Friday Fitness Fact – Patience is a Virtue

Patience is a virtue when it comes to weight loss. Many, many studies have shown that people who lose weight really fast rarely keep it off and often caught whatever bug might be going around at the time. Any average of 2-3 pounds a week is a steady pass that is easily sustainable over time.

The Fast Way is Not Always the Best Way

There are plenty of methods out there that really will make the pounds seem to melt away. I am not going to lie to you – there really are pills and crash diets and fad diets and methods out there that will make you lose 10 plus pounds in less then a  week. There are two problems inherent in any of these means – 1. It is rarely healthy and 2. It never lasts. Usually the bare fact basis of the method is water weight lose. You purge your body of all the extra water weight and think that you have lost 10 pounds in four days. Really all your have done in severely dehydrated yourself and wrecked havoc on your kidneys and digestive system. And once your body realizes that this is what you have done, you will be so hungry and thirsty you may not only gain back what you lost but get more, if your body actually gets all the way to survival mode.

The Straight and Narrow

It takes alot of work and commitment to live a healthy lifestyle. You have to change your eating habits, you have to change your level of physical activity, you have to limit your sedentary habits. You did not gain all the weight, and/or become unhealthy over night. You can not expect to reverse the effects over night, either. I am not saying that it is going to take you ten years to lose the weight you gained over the last year (for most people), but rather that you can get discouraged that after one month in the gym you are not to your goal weight. It takes dedication to changing your lifestyle to lose weight and keep it off. As I said above, a healthy measure of weight loss is 2-3 pounds a week. This is a healthy number that your body will not “freak-out” over, so to speak. And, when done in a healthy manner, you are more likely to keep the weight off for good. And that is the ultimate goal, right? To reiterate my point here – it took you X number years gain the weight it will take some time to lose, so have patience!