Breaking Through a Weight Loss Plateau


It's extremely common to hit a plateau at some point during your weight loss journey. And, obviously, it can be really discouraging when the number on the scale doesn't move. Good news — there are certain things you can do to help bust through that plateau and watch the scale number lower. First of all, I want you to know that your not alone. I hit many plateaus over the ten years it took me to lose 60 pounds. I'm not saying that it will take you 10 years to lose your weight. 

All of us can become discouraged when we don't reach our weight loss goals, but the mistake I made was to settle for a smaller amount and for several years I quit trying. I maintained the weight loss I attained but I gave up trying to lose more. My mistake, I finally realized that I might have lost some weight, but I still had the fat. That's when I realized the the real goal was to lose the fat. It wasn't that important what the scale said, it was more important to lose my extra fat. I wanted that flat belly and I knew sit-ups wasn't going to do it. 

Reevaluate Caloric Needs

As you lose weight, your body burns fewer calories — sad, but true! This means that over time, you need to consume fewer calories to lose weight at the same rate.

You have two options: 
  1. Consume less food every day
  2. Move a little more to make up the difference. 
I found this part out the hard way. It's true that as you lose weight your body will need to burn fewer calories to maintain your body. This is normal, so if you still want to lose you want to eat less calories. Now that doesn't mean you have to starve, it just means the foods you eat and drink have less calories. You can eat as much as you want, just change the food and the drinks so the calories you consume are fewer. 

Also, if your doing the same exercise program every workout, your body will adapt to that and won't have to burn as many calories to do the same thing as before. So, to keep burning the same or more calories every workout you have to change the workout. By that I mean, if you use a treadmill to exercise every time you workout, make a change and join a "spin class" on the even days of the week and do the treadmill on the odd days of the week.

Back to Basics
Good habits sometimes fall by the wayside when you get too comfortable with a program, so make sure you're as on track as you think you are. For starters, write down or keep a log of all your food and drinks, your exercise and check your weight every day. With the log you can look back on history and see why you might have slipped up. And never through the logs away, your history will aways show you your successes and your failures. 

I write E-books and blogs about fitness and weight loss. I’ll show you the cheapest, inexpensive way to lose weight. Right now and for a limited time, my E-book, "How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight”, is $1.99 on all the major sites. Amazon.com, iBooks, B&N.com, Scribd.com, Kobo.com and many others in several other countries. 

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