Calories: Constant or Cycle?

Question

I want to lose weight and I'm thinking about doing a simple, balenced 1,200 calorie diet to lose my 20lbs. However I've heard that if you stay at a constant calorie level for too long, your body slips into the patern and you plateau on weight loss. Is this true? And if so should I do 1,200 one day and then 1,300 and then back again or something like that? Any suggestions? Thanks.

Answer 1

Eating a low amount of calories like 1200 is perfectly good practice if you have a lot of weight to lose and need to lose it quickly. When you have less weight to lose, the weight lose is going to be pretty slow no matter what, especially if you are trying to lose 20 lbs of pure fat and gain nothing else.

I would recommend doing weight training at a gym so you can gain muscle mass and a nice tone to your body and then just follow a moderate diet regimen to lose the weight. You may not end up losing 20 lbs - maybe more like 10 lbs or so, but you will have overall less body fat %, so you'll look better, be slimmer, and have a smaller body size. Weight training is going to boost your metabolism so body fat is lost more easily, but since muscle weighs more than fat, this may not be very rewarding when you step on the scale. You'll have to do more measurements dealing with inches lost instead of lbs lost.

As for your general question, you can plateau when your body gets bored and used to what you're eating or doing to stay active. Varying the calorie amounts isn't going to be as important as varying the actual things you eat though. When you eat less, your metabolism will generally slow down so your body can sustain itself on less. This is why is it important to eat frequent, but small meals, so your body doesn't get confused and think you are starving.

Now, I mentioned a moderate diet above. That consists of pretty much continuing to eat what you do now, but eating less of it, and making small alterations to the food so there are fewer calories. That means eating only one piece of pizza, and then adding a salad with low fat dressing instead of eating 2-3 pieces. Or, it means making a sandwich with lean meat and using light mayo or no mayo at all. You should never cut out your favorite foods, because it will make you destined to either fail your diet, or will cause all the hard work and lost weight to come right back.

Since you don't have much to lose, I'm definitely going to recommend working out though. I think that is what is going to get you to your target size, not the dieting.

Best of luck!

Answer 2

you need to know your basal metabolic rate (minimum energy requirements for metabolism), fat percentage and activity level (there are several formulas around).

After you know what your caloric intake should be to stay constant in weight, you need to eat 15-20% calories less. Not more, or you will go into starvation mode (ie you will not loose fat).

Finally, cycling calories is done as follows: you increase the caloric level for 2 days in a row so to speed up your metabolism, and then go back to your diet, and you make 1 cycle a week.

Answer 3

why don't you just eat less and do more. I don't count calories, just watch what you eat, stay away from junk food and do more. it works.