For the past year or so, since I started tracking what I ate, I
have consumed a daily average of between 1,000 & 1,200 calories. It
satisfied me I guess, I never went too hungry, I mostly ate salad, veg and
healthy meals, but also some less healthy processed foods and snacks, and I'd also
have days where I’d eat whatever I wanted without tracking it. I'd stick to my
1200(ish) calories for Mon to Fri, and then not track at all on Saturdays and
Sundays. I couldn't understand what I was doing wrong, why wasn't I losing weight?! 5 out of 7 days I was consuming well
under the average recommended calorie intake for women, surely I should be dropping the pounds?
After about a year of doing this and becoming frustrated that I
wasn't losing any body fat, I knew I needed to make a change. After all, it
doesn't matter how much you workout, if you don't eat right then you won't see
results. After a fair amount of reading and researching online, I realised I
was consuming too few calories, causing
my metabolism to slow down, meaning I couldn't burn body fat. My body probably
resorted to using muscle mass as a source of energy (reduced muscle mass also = a slower metabolism). This would explain
why my regular gym visits didn't seems to be making much of a difference.
So now, after trying a few varied diets and ways of eating (I will
go in to these in more detail later), I have decided to calculate what my
actual calorie intake should be and then increase my calorie intake to match
it. There's a load of calculators online that will calculate this for you
depending on your age, weight, activity level etc... Just Google 'calorie
calculator'. This is the one I used. (Note: this
one calculates maintenance calories, if you want to gain/lose
weight you will have to add/deduct calories to the result).
I hadn't been brave enough to do this sooner because the thought
of eating even more food while trying to lose body fat just seemed so illogical
to me - as I'm sure it does to a lot of people. But reading up on it, there
seems to be a lot of proof that upping your food intake to what your body
actually requires will ramp up your metabolism and kick start your fat loss.
Now, I've been eating my suggested 1,600 maintenance calories a
day (or at least close to that) for a couple of weeks and I have to say I am
feeling alright. I haven’t got any fatter from the extra food (phew!), and I definitely
feel less hungry and more energetic. I think it’s working! I imagine in a few more weeks, once my
metabolism has picked up a bit, I will reduce my calorie intake by 50 - 100 to
start with, which (I'm hoping) will kick start some body fat loss. I will be
tracking my progress measuring body fat % and measurements only. I stopped
trusting the scales a long time ago!
If you take anything from this post, be it this… If you're eating too few calories, your
metabolism will slow down, you’ll probably lose muscle mass and you’ll struggle to maintain healthy weight
loss in the long term. If you think this may have happened to you, a good
starting point would be to find out what your recommended daily calorie intake
is, and try to reach it every day! Use a food tracker like My Fitness Pal or Cronometer
to stay on track, and remember, patience is key!
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| Via wifflegif.com |
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