There are a lot of ways to lose weight. Some ways are healthy and encouraged. Other ways are not healthy or due to illness, like a bout of the stomach flu that can make you lose lots of water weight. Answering the amount of weight you can lose per week will be based solely on healthy ways to shed weight, not the unhealthy ones, since that amount varies and not desirable.
It’s based on the individual, your exercise habits and how long you’ve been trying to lose weight.
People who are heavier and exercise will lose weight faster than the person who is just a pound or two overweight, simply because it takes more calories to move their body. However, going on a strict diet isn’t necessarily losing fat, but water weight. That type of weight loss is just temporary. If you’re just beginning a weight loss program, especially one that’s low carb, you also may notice an increased weight loss that comes from water weight loss.
If you’ve working toward a healthy weight loss, aim for a pound or two a week.
You can lose more in a week, but that weight won’t necessarily stay off permanently. If you do it by starving yourself, you may actually end up gaining even more weight later. Aim for a pound or two a week and shed those pounds with a healthy diet and regular exercise. Switching to a healthy diet can program you to continue eating healthy after you’ve lost the weight. That will help prevent gaining the weight back later.
You can boost your weight loss with regular exercise.
Diet alone won’t get the fastest results. You’ll tend toward the pound a week rather than the two pound goal. When you add a program of regular exercise to your diet, you not only burn extra calories to help weight come off quicker, you’ll also build muscle tissue. Muscle tissue requires more calories to maintain than fat tissue does, so the more you have, the higher your resting metabolism is and easier it is to shed those extra pounds. Increasing exercise means you can expect to shed two pounds a week safely if you’re overweight.
- The reason for rapid weight loss in the beginning comes from burning glycogen stores that are used for quick energy. As you lose glycogen, you lose three times as much water.
- Don’t weigh yourself frequently throughout the day, but just once a day at the most and do it at the same time every day.
- Trying to lose weight too fast by cutting calories extremely low or over-exercising can be counterproductive. You can end up losing lean muscle mass, which slows your metabolism, form gallstones or even miss out on nutrients, some of which are important for burning fat.
- Opting for slower weight loss may not get your ready for next week’s wedding or class reunion, but it does give you time to form new habits that can mean you’ll never have to diet again.
For more information, contact us today at LIV Fitness 247