Weight Management

Now I don’t usually talk about calories, but just for you, I’ll make an exception!

It is recommended that for an average (?) person, the following calorie intake is needed in a day:

Women approximately 2000 calories

Men approximately 2500 calories

The sun is beginning to make an appearance, the summer holidays are tantalizingly close, and the thought of how stunning you are going to look on the beach crosses your perplexed mind – arrrrrh! How to shift some troublesome tummy, thunderous thighs and bulbous behind – all in 4 weeks???

Often people slash their calorie intake dramatically, which can lead to you feeling faint, grumpy and darn hungry – and a bit of weight loss. Then out of sheer frustration, there is the all out binge, leaving you feeling guilty, bloated and having put the weight back on. Our bodies feel very uncomfortable when we eat far too many or far too few calories.

Brian Wansink in the book ‘Mindless Eating’, recommends trying to eat 100 – 200 fewer calories a day, every day. Our bodies certainly do not miss or even notice these calories, and it is a sustainable way to lose weight long term. He states, ‘It takes 3500 extra calories to equal one pound. It doesn’t matter if we eat these extra 3500 calories in one week or gradually over an entire year. They’ll all add up to a pound. This is the danger of creeping calories. Just 10 extra calories a day – one stick of double mind gum - will make you a pound more portly one year from today’.

In reading that, it seems everything you eat, adds to your overall weight over time. Far from being depressing news, this could work in your favour! By making small painless changes, you can gradually change the way you look and how much you weigh.

EXAMPLE

1 less 82 calorie shortbread finger a day with mid afternoon cuppa = 8.2 fewer pounds a year

1 small glass of white wine rather than a large glass = 10 fewer pounds a year

1 less 408 calorie cheeseburger a day = 40.8 fewer pounds a year

Although this method will not help you lose a stone in the next month for you to be a beach babe, it will effortless help you lose it over the year – and with a lot less pain into the bargain!

CHALLENGE

Decide what item you would like to cut out. This needs to be things which you don’t mind missing out e.g. go from semi skimmed to skimmed milk, no sugar in your tea, have skinny cappuccinos rather than full fat, have one less chocolate or biscuit than normal.

Implement the change and monitor how you get on. When this becomes your new habit, see if there are any more items you could exclude. Only make one change at a time. Too many changes will get you all confused and you will be cutting out too many calories, resulting in you starting to feel you are on a diet again – and we can’t have that! Maybe challenge yourself to trying one item a week for a month. Remember, all the little changes soon add up – good luck!