The safest and most efficient way to get the pounds off and maintain a healthy weight is to cut back on your calorie intake and burn some more calories through exercise. However, taking this healthy technique to the extreme and virtually starving yourself of calories can result in more weight-loss struggles than benefits.
Too Few Calories
Fasting or cutting too many calories can make you struggle to lose weight for multiple reasons. One reason is cutting lots of calories at once causes you to lose valuable muscle tissue in addition to loss of water and fat. Since muscle tissue helps you burn calories at a faster pace, loss of muscle tissue can slow down your metabolism. Another reason cutting too many calories causes you to have trouble losing weight is your body purposely slows down its metabolism to conserve necessary energy for simple body functions. Third, trying to live on very few calories can damage your body's hunger and satisfaction signals, which may eventually cause you to eat more food than you really need.
Ideal Calorie Intake
Factors such as your age, sex, size and activity level influence metabolic rate and determine how many calories you should eat to maintain your current weight. Once you know what you would need to maintain your weight you can calculate how much you could cut out to lose a healthy amount of weight. A reasonable weight loss rate for most people is about 1 lb. every week, or about 500 calories less per day, according to the Waldo County General Hospital website. Regardless, you should never try to dip below about 1,200 calories or your body may begin storing calories to protect itself.
Other Healthy Habits
As long as you burn off enough calories every day through exercise you may never need to make large cuts to your daily calorie intake. Start by setting a goal to do 30 or more minutes of aerobic exercise every day, but consider that you may need about 45 to 60 minutes of exercise per day to lose weight. Examples of aerobic exercise are jogging and swimming. Add in some strength-training activities such as weightlifting and pushups at least twice per week to build calorie-burning muscle tissue. Simply becoming more active in daily life will help you burn calories, so pick up hobbies such as gardening and hiking.
Low-Calorie Diet Considerations
If you're obese and struggling to lose weight through traditional exercise and diet, your doctor may recommend that you try a very low-calorie diet to quickly reduce your risk of serious health problems. Don't get this confused with a very low-calorie diet you follow at home. Your doctor will carefully monitor the balance of carbohydrates and protein in your diet and ensure that you take in an adequate amount of electrolytes, minerals and vitamins. You will be less likely to regain the weight after your monitored very low-calorie diet if you seek behavioral therapy and commit to making long-term healthy eating and exercise choices.
References
- Mayo Clinic: Metabolism and Weight Loss: How You Burn Calories
- University of Iowa Health Care: Fasting and Liquid Diets
- Waldo County General Hospital Website: How to Understand the Risks of Eating Too Few Calories
- Health Services at Columbia University: How Low Is Too Low?
- Weight-control Information Network: Very Low-calorie Diets
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