Fat Loss, Weight Loss – What Do You Do When You Stop Losing Weight Or Fat
It happens to people, and it has happened to me: You stop losing weight/fat, you plateau (a common name for this), and you get frustrated. You’re exercising, you’re eating right, you’re sleeping well, you seem to be doing all the right things, and yet the scale hasn’t budged in 2-4 weeks, you’re clothes are not getting looser, and you’re thinking about grabbing that gallon of Ben and Jerry’s and just saying “Screw it!”.
Been there. There currently, minus the Ben and Jerry’s.
Plateaus happen. They suck. They are frustrating. I’ve personally been stuck at the same weight for 3 weeks now and can relate. With my shoulder issues my exercise has been scaled back, but I’m still eating on my chosen nutrition plan.
When plateaus happen, it’s time to shock the body. You’ve got to try something different, right? So here are a few things that may help, may not, and cannot hurt to try (just don’t go overboard here).
1. A cleanse, detox, or something similar – I’ll talk about what I plan on doing a bit later in this post, but try a cleanse. Sometimes our body needs to reset.
2. Over-eat one meal – Similar to a cheat meal. In fact, you can take this as a cheat meal if you want. But if you’ve been on calorie restriction for a period of time (or severe calorie restriction), eat at-or-above maintenance one day, or eat one really big meal. One big meal won’t kill you and very well may reset your body to need to burn more.
3. Take a slight break from exercise. Yes, I said it: Stop exercising! But only for a short time, such as a week.
4. Up your intensity of exercise. The opposite of #3. Lift heavier, do a HITT, something different.
Try one of these four. Can’t hurt, right? Eating one meal isn’t going to cause you to gain 5 pounds of fat back, and one week of not exercising is not going to turn you into a soft body.
As for me….
With going through shoulder PT, I’m limited on upper body work. I plan on using my body as a human lab. I’m experimenting with two different things:
1. I plan a Shakeology Cleanse. I need to reset my body nutritionally. Honestly, I’m not a huge fan of doing a cleanse, but it has always helped me when I need to move my metabolism into overdrive.
2. I am going to do a Leptin Reset. I have a slight feeling that I may have a bit of leptin resistance which causes my body to burn more sugar than fat (hence why last year I was 159 lbs, approx 13% body fat, and still did not look slim).
I have nothing to lose doing either of these. I will not be blogging daily about how it is working but will hit on it every now and then throughout the week. My goals is to bust through this plateau through nutrition and moderate exercise while the shoulders are healing. I will take before/after pictures of the cleanse, and will also take weight measurements during the reset with full measurements every two weeks as well as pictures. The Leptin Reset is only a 4-6 week cycle, so I should finish up by end of March, maybe into the first bit of April.
Note: This is fairly extreme. Not that it is extreme as in extremely difficult, but rather just a big change for most. If you have been eating Paleo/Primal, it cannot hurt to try, which is why I want todo it.
By the way, what are some of the advantages I’ve read about doing a Leptin Reset?
- Fat Loss
- Better hair/nails
- Better sleep (a big reason I want to do this)
- Increased sex drive
- Better recovery from intense exercise
- Decreased cravings
I’ll write more on how I plan on doing the reset (yes, it will include Shakeology, since I’ll be taking reduced carbs I want maximum nutrition).
If you’ve busted through a plateau, I’d love to know what you did and see if anyone else here could benefit from it as well.
