Why You’ve Plateaued (Your Nutrition)

So you’re resting enough and you don’t have a care in the world 🙂 but you’re still not losing weight. (see the last blog post to get up to speed if you missed it)

If I was a betting woman (I don’t gamble, that’s throwing away perfectly good shopping money) I’d say it’s because of one of two other things-your nutrition or your workouts.

Let’s talk about your nutrition today.

Nutrition is off in some way (eating too much, not enough, too much sugar, not a balanced ratio of macro nutrients)

I don’t believe in being a total calorie hard nose ‘cause frankly counting calories can be a drag. But you do need to be aware of how many- ish calories you need to take in and how many-ish you actually are taking in. For instance if you know that you need to be in the 1800-2,000 range and that on average you take in about 1,925. As long as you hit somewhere in that range daily there’s no need to know your number to an exact T…….except for if the scale is no longer budging. The it’s time to get down to the facts and figure out EXACTLY what you are doing.

Both eating too much AND too little can lead to you not progressing.

Take in too many calories and you’re not creating the calorie deficit needed to progress. Take in too few and your body may start munching on your hard earned muscle for nutrition. Lose muscle and your metabolism slows and you stop losing weight.

Here’s what you need to do: Figure out your calorie needs, there are lots of online calculators that‘ll give you a pretty good estimate of your needs, just google it. Then start counting your actual calories, this will require weighing and measuring everything you eat and drink, writing it down or putting it into some kind of software or app on your smart phone. Yes, I know it’s a drag but so is not losing any weight week after week soooo…………

Two things will happen while you’re doing this:

1. You realize that you munch or mindless eat a lot more than you thought and you will self-correct the behavior, bringing your calories back in line and thus jump- starting your progress again.

2. You will see that you are in fact way off the mark on your calories and can correct the situation immediately.

It’s not all calories though. You need to pay attention to how much sugar you eat. Your goal is no more than 32 grams of added sugar a day. Too much and your blood sugar will be on a roller coaster and your body will spend way too little time in fat burning mode. 32 grams is not a lot of added sugar. I think you might be a little shocked at what you find out about that one.

Man cannot live on bread alone but we women sure try! You need a balance of protein, fat and carbs. I really like a zone-ish (I love the –ish) type ratio 40/30/30 Protein/Carbs/fat. Each meal does not have to be these perfectly balanced number, and for that matter each day doesn’t either but at the end of the week if you are mostly on target you’ll be doing well and most likely losing some L-B’s again.

If you need help figuring out your calories just let me know, I’d be happy to help you out.

Not enough water (sounds simple but it happens)

Most Americans are dehydrated. In fact, chronic dehydration is probably the most common cause of a lot of our health ailments. You need water for your body to burn fat. Without water, your kidneys cannot do their job properly and your liver must pitch in to help. While it’s helping the kidneys, your liver can’t burn as much fat, so some of the fat that would normally be used as fuel gets stored in your body instead. Drinking more water lets the liver get back to its own job of turning fat into fuel.

Here are a few tips to get more water into your diet:

• You can sip water all day at work.
• You can bring along bottled water in your car.
• You can have an after work drink of sparkling water with a twist of lemon or lime.
• You can use water to mix up your daily protein smoothie shake.
• You can mix a packet of Emergen-C vitamin C drink with a glass of water in the afternoon instead of a coffee break.

Action Steps Outline:

1. Figure out how many calories YOU specifically need by either having your bodyfat tested via hydrostatic bodyfat testing or by finding an online calculator that factors in age, sex, height, and weight .

2. Start weighing and measuring your food and beverages and recording them. You will instantly see where you can improve and you can take steps to begin correcting your path right away.

3. Assess whether your diet is balanced. Aim for a 40/30/30 ratio of Protein/Carbs/Fat

4. Drink more water. If you are active, you may need to drink more than you think. 8 glasses is not the end all be all. Maybe you need to be drinking 10 or 14. Wherever you are now, drink some more.

Nutrition is such a HUGE part of the weight loss equation. Simply eating “better” or “pretty healthy” is not always enough to get the scale to budge once you’re past the very beginner stage. Our bodies are masters at adaption. What once made your body go into total confusion and thus drop weight/bodyfat easily in the beginning soon becomes old hat.

Also we tend to underestimate the damage we do via eating and overestimate the good we do via our workouts. I would say 6 out of 10 times when a client has plateaued, it’s the diet we need to bring back in line in some form (remember it’s not always about eating too much).

Start actually paying real attention to your nutrition and the results will start rolling in.

Ok, so next up: your workouts. There is usually a lot you can do in this category as well.

I’ll give you a sample meal plan and workout on the next post so keep your eye out for it.