Losing weight is hard. I get it. Trust me.
We all want a “quick fix”, “an easy solution” or to grasp at any diet that offers us drastic weight loss in a short amount of time. But trying to change people’s mindsets about losing weight, getting healthy and changing your lifestyle forever is something that I am now trying to challenge on a daily basis. Even more so once my new business venture takes off.
Let me ask you a question.
How long have you been overweight? Chances are it’s many years, I myself was bordering on 10 years above a healthy BMI. So why the rush to get rid of weight within a few short months? If it worked, then you’d already be enjoying a healthy life as a slim fit person. But chances are quick fixes in the past have only resulted in your gaining more weight than you originally started with.
If I knew last year what I know now about food and nutrition things could have been very different for me. People often say that I “took an easy way out” or “cheated” by having surgery, but having surgery didn’t make me lose weight ( of course it helped ). But learning about how to fuel my body and what foods nourish me, did help.
If after 2 months once my stomach had healed I began eating white carbs, chocolate, soda etc… I wouldn’t have lost weight at all, even with my smaller stomach. Losing weight, and keeping weight off is entirely about what foods you put into your mouth, and how those foods then affect your body.
So lets look at the science of fad diets, because I never understood how they worked before, and if I did, oh how things could have been very different for me.
Let’s say you go on a juice cleanse.
You eat fresh fruit and vegetable juices everyday for only 7 days as part of a detox. What happens to your body? You lose weight right? Well yes, you probably will. But what’s happening to your body to produce that weight loss is not healthy at all.
You’re drinking fruit juice which has been blended, squeezed, juiced, and drained of all it’s fibre, and of most of it’s nutrients. You’re basically drinking a glass of sugar. This causes your insulin levels to rise, and you’re body to cling onto fat.
So at night time, you’re allowed one meal. A healthy portion of meat and some vegetables. That will get your daily requirements of nutrients right? Wrong.
You’re body needs protein. If you deprive your body of protein you will be losing muscle, not FAT. Losing muscle might make you slimmer, but it will make you weaker, flabbier, and unhealthy. The more muscle you have, the more calories your body burns a day, so losing muscle will actually slow down your ability to lose more weight.
Quick fixes are that because they deprive you’re body of some essential nutrients and your body begins to eat away at it’s own muscle to survive. This is where your weight loss comes from. You’re eating away at your own body. NICE.
I know it’s hard to resist quick fixes, and sometimes it’s easier to be motivated to complete a 7 day program than is to make a lifestyle change. But a lifestyle change doesn’t have to mean a lifestyle without. Each new meal, each new day, brings a new opportunity to make a good choice. Every meal time provides an opportunity to make a choice that either helps or hinders you’re health. It’s ALWAYS your choice.
So don’t feel threatened by the scary prospect of committing to a year of healthy eating. Commit to only today. Commit to eating a healthy lunch, commit to avoiding sugar with your mid afternoon cuppa.
Don’t beat yourself up for having a small treat, for catching the bus instead of walking to work, or taking the lift instead of the stairs.
Just take each opportunity that arises as a fresh chance to start taking control of your own life. Or not.
Its entirely you’re choice.
Healthy Hazimax 