Weight Loss – the second decision
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Once you have decided you need to lose weight you need to decide what you are going to do to tone and strengthen muscles and burn extra fat. It is all about burning calories and you have a big calorie burner on your side already. At the end of the article is an embedded video I made about beginning the process of losing excess fat.
BMR
BMR is your basal metabolic rate. It is the amount of calories you must consume to remain at your current weight and stay healthy. BMR is your largest caloric expenditure unless you are a super fit athlete. You can influence this by the amount of muscle you possess. So, exercise becomes your ally in increasing your BMR. As you lose weight your BMR decreases so you must reduce your calories accordingly or increase your activity significantly.
Estimating your BMR.
A good way to estimate your BMR is to multiply your weight in pounds by 10. I weigh 163 pounds. 10 x 163 = 1630 calories per day as my BMR.
If I weighed 153 it would be 1530 calories.
For activity and digestion add another .3 x BMR to .6 x BMR to estimate the rest of your caloric needs.
If you walk 30 minutes three times a week, multiply your BMR by .4. .1 is for digestion and .3 for activity.
Use the Google search box as a calculator by entering the numbers like this BMR or for me 1630*.4=.
* is the symbol for multiply.
The answer is 652 calories more.
You can see that if I just lie still all day I need 1630 calories to sustain me, if I am up and active and walk 30 minutes 3 times per week I burn another 652 calories per day for a total of 2282 calories per day to SUSTAIN my current weight.
How do I lose excess fat?
You must do two things to lose weight. First cut your calories. If 2282 will maintain my weight while exercising, I must cut the calories. If I reduce my calories per day to 2032 (250 calories per day less) I will lose 8 ounces per week or 2 pounds per month or about 26 pounds per year. Not much you say. Well, it is a habit that can be sustained over the long haul. If I need to lose 15 pounds to get my BMI (body mass index) below 25 which is the normal range (19-24.9) then I could do it by keeping my calories to around 2000 per day and walking 30 minutes 3 times per week. Second, if I want to speed this up, I can walk 5-7 times per week for 30 minutes.
How much is too much too fast?
Remember it isn’t weight loss that is hard. It is not letting the weight you lost find its way home to your body. Keeping the weight off is the part that challenges most of us. This requires us to change habits and that takes time and some good reasons. Most experts agree that 10% of your body weight over 6 months is a good goal and is very sustainable. It means you have established as a habit the behaviors for eating and exercise that will sustain you in your effort. Below is a video I made about the start of a weight loss program.
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