You’ve worked hard, lowered your calorie intake from several months if not longer. You’ve eaten the right foods, been a good girl (or boy), and increased your consumption of fruits and vegetables, and low and behold, you’ve lost weight.

Congratulations! You met your goal!!

Now what?

Do you know that only 5-10% of people who lose weight are able to keep it off? Or will you be part of the 90-95% who gain some, if not all, of their weight back?

So what’s the secret to keep my weight loss?

The secret isn’t that much different from how you actually lost weight in the first place. The first part of the secret is:

EXERCISE!

Yes, that’s right, exercise. Surprise, surprise. Who knew???

Physical activity, in ways that researchers don’t really understand, influences some of the biological systems that promote weight regain, encouraging the body to become more sensitive to leptin and insulin, for example. Leptin is a major appetite regulator — it tells the body to stop eating and store fat after meals.

Do you know that after you lose weight, your metabolism changes?

According to University of Colorado professor James O. Hill, director of the Center for Human Nutrition in Denver, the body now needs about eight fewer calories per day for each pound of weight that was lost. That means someone who loses 40 pounds will require about 320 calories fewer each day than they did before the weight loss.

How are you going to get rid of these 320 extra calories?

Oh, you could eat less food, but isn’t it easier and actually better for you to exercise it off?

BTW, if you noticed in the title, this is the first secret. I’ll be featuring the second secret coming up in the next few days, because,

After all, it’s about a healthy lifestyle!

© Iowa Avenue

Photos courtesy of LollyKnit