How To Overcome The Dreaded Weight Loss Plateau

It's a great feeling once you have made that decision to lose weight and commit to the cause. And you will enjoy the results when you first start, but sooner or later you are bound to hit what is known as a weight loss plateau and it can be very discouraging and overwhelming. But don't worry, a weight loss plateau doesn't mean that you're hard work is all in vain it's just means that you are turning you're fat into lean muscle, which will burn more calories and fat even when you're not active. 

Weight loss plateau happens to everyone at some point during their weight loss plan. The plan of best action when you hit your weight loss plateau is to maintain your low calorie eating habits as well as you work out schedule. However, you may need to switch up you're exercise routine a bit to trick you're body back into a state of shock and which will break the weight loss plateau you are stuck in at faster rate.

The cause of a weight loss plateau is due to the drastic changes your body experiences when you first start your workouts and diet. The weight loss you're experiencing is because you're  cutting calories, so the body gets its needed energy by releasing its stores of glycogen, which is a type of carbohydrate found in your muscles and liver. Glycogen is made up partly of water, so when you burn glycogen for energy, water is released and the result is weight loss that's mostly water weight. Obviously, this rapid weight loss is only temporary, and as you lose weight, you're also losing muscle along with fat. 

Lean muscle is important because it's what helps keep the rate at which you burn calories up, so as you lose weight, your metabolism temporarily declines, which causes you to burn fewer calories than you did at your heavier weight. This slower metabolism will slowdown your weight loss and is what causes your weight loss plateau. In other words, when the calories you burn equal the calories you eat, you reach a weight loss plateau. To lose more weight and break the weight loss plateau, you will need to either increase your physical activity or decrease the calories you eat. 

You will need to constantly change up the intensity as well as exercises in your workout routine to continue achieving your weight loss goals and have decrease the amount of weight loss plateaus in the future. There are a few things that you can do to overcome weight loss plateau. One is to evaluate your daily habits by looking at your food and activity records, this is where keeping a food journal will come in handy. This helps ensure that you don't slack on your diet as well as the amount exercise you do.

 

Another effective method  to prevent a weight loss plateau, is to cut down on your calorie intake by 200 calories. This works great but be careful, you don't want to go below 1,200 calories,if you go lower than this a day, you can increase your risk of overeating. The next thing to do to overcome a weight loss plateau is to increase the intensity of your workout as well as raise the amount of time you exercise by 15 to 30 minutes.The combination of the two will burn more calories. 

And finally, if you haven't already,  it would be a great idea to add weightlifting to your  work out routine to increase your muscle mass and help you burn more calories as well. So you see weight loss plateau is nothing to stress over, it's all about perspective and should be taken as a sign that you are achieving results.

Follow the suggestions above to overcome your weight loss plateau.