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Weight loss is actually easy to do if you follow these common sense guidelines:
Reduce your food intake. The recommendation for successful weight loss is no more than 500 calories less than what you presently eat per day. Rapid weight loss can harm the body and if calorie cutting gets too extreme your body’s metabolism often slows, making weight loss more difficult.
Eat fibre! This is a key tip. Not only will it make you feel fuller, it’ll help reduce irregular bowel cycles, diarrhea, and constipation. You’ll also reduce your risk for developing diverticulosis. Recommended daily fibre intake is 25 to 35 grams. High fibre foods include whole grains, fruits and vegetables, beans, and high fibre cereals.
Follow Canada’s Food Guide or the State’s Food Pyramid. If you eat according to either, you’re likely to be taking in the correct ratio of foods, providing you with all the nutrients you need to be healthy.
Canada’s Food Guide is designed to give you certain ratios of carbohydrates (>55%), proteins (10 to 15%), and fats (30%). Besides counting your servings, how can you tell if you fall within these ranges?
Try FitDay. There’s an excellent nutritional program at FitDay that can tell you if you fall within the ranges. All you need to do is sign up for a free account, then start plugging your foods into the food log. Each day you’ll be able to see what percentages of fat, protein, and carbohydrate you have eaten, as well find out how much fibre you’re taking in. You can also check to see if you’re getting all the nutrients you need, by running the nutrition report.
People often eat too much fat. And when you’re working with percentages it can be hard to figure out what 30% of fat calories is in grams of fat. The equation is:
Daily calories x 30% / 9 calories per gram of fat = number of grams of fat per day.
Or, check out the following chart to figure out how much fat you should be eating a day:
1200 calories – 40 grams of fat
1400 calories – 47 grams of fat
1600 calories – 53 grams of fat
1800 calories – 60 grams of fat
2000 calories – 67 grams of fat
2200 calories – 73 grams of fat
FitDay also allows you to run an average of your food intakes for one week, two weeks, and one month. This information gives you an invaluable snapshot of how close to optimal your eating habits bring you over time.
You can also input your daily activities into the activity log to see how many calories you burn per day. There’s also a section to keep track of your goals, a journal, and a calendar that allows you to click on various daily logs quickly.
The easiest way to go about using FitDay is to keep track of your regular food intake for three days to a week. Then work at reducing your calorie intake by 500 calories, which should give you the optimal 1 to 2 lbs of weight loss per week. Try to keep carbohydrate, fat, and protein ratios in the right range, making sure to eat your 25 to 35 grams of daily fibre. Increase your physical activity to burn more calories and improve your health. Then keep at it.
The interesting thing about programs like FitDay is they give an accurate picture of our eating patterns. We think we eat well, but when the graphs are on the table many people are astonished to find they overeat certain categories and aren’t eating well enough nutritionally to maintain their health. Or eating enough fibre. Remember fibre is key. Weight loss really is easy. All it takes is some common sense and willpower. The rest just happens over time.
Other Excellent Online Activity and Nutrition Websites and Communities
SparkPeople
FitLink
Fitness
PeerTrainer
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Photo Credit: Arcelia Vanasse
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