Tips For Weight Loss | Weight loss | Health care

    10 Proven Tips For Weight Loss

Over the years, you’ve probably heard your fair share of wacky weight loss recommendations, whether it’s to drink celery juice every day or replace your meals with weight loss “cookies.”  While there’s an abundance of misguided advice, there are also many legitimate, research-backed tips for people who are in the right mental health space and have weight loss as a personal goal.

We spoke with nutritionists, registered dietitians, personal trainers, and other experts to give you the most effective and practical tips for weight loss. Here are expert-approved and science-backed tips that can help you achieve and maintain a healthy weight.

1. Eat Slow

I have my clients learn how to choose foods they like, really taste each morsel going into their mouths, and chew deliberately. I advise them to chew slowly, swallow only when the food is all chewed up, and repeat. It takes time to know we're full. Eating slowly not only allows us to enjoy our food more but gives us better cues of satiety.

2. Enjoy the Food You Eat

So often we’re told what to eat, and then when we don’t like that specific food, we’re less apt to create long-term healthy habits. Try new fruits and vegetables. Find out how to prepare new dishes that provide variety and flavor. Add herbs and spices to elevate flavor. Or if you prefer, savor the sweetness of fruit and the depth of raw and steamed vegetables. There’s no reason that your relationship with food can’t be pleasurable.

3. Don’t Forget the Weights

Make sure you are lifting weights or doing another form of strength training two or three times a week. Using moderate to heavy weights  three or four sets of 10 to 15 reps with weights that challenge you helps increase your muscle mass. When you have more muscle on your body, the food you eat is more likely to be utilized as fuel, rather than be stored as fat. Research also shows that resistance training can make a weight loss plan more effective.

4. Get Enough Z’s

A lack of sleep increases your hunger hormone, ghrelin, and decreases your satisfaction hormone, leptin, which can contribute to weight gain. When we are sleep derived, we crave more salty and sweet foods. Why? Because anytime you feel more intense hunger, your cravings for higher energy aka higher calorie  foods intensify. We also know that the way we think and process our emotions is affected by inadequate sleep, so it’s easy to connect this with an impaired ability to make reasonable choices in many areas of life, including with food. If we flip the coin, we can safely assume that when we are well rested, our bodies work better. When it comes to eating, that would mean that we would eat when we are truly hungry and eat just until satisfied.

5. Don’t Skip Meals

Remember, our body's ultimate goal is to stay alive. As soon as we are being kept from calories, which are literally the life energy for our bodies, it will do things to survive. Our body knows what foods are higher in energy density, and we will crave those more. Honor your hunger and don’t allow your body to think it's being starved. Research shows that the benefits of fasting like a potential decrease in LDL (“bad”) cholesterol  typically disappear when the fast is over. This goes against many dieting tactics, but those tactics truly don't work well for people in the long term. I generally recommend eating every four hours.

6. Stay Hydrated

Research has found that people who drank two glasses of water before a meal lost more weight than people who didn’t drink water before meals  and they kept it off. This simple tip works in two ways. Thirst can mask itself as hunger, causing you to eat more. And water makes you feel fuller, causing you to eat less during a meal.

7. Give Your Breakfast a Protein Boost

Aim for 15 to 25 grams of protein at breakfast. Protein is digested slowly and suppresses hunger hormones, helping keep you full. Additionally, a high-protein breakfast helps curb cravings later in the day. Pair protein-rich foods with fiber and healthy fats, like two eggs with whole-wheat toast and avocado or high-protein frozen waffles with nuts, berries, and a little maple syrup.

8. Consume Protein at Every Meal

Eating protein-rich foods at every meal, especially breakfast, can help shave extra pounds. Protein slows down the digestive process and positively impacts your hunger hormones. Protein can also do better at staving off hunger than carbohydrates. Protein-rich foods include beans, seeds, nuts, eggs, yogurt, cheese, tofu, lentil pasta, poultry, fish, and meat.

9. Experiment With Fruits at Dessert Time

Fruits are low in calories and carry tons of nutrients like antioxidants and fiber. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, only about 12 percent of the U.S. population is meeting their fruit intake and only 10 percent is meeting their vegetable intake. Using fruits for dessert will help you meet your daily requirements but also add flavor to your day. Many fruits can be sauteed, grilled, or baked. For example, a grilled peach topped with vanilla yogurt and shaved almonds is amazing!

 

10. Eat a Large Breakfast and a Small Dinner

You’ll want to take in more of your calories earlier in the day. A study published in 2019 found that subjects who were given small breakfasts and large dinners lost significantly less weight than those assigned to a large breakfast and a smaller dinner. So smaller meals in the latter part of the day may be an advantage to those who want to lose weight and improve overall health. However, each person has individual needs, which may require additional snacks and food, such as those who are pregnant, are breastfeeding, have diabetes, or take medication that require certain foods. This is why it is so important that you seek a consultation with a registered dietitian-nutritionist.

11. Get Into Meal Planning

Meal planning is one of my top tips for staying healthy and eating well. I'm such a fan of the concept that I wrote a book about it! Taking 5 to 10 minutes over the weekend to write out a menu for the week ahead will save you time, money, and unwanted calories down the road. Not sure what to make for dinner tonight? No worries, it's already on your menu plan. Menu planning is a great way to stay organized, and know what groceries you need to buy and what you already have on hand, and it will help ensure a balanced plate. Keep in mind, a night off from cooking and ordering takeout or making a frozen meal is a totally acceptable part of the menu plan. And be sure to write down the plan — you're more likely to stick to it if it's in front of you as a reminder.

12. Choose Super Snacks

It’s best to look at your snacks as mini-meals. We are snacking more than ever, so it’s best to choose snacks with benefits, like almond butter and a sliced apple or Greek yogurt topped with fruit and a high fiber cereal. It’s not easy to get everything you need in a day, so nutritionally rich snacks can help fill that gap while also making you feel more full and satisfied.

The Takeaway

As the experts have noted, there are many effective ways to lose weight. The right way for you depends on your individual goals and preferences. Remember that small changes can make a big difference. And it may take some experimentation to find out which tips work best for you.

Along with dietary changes and meal planning, it may also be helpful to identify why you are trying to make a change, to embrace setbacks, and to get support from friends or family.

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