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FACT SHEET #9

Return to healthy living

Changing Body Composition

Need to know!

No matter what you're told, there is only one way to change your weight, (other than resorting to surgery), and this is to create an imbalance between your energy intake and expenditure!

Whichever diet you choose will follow this principle - the only difference being what you are told to eat and when. However, in reality, when it comes to pure weight loss it doesn't make that much difference how your diet is composed or when you choose to eat - it can be roughly guided with calories, too many and you gain weight, too few and you lose it! Obviously, some diets are healthier than others but the basic principle will never change.

Basic Metabolic Rate (BMR) is a crucial figure in weight change. Your BMR dictates how many calories you need per day to keep your body functioning in the resting state, you then need to account for the extra calories required for any daily activities to come up with a more realistic value to work with.

Research has shown that diet or exercise alone can result in weight changes, however, combining both of these factors will produce much greater, more permanent and safer results. Additionally, any diet that promises rapid weight loss/gain should be eschewed - the most sensible diets allow for gradual changes - forget magic and miracles and be prepared to invest sufficient time and effort!

Nice to know!

Losing Weight: When trying to lose weight you are really trying to lose fat mass and, on the other hand, when trying to gain weight you are talking about gaining muscle mass. If you go about it the wrong way you will do the opposite and end up losing muscle mass or gaining fat mass!

In terms of weight loss, you should aim to lose 1-2lb per week initially, but this rate will slow down after a few weeks. To do this you need to consume 500-800 calories per day less than your needs (BMR + activity). However, in general terms, women should never eat less than 1,200 calories per day and men no less than 1,500.

Remember that 1lb of fat represents 3,500 calories therefore, based on a loss of 500 calories per day, it will take 7 days to lose 1lb of fat.

Gaining Weight: Gaining weight isn't as easy as it sounds! Unfortunately, it's not as simple as eating as much as you want of what you want - this simply leads to a gain in fat mass! To gain lean mass you need to combine your eating plan with a good training programme and you should expect to gain no more than 1/2-1lb per week initially. Adding 300-500 calories to your daily energy intake or, more specifically, 2 extra calories per Ib of body mass is recommended and you should also try to increase your protein intake to around 25% of your daily intake.

Eating Regularly: With both weight loss and gain, it makes sense to eat more, smaller meals per day. For weight loss, this ensures that you maintain a more even blood sugar level throughout the day which helps prevent binging. When gaining weight, it allows for greater intake and helps prevent stomach discomfort.

Fun facts

  1. The weight loss industry is now worth billions of pounds but it is unregulated meaning that anyone can sell you a diet whether they are qualified or not!
  2. You can never reduce the number of fat cells in your body, unless you resort to liposuction! What actually happens is you change the amount of fat stored within each cell and consequently the size of the cell which impacts on your body shape.
  3. By eating just 1 extra slice of bread more than you need every day you will gain 8lb in a year!
  4. The number of eating disorders is increasing more rapidly in the male population than in the female population. Nutrition and exercise go hand in hand - for best results, look at both!