Most people who have lost weight would agree that it’s a tough battle to maintain goal weight when it seems their bodies are actually fighting back with a vengeance and trying to gain back all the extra pounds it had lost initially. Research shows that around 80% of people who lose weight tend to gain it all back, and that too within a short span of 12 months! To avoid weight gain, it’s important that you follow a weight loss program that is actually sustainable and not treat it as a short-term project. If you’ve lost weight in the past, it’s quite frustrating to see fat accumulation at all the wrong places, and see months of hard work and effort go down the drain. Wondering what’s happening? Here are 9 reasons you regain lost weight back!
1. You Were Not on a Sustainable Weight Loss Diet: If you lost weight eating meal replacement powders and appetite suppressant pills, it’s not a strategy you can continue to follow for the rest of your life. After having lost weight, the main policy of the body is to conserve energy, and to store away more fuel as fat, in case, there’s an energy crunch in the future. That’s why crash dieting is an absolutely bad idea to slim down because it actually prepares and primes the body to gain lots of weight in the near future. A sustainable diet is not based on food deprivation – with Rati Beauty diet you can slim down by actually eating nutrient-dense food, without having to starve through the entire day. It’s important to not lower down the calorie intake by an extreme degree, otherwise, the body will swiftly switch to a fat-conserving mode. However, if you cut down calories at an optimum level, it will continue to burn fat in calorie deficit and with exercise. That’s why it’s important not to deprive the body of nutrients it needs to function. Do check the diets on the Rati Beauty app for more details on how you can lose weight successfully.
1. It Follows Set Point Theory: The set point theory is the way the body will stick to a specific weight and will fight and defend to stay this particular weight. The set point theory indicates that your weight may go up or down temporarily but will ultimately return to its normal set range. If there’s severe calorie deprivation (aka crash dieting), the body will become fuel efficient and adapt itself to run on fewer calories. It does so by making metabolism slow, raising the appetite, increasing the levels of hunger hormone “ghrelin,” and bringing about changes in fat-burning hormones (15 Ways to Switch on Fat-Burning Hormones). As a result, you tend to burn less calories, and eventually, when you come off the diet, the metabolism will remain sluggish and weight gain would be rapid. Continue to eat healthy, sleep well, be active through most part of the day, cut down sugar intake, and continue exercising to avoid rapid weight gain.
2. Slowed-Down Metabolism: A robust metabolism is essential to burn extra calories and drop extra weight. Metabolism is the rate at which calories are burnt and converted into energy form by the body. If someone’s metabolism is high, he/she will burn more calories even at rest! When someone slashes calories to lose weight, the body lowers metabolism to burn fewer calories and conserve energy – it switches to a “starvation” mode. Also, during weight loss, the body loses both muscle and fat, and with loss of muscle – metabolism too dips. A slow and sluggish metabolism will burn only a few calories even with intense activity, and that’s why even with regular exercise, you are not seeing the pounds coming off. But the best thing is that you can manipulate your metabolism and make it robust by following these “21 Tricks to Boost your Metabolism.”
3. Altered Hormones: With weight loss, believe it or not, hormones too get altered. There are around 11 Hormones that can directly affect body shape and weight gain – thyroid, insulin, estrogen, leptin, ghrelin, and cortisol are just a few of them. After considerable weight loss, ghrelin (the hunger hormone) increases, making you hungrier, even after eating a normal meal. To control ghrelin, stick to scheduled meal timings, avoid frequent snacking, workout regularly, eat a high-protein breakfast, stay away from refined food, increase fiber intake, keep yourself hydrated.
4. Increased Stress Level: Chronic stress has been strongly linked to weight gain, especially belly fat. Apart from lowering metabolism, the stress hormone “cortisol” increases appetite, cravings, and also directs the body to store fat around the belly region. Go for a walk or run, exercise, practice a new hobby, listen to music, pick a book to read – try out every trick to de-stress and it will work wonders for your physical and mental health.
5. Sleep Deprivation: Sleep deprivation is directly linked to weight gain and obesity. You can do intense exercise and literally have no food during the day, but don’t expect to lose any weight if you aren’t getting at least 7 hours of sleep in the night. Poor quality of sleep is one of the major reasons for weight gain and obesity. In fact, if you desperately want to get rid of belly fat, just sleep well in the night. Not having a sound sleep has a spiralling effect when it comes to weight and health – it reduces leptin (satiety hormone) level, increases cortisol production, makes metabolism sluggish, lowers fat-burning enzymes, increases level of the hunger hormone “ghrelin.” Added to this, bad sleep can hamper the gut flora by hampering the physiological stress response, and an imbalanced gut can totally stall the whole weight loss process. In fact, in all seriousness, do nothing but sleep like a baby all through the night to shed extra flab and reset set point weight.
6. Falling Back on Pre-Dieting Eating Habits: So, you thought your weight loss was permanent and you can eat junk and fast food now! No! Eating healthy and nutrient-dense food should be a priority, even if you do not want to lose weight.
7. Not Making Lifestyle Changes: To lose weight successfully and to sustain that weight loss, one needs to make healthy lifestyle changes. Exercise and healthy eating should be part of one’s lifestyle, not means to get to a certain size, shape or number on the weighing scale. Steer away from unhealthy food, come out of sedentary lifestyle, and lead an active life to sustain goal weight.
8. Not Practicing Portion Control: Are you not practicing portion control now that you have hit goal weight? Portion control is essential not only to lose weight, but also to maintain that ideal number on the weighing scale. Please continue doing that.
9. You are Obsessed with (Over)Eating Healthy Food: There’s no doubt that clean and healthy eating leads to weight loss, but always remember to maintain calorie deficit in any case. No food is calorie free; there’s some amount of calories that come attached with healthy food as well, and without mindful eating, they can put you into calorie surplus and lead to weight gain instead. There’s a wrong notion that there’s no need to count calories with healthy food, especially after reaching goal weight, but absolutely not, you need to practice portion control with every food that’s on your plate!
Hope these tips would help you to stick to your ideal weight.
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