So your diet is over, you’ve reached your goal weight (Congrats by the way), you feel proud after X amount of time and restricting your calories, resisting temptation of your ever-growing appetite.
The suffering is finally over and you’re ready to live life again.
A month later you jump on the scale’s and slap yourself trying to awaken you from this nightmare. You suddenly realise that this is no dream. How can months of dieting and hard work be undone in a matter of weeks.
What do you do now, Why has this happened, Do you do another round of restrictive eating and hope it sticks this time?
Well getting the Body you want is only half the Battle, There’s the Battle of keeping the weight off as well which is just as Hard if not Harder.
It’s no secret that when we restrict our Calories our bodies react via Hormones such as Leptin Decreasing and Ghrelin Increasing along with other key hormones that play a role in weight management. Also as an effect of Diet-induced Weight loss our appetites get bigger but those hormones do not return back to normal after the diet has ended (1.) Resulting in constantly feeling more hungry and unconsciously consuming way more Calories than you think you’ve eaten. I’ve discussed this in greater detail & other concepts of the Metabolism in these articles here (2,3.)
So your Metabolism had a massive wrench thrown into its tracks, The wrench being Adaptive Thermogenesis (Metabolic Adaptation) Seriously read this (3.) When Adaptive Thermogenesis Kicks In Your BMR drops and you burn less Calories Throughout the day along with the increase in certain Hunger Hormones and Appetite it’s Going to be hard to burn more Calories than you Consume.
There’s only so much you can exercise and reduce Calories before your lifestyle becomes miserable and pretty impossible to maintain.
Let’s Use a female competitor weighing 140 pounds (64 kg) at 20 percent body fat who needs to get down to below 12 percent as an example (4.) Her maintenance diet looks something like this:
Calories: 2350 calories a day
Protein: 30 percent, 176 g/day
Fat: 30 percent, 78 g/day
Carbs: 40 percent. 235 g/day
Level Up Your Life 