There are 3 common mistakes that I see over the years with people who can lose weight consistently to who cannot. And those are not lack of motivation or not following the process. They are mistakes that people are doing without even realizing.
Common Mistake 1: Added sugar without knowing.
One of the important factor in reducing body fat is managing your insulin. Without insulin being suppressed, only way to lose fat is add more hours to your physical activity. To be honest, I don't think I can find any more time to do that myself. Managing insulin by controlling carbohydrate intake is more reasonable. However, added sugars are everywhere and can be sneaking into any of our foods and beverages, especially if food and beverages are created by someone else, usually pre-cooked, delivered or restaurant meals. You should also watch for what you are seasoning or marinating your food with.
Get into the habit of reading the label in the back. You will be amazed with how companies can sneak in some form of added sugar to pretty much anything. Whether it is natural form or artificial sweetener, body does not know the difference and act as if it is a sugar.
Another thing, if you are juicing, be careful. You can consume a lot more carbohydrates and sugar than you think. If you want to add fruits and vegetables into your diet, eat them but don't drink them.
Common Mistake 2: Overestimate and underestimate of calories.
This is the challenge part. Although you may be watching what you are eating and exercising on regular basis, if you are not losing body fat it is possible that you are consuming more calories than you are spending.
Studies have shown that even expert dietitians without measuring can underestimate how much calories they are consuming by 200-300 calories and overestimate how much they burn from exercise by 100-200 calories. That is 300-500 calorie over than what we should be eating and it is almost impossible to lose fat this way. Calculating portion by calories is actually that hard.
If you have a smart watch or heart rate monitor that track your calories, don't rely on them and stick with your portion plan.
For portion control, you can weight your food and logging into you fitness app until you reach your goal. It is pain to do so but once you get used to it, it is not that bad. Better than not being able to lose fat after working hard.
Another way to monitor your portion without measuring is using your hands as guide. Portion size below is per meal.
Protein - 2 palm size for men and 1 palm size for women.
Vegetables - 2 fist size for men and women.
Carbohydrate - 2 handful for men and 1 for women. If you have high amount of fat to lose, you can add this portion with vegetables.
Fat - 2 thumb size for men and 1 for women.
Now these are guides. If you feel like you are not moving towards your goal, either adjust your workout frequency or your portion based on your goals.
Common Mistake 3: Random and low frequent measurements
Whether you like to weigh yourself or not, majority of times people weigh in very bizarre way. Yes, I do realize that there are so many different opinions but from research or data collection stand point, weight measurement should be consistent and should be done more frequently.
The body go through changes everyday. It is not going to be one straight line going from 200 lb to 150 lb. Your weight can fluctuate from 200 lb to 195 lb then to 198 lb then to 190 lb and so on. However, as long as the trend is moving towards the weight you are looking for then that is good. If fluctuation of the measurement is going to happen, you cannot just weigh yourself once per week because you may be measuring on higher weight or lower weight day. You want to know the trend not just a number.
Until you reach your goal and you like to monitor with your scale, you should be monitoring your weight everyday at same time with same condition. Easiest time to do is after awakening. So if you can average your 7 days weigh-in and compared with previous an following week, you will see a better trend.
Kota Shimada
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