I’ve been coaching weight loss and fitness
for over a decade now.
I understand your struggles and frustrations
when you’re trying to drop body fat and to
get into shape.
It is not easy. It is, in fact, one of the
most challenging things in the world to do.
(If it was easy everyone would do it, you
know this)
I’ve worked with a lot of clients that while
dieting, got frustrated with a lack of results
from their own program and just begin to eat
less and less, hoping to speed up the progress
of the decreasing pounds and inches.
For a lot of girls usually under 30 getting
into shape means NOT eating and this is a very
bad thing
Quite often they were shooting themselves
in the foot.
As counterintuitive as it may seem, sometimes
you need to eat more to lose fat and to get a
more toned appearance.
An Australian girl named Madalin Frodsham made
an Instagram post recently that has gone viral
that showed the results of making a calorie
increase in her diet.
She posted a side-by-side photo of herself, one
photo of her body when she was eating 800 calories
a day, and the other when she was eating 1800.
Madalin Frodsham wrote:
“Let’s just preface this by saying no, I did not
have an ED. When I was eating 800 calories a day,
I thought I was healthy. I was eating healthy
food, but hardly any macronutrients. I was curious
to find out what my macros were like before I
actually started counting my macros, so I entered
my old foods into @myfitnesspal to find out.
I was [quite] astonished to see how little
protein and carbs I was eating. 800 calories
seems absurdly low as now I need minimum 1500
calories to be full, but at the time 800 calories
was keeping me full because that’s what my body was
used to.
After a while though, salad simply wasn’t cutting
it, and for all the restrictions I was placing on
my diet, I simply wasn’t seeing the results I
had anticipated.
So I got in touch with a PT and nutritional coach
and got my macros sorted. When he first told me
to eat 50% carbs I nearly died! I was eating about
10% carbs before and could not fathom how 50% carbs
would not make me fat.
I also freaked out at all the calories. I’ve been
keeping an excel spreadsheet and in the first
week of being on macros my average calories
for the week was a little over 1000. I remember
how hard I struggled to actually eat the size
of my meals.
I would just put my lunch next to my desk and eat
it over the course of 3 hours as I couldn’t eat
it in one sitting! Now my stomach can take way
more and is much happier! In the second week
I was averaging 1600 calories a day!
It didn’t take long for my body to catch up.
A part of me may always have that mindset that
relates not eating with weight loss and “being
good today”.
Sometimes I may forget to eat lunch just because
I got busy and for a second I will revert back to
old thinking, and think “ohh, I’ve done really
well today and haven’t eaten much at all.”
That’s why I love tracking my macros. It will
tell me “Maddy, you need to eat more. Go eat
3 potatoes”.
And I’ll pat myself on the back for being healthy
and doing really good today!”
-Madalin Frodsham
What Madalin wrote about is a scientifically sound
fact.
When we deprive our body of food, it will react
by slowing down our metabolism to account for
the nutrient deficiency.
A slower metabolism can literally stop a body from
losing weight. While you may be tempted to
cut back on eating further and further, you
should resist this temptation.
If you’re under eating in an effort to
lose weight, don’t do what this girl
did for so long.
Increase your calories. Keep it clean
but increase your calories.
And I KNOW it can be a challenge theres a
lot of headtrash and guilt and anxiety
that goes with all this.
Tell yourself you’re just going to
“Test it”.
You don’t have to commit to it forever.
Snap some before pics, tweak your calories
up for 4 weeks and look at the results.
You will see a smaller, tighter, leaner, easier
to maintain figure.
Talk soon.
Dave
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