A weight loss journey is full of ups and downs. Shedding off a few pounds after several weeks of diet and exercise makes one want to lose more. But sooner or later, you could hit a wall and feel like you’re no longer losing weight.
When this happens, a person experiences a weight loss plateau—a stage where weight loss efforts seem to be ineffective. According to health experts, lack of weight loss progress happens often for different reasons. This article will discuss reasons why a weight loss plateau happens and what you can do to overcome the phenomenon.
Why Does A Weight-Loss Plateau Happen?
By having a long-term diet, exercising, and understanding water weight, you’ll ultimately lose muscles and fats, which can impact your metabolic rate. However, this can become a double-edged sword, causing your weight reduction efforts to come to a halt.
Below are some of the common reasons why your efforts may stall:
1. Your Calorie Consumption Is Equal To What Your Body Can Burn
When you lose weight and achieve a slimmer body, your calorie requirements drastically decrease. This means the food you eat to fuel your activities may reach a point where it’s equal to the number of calories your body is capable of burning on a daily basis. To lose weight, you need to burn calories more than you’re consuming.
2. You’ve Lost Muscle Mass
Your muscles are partly responsible for your metabolic rate or how fast your body burns energy while at rest. Loss of muscle mass means reduced metabolic rate, and your capacity to burn energy dips, too. Because of this phenomenon, your weight loss journey slows down.
3. You’ve Become Less Conscious of Your Diet
Individuals wanting to lose weight need to endure a few months of sacrifice, giving up their favorite foods, especially sugary and sweet snacks. Unfortunately, upon reaching their weight and fitness goals, some people tend to slack off. While it’s not discouraged, having too many cheat days will inevitably cause you to regain lost weight.
4. Your Physical Activities Hadn’t Changed
Weight loss doesn’t only happen in the gym. As mentioned, the rate at which your body burns energy while at rest is impacted by your muscles. Additionally, everything you do daily like climbing through a flight of stairs, walking towards the grocery stores, and tending to your garden can contribute to weight regulation.
If your exercise routine hasn’t changed and you’ve got a reduced metabolic rate, your weight loss efforts may stagnate.
5. You’re Retaining Water
Within a few weeks after starting your journey, you’ll likely notice rapid weight reduction as the body releases stored carbohydrates to generate the energy needed for vigorous exercises. This type of carbohydrate is called glycogen, and it’s made up of water. This means most of the weight that disappears at this stage is predominantly water.
Too much water retention due in part to hormonal changes and high sodium intake can negatively impact your weight loss struggles.
6. You May Have An Imbalanced Gut
The medical community is continuing its research on the health effects of having a healthy gut. Apart from boosting the immune system, the gut may also impact digestion and weight loss. Initial results reveal persons who have elevated levels of good bacteria in the gut find losing weight easier.
In a 2017 study published in the International Journal of Obesity, researchers from the University of Copenhagen found out that specific gut bacteria such as Prevotella and Bacteroides can help hasten weight loss efforts.
However, if you’re not cultivating good bacteria through your diet, you may develop an imbalanced gut, making weight loss more challenging.
Ways to Overcome Weight-loss Plateau
Once you’ve reached a plateau, check whether you’re already contented with the amount of weight you’ve lost or if you want to shed more pounds. If it’s the latter, you’d need to switch up your eating habits, diet plan, and exercise routine.
A weight loss plateau can be frustrating, but understanding that it’s a normal occurrence can help you overcome it. To get past this temporary weight loss snag, here are the things you can do:
- Reduce Your Calorie Intake Changing your diet plan and monitoring your calorie intake may help you get out of the weight loss plateau. Just make sure not to fall below the 1,200-calorie mark as reducing further can trigger constant hunger.
- Intensify Your Workout Routine Switching up some of your exercise routines can help you burn more calories. For instance, you may consider including weightlifting or strength training for a more intensified workout. Also, consider stretching your workout times too.
- Encourage More Movements Having an exercise partner may help you to get moving more often. But apart from exercising inside the gym, strive to move more in and out of your home. Walking, jogging, skipping the elevator, cleaning your home, and other household chores can be done with less dependence on machines to help you burn more calories.
- Reduce Stress Studies suggest that weight and stress may be related. Whether stress can cause weight loss or weight gain may vary from person to person and may hinge on how one copes. For instance, some may feel the need to eat more while some will completely lose their appetite. In addition, some people may lose sleep while others doze off more easily.
- Get Rid Of Water Weight Practicing a few activities to reduce water retention such as decreasing salt and carbohydrate consumption, increasing water and potassium intake, and ingesting magnesium supplements may help reverse the situation.
- Be More Conscious Of What You Eat To encourage gut health, take probiotics and stay away from processed and refined foods. Consuming more fiber-rich foods and essential fatty acids are essential in increasing good bacteria in the gut.
- Final Thoughts Losing weight leads to improved health, and experiencing a plateau doesn’t mean everything is lost. This simple snag in your journey shouldn’t discourage you from moving on with your weight loss objectives.
