Use HOW TO WEIGHT LOSE To Make Someone Fall In Love With You
How to lose weight you have trouble losing weight? Or want to lose faster? I came to the right place. Prepare to lose weight without hunger.
The sad truth is that traditional ideas - eat less, run more - do not work long term. Count calories, exercise for hours every day and try to ignore your hunger? Such unnecessary suffering and wasted your time and willpower precious. It's a weight loss for masochists. In the end almost everyone gives up. That's why we have an obesity epidemic. Luckily there is a better way.
Bottom line? Your weight is organized in a hormonal way. If you lower your hormone levels that stores fat, insulin, you will have an easier time losing excess weight.
Top 18 Weight Loss Tips
are you ready? here we are. Start at the top of the list (most important) and bring down as much as you need. Click on any advice to read everything about it. Maybe you just need the first advice?
Choose a low carbohydrate diet
Eat when hungry
Eat real
Eat only when hungry
Measure your progress wisely
Be persistent
Avoid fruit
Avoid beer
Avoid artificial sweeteners
Review any medications
Less stress, more sleep
Eat fewer dairy products and nuts
Supplements vitamins and minerals
Use intermittent fast
Exercise wisely
Achieve ketoacid idealism
Get your hormones checked
Consider weight loss pills (if you are desperate)
1. Choose a low carbohydrate diet
Quito cup salad with ranche sauce
If you want to lose weight, you should start by avoiding sugar and starch (such as bread, pasta and potatoes). This is an old idea: over 150 years or more, there has been an infinite number of diets that depend on weight loss based on eating less carbohydrates. What's new is that dozens of recent scientific studies have demonstrated, yes, that low-carb diets are the most effective ways to lose weight.
Obviously it is still possible to lose weight on any diet - just eat less calories than you burn, do not you? The problem with this simple advice is that they ignore the elephant in the room: hunger. Most people do not like to "eat less", that is, to be hungry forever. This is a diet for masochists. Sooner or later, the average person will abandon and eat food, hence the "yo-yo diet".
The main advantage of a low carbohydrate diet is that it causes you to desire less to eat. Even without calculating calories most people who are overweight are eating much less calories Carbohydrates Low Sugar and starch may increase hunger, while avoiding it may reduce your appetite to an appropriate level. If your body wants to get an adequate number of calories you do not need to bother them. Thus: the number of calories, but you do not need to calculate them.
A study in 2012 also showed that people who ate a low-carbohydrate diet burned an extra 300 calories a day - while resting! According to one Harvard University professor behind the study, this feature "will equal the number of calories that are usually burned in an hour of moderate-intensity physical activity." Imagine it: a full hour of exercise every day, without actual exercise.
Bottom line: A low carb diet reduces your hunger and makes it easier to eat less. It can increase fat burning during rest. Study after study shows that low carbohydrate is the smart way to lose weight and it improves important health signs.
2. Eat when hungry
Eat when hungry
Do not be hungry The most common mistake when starting a low-carbohydrate diet is: reduce the intake of carbohydrates while still afraid of fat. Carbohydrates and fats are two main sources of energy in the body, and need at least one of them.
Low carbohydrate and low fat = hunger
Avoid both carbohydrates and fat results in hunger, cravings and fatigue. Sooner or later, people can not stand up and surrender. The solution is to eat more natural fat until you feel good. For example:
butter
Full Cream
olive oil
Meat (including fat)
Fat fish
bacon
eggs
Coconut oil, ect
Top 10 Ways to Eat More Fat
Always eat enough, so you feel good, especially at the beginning of the weight-loss process. Doing so on a low-carb diet means that the fat you eat will be burned as a fuel by your body, as the levels of fat that store the insulin hormone will be reduced. You will become a fat burning machine. You will lose excess weight without hunger.
Do you still fear saturated fat? No. The fear of saturated fat is based on outdated theories that have proved to be incorrect in modern science. Butter is good food. However, feel free to eat mostly unsaturated fats (such as olive oil, avocado and fatty fish) if you prefer. This low carbohydrate diet can be called in the Mediterranean and also works great.
Eating when hunger also requires something else: If you are not hungry, you may not need to eat yet. When dieting in Quito, you can trust your feelings of hunger and satiety again. Feel free to eat several times a day that works best for you.
Some people eat three times a day and sometimes have a snack (note that frequent snacks may mean you will benefit from adding fat to your meals, to increase satiety). Some people eat once or twice a day and do not eat a snack. Whatever works for you. Just eat when you feel hungry.
Read more about why eating when the hungry is smarter than calculating calories
Learn more about fueling your body
3. Eat real
Grocery shopping
Another common mistake when eating a low-carbohydrate diet is to be fooled by the creative marketing of low-carbohydrate products.
Remember: You should adopt an effective low carbohydrate diet for weight loss on real food.
Real food is what humans eat for thousands (or even better) millions of years, such as meat, fish, vegetables, eggs, butter, olive oil, nuts etc.
If you want to lose weight, it is best to avoid carbohydrate-specific carbohydrate products. This should be obvious, but creative marketers are doing everything they can to trick you (and get your money). It will tell you that you can eat cakes, pasta, ice cream, bread and lots of chocolate on a low-carbohydrate diet, as long as you buy its brand. They're full of carbohydrates. Do not be fooled
What about low carb bread? Be careful: if baked with cereal it is certainly not low carb. But some companies are still trying to sell them to you as a low carbohydrate option.
Typically, low-carbohydrate chocolate is filled with sugary alcohols, which are not counted by the manufacturer as carbohydrates. But can absorb nearly half of these carbohydrates, raise blood sugar and insulin. The remaining carbohydrates end up in the colon, potentially causing gas and diarrhea. Moreover, any sweetener can maintain sugar cravings.
Here are three examples of what to avoid:
Cookies Atkins' Tale
Julian bread bakery low carbohydrate carbohydrates
Past fraud Dreamfields (which eventually led to a fine worth $ 8 million!)
These three companies are not unique. There are thousands of similar companies trying to trick you into buying low-carbohydrate junk foods, filled with starch, alcohol, sugar, wheat flour, sweeteners and exotic additives. Two simple rules to avoid this junk mail:
Do not eat low-carbohydrate versions of high-carbohydrate foods such as cakes, bars, chocolate, bread, pasta or ice cream - unless you are sure of ingredients (perhaps made by yourself).
Avoid products with the words "net carbohydrates" on them. This is usually just a way to trick you.
Focus on eating good food, real food and treating as little as possible. Ideally, the food you buy should not contain a list of ingredients (or should be very short).
Read more about low carb products
Read more about sweeteners
Less moderation, more quality
Finally - forget the failure of "everything in moderation" diet slogan of ignorant nutritionists. It's awful advice, and Americans who eat a more varied diet will gain more weight.
Do not eat everything moderately. Eat as healthy as you can, whenever you are hungry. Eat a little junk as unhealthy as you can. If possible nothing at all.
4. Eat only when hungry
Women snacking on walnuts
On a low carbohydrate diet, you should aim to eat when hungry (see Tip # 2 above). And if you do not feel hungry? do not eat Nothing slows weight loss more than eating too much food you do not need. This, in fact, is important that it deserves this section on its own.
Reduce unnecessary snacks
Eating unnecessary snacks can be a problem on the Quito diet as well. Some things are easy to eat just because they are delicious and easily available. Here are three common traps to be wary of regarding a low-carb diet:
Dairy products such as cream and cheese. They work well in cooking because they satisfy. The problem is if you grind a lot of cheese in front of the TV in the evening ... without hunger. Be careful though. Or a lot of gracious with dessert, when already already full, continue to eat because its taste is good. Or another common defendant: Quantities of heavy cream in coffee, several times a day.
Nuts. Very easy to eat until the nuts disappear, no matter how efficient you are. Tip: According to science, it is difficult to stop eating salted nuts for unsalted nuts. Salted nuts tempt you over-eating. Good to learn. Other advice: Avoid putting the whole bag on the couch, preferably choosing a small pot instead. I often eat all nuts in front of me, whether I'm hungry or not.
Low carb bread. Even if you use almond flour and sweeteners that only eat baked meals, cakes usually provide extra amounts of food when you are not hungry ... and yes, this will slow down weight loss.
Feel free to skip meals
Do you have to eat breakfast? No, of course not. Do not eat if you are not hungry. This applies to any meal.
On a strict diet in Quito, hunger and the desire to eat tend to decrease a lot, especially if you have excess weight to lose. Your body may be burning fat stores happily, thus reducing the need to eat.
If this happens, be happy! Do not fight it by eating it you do not want. Instead, wait until hunger returns before you eat again. This will save you time and money, while speeding up your weight loss.
Some people fear they will lose control if they do not eat every three hours, making them eat thousands of calories and beat their entire diet. So they eat a snack all the time.
These snacks may be necessary for a high carbohydrate / carbohydrate diet to control cravings for hunger, but they are usually completely unnecessary on a diet containing quito. Hunger will only slowly return, and you will have plenty of time to prepare food or snack.
CONCLUSION: Losing weight quickly and sustainably: Eat when you are hungry - but only when you are hungry. Forget the clock and listen to your body instead.
5. Measure your progress wisely
A man measuring his stomach
Tracking successful weight loss is sometimes more complicated than you think. Focusing only on weight and straying on the scale may be misleading every day, causing unnecessary anxiety and undermining your motivation for no good reason.
The scale is not necessarily your friend. You may want to lose fat - but the meter measures the muscles, bones and internal organs as well. Muscle gain is good. Thus weight or BMI are incomplete ways to measure your progress. This is particularly true if you are coming for a long period of near-starvation (counting calories), where your body may wish to restore lost muscles and so on. Weight training and muscle gain can also mask fat loss.
Losing fat and gaining muscle means great progress, but you may miss this if you measure your weight only. So of intelligence also follow the disappearance of fat in the abdomen, by measuring your waistline.
Heres how to do this:
Place the measuring tape around your middle, slightly above your belly button (specifically: midway between your lower rib and the top of the hipbone, next to you)
Exhaling and relaxing (do not suck your stomach)
Make sure that the measuring tape fits snagly, without squeezing your skin
Measurement
Compare your results with these recommendations:
Excellent Decent very high
women Below 31.5 inches 31.5-35 inches More than 35 inches
(80 cm) (80-88 cm) (88 cm)
Men Less than 37 inches 37-40 inches More than 40 inches
(94 cm) (94-102 cm) (102 cm)
I recommend aiming at "excellent" but it is not always realistic. Young people can usually achieve this, but for some middle-aged women or older women, this may be a great victory to reach a "decent".
Measure progress
I suggest measuring your waist circumference and weight before you begin your weight loss trip and maybe once a week or once a month. Type your results so you can track your progress. If you want, you can measure more areas: around the buttocks, chest, arms, legs, etc.
Please note that your weight can fluctuate several times from day to day, depending on the fluid balance and digestive content: Do not worry about short-term changes, follow the long-term trend instead.
If you can, try checking other important health signs at the start, such as:
blood pressure
Blood sugar (fasting blood sugar and / or HbA1c)
Profile for cholesterol (including HDL, triglycerides)
These signs have improved almost universally on a low carbohydrate diet, even before the main weight loss. Re-examining these signs a few months later can be great for your stimulation because it will usually show that you are not only losing weight, but also gaining health.
Note: Do not you have a tape measure at home? Try these options:
Use any part of the string. Wrap the thread around your waist and cut the bracelet to suit your waist on the first day. This series can look longer and longer magically each week wrap around your waist.
Compare how a pair of old jeans also fits a good choice.
6. Be persistent
Don `t give up
It usually takes years or decades to get a lot of weight. Trying to lose everything as quickly as possible by starving yourself rarely works well in the long run, and this is just a recipe for a "yo-yo diet." To succeed, you need something that works long term.
What is the goal for
It is common to lose 2-6 pounds (1-3 kg) during the first week on a strict low carbohydrate diet, then on average about one pound (0.5 kg) per week as long as you have a lot of residual weight you lose. This translates to about 50 pounds (23 kilograms) per year.
Every 5 pounds of fat loss is approximately 1 inch missing around the waist (1 kg = 1 cm).
Sometimes young males lose weight faster than this, perhaps twice the speed. Menopausal women may lose at a slightly slower pace. People on a very low carbohydrate diet may lose weight faster, as do those who exercise a lot (reward). If you have a lot of extra weight to lose, you can start more quickly.
When you approach your ideal weight, the loss may slow down, until you settle at a weight that your body feels is right. Very few people become underweight on a low carbohydrate diet - as long as they eat when hungry.
7. Avoid eating fruit
This advice is controversial as the fruit has a magical health aura almost today. People may think that the fruit is nutritious but unfortunately contains fruit on Lots of sugar - about 10% of the weight (the rest is mostly water). Just taste orange or grape. Sweet, right?
Five servings of fruit per day equals the amount of sugar in 16 ounces of soda (500 ml). Contrary to what many people think, sugar is fairly similar (about 50% glucose, 50% fructose).
Sugar from the fruit can shut down fat burning. This can increase your hunger and slow down weight loss. For best results, avoid fruit - or sometimes enjoy it as a treat.
Conclusion: fruit candy from nature.
Low Carbohydrate Fruits Fruits, spices, carbohydrates, berries - better and worse
Is not a natural fruit?
Most people believe that the fruits are natural, but the fruits of the day in the grocery store share little with the fruits they had before they were cultured. There is more sugar in modern domesticated fruits.
8. Avoid drinking beer
Beer contains quick-digesting carbohydrates that close fat burning. For this reason beer is sometimes referred to as "liquid bread". There is a good reason for the term "beer belly".
Here are the smarter alcoholic options for losing weight:
Wine (red or dry white)
Champagne dry
Solid wines such as whiskey, cognac, vodka (avoid sweetened cocktails - try vodka, soda water, lime instead)
These drinks barely contain any sugar / carbohydrates so they are better than beer. However, large amounts of alcohol may slow down weight loss to some extent, so moderation is still a good idea.
9. Avoid artificial sweeteners
Industrial Sweeteners
Many people replace sugar with artificial sweeteners in the belief that this will reduce the calories caused and cause weight loss. It seems reasonable. However, many studies have failed to show any positive effect on weight loss by consuming artificial sweeteners instead of normal sugar.
Instead, according to scientific studies, artificial sweeteners can increase appetite and maintain cravings to eat sweet. A recent independent study showed that switching drinks with artificial sweeteners to water clearly helped women lose weight:
10. Review any medicines
Many medical drugs can disrupt your weight loss. Discuss any change in treatment with your doctor. The following are the three worst:
Insulin injections, especially at high doses, are probably the worst obstacle to losing weight. There are three ways to reduce your insulin needs:
Eat less carbohydrates, making it easy to lose weight. The less carbohydrates you eat the less insulin you need. Remember to lower the dose if you can.
If this is not enough, treatment with metformin tablets (2 to 3 g / day) can reduce the need for insulin (at least for type 2 diabetics).
If this is not enough to get rid of insulin (again, for type 2 diabetes), you can try new promising drugs such as Victoza or Byetta. These reduce the need for insulin and cause weight loss.
Other medicines for diabetes. Insulin excretion tablets (such as sulfonyl urea) often lead to weight gain. These include: Minodiab, Euglucon, Daonil, and Glibenclamide. Tablets such as Avandia, Actos, Starlix and NovoNorm also encourage weight gain. But not metformin. New drugs Victoza and Byetta (injectable) often lead to weight loss, but the long-term potential side effects are still unknown. More about Diabetes
On a low-carb diet your hunger is reduced and it's much easier to do a period of fasting. Also, your fat burning is already very good – so when fasting you'll easily burn lots of fat.
So, while on a low-carb diet the fasting periods become both easier to do and more effective. 1 + 1 equals 3.
Who should not do intermittent fasting
Intermittent fasting can be a great idea, but not everyone should do it:
If you are addicted to food or sugar then intermittent fasting may increase food cravings and increases the risk of a relapse… so be very careful. I recommend always eating when hungry.
If you are totally stressed out or sleep deprived then take care or that problem first (see weight loss tip #11) or fasting may be too stressful for your body.
If you are on any medication – especially insulin – the doses may need to be adjusted when fasting. Discuss it with your doctor first.
Growing children, pregnant women and breastfeeding women should not do longer fasting periods, as they have an increased need of nutrients. I recommend eating when hungry and using the 14 tips above if you need to lose weight.
15. Exercise wisely
Exercise on a keto diet
Do you wonder why this weight-loss tip doesn't show up until number 15 on the list? It's because few things are so overrated for weight loss as exercise is.
Have you ever watched “The Biggest Loser”? The participants take leave from their jobs (and family) for months. They are allowed only small portions of food, and work out as though it were their full-time job – 40 hours a week, sometimes more. This method is clearly unsustainable for the average person in the long run.
Just taking the stairs instead of the elevator, or getting off the bus one stop earlier, isn't going to change the numbers on your bathroom scale. It's a myth. Sorry. Studies show that if you just start exercising, you're going to need at least one hour of tough workouts every single day to noticeably lose weight.
Basically, the effect of exercise on our weight is vastly overrated. That's why it's only number 15 on this list. There are other things you need to take care of first. It's not a good idea to eat bad food, drink sugar water (so-called “sports drinks”) or be on medications which force you to exercise for hours daily just to compensate. Metaphorically that's like digging a hole, into which you put your ladder, on which you stand and paint the basement-level windows of your house.
Exercise cannot compensate for other issues in your life. Those must be addressed first.
The good news
If, on the other hand, you've already taken care of steps 1-12, you should have a rested and recharged body which is already happily burning fat. In this case, increased activity will accelerate your weight loss, and act as a nice bonus. You'll be burning even more fat from the very first step.
For example, you could take long walks (golf), cycle, dance, or play any sport you're happy and comfortable with.
Exercise also burns the body's glycogen stores, which are essentially carbohydrates. This means that after a workout, you can eat a little more carbs than you otherwise can permit yourself, without negative effects on insulin or fat storage. Also, don't forget that the non-weight-related health effects of exercise are quite impressive.
Hormonal effects
For even more impressive effects on body composition: aim for exercise forms which elicit a positive hormonal response. This means lifting really heavy things (strength training), or interval training. Such exercise increases levels of the sex hormone testosterone (primarily in men) as well as growth hormone. Not only do greater levels of these hormones increase your muscle mass, but they also decrease your visceral fat (belly fat) in the long term.
As a final bonus, exercise can both make you feel and look better.
What kind of activity fits you?
16. Achieve optimal ketosis
blood-ketone-test-16-9
Warning: Not recommended for type 1 diabetics, see below.
We've now arrived at tip number 16. If you're still having trouble losing weight, despite following the 15 pieces of advice listed above, it might be a good idea to bring out the heavy artillery: optimal ketosis. Many people stalling at weight plateaus while on a low-carb diet have found optimal ketosis helpful. It's what can melt the fat off once again.
So how does this work? A quick run-through: The first tip was to eat low carb. This is because a low-carb diet lowers your levels of the fat-storing hormone insulin, allowing your fat deposits to shrink and release their stored energy. This tends to cause you to want to consume fewer calories than you expend – without hunger – and lose weight. Several of the tips mentioned above are about fine-tuning your diet to better this effect.
How do you know you're getting the maximum hormonal impact from your low-carb diet? You do that by achieving what's known as “optimal ketosis”.
Ketosis
Ketosis is a state where the body has an extremely high fat-burning rate. Even the brain runs on fat, via ketone bodies. These are energy molecules in the blood (like blood sugar) which become fuel for our brains after being converted from fat by the liver.
To encourage ketone production, the amount of insulin in your bloodstream must be low. The lower your insulin, the higher your ketone production. And when you have a well-controlled, sufficiently large amount of ketones in your blood, it's basically proof that your insulin is very low – and therefore, that you're enjoying the maximum effect of your low-carbohydrate diet. That's what's called optimal ketosis.
Measuring ketones
Today, there are reasonably-priced gadgets available for measuring ketone levels at home. One needle prick of the finger, and in just a few seconds you'll know your blood ketone level.
Blood ketones are best measured on a fasted stomach in the morning (before breakfast, that is). Here are a few pointers on how to interpret the result:
Below 0.5 mmol/L is not considered “ketosis”. At this level, you're far away from maximum fat-burning.
Between 0.5-1.5 mmol/L is light nutritional ketosis. You'll be getting a good effect on your weight, but not optimal.
Around 1.5-3 mmol/L is what's called optimal ketosis and is recommended for maximum weight loss.
Numbers over 3 mmol/L aren't neccessary. That is, they will achieve neither better nor worse results than being at the 1.5-3 level. Higher numbers can also sometimes mean that you're not getting enough food. For type 1 diabetics, this can be caused by a severe lack of insulin, see below.
Ketones in urine
Ketone levels can also be measured in a more old-fashioned way, with urine test sticks (sold prescription-free in pharmacies or on Amazon). Ketone sticks give less reliable results for several reasons, and the above recommendations can't be straightforwardly applied to them. They are, however, much cheaper.
My personal experience
Feel free to read my accounts of a two-month personal trial:
Experiment: Optimal ketosis for weight loss and increased performance
Four weeks of strict keto and ketone monitoring
Final report: Two months of strict keto and ketone monitoring
Although I was quite happy with my weight before these trials, they resulted in a further loss of 4.5 kg (10 pounds) and 7 cm (3 inches) around my waist – without additional exercise or even the slightest resemblance of hunger.
How to achieve optimal ketosis
Many who firmly believe they are eating a strict low-carb diet are surprised when they measure their blood ketones. They may be at around only 0.2 or 0.5 – quite far off from the sweet spot! Why?
The trick here is not only to avoid all obvious sources of carbohydrate (sweets, bread, spaghetti, rice, potatoes), but also to be careful with your protein intake. If you eat large amounts of meat, eggs and the like, the excess protein will be converted into glucose in your body. Large amounts of protein can also raise your insulin levels somewhat. This compromises optimal ketosis.
The secret to getting around this is usually to eat your fill with more fat. For example, if you have a bigger helping of herb butter to your steak, you might not feel like having a second steak, and instead feel satisfied after the first one.
A popular trick people use to ingest more fat is “fat coffee” (sometimes called “Magic Bullet Coffee” or MBC). It involves adding one tablespoon of butter and one tablespoon of coconut oil to your (morning) coffee, and requires a food blender for the right texture.
More fat in your food will fill you up more. This will ensure that you eat less protein, and even fewer carbohydrates. Your insulin will drop and, hopefully, you'll be able to reach optimal ketosis. And that's when many a stubborn weight plateau is overcome.
If it doesn't work
Being in optimal ketosis for a prolonged period of time (say, a month) will ensure that you experience the maximal hormonal effect from eating a low-carb diet. If this doesn't result in noticeable weight loss, you can be certain that too many carbs are NOT part of your weight issue and not the obstacle to your weight loss. There are, in fact, other causes of obesity and being overweight. The next three tips in this series might help you.
Try it
Order a ketone meter online and start measuring. There are a few different models, the most popular one is probably the Precision Xtra ketone meter. Unfortunately these meters are all quite expensive to use, as the test strips can cost about $5 per test.
Here's a complete package with everything you need to check your blood ketone levels.
Learn much more about ketogenic diets here:
A quick guide to ketogenic diets
Watch my video interview with the American doctor Peter Attia, on a strictly ketogenic low-carb diet: Very Low Carb Performance
A word of warning
If you have type 1 diabetes, you should not follow the above advice on optimal ketosis – it may be risky. If you have ketones in your blood at all, you must be sure that your blood sugar levels are normal. If they are, you're in normal ketosis – just like the ketosis of non-diabetic people who stick to a strict low-carb diet.
High blood sugar levels coupled with high blood ketones, on the other hand, will mean that you have a pathologically low level of insulin – something non-diabetics do not suffer from. This can lead to ketoacidosis – a potentially life-threatening condition. If this happens, you'll need to inject more insulin; if you're at all unsure of what to do, contact a medical professional. Coveting really high blood ketones for weight control is not worth the risk for type 1 diabetics.
17. Get your hormones checked
Test your hormones
So you've followed the previous tips, implemented major lifestyle changes and established that neither medication nor vitamin deficiency is an issue. You've even tried being in optimal ketosis for a while (ensuring low insulin levels). And you still can't hit the normal weight mark?
If this applies to you, it's high time to consider the possibility that hormonal imbalances are the cause of your troubles. There are three common problem areas:
Thyroid hormone
Sex hormones
Stress hormones
Thyroid hormone
Some people, especially women, suffer decreased metabolism as a result of thyroid hormone deficiency – hypothyroidism. Common symptoms are:
Fatigue
Cold intolerance
Constipation
Dry skin
Weight gain
In these cases, weight gain resulting from decreased metabolism usually do not exceed fifteen pounds.
Your doctor can easily arrange for you to take a blood test to measure the concentration of thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH). If the test comes back and everything looks good, your thyroid gland is probably fine. For a more exact diagnosis, you can ask them to measure the actual levels of thyroid hormones in the blood (T3 and T4).
Two ways to avoid becoming deficient in thyroid hormone:
Make sure you consume enough iodine, which is a building block of thyroid hormone. Good sources are fish, shellfish and iodised salt (or sea salt).
Very low levels of thyroid hormone usually indicate an autoimmune reaction to the thyroid gland itself. This means you'll have to take thyroid hormone supplements orally, usually the stable form T4 (Levaxin), which your doctor can prescribe for you. Your body will transform this into the active T3 hormone when necessary. The supplement dose should be adjusted so that you reach normal hormone levels (TSH, T3, T4) and sufficiently alleviate symptoms – though a few people feel best when keeping TSH slightly below normal.
Some people feel better supplementing the already active T3 (sometimes prepared from pig thyroid glands), as it can give a stronger effect than the T4 hormone, but its effect is often harder to control. Swedish healthcare rarely prescribes or offers such T3 treatment, as it often lacks advantages and may pose a risk when doses are high for an extended period of time.
Sex hormones
Sex hormones also affect your weight:
Women: Women can suffer from the endocrine disorder PCOS – polycystic ovarian syndrome – which elevates testosterone and insulin levels. This can mean weight gain and menstrual disorders (very common), infertility, acne and male pattern hair growth (such as facial hair). A low-carbohydrate diet is a good treatment for this. More on PCOS.
During menopause, a woman's level of the female sex hormone estrogen drops. This often causes some weight gain, especially around the gut (so-called central obesity). Excess weight gained after menopause will tend to be proportioned less like for a fertile woman, less curvy.
Learn more:
Top 10 tips to lose weight on low carb for women 40+
Men: From middle age and onwards, men experience gradually declining levels of the male sex hormone testosterone. This leads to slight weight gain, also typically around the gut, and decreased muscle mass.
What can you do about sex hormones?
Testosterone deficiency can be at least partially treated naturally by engaging in smart exercise routines, conscious body language and supplementing vitamin D.
Of course, you can also affect testosterone levels by getting your doctor to prescribe a testosterone supplement (a blood test will confirm any deficiency). Women can use estrogen supplementation for menopause problems.
It's important you take into account, however, that supplementation of testosterone or estrogen for years on end, in doses that are abnormally large for your age, will increase the risk of prostate cancer (in men) and breast cancer (in women).
It may be wise to accept that you don't (and shouldn't!) have the body of a 20-year-old when you're several times that age. A better option might be to try to focus on a healthy lifestyle instead, and to be as happy and grateful as you can for the body you have.
Stress hormone
The final possible culprit behind stubborn weight issues may be the stress hormone, cortisol. Too much cortisol will increase hunger levels, bringing along subsequent weight gain. The most common cause of elevated cortisol is chronic stress and lack of sleep (see tip #10), or cortisone medication (tip #9). It's a good idea to try your best to do something about this.
In rare and extreme cases, you could be dealing with a specific kind of tumor that drives cortisol production. The condition is called Cushing's syndrome. If you suspect you're suffering from this, consult your doctor and they will run appropriate tests.
18. Consider weight-loss pills (if desperate)
Weight Loss Pills
It sounds like a dream. Keep living like you already do, take a pill a day, and effortlessly lose your excess weight. This is why weight-loss pills is a billion dollar industry.
So do they work? Yes. But they're not very effective.
There are many drugs that result in a modest weight loss (a few pounds on average) at the expense of significant side effects. In my opinion there's only one drug that you may want to consider using.
Before we get to that one drug we'll very briefly summarize the other options and why they are not great.
Prescription-free supplements
The internet is full of claims of magic supplements that can make you thin. Unfortunately, the only thing they'll make thin is your wallet. This is true even if they were once mentioned on Dr. Oz – you know that's an entertainment show, right?
Any prescription-free supplements for sale that are not dangerous or illegal (like steroids) are likely to have a small or negligible effect on your weight.
This is true even for the vitamin supplements mentioned in advice #13 – the effect is definitely small, but in that case it's also safe – maybe even healthy – and also dirt cheap, making it a potentially smart bonus (note that we sell no supplements whatsoever and make no money from this piece of advice).
There are also prescription free “carb blockers” out there, that are supposed to stop the body from absorbing carbs we eat. The effect tend to be relatively tiny though, even in studies funded by the companies selling the products. It's definitely at least ten times more effective to not eat the carbs in the first place (it's also free).
Older appetite suppressants
PhentermineIn the US, it's still possible to get amphetamin-like appetite suppressants prescribed for short-term use (weeks). As they are only for short-term use they are no use for long-term weight control. These drugs are not approved in the EU.
These drugs have side effects like insomnia, heart palpitations and elevated blood pressure. It's also possible to become addicted to them and thus they require a special controlled-substance prescription. Examples include:
Adipex-P or Suprenza (Phentermine)
Bondril (Phendiametrazine)
Didrex (Benzphetamine)
The effect of these drugs is decidedly modest and short term, hardly outweighing their risks. I do not recommend them.
The “oily discharge” pill
alli
Let's move on to another older drug, Xenical, lately for sale prescription-free as “Alli” and with a falling popularity.
This drug prevents the body from digesting fat in the intestines. Instead it just passes through you and ends up in the toilet… or in your pants.
Side effects include stomach cramping, gas, leaking oily stool and being unable to control bowel movements. And finally the “oily discharge” that often results when people think they are just passing some gas.
This pill is not compatible with wearing white pants and it's not compatible with eating fat. Thus it's not compatible with a low-carb diet. This does not mean you have to a wear white pants on a low-carb diet, you just need to eat fat (you understood that already, right?).
Just forget this drug. Most doctors already have.
The stupid pill
StupidIs there a worse option than Xenical/Alli? Why, yes. It's called Qsymia.
Qsymia is available in the US, but it got rejected in Europe (where the side effects were sensibly judged worse than the benefits). I prefer to label this drug the “stupid pill”.
Qsymia combines a tiny amount of the old Phentermine (see Appetite Suppressants above) with a small dose of Topiramate, an anti-seizure drug.
The real problem? Common side effects of topiramate include drowsiness, fatigue, depression, attention disturbance, memory impairment, cognitive disorder, impaired psychomotor skills (ie becoming clumsy), lethargy, balance disorder, sedation, gait abnormality (ie walking like you're drunk).
Basically, this drug slows down your brain, like alcohol or sedatives. Are you really going to do that to lose a few pounds, that you'll regain once you stop taking the drug?
The “meh” pills
Two more weight control drugs were approved in the US in 2012 and are now available, Belviq and Contrave.
Belvic has been rejected in Europe because of safety concerns. Contrave was recently approved (under the name Mysimba).
These two drugs work on different receptors in the brain to control appetite. The effect is modest – 6 to 8 pounds lost in a year, with partial regain after that. There are ongoing safety concerns with both drugs and a definite risk of side effects like (for Contrave) nausea, constipation, headache, risk of suicidal thoughts and seizures.
To me, these modest benefits do not outweigh the risk of side effects.
The reigning champion
And then there is only one more approved weight loss drug left. Fortunately this one actually shows a lot of promise and can speed up weight loss quite significantly.
This drug is an injected variant of a satiety hormone called GLP-1. It slows down how quickly the stomach empties and tells the brain that you don't need to eat yet – a great idea for losing weight. As a bonus this drug works fine while one is on the keto diet and it works even better with intermittent fasting – for a rapid weight loss with no hunger.
This drug was initially used to control blood sugar in type 2 diabetes – under the brand name Victoza – where it has the nice side effect of significant weight loss.
Testing on people with obesity (without diabetes) shows that at higher doses the drug is quite effective as a pure weight loss treatment, with patients losing on average 12.3 pounds (5.6 kilos) more than a placebo group after one year.
Saxenda
This drug has recently been approved in both the US and in Europe for weight loss, under the name Saxenda. There are many other similar GLP-1 drugs for treating diabetes type 2, but none of them have been carefully tested or approved for treating obesity yet.
Saxenda is already available at the fantastic cost of about $1,000 per month.
In both the US and in Europe another option is Victoza, which is the exact same drug at half the dose and half the price. At this lower dose the resulting weight loss is about 75% of the weight loss when one is on Saxenda. Victoza is approved only for treating type 2 diabetes.
The main side effect of Saxenda / Victoza is what happens if the satiety effect becomes too strong: nausea and vomiting. This is quite common when starting out, so it's necessary to start with a low dose and then slowly increase it as the body adapts to the medication.
The bonus
If you have type 2 diabetes there is another diabetes drug that can result in noticeable weight loss: the “low-carb in a pill” drug Farxiga (called Forxiga in Europe).
The bottom line
There is no pill that easily makes people thin. These drugs are all pretty bad or at least not very effective.
The only exception in my mind is Saxenda – and this is a daily injection, not a pill.
The downside to Saxenda is the very high price – insurance may only cover part of it – and the nausea that people often experience on it.
It's also clear from my own and other people's experience treating patients with it that it does not work well for everyone. Some people experience only minimal weight loss. Other people lose a lot more than the additional 12 pounds lost in a recent study – this is only an average.
Finally, Saxenda only works as long as you use it. Once you stop, the weight tends to return. So is losing about 12 pounds worth $1,000 per month and the risk of nausea? Only you can decide.
Most people who want to lose weight have more than 12 pounds to lose. That's why even the best weight loss drug in the world can only be an optional complement to other treatment. That's why this piece of advice is number 18 out of 18. It may be a helpful addition for some people, but the advice higher on the list is what can make the biggest difference, by far.
The sad truth is that traditional ideas - eat less, run more - do not work long term. Count calories, exercise for hours every day and try to ignore your hunger? Such unnecessary suffering and wasted your time and willpower precious. It's a weight loss for masochists. In the end almost everyone gives up. That's why we have an obesity epidemic. Luckily there is a better way.
Bottom line? Your weight is organized in a hormonal way. If you lower your hormone levels that stores fat, insulin, you will have an easier time losing excess weight.
Top 18 Weight Loss Tips
are you ready? here we are. Start at the top of the list (most important) and bring down as much as you need. Click on any advice to read everything about it. Maybe you just need the first advice?
Choose a low carbohydrate diet
Eat when hungry
Eat real
Eat only when hungry
Measure your progress wisely
Be persistent
Avoid fruit
Avoid beer
Avoid artificial sweeteners
Review any medications
Less stress, more sleep
Eat fewer dairy products and nuts
Supplements vitamins and minerals
Use intermittent fast
Exercise wisely
Achieve ketoacid idealism
Get your hormones checked
Consider weight loss pills (if you are desperate)
1. Choose a low carbohydrate diet
Quito cup salad with ranche sauce
If you want to lose weight, you should start by avoiding sugar and starch (such as bread, pasta and potatoes). This is an old idea: over 150 years or more, there has been an infinite number of diets that depend on weight loss based on eating less carbohydrates. What's new is that dozens of recent scientific studies have demonstrated, yes, that low-carb diets are the most effective ways to lose weight.
Obviously it is still possible to lose weight on any diet - just eat less calories than you burn, do not you? The problem with this simple advice is that they ignore the elephant in the room: hunger. Most people do not like to "eat less", that is, to be hungry forever. This is a diet for masochists. Sooner or later, the average person will abandon and eat food, hence the "yo-yo diet".
The main advantage of a low carbohydrate diet is that it causes you to desire less to eat. Even without calculating calories most people who are overweight are eating much less calories Carbohydrates Low Sugar and starch may increase hunger, while avoiding it may reduce your appetite to an appropriate level. If your body wants to get an adequate number of calories you do not need to bother them. Thus: the number of calories, but you do not need to calculate them.
A study in 2012 also showed that people who ate a low-carbohydrate diet burned an extra 300 calories a day - while resting! According to one Harvard University professor behind the study, this feature "will equal the number of calories that are usually burned in an hour of moderate-intensity physical activity." Imagine it: a full hour of exercise every day, without actual exercise.
Bottom line: A low carb diet reduces your hunger and makes it easier to eat less. It can increase fat burning during rest. Study after study shows that low carbohydrate is the smart way to lose weight and it improves important health signs.
2. Eat when hungry
Eat when hungry
Do not be hungry The most common mistake when starting a low-carbohydrate diet is: reduce the intake of carbohydrates while still afraid of fat. Carbohydrates and fats are two main sources of energy in the body, and need at least one of them.
Low carbohydrate and low fat = hunger
Avoid both carbohydrates and fat results in hunger, cravings and fatigue. Sooner or later, people can not stand up and surrender. The solution is to eat more natural fat until you feel good. For example:
butter
Full Cream
olive oil
Meat (including fat)
Fat fish
bacon
eggs
Coconut oil, ect
Top 10 Ways to Eat More Fat
Always eat enough, so you feel good, especially at the beginning of the weight-loss process. Doing so on a low-carb diet means that the fat you eat will be burned as a fuel by your body, as the levels of fat that store the insulin hormone will be reduced. You will become a fat burning machine. You will lose excess weight without hunger.
Do you still fear saturated fat? No. The fear of saturated fat is based on outdated theories that have proved to be incorrect in modern science. Butter is good food. However, feel free to eat mostly unsaturated fats (such as olive oil, avocado and fatty fish) if you prefer. This low carbohydrate diet can be called in the Mediterranean and also works great.
Eating when hunger also requires something else: If you are not hungry, you may not need to eat yet. When dieting in Quito, you can trust your feelings of hunger and satiety again. Feel free to eat several times a day that works best for you.
Some people eat three times a day and sometimes have a snack (note that frequent snacks may mean you will benefit from adding fat to your meals, to increase satiety). Some people eat once or twice a day and do not eat a snack. Whatever works for you. Just eat when you feel hungry.
Read more about why eating when the hungry is smarter than calculating calories
Learn more about fueling your body
3. Eat real
Grocery shopping
Another common mistake when eating a low-carbohydrate diet is to be fooled by the creative marketing of low-carbohydrate products.
Remember: You should adopt an effective low carbohydrate diet for weight loss on real food.
Real food is what humans eat for thousands (or even better) millions of years, such as meat, fish, vegetables, eggs, butter, olive oil, nuts etc.
If you want to lose weight, it is best to avoid carbohydrate-specific carbohydrate products. This should be obvious, but creative marketers are doing everything they can to trick you (and get your money). It will tell you that you can eat cakes, pasta, ice cream, bread and lots of chocolate on a low-carbohydrate diet, as long as you buy its brand. They're full of carbohydrates. Do not be fooled
What about low carb bread? Be careful: if baked with cereal it is certainly not low carb. But some companies are still trying to sell them to you as a low carbohydrate option.
Typically, low-carbohydrate chocolate is filled with sugary alcohols, which are not counted by the manufacturer as carbohydrates. But can absorb nearly half of these carbohydrates, raise blood sugar and insulin. The remaining carbohydrates end up in the colon, potentially causing gas and diarrhea. Moreover, any sweetener can maintain sugar cravings.
Here are three examples of what to avoid:
Cookies Atkins' Tale
Julian bread bakery low carbohydrate carbohydrates
Past fraud Dreamfields (which eventually led to a fine worth $ 8 million!)
These three companies are not unique. There are thousands of similar companies trying to trick you into buying low-carbohydrate junk foods, filled with starch, alcohol, sugar, wheat flour, sweeteners and exotic additives. Two simple rules to avoid this junk mail:
Do not eat low-carbohydrate versions of high-carbohydrate foods such as cakes, bars, chocolate, bread, pasta or ice cream - unless you are sure of ingredients (perhaps made by yourself).
Avoid products with the words "net carbohydrates" on them. This is usually just a way to trick you.
Focus on eating good food, real food and treating as little as possible. Ideally, the food you buy should not contain a list of ingredients (or should be very short).
Read more about low carb products
Read more about sweeteners
Less moderation, more quality
Finally - forget the failure of "everything in moderation" diet slogan of ignorant nutritionists. It's awful advice, and Americans who eat a more varied diet will gain more weight.
Do not eat everything moderately. Eat as healthy as you can, whenever you are hungry. Eat a little junk as unhealthy as you can. If possible nothing at all.
4. Eat only when hungry
Women snacking on walnuts
On a low carbohydrate diet, you should aim to eat when hungry (see Tip # 2 above). And if you do not feel hungry? do not eat Nothing slows weight loss more than eating too much food you do not need. This, in fact, is important that it deserves this section on its own.
Reduce unnecessary snacks
Eating unnecessary snacks can be a problem on the Quito diet as well. Some things are easy to eat just because they are delicious and easily available. Here are three common traps to be wary of regarding a low-carb diet:
Dairy products such as cream and cheese. They work well in cooking because they satisfy. The problem is if you grind a lot of cheese in front of the TV in the evening ... without hunger. Be careful though. Or a lot of gracious with dessert, when already already full, continue to eat because its taste is good. Or another common defendant: Quantities of heavy cream in coffee, several times a day.
Nuts. Very easy to eat until the nuts disappear, no matter how efficient you are. Tip: According to science, it is difficult to stop eating salted nuts for unsalted nuts. Salted nuts tempt you over-eating. Good to learn. Other advice: Avoid putting the whole bag on the couch, preferably choosing a small pot instead. I often eat all nuts in front of me, whether I'm hungry or not.
Low carb bread. Even if you use almond flour and sweeteners that only eat baked meals, cakes usually provide extra amounts of food when you are not hungry ... and yes, this will slow down weight loss.
Feel free to skip meals
Do you have to eat breakfast? No, of course not. Do not eat if you are not hungry. This applies to any meal.
On a strict diet in Quito, hunger and the desire to eat tend to decrease a lot, especially if you have excess weight to lose. Your body may be burning fat stores happily, thus reducing the need to eat.
If this happens, be happy! Do not fight it by eating it you do not want. Instead, wait until hunger returns before you eat again. This will save you time and money, while speeding up your weight loss.
Some people fear they will lose control if they do not eat every three hours, making them eat thousands of calories and beat their entire diet. So they eat a snack all the time.
These snacks may be necessary for a high carbohydrate / carbohydrate diet to control cravings for hunger, but they are usually completely unnecessary on a diet containing quito. Hunger will only slowly return, and you will have plenty of time to prepare food or snack.
CONCLUSION: Losing weight quickly and sustainably: Eat when you are hungry - but only when you are hungry. Forget the clock and listen to your body instead.
5. Measure your progress wisely
A man measuring his stomach
Tracking successful weight loss is sometimes more complicated than you think. Focusing only on weight and straying on the scale may be misleading every day, causing unnecessary anxiety and undermining your motivation for no good reason.
The scale is not necessarily your friend. You may want to lose fat - but the meter measures the muscles, bones and internal organs as well. Muscle gain is good. Thus weight or BMI are incomplete ways to measure your progress. This is particularly true if you are coming for a long period of near-starvation (counting calories), where your body may wish to restore lost muscles and so on. Weight training and muscle gain can also mask fat loss.
Losing fat and gaining muscle means great progress, but you may miss this if you measure your weight only. So of intelligence also follow the disappearance of fat in the abdomen, by measuring your waistline.
Heres how to do this:
Place the measuring tape around your middle, slightly above your belly button (specifically: midway between your lower rib and the top of the hipbone, next to you)
Exhaling and relaxing (do not suck your stomach)
Make sure that the measuring tape fits snagly, without squeezing your skin
Measurement
Compare your results with these recommendations:
Excellent Decent very high
women Below 31.5 inches 31.5-35 inches More than 35 inches
(80 cm) (80-88 cm) (88 cm)
Men Less than 37 inches 37-40 inches More than 40 inches
(94 cm) (94-102 cm) (102 cm)
I recommend aiming at "excellent" but it is not always realistic. Young people can usually achieve this, but for some middle-aged women or older women, this may be a great victory to reach a "decent".
Measure progress
I suggest measuring your waist circumference and weight before you begin your weight loss trip and maybe once a week or once a month. Type your results so you can track your progress. If you want, you can measure more areas: around the buttocks, chest, arms, legs, etc.
Please note that your weight can fluctuate several times from day to day, depending on the fluid balance and digestive content: Do not worry about short-term changes, follow the long-term trend instead.
If you can, try checking other important health signs at the start, such as:
blood pressure
Blood sugar (fasting blood sugar and / or HbA1c)
Profile for cholesterol (including HDL, triglycerides)
These signs have improved almost universally on a low carbohydrate diet, even before the main weight loss. Re-examining these signs a few months later can be great for your stimulation because it will usually show that you are not only losing weight, but also gaining health.
Note: Do not you have a tape measure at home? Try these options:
Use any part of the string. Wrap the thread around your waist and cut the bracelet to suit your waist on the first day. This series can look longer and longer magically each week wrap around your waist.
Compare how a pair of old jeans also fits a good choice.
6. Be persistent
Don `t give up
It usually takes years or decades to get a lot of weight. Trying to lose everything as quickly as possible by starving yourself rarely works well in the long run, and this is just a recipe for a "yo-yo diet." To succeed, you need something that works long term.
What is the goal for
It is common to lose 2-6 pounds (1-3 kg) during the first week on a strict low carbohydrate diet, then on average about one pound (0.5 kg) per week as long as you have a lot of residual weight you lose. This translates to about 50 pounds (23 kilograms) per year.
Every 5 pounds of fat loss is approximately 1 inch missing around the waist (1 kg = 1 cm).
Sometimes young males lose weight faster than this, perhaps twice the speed. Menopausal women may lose at a slightly slower pace. People on a very low carbohydrate diet may lose weight faster, as do those who exercise a lot (reward). If you have a lot of extra weight to lose, you can start more quickly.
When you approach your ideal weight, the loss may slow down, until you settle at a weight that your body feels is right. Very few people become underweight on a low carbohydrate diet - as long as they eat when hungry.
7. Avoid eating fruit
This advice is controversial as the fruit has a magical health aura almost today. People may think that the fruit is nutritious but unfortunately contains fruit on Lots of sugar - about 10% of the weight (the rest is mostly water). Just taste orange or grape. Sweet, right?
Five servings of fruit per day equals the amount of sugar in 16 ounces of soda (500 ml). Contrary to what many people think, sugar is fairly similar (about 50% glucose, 50% fructose).
Sugar from the fruit can shut down fat burning. This can increase your hunger and slow down weight loss. For best results, avoid fruit - or sometimes enjoy it as a treat.
Conclusion: fruit candy from nature.
Low Carbohydrate Fruits Fruits, spices, carbohydrates, berries - better and worse
Is not a natural fruit?
Most people believe that the fruits are natural, but the fruits of the day in the grocery store share little with the fruits they had before they were cultured. There is more sugar in modern domesticated fruits.
8. Avoid drinking beer
Beer contains quick-digesting carbohydrates that close fat burning. For this reason beer is sometimes referred to as "liquid bread". There is a good reason for the term "beer belly".
Here are the smarter alcoholic options for losing weight:
Wine (red or dry white)
Champagne dry
Solid wines such as whiskey, cognac, vodka (avoid sweetened cocktails - try vodka, soda water, lime instead)
These drinks barely contain any sugar / carbohydrates so they are better than beer. However, large amounts of alcohol may slow down weight loss to some extent, so moderation is still a good idea.
9. Avoid artificial sweeteners
Industrial Sweeteners
Many people replace sugar with artificial sweeteners in the belief that this will reduce the calories caused and cause weight loss. It seems reasonable. However, many studies have failed to show any positive effect on weight loss by consuming artificial sweeteners instead of normal sugar.
Instead, according to scientific studies, artificial sweeteners can increase appetite and maintain cravings to eat sweet. A recent independent study showed that switching drinks with artificial sweeteners to water clearly helped women lose weight:
10. Review any medicines
Many medical drugs can disrupt your weight loss. Discuss any change in treatment with your doctor. The following are the three worst:
Insulin injections, especially at high doses, are probably the worst obstacle to losing weight. There are three ways to reduce your insulin needs:
Eat less carbohydrates, making it easy to lose weight. The less carbohydrates you eat the less insulin you need. Remember to lower the dose if you can.
If this is not enough, treatment with metformin tablets (2 to 3 g / day) can reduce the need for insulin (at least for type 2 diabetics).
If this is not enough to get rid of insulin (again, for type 2 diabetes), you can try new promising drugs such as Victoza or Byetta. These reduce the need for insulin and cause weight loss.
Other medicines for diabetes. Insulin excretion tablets (such as sulfonyl urea) often lead to weight gain. These include: Minodiab, Euglucon, Daonil, and Glibenclamide. Tablets such as Avandia, Actos, Starlix and NovoNorm also encourage weight gain. But not metformin. New drugs Victoza and Byetta (injectable) often lead to weight loss, but the long-term potential side effects are still unknown. More about Diabetes
On a low-carb diet your hunger is reduced and it's much easier to do a period of fasting. Also, your fat burning is already very good – so when fasting you'll easily burn lots of fat.
So, while on a low-carb diet the fasting periods become both easier to do and more effective. 1 + 1 equals 3.
Who should not do intermittent fasting
Intermittent fasting can be a great idea, but not everyone should do it:
If you are addicted to food or sugar then intermittent fasting may increase food cravings and increases the risk of a relapse… so be very careful. I recommend always eating when hungry.
If you are totally stressed out or sleep deprived then take care or that problem first (see weight loss tip #11) or fasting may be too stressful for your body.
If you are on any medication – especially insulin – the doses may need to be adjusted when fasting. Discuss it with your doctor first.
Growing children, pregnant women and breastfeeding women should not do longer fasting periods, as they have an increased need of nutrients. I recommend eating when hungry and using the 14 tips above if you need to lose weight.
15. Exercise wisely
Exercise on a keto diet
Do you wonder why this weight-loss tip doesn't show up until number 15 on the list? It's because few things are so overrated for weight loss as exercise is.
Have you ever watched “The Biggest Loser”? The participants take leave from their jobs (and family) for months. They are allowed only small portions of food, and work out as though it were their full-time job – 40 hours a week, sometimes more. This method is clearly unsustainable for the average person in the long run.
Just taking the stairs instead of the elevator, or getting off the bus one stop earlier, isn't going to change the numbers on your bathroom scale. It's a myth. Sorry. Studies show that if you just start exercising, you're going to need at least one hour of tough workouts every single day to noticeably lose weight.
Basically, the effect of exercise on our weight is vastly overrated. That's why it's only number 15 on this list. There are other things you need to take care of first. It's not a good idea to eat bad food, drink sugar water (so-called “sports drinks”) or be on medications which force you to exercise for hours daily just to compensate. Metaphorically that's like digging a hole, into which you put your ladder, on which you stand and paint the basement-level windows of your house.
Exercise cannot compensate for other issues in your life. Those must be addressed first.
The good news
If, on the other hand, you've already taken care of steps 1-12, you should have a rested and recharged body which is already happily burning fat. In this case, increased activity will accelerate your weight loss, and act as a nice bonus. You'll be burning even more fat from the very first step.
For example, you could take long walks (golf), cycle, dance, or play any sport you're happy and comfortable with.
Exercise also burns the body's glycogen stores, which are essentially carbohydrates. This means that after a workout, you can eat a little more carbs than you otherwise can permit yourself, without negative effects on insulin or fat storage. Also, don't forget that the non-weight-related health effects of exercise are quite impressive.
Hormonal effects
For even more impressive effects on body composition: aim for exercise forms which elicit a positive hormonal response. This means lifting really heavy things (strength training), or interval training. Such exercise increases levels of the sex hormone testosterone (primarily in men) as well as growth hormone. Not only do greater levels of these hormones increase your muscle mass, but they also decrease your visceral fat (belly fat) in the long term.
As a final bonus, exercise can both make you feel and look better.
What kind of activity fits you?
16. Achieve optimal ketosis
blood-ketone-test-16-9
Warning: Not recommended for type 1 diabetics, see below.
We've now arrived at tip number 16. If you're still having trouble losing weight, despite following the 15 pieces of advice listed above, it might be a good idea to bring out the heavy artillery: optimal ketosis. Many people stalling at weight plateaus while on a low-carb diet have found optimal ketosis helpful. It's what can melt the fat off once again.
So how does this work? A quick run-through: The first tip was to eat low carb. This is because a low-carb diet lowers your levels of the fat-storing hormone insulin, allowing your fat deposits to shrink and release their stored energy. This tends to cause you to want to consume fewer calories than you expend – without hunger – and lose weight. Several of the tips mentioned above are about fine-tuning your diet to better this effect.
How do you know you're getting the maximum hormonal impact from your low-carb diet? You do that by achieving what's known as “optimal ketosis”.
Ketosis
Ketosis is a state where the body has an extremely high fat-burning rate. Even the brain runs on fat, via ketone bodies. These are energy molecules in the blood (like blood sugar) which become fuel for our brains after being converted from fat by the liver.
To encourage ketone production, the amount of insulin in your bloodstream must be low. The lower your insulin, the higher your ketone production. And when you have a well-controlled, sufficiently large amount of ketones in your blood, it's basically proof that your insulin is very low – and therefore, that you're enjoying the maximum effect of your low-carbohydrate diet. That's what's called optimal ketosis.
Measuring ketones
Today, there are reasonably-priced gadgets available for measuring ketone levels at home. One needle prick of the finger, and in just a few seconds you'll know your blood ketone level.
Blood ketones are best measured on a fasted stomach in the morning (before breakfast, that is). Here are a few pointers on how to interpret the result:
Below 0.5 mmol/L is not considered “ketosis”. At this level, you're far away from maximum fat-burning.
Between 0.5-1.5 mmol/L is light nutritional ketosis. You'll be getting a good effect on your weight, but not optimal.
Around 1.5-3 mmol/L is what's called optimal ketosis and is recommended for maximum weight loss.
Numbers over 3 mmol/L aren't neccessary. That is, they will achieve neither better nor worse results than being at the 1.5-3 level. Higher numbers can also sometimes mean that you're not getting enough food. For type 1 diabetics, this can be caused by a severe lack of insulin, see below.
Ketones in urine
Ketone levels can also be measured in a more old-fashioned way, with urine test sticks (sold prescription-free in pharmacies or on Amazon). Ketone sticks give less reliable results for several reasons, and the above recommendations can't be straightforwardly applied to them. They are, however, much cheaper.
My personal experience
Feel free to read my accounts of a two-month personal trial:
Experiment: Optimal ketosis for weight loss and increased performance
Four weeks of strict keto and ketone monitoring
Final report: Two months of strict keto and ketone monitoring
Although I was quite happy with my weight before these trials, they resulted in a further loss of 4.5 kg (10 pounds) and 7 cm (3 inches) around my waist – without additional exercise or even the slightest resemblance of hunger.
How to achieve optimal ketosis
Many who firmly believe they are eating a strict low-carb diet are surprised when they measure their blood ketones. They may be at around only 0.2 or 0.5 – quite far off from the sweet spot! Why?
The trick here is not only to avoid all obvious sources of carbohydrate (sweets, bread, spaghetti, rice, potatoes), but also to be careful with your protein intake. If you eat large amounts of meat, eggs and the like, the excess protein will be converted into glucose in your body. Large amounts of protein can also raise your insulin levels somewhat. This compromises optimal ketosis.
The secret to getting around this is usually to eat your fill with more fat. For example, if you have a bigger helping of herb butter to your steak, you might not feel like having a second steak, and instead feel satisfied after the first one.
A popular trick people use to ingest more fat is “fat coffee” (sometimes called “Magic Bullet Coffee” or MBC). It involves adding one tablespoon of butter and one tablespoon of coconut oil to your (morning) coffee, and requires a food blender for the right texture.
More fat in your food will fill you up more. This will ensure that you eat less protein, and even fewer carbohydrates. Your insulin will drop and, hopefully, you'll be able to reach optimal ketosis. And that's when many a stubborn weight plateau is overcome.
If it doesn't work
Being in optimal ketosis for a prolonged period of time (say, a month) will ensure that you experience the maximal hormonal effect from eating a low-carb diet. If this doesn't result in noticeable weight loss, you can be certain that too many carbs are NOT part of your weight issue and not the obstacle to your weight loss. There are, in fact, other causes of obesity and being overweight. The next three tips in this series might help you.
Try it
Order a ketone meter online and start measuring. There are a few different models, the most popular one is probably the Precision Xtra ketone meter. Unfortunately these meters are all quite expensive to use, as the test strips can cost about $5 per test.
Here's a complete package with everything you need to check your blood ketone levels.
Learn much more about ketogenic diets here:
A quick guide to ketogenic diets
Watch my video interview with the American doctor Peter Attia, on a strictly ketogenic low-carb diet: Very Low Carb Performance
A word of warning
If you have type 1 diabetes, you should not follow the above advice on optimal ketosis – it may be risky. If you have ketones in your blood at all, you must be sure that your blood sugar levels are normal. If they are, you're in normal ketosis – just like the ketosis of non-diabetic people who stick to a strict low-carb diet.
High blood sugar levels coupled with high blood ketones, on the other hand, will mean that you have a pathologically low level of insulin – something non-diabetics do not suffer from. This can lead to ketoacidosis – a potentially life-threatening condition. If this happens, you'll need to inject more insulin; if you're at all unsure of what to do, contact a medical professional. Coveting really high blood ketones for weight control is not worth the risk for type 1 diabetics.
17. Get your hormones checked
Test your hormones
So you've followed the previous tips, implemented major lifestyle changes and established that neither medication nor vitamin deficiency is an issue. You've even tried being in optimal ketosis for a while (ensuring low insulin levels). And you still can't hit the normal weight mark?
If this applies to you, it's high time to consider the possibility that hormonal imbalances are the cause of your troubles. There are three common problem areas:
Thyroid hormone
Sex hormones
Stress hormones
Thyroid hormone
Some people, especially women, suffer decreased metabolism as a result of thyroid hormone deficiency – hypothyroidism. Common symptoms are:
Fatigue
Cold intolerance
Constipation
Dry skin
Weight gain
In these cases, weight gain resulting from decreased metabolism usually do not exceed fifteen pounds.
Your doctor can easily arrange for you to take a blood test to measure the concentration of thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH). If the test comes back and everything looks good, your thyroid gland is probably fine. For a more exact diagnosis, you can ask them to measure the actual levels of thyroid hormones in the blood (T3 and T4).
Two ways to avoid becoming deficient in thyroid hormone:
Make sure you consume enough iodine, which is a building block of thyroid hormone. Good sources are fish, shellfish and iodised salt (or sea salt).
Very low levels of thyroid hormone usually indicate an autoimmune reaction to the thyroid gland itself. This means you'll have to take thyroid hormone supplements orally, usually the stable form T4 (Levaxin), which your doctor can prescribe for you. Your body will transform this into the active T3 hormone when necessary. The supplement dose should be adjusted so that you reach normal hormone levels (TSH, T3, T4) and sufficiently alleviate symptoms – though a few people feel best when keeping TSH slightly below normal.
Some people feel better supplementing the already active T3 (sometimes prepared from pig thyroid glands), as it can give a stronger effect than the T4 hormone, but its effect is often harder to control. Swedish healthcare rarely prescribes or offers such T3 treatment, as it often lacks advantages and may pose a risk when doses are high for an extended period of time.
Sex hormones
Sex hormones also affect your weight:
Women: Women can suffer from the endocrine disorder PCOS – polycystic ovarian syndrome – which elevates testosterone and insulin levels. This can mean weight gain and menstrual disorders (very common), infertility, acne and male pattern hair growth (such as facial hair). A low-carbohydrate diet is a good treatment for this. More on PCOS.
During menopause, a woman's level of the female sex hormone estrogen drops. This often causes some weight gain, especially around the gut (so-called central obesity). Excess weight gained after menopause will tend to be proportioned less like for a fertile woman, less curvy.
Learn more:
Top 10 tips to lose weight on low carb for women 40+
Men: From middle age and onwards, men experience gradually declining levels of the male sex hormone testosterone. This leads to slight weight gain, also typically around the gut, and decreased muscle mass.
What can you do about sex hormones?
Testosterone deficiency can be at least partially treated naturally by engaging in smart exercise routines, conscious body language and supplementing vitamin D.
Of course, you can also affect testosterone levels by getting your doctor to prescribe a testosterone supplement (a blood test will confirm any deficiency). Women can use estrogen supplementation for menopause problems.
It's important you take into account, however, that supplementation of testosterone or estrogen for years on end, in doses that are abnormally large for your age, will increase the risk of prostate cancer (in men) and breast cancer (in women).
It may be wise to accept that you don't (and shouldn't!) have the body of a 20-year-old when you're several times that age. A better option might be to try to focus on a healthy lifestyle instead, and to be as happy and grateful as you can for the body you have.
Stress hormone
The final possible culprit behind stubborn weight issues may be the stress hormone, cortisol. Too much cortisol will increase hunger levels, bringing along subsequent weight gain. The most common cause of elevated cortisol is chronic stress and lack of sleep (see tip #10), or cortisone medication (tip #9). It's a good idea to try your best to do something about this.
In rare and extreme cases, you could be dealing with a specific kind of tumor that drives cortisol production. The condition is called Cushing's syndrome. If you suspect you're suffering from this, consult your doctor and they will run appropriate tests.
18. Consider weight-loss pills (if desperate)
Weight Loss Pills
It sounds like a dream. Keep living like you already do, take a pill a day, and effortlessly lose your excess weight. This is why weight-loss pills is a billion dollar industry.
So do they work? Yes. But they're not very effective.
There are many drugs that result in a modest weight loss (a few pounds on average) at the expense of significant side effects. In my opinion there's only one drug that you may want to consider using.
Before we get to that one drug we'll very briefly summarize the other options and why they are not great.
Prescription-free supplements
The internet is full of claims of magic supplements that can make you thin. Unfortunately, the only thing they'll make thin is your wallet. This is true even if they were once mentioned on Dr. Oz – you know that's an entertainment show, right?
Any prescription-free supplements for sale that are not dangerous or illegal (like steroids) are likely to have a small or negligible effect on your weight.
This is true even for the vitamin supplements mentioned in advice #13 – the effect is definitely small, but in that case it's also safe – maybe even healthy – and also dirt cheap, making it a potentially smart bonus (note that we sell no supplements whatsoever and make no money from this piece of advice).
There are also prescription free “carb blockers” out there, that are supposed to stop the body from absorbing carbs we eat. The effect tend to be relatively tiny though, even in studies funded by the companies selling the products. It's definitely at least ten times more effective to not eat the carbs in the first place (it's also free).
Older appetite suppressants
PhentermineIn the US, it's still possible to get amphetamin-like appetite suppressants prescribed for short-term use (weeks). As they are only for short-term use they are no use for long-term weight control. These drugs are not approved in the EU.
These drugs have side effects like insomnia, heart palpitations and elevated blood pressure. It's also possible to become addicted to them and thus they require a special controlled-substance prescription. Examples include:
Adipex-P or Suprenza (Phentermine)
Bondril (Phendiametrazine)
Didrex (Benzphetamine)
The effect of these drugs is decidedly modest and short term, hardly outweighing their risks. I do not recommend them.
The “oily discharge” pill
alli
Let's move on to another older drug, Xenical, lately for sale prescription-free as “Alli” and with a falling popularity.
This drug prevents the body from digesting fat in the intestines. Instead it just passes through you and ends up in the toilet… or in your pants.
Side effects include stomach cramping, gas, leaking oily stool and being unable to control bowel movements. And finally the “oily discharge” that often results when people think they are just passing some gas.
This pill is not compatible with wearing white pants and it's not compatible with eating fat. Thus it's not compatible with a low-carb diet. This does not mean you have to a wear white pants on a low-carb diet, you just need to eat fat (you understood that already, right?).
Just forget this drug. Most doctors already have.
The stupid pill
StupidIs there a worse option than Xenical/Alli? Why, yes. It's called Qsymia.
Qsymia is available in the US, but it got rejected in Europe (where the side effects were sensibly judged worse than the benefits). I prefer to label this drug the “stupid pill”.
Qsymia combines a tiny amount of the old Phentermine (see Appetite Suppressants above) with a small dose of Topiramate, an anti-seizure drug.
The real problem? Common side effects of topiramate include drowsiness, fatigue, depression, attention disturbance, memory impairment, cognitive disorder, impaired psychomotor skills (ie becoming clumsy), lethargy, balance disorder, sedation, gait abnormality (ie walking like you're drunk).
Basically, this drug slows down your brain, like alcohol or sedatives. Are you really going to do that to lose a few pounds, that you'll regain once you stop taking the drug?
The “meh” pills
Two more weight control drugs were approved in the US in 2012 and are now available, Belviq and Contrave.
Belvic has been rejected in Europe because of safety concerns. Contrave was recently approved (under the name Mysimba).
These two drugs work on different receptors in the brain to control appetite. The effect is modest – 6 to 8 pounds lost in a year, with partial regain after that. There are ongoing safety concerns with both drugs and a definite risk of side effects like (for Contrave) nausea, constipation, headache, risk of suicidal thoughts and seizures.
To me, these modest benefits do not outweigh the risk of side effects.
The reigning champion
And then there is only one more approved weight loss drug left. Fortunately this one actually shows a lot of promise and can speed up weight loss quite significantly.
This drug is an injected variant of a satiety hormone called GLP-1. It slows down how quickly the stomach empties and tells the brain that you don't need to eat yet – a great idea for losing weight. As a bonus this drug works fine while one is on the keto diet and it works even better with intermittent fasting – for a rapid weight loss with no hunger.
This drug was initially used to control blood sugar in type 2 diabetes – under the brand name Victoza – where it has the nice side effect of significant weight loss.
Testing on people with obesity (without diabetes) shows that at higher doses the drug is quite effective as a pure weight loss treatment, with patients losing on average 12.3 pounds (5.6 kilos) more than a placebo group after one year.
Saxenda
This drug has recently been approved in both the US and in Europe for weight loss, under the name Saxenda. There are many other similar GLP-1 drugs for treating diabetes type 2, but none of them have been carefully tested or approved for treating obesity yet.
Saxenda is already available at the fantastic cost of about $1,000 per month.
In both the US and in Europe another option is Victoza, which is the exact same drug at half the dose and half the price. At this lower dose the resulting weight loss is about 75% of the weight loss when one is on Saxenda. Victoza is approved only for treating type 2 diabetes.
The main side effect of Saxenda / Victoza is what happens if the satiety effect becomes too strong: nausea and vomiting. This is quite common when starting out, so it's necessary to start with a low dose and then slowly increase it as the body adapts to the medication.
The bonus
If you have type 2 diabetes there is another diabetes drug that can result in noticeable weight loss: the “low-carb in a pill” drug Farxiga (called Forxiga in Europe).
The bottom line
There is no pill that easily makes people thin. These drugs are all pretty bad or at least not very effective.
The only exception in my mind is Saxenda – and this is a daily injection, not a pill.
The downside to Saxenda is the very high price – insurance may only cover part of it – and the nausea that people often experience on it.
It's also clear from my own and other people's experience treating patients with it that it does not work well for everyone. Some people experience only minimal weight loss. Other people lose a lot more than the additional 12 pounds lost in a recent study – this is only an average.
Finally, Saxenda only works as long as you use it. Once you stop, the weight tends to return. So is losing about 12 pounds worth $1,000 per month and the risk of nausea? Only you can decide.
Most people who want to lose weight have more than 12 pounds to lose. That's why even the best weight loss drug in the world can only be an optional complement to other treatment. That's why this piece of advice is number 18 out of 18. It may be a helpful addition for some people, but the advice higher on the list is what can make the biggest difference, by far.
