily exercise. For example, if you cut 500 to 750 calories from your daily intake, you could exercise to burn off the remaining 250 to 500 calories, still resulting in an average reduction of 1,000 calories per day. As the Mayo Clinic notes, all successful weight-loss programs use a dual-strategy approach that combines calorie cutting with regular exercise. It suggests choosing a weight-loss goal based not on total pounds lost or calories consumed, but on healthy and achievable habits, such as walking or jogging for 30 minutes five days a week.
Warning
A diet consisting of 1,000 calories a day may not be sufficient to maintain basic nutrition and health, depending on your level of activity. If you believe you need to drop below the lowest recommended intakes as noted by Medline Plus, talk to your doctor first. She can help you devise a healthy strategy that combines diet and exercise to accomplish your weight loss goals safely.
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