Why We Gain Weight
One of the primary reasons why we gain weight is that we eat more calories than what our body needs in a day, so the excess gets stored as fat. Our bodies are designed in such a way that in times when it was harder to get food, our bodies could be prepared by having stored extra calories in times of plenty in the form of fat. Now, with as easy as it is to get food, a lot of people tend to overeat, and this is a severe problem that causes many to become overweight or obese.
Genes Play a Factor in Why We Gain Weight
Genes set basic parameters on the metabolic efficiency of your body. People who are overweight many times have very efficient metabolisms, meaning they need less caloric intake than others, and they store the excess as fat. You have a greater risk of being obese if one parent is and an even greater risk if both parents are. However, genes only determine a tendency towards a higher or lower metabolic efficiency, not what your actual body metabolism will be.
When most people think of losing weight, they think of going on a diet. Many times, this means finding some fad diet that is probably popular at the current time, and trying to follow all of its crazy rules and recipes, like lemon juice, cayenne pepper and maple syrup. But honestly, who enjoys these things? Do you like cutting out entire food groups such as carbohydrates or drinking crazy concoctions that simply do not taste very good and do not fill you up?
It is doubtful that anyone does
Choosing the right diet plan is the key. Yes, there are other diet plans out there that have a lot of merit to them, and if a diet is the way you want to go, then researching the different ones out there is very advisable so that you can find a reasonable, sensible diet plan that is not going to harm you or make you go crazy with hunger, causing you to fail in the end anyway.
The Downsides of Dieting
• Fad Diets – These diets usually consist of removing one food group entirely from your diet or drinking an unusual mixture of ingredients to get you to lose weight. Not only can these be unhealthy and dangerous at times, they can leave you feeling hungry (one of the reasons why we gain weight) or drained from not enough nutrients. In the end, even if you do lose some weight at first, these diets usually fail because they are too restrictive and as soon as you stop them you wind up gaining all the weight back, plus more sometimes.
• Counting Calories – Sometimes counting every little calorie we take in is very bothersome and frustrating to people. Because of this, some people may give up on their diet altogether.
• Eating Too Little – Dieting for some people means just eating very little. If you do not follow a proper diet plan, and think that just not eating is the way to lose weight, you will quickly find out that besides being very hungry you will not feel good at all because you are not getting enough nutrients. You are also confusing your body’s metabolism with this starving method – it might not make you lose weight much at first as your body starts to store all the fat it can when you do.
Your Metabolic Rate Determines Why We Gain Weight
Besides genetics, your metabolic rate depends on how active you are. It is said that every ten years past our mid-twenties we lose about 10% of our metabolic rate. This probably does not have to do completely with age, however, but instead with how active we are. The more active we are, the more muscle mass we can retain, or even build, and in turn the more fit we are because muscle tissue is metabolically active whereas fat is not. On the other hand, if we lead a basically sedentary life, we are much more likely to be able to gain weight as we lose muscle mass.
Another Reason Why We Gain Weight is Our Eating Patterns
People’s eating habits make a huge difference in determining their weight. When foods high in fat or sugars are favored, this of course can cause much weight gain. Also, how you serve the food, i.e. do you put the portions on everyone’s plate or do you bring it all to the table and serve it the food family style where everyone can take as much as they want? Portion size is one of the main reasons people eat too much. Also, how have you learned to eat? If you are a fast eater, you may not even realize the cues your stomach gives you that it is full.
Is Dieting Necessary for Weight Loss? Losing weight, especially belly fat seems to be on every one’s agenda these days and this has given rise to a number of products in the market claiming to offer wonderful results within just a few days of using it. There are several weight loss programs too that are available that make tall claims of helping people lose several pounds within just days and weeks.