You were likely excited in the beginning. You were ready to start a new lifestyle and lose weight. You filled up the shopping cart with fruits and vegetables, read tons of articles about losing weight and began walking every night after dinner.
For the first couple of weeks it seemed everything was going great! You lost a couple of pounds, felt more energetic, and learned to prepare some new healthful meals and snacks. Then suddenly in the second month of your new lifestyle things started to fall apart. You’re not losing weight anymore, or even more frustrating, actually gained back a few pounds. You started to miss the foods that you used to eat. The healthy honeymoon, once again, is hitting the self-sabotage wall.
Why You’re Not Losing Weight
The best way to avoid the self-sabotage is to recognize it when you see it. Do you recognize any of the self-sabotaging thoughts, behaviors and patterns below?
“I am always so stressed out!”
It seems like stress should make us lose weight. Anxiety is exhausting and it sure makes many of us feel hungry. Unfortunately, stress causes weight gain. This is because chronic stress that lasts for an extended period of time may cause the body to become flooded with cortisol.
Cortisol is a steroid hormone secreted by the adrenal glands. When we are under stress, cortisol first mobilizes carbohydrate and fat for quick energy (the “fight or flight” response). Once the stress has passed, cortisol causes an increase in appetite to replace the carbohydrate and fat that we burned while fighting or flighting. The result: You can’t lose weight.
However, we are not really fighting or flighting in today’s society. Many of us live sedentary or minimally active lives. This means that, in theory, we are eating more calories than we can burn when our cortisol levels increase. You need to find a way to relax for a many different health reasons, one of which is your weight.
“No one needs to know about this handful of candy.”
You started out with measuring cups and maybe a food scale. You wrote down and planned everything that you ate. Then one day you had three pieces of chocolate or a spoonful of peanut butter. You did not gain weight from this and so… you did it again.
Maybe you went to the gym and came home extra hungry; so, you ate a little extra. Or perhaps you had been doing so well you decided to reward yourself with “a treat”.
However, now this has become a habit. You still write down the food that you remember eating, but what about those little “food bonuses,” which you doubt are really adding up to anything because you tell yourself, “what difference does it make. It’s just only a little_______ ( fill in the blank).”
The fact is, everything that goes into your mouth counts. Yes, even if you eat it fast. Yes, even if you do not even remember eating it. Yes, even if you did not really enjoy it, it still counts.
“It says fat-free. Great! I will have seconds!”
Study after study has shown that fat-free foods instill eaters with a false sense of security. When people are given cookies and told that they are low fat, they eat far more than they do when given cookies with no such claim. Fat-free, organic, all-natural, low-fat, reduced-fat, and lite foods still contain calories. Do not get fooled by bright colors and bold words on food labels. Read the Nutrition Facts and the ingredient list. Pay special attention to the serving size.
“By skipping breakfast, I will save a couple hundred calories!”
If you save 300 calories by skipping breakfast, you are likely to consume an extra 400 calories at lunch. People who have lost weight and kept it off were studied—they always ate breakfast.
Breakfast has many benefits, including:
- Getting your metabolism going
- Helping to curb eating later in the day
- Providing energy, so that you do not find yourself relying on sugar and caffeine later in the day in a desperate attempt to gain some pep
- Setting the mood for the rest of the day’s food choices
“I should have lost more weight by now.”
Of course, the sooner you hit your weight goal, the happier it will make you. The thing is that making a lifestyle change is for life. Once you have reached your goal, you cannot go revert back to your old habits and eating behaviors. This is paramount to your weight maintenance and stopping the yo-yo dieting cycle.
The good news is that no foods are off limit to you. You can work all foods can into a healthful lifestyle, even when weight loss is the goal. Many people who have successfully lost weight have done so by recognizing that 1) they had been eating too much food (portions) and 2) they were eating when they were not physically hungry.
After the initial, exciting loss of water weight, you should lose an average of 1-2 pounds a week. Some weeks you will lose .5 lbs and other weeks you might lose 3 lbs. Getting angry or upset at yourself is likely to backfire. Fluctuations and plateaus are part of the journey. Get your mindset in the right place to stay the course.
You might feel like giving up and that voice in your head will say, “I am not losing any weight anyway. I may as well eat.” Once you start this mind trick, it’s all down hill. Stay positive and keep telling yourself “I CAN” and “I WILL”! Your actions will follow your thoughts.
Lasting weight loss is a marathon, not a sprint. If you’ve been dealing with these weight loss frustrations on your own or if you’re still not sure why you’re not losing weight, schedule your free call with me here.
