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"MY DIET ISN'T WORKING"
HAVE YOU EVER SAID THIS BEFORE?
We get it. We know how frustrating it is to feel like you’re busting your butt in the gym but aren’t seeing the results you’d like. Maybe you’ve been dieting for a while and your progress has come to a stand-still. Or, maybe you just started your fitness journey a few weeks ago and you aren’t seeing the results you were hoping to see. Either way, there are a few fairly simple reasons for your frustrations, so our goal is to shed some light and hopefully help you pinpoint what’s happening.
Reason #1: You're not sticking to your diet long enough
You “diet” for a few weeks, maybe even see some results at first, but then you stop seeing progress, so you quit and/or try a different diet. You end up hopping on and off several different diets, all to stay nearly the same weight. We hear this so often; “I’ve tried keto, paleo, whole30, weight watchers, and nothing works!”. Welp, we hate to break it to ya, but sometimes the diet isn’t the problem… rather, your ability to adhere to it is. Any diet “works” if you’re in a caloric deficit. #Science.
One salad won’t make you lose fat overnight just like one hot fudge sundae won’t make you gain fat overnight. Fat loss requires an abundance of patience (and discipline) as it CAN be a slow and tedious process. We know that patience seems foreign with lightning fast technology at our fingertips... but unfortunately, that’s just not how fat loss works. If you’re ready to take your health seriously, then you’re going to need to commit to your diet for longer than a few weeks. And if you can’t see yourself “lasting” on a particular type of diet; ex: keto, paleo, etc, then you probably shouldn’t start it to begin with.
The Fix: Find a diet you like. Yes, we did just use “diet” and “like” in the same sentence. Your diet doesn’t need to be miserable. If you’ve had to cut out all your favorite foods, cut food groups, or are forcing down foods you don’t like… YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG. So what’s the best diet? The one you can STICK to! That’s why we're huge advocates of “flexible dieting” at Level TEN. Flexible dieting is the notion that you can eat what you’d like (within reason) provided that it fits within your daily allotment of calories and macronutrients (carbs, fats, and proteins) for the day. Why is this approach what tends to work best for our clients? Because it's the one that doesn’t restrict them of any particular foods or food groups. It teaches them HOW to fuel their bodies and HOW to properly monitor portion sizes to achieve their goals.
Reason #2: You're not eating enough
Hold on, isn’t that the point of dieting? Eat less and you’ll lose more? Yes…but also no….sometimes. We know when you’re not losing weight it’s extremely easy to say “okay, guess I’m still eating too much. Time to cut more calories!” While in some cases this is true, constantly lowering your calories week after week will not always illicit the results you're looking for. You see, the body always wants to maintain homeostasis. It will always *eventually* adapt and adjust to find its “new normal”. This means each time you drop your calories lower, your body must learn to live off of that caloric intake. It essentially says “Hey, if you’re only feeding me 1,000 calories, then I’ll learn how to function efficiently on 1,000 calories”. The body's job is to be effective, efficient, and keep you safe. It’s not “fighting” you. It’s trying to safe you by adapting. Your body knows it can't endlessly lose fat at a rapid rate (otherwise you'd starve!) and so, the metabolism adapts. This is why it’s always better to start with higher calories when you’re dieting. The more calories you start with, the more “wiggle room” you have when your fat loss “stalls”. This is also why it’s often wise to make smaller cuts to your calories if you suspect you need to lower them, rather than making drastic reductions.
Another important point to consider with extreme deficits is the stress response that often takes place beneath the surface. When the body perceives stress, be it mental OR physical, a hormone called cortisol gets released. Acute releases of cortisol can be a good thing; but chronically high cortisol makes dieting extremely difficult. Oftentimes, the more our diet “stalls”, the harder we start to push it in the gym and amp up those cardio sessions. This is often a recipe for disaster when it comes to cortisol. You see, in the long-term, excessive cortisol can be a detriment to our overall health, muscle building abilities, and fat burning abilities, hormones, blood sugar, etc. Not to mention, from an aesthetic standpoint, when cortisol goes up, our bodies typically hold onto more water. This causes us to feel “softer” and “less lean” than we actually are, while also causing our weigh-ins to appear "heavier". This stress induced water retention can mask fat loss that MAY be occurring, by preventing us from seeing visual and scale related changes.
Moral of the story: Your calories don’t always need to be as low as you think. Start your “diet” with the least restrictive approach. Calories still semi-high and very little cardio. Then, when your metabolism does adapt to your current regimen (as it will), you still have some "wiggle room" for caloric reduction and increasing cardio. Sometimes less is more!
Reason #3: You've been in a caloric deficit for too long
When we reference a “deficit”, we're referring to a caloric deficit. A caloric deficit refers to eating less calories than your body needs to maintain its weight. A deficit can be created from consuming less calories and/or expending more calories. Now, you may be wondering... "Why is it bad to be in a deficit for a long time? Isn't dieting and losing weight healthy?" Well yes... Sort of... To a degree.
Think of your metabolism like the thermostat in your house. When you don't get all the calories you need for long periods of time, your body regulates itself by turning down your metabolism, just as a thermostat would if your house got too hot. It's a regulated system designed to keep your metabolism in line with your daily caloric intake. But just like the thermostat will eventually crap out, so will your dieting efforts. If you can’t remember the last time you weren’t trying to lose weight, there’s a good chance it’s time to give your body AND mind a rest. After a long period of caloric restriction and weight loss, metabolic adaptations begin to take place. From a physiological standpoint; your organs use less energy, your heart rate slows, you SNS activity decreases, thyroid hormones, testosterone, estrogen, progesterone, leptin, and ghrelin are all negatively affected, your NEAT decreases (non-exercise activity thermogenesis), and overall, your body and muscles become more efficient, requiring less fuel and less calories. Ever wonder why it’s so hard to lose those “last few pounds”? Simply put, a caloric deficit gets harder and harder to achieve after fat loss as your maintenance calories have decreased due to these metabolic and hormonal adaptations. You’re not broken. It's just the law of thermodynamics. The metabolism is adaptive.
The Fix: If you suspect what we've listed above is happening to you, it may be time to explore the idea of “reverse dieting”. Essentially this method allows you to slowly increase your calories back up to maintenance and beyond to reverse the negative effects of dieting and improve your biofeedback and metabolic capacity. We've helped hundreds of our clients recognize how incredible reverse dieting can be for restoring their hormones, metabolism, and overall health after an extended period of dieting.
Reason #4: You've cut out too many of your favorite things
Sometimes, the more strict our diets are, the harder it becomes to resist our favorite foods. This is often why “strict” or “structured” meal plans don’t work. Or rather, they don’t work for an extended period of time at least. If your diet requires you to only eat “good foods” and cut out all “bad foods”, there’s a good chance you’ve developed a pretty unhealthy relationship with food, your body, and exercise. These altered relationships have the potential to elicit a downward spiral into a vicious binge and restrict cycle. While you may have never considered yourself a “binge eater”, it’s more common than you think. Example: You're strict all week, on point with your diet for 5 consecutive days, getting in your veggies, steps, etc. But then... THENNNN you get to the weekend and “blow it”. Drinks, nachos, wings, burgers, booze, whatever. By Sunday night, you feel awful, disappointed, guilty, and bloated. And so the cycle continues; Monday hits and you're back on your restrictive diet. We see it all the time, or some level of it at least. When you are constantly feeling restricted from certain foods or food groups, the desire to have them becomes stronger and stronger. So, you have one potato chip or one bite of a cookie and before you know it, you’ve blacked out and have eaten 2 days worth of calories in one sitting. And it’s not over! Here comes the guilt. The anger. The disappointment in yourself. And so, the cycle continues. You restrict. You binge. You feel guilty. Repeat. Sound familiar?
The Fix: Instead of being super restrictive, try a more sustainable and realistic style of dieting; ie, “flexible dieting”. No food restrictions, no "bad food" list. Simply eat within your caloric means and try to follow the 80/20 or 90/10 rule. The larger percentage being wholesome, nutrient dense, high quality foods, and the smaller percentage being room for the “fun” stuff and small indulgences. Doesn't that sound a bit more sustainable?
Reason #5: You're not actually in a caloric deficit
This one is pretty simple but without a doubt, it's the most important. If you're not in a caloric deficit, you will not be losing body fat. Keto, intermittent fasting, paleo, atkins, etc. None of them "work" if you're in a caloric surplus. Yet, all of them "work" if you're in a caloric deficit.
How do you know if you're in a caloric deficit? Well, for starters, you need to know how much you're eating. How do you know how much you can spend at the store if you don't know how much money is in your account? Tracking calories and macros is a pretty sure-fire way to make sure you're eating an appropriate amount of calories for your body and your goals.
The Fix: Track your USUAL food intake (portion sizes, food type, condiments, drinks, etc) consistently for 2 full weeks. After two weeks, evaluate your progress. Has the scale moved? Are your measurements different? Do your clothes fit better? Do your progress pictures look any different? BE OBJECTIVE.
If your weight and body have NOT changed at all, you're likely eating at "maintenance". In order to be in a deficit, you'd need to eat less than that amount. If your body weight has gone up, and pictures, measurements, clothes, etc are moving upward (and that's not your goal) then you are likely in a caloric surplus with your current eating regimen. In order to lose fat, you'll need to adjust your calories downward to ensure you're in a caloric deficit. If after two weeks your clothes are fitting better, measurements are smaller, and the scale is perhaps trending downward, don't change anything! You're likely in a caloric deficit. Consistency and patience will be your two best friends here. Anytime you're even THINKING about making a change to your calories or macros, you need to make sure you have been 90% consistent for 2-4 weeks. Otherwise, the diet isn't your problem, adherence is, which brings us back to point #1 and #4.
DID A LIGHTBULB GO OFF? DON'T WORRY, WE'RE HERE TO HELP. To learn more about our online health coaching, personalized to meet your goals and fit your lifestyle, click here!
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