When it comes to the weight loss journey, it could be very difficult to navigate due to the overwhelming availability of information everywhere. However, when it comes to selecting trustworthy and effective weight loss advice, it is important to check whether the science behind those strategies is reliable and supports the claims. Therefore, in order to help you with your weight loss journey, we came up with these effective strategies backed up by science to help you achieve your goals this year!
1. Changes in Your Diet:
The number of diets available everywhere can be very overwhelming, making it much harder to pick one to stick with. To help you with this choice, we selected 3 renowned diets that should help you to achieve results:
- Ketogenic Diet: Also known as Keto, this diet is made up of the consumption of high protein and high-fat foods while minimizing the consumption of carbohydrates. The purpose of this diet is to induce the state of ketosis which is a metabolic process where the body has to utilize fat to produce energy due to the fact that the carbohydrates are not available within immediate availability. For example, recent research suggests that the keto diet results were responsible for 11% fat loss compared to only 2.7% for the low-fat diet.
- Zone Diet: This diet revolves around maintaining a specific ratio of macronutrients in the following proportion: 40% carbohydrates, 30% fat, and 30% protein. If maintained correctly, this diet encourages the body to metabolize the fat while also stabilizing the levels of insulin release. For example, a recent study showed that over the 6 month period, a sample of obese or overweight women managed to lose 7.4% of the weight on average.
- Restrictricted Calorie Diets: With this diet, the whole purpose is to restrict your calorie intake to maintain balanced nutrition, ranging between 20%-40% reduction in the intake of calories. One of the ways of implementing this diet is to use the “Weight Watchers Diet” which allocates points to each specific food you consume. As a result, you allocate these points by consuming the food while ensuring you stay within your selected daily maximum. As a result, the effectiveness of this diet was researched which reported a 10%-20% reduction in the weight relative to body mass for overweight/obese participants within a 12-month period.
Even though these diets are proven to be effective and backed up by research, it is still important to ensure that you seek tailored advice from a professional on how to adjust your diet specifically for you to achieve the best possible results.
2. Start Exercising and Increase Physical Activity Levels:
In order to ensure that your exercise is focused on weight loss, it is important to achieve a negative energy balance where the use of energy (i.e. the output) is higher than the production (i.e. input). Even though starting exercising could be perceived as easy, it is difficult to maintain the exercise over longer periods of time.
Here are a couple of tips on how to start your exercising routine:
- Always remember why you started and remind yourself of the benefits
- Start slow to make it easy and more enjoyable.
- Always adjust your diet to compensate for increased use of energy.
- Join a fitness class or find someone to train with.
- Plan your sessions each week but don’t overcomplicate.
- Gradually increase intensity/duration and vary exercise mode/sessions.
- Set realistic weight loss and exercise goals that you can record and reward.
Also, in addition to that, walking could also be a good starting strategy. For example, increasing your daily step count by just 2000 steps a day can have a positive effect on weight loss results.
3.Improve Your Sleep:
Many people associate good night’s sleep with their successful weight loss journey … and so do scientists! A recent study that explored the correlation between sleep duration and weight loss suggested that having 6-8 hours of sleep a day consistently has the best possible results while sleeping more or less affects the hormones that regulate you appetite. In addition, consistent lack of sleep also has a long-term negative effect on the hormones that affect your appetite.
4. Prescription Weight Loss Treatments:
In order to assist with your weight loss journey, you can also start taking clinically proven, safe, and effective weight loss treatments in addition to your exercise, especially if your BMI is high (>30). Treatments like Orlistat (also branded as Xenical or Alli or Orlos) contain the key ingredient (pancreatic lapse inhibitor) that reduces the amount of the ingested fat absorbed by up to 30%
Furthermore, the effectiveness of Orlistat is seriously supported by an extensive number of studies in terms of long-term and short-term weight loss as well as weight maintenance. In order to maximize the efficiency of this treatment, it is important to take it as a part of a consistent and varied diet as well as an exercise routine.
5. Reduce Consumption of Alcohol:
By reducing the amount of alcohol you consume, you can maximize the weight loss results by reducing the calorie intake associated with it. Furthermore, reducing consumption can encourage a healthier lifestyle, motivation and maximize the results of your weight loss journey.
6. Try to Reduce Your Stress Levels:
Factors like chronic stress, usually caused by life events as well as stress-inducing lifestyle, are ofter related to unplanned weight gain. Stress activates the mesocorticolimbic dopamine that increases the food cravings as a result of the glucocorticosteroid flowing in your bloodstream. As a result, chronic stress can cause unintended weight gain, in the long run, making it harder to achieve your goals. Trying to avoid stress triggers while also ensuring that you have time reflect and sleep well can be an efficient approach to reduce the stress levels experienced.
7. Set Realistic Goals. Track Results and Reward Yourself.
However, one of the most important pieces of advice is to set realistic goals that are achievable and manageable. Even though quick weight loss results might be very attractive and desirable, it’s the consistent results over time that plays a key role in your weight loss journey successful. Plan your exercise, plan your diet, organize your time efficiently and make sure that you have time to track your progress and reflect. Finally, ensure to reward yourself for the milestones you achieve to reinforce those positive behavioral changes.
In conclusion, if you are feeling like committing to losing weight this year, the steps above are recommended to help you on your weight loss journey and achieve amazing results.
