The Diet After The Diet

Diets work there is no doubt about that. The obesity epidemic we face isn’t due to people not being able to lose weight, it’s they are not able to keep it off. Let’s start with some weight loss statistics. It has been shown that 6/7 overweight people will lose a large amount of weight in their life. Within 1 year 80% will have put it all back on. Within 2 years 95% will have put it all back on, plus more! On average the weight is gained back twice as fast as it took to lose then takes twice as long to lose the second time around. As you can see this viscous cycle of weight loss followed by regain is doing a lot of damage to our bodies, our mindsets and our health.

How do we maintain our weight loss? This is where the focus needs to be. We know maintenance is the hardest part that's why we put a large amount of focus into ongoing education and support. Here are our four top tips to get your incredible result and maintain it.

Education
Once initial motivation wears off it’s important to know why you're doing what you're doing and how to make the best decision’s on your own. At Vision we believe it is crucial to educate our clients about what to eat and what to do when they are not with us (which is most of the time). We want our clients to feel empowered and educated enough to be able to make their own decisions and feel confident they will remain on track. We have a range of tools available to help with this such as MyVision app, seminars, shopping tours, ready set go and ongoing coaching throughout goal sessions and personal training sessions. Once the end goal is achieved our members will be educated and informed enough to be able to maintain their weight while still living life!

Forget Fad Diets
Fad diets are highly restrictive and dangerous diets that are marketed to us with a set of rules we must follow. No carbs, no eating after dark, intermittent fasting, keto, the list goes on. Aside from being completely unsustainable, fad diets can have many negative long term health effects. When a lot of weight is lost fast, more often then not this “weight loss” is from a reduction in water and muscle tissue. So yes, you may have lost weight on the scales but it is not true fat loss. This can have a negative impact on your metabolism and lead to it down-regulating to match your lowered calorie intake. As soon as you go back to any normalcy the weight you just lost will pile right back on. Therefore following a nutrition plan that works for your lifestyle and you enjoy is the best plan for you and will give you the best chance of maintaining your result.

Set A Secondary Goal
The most common goals we see are related to weight loss or seeing a change in scale weight. This is why we encourage a secondary goal to be set that focuses on something other then scale weight. For example fitness, participating in an event, completing a 5km run, lifting a certain weight, having more energy to play with the grandkids, etc. Having this secondary goal to focus on ensures all the healthy habits you have put in place remain therefore resulting in a higher chance of keeping the weight off. The focus shifts from trying to deprive yourself to lose weight to fueling your body with adequate nutrition to train hard, feel great and increase overall energy.

Build Sustainable Habits
When starting your journey the goals and habits set need to be realistic so they can remain in place long term. If you don't have 10 hours a week to do cardio don't commit yourself to trying to fit it in. Instead, set a realistic goal of trying to get out for a bike ride with the kids on the weekend. If you can make it fun, achievable and realistic it is much more likely to continue to happen. Instead of cutting out alcohol completely maybe set the goal of having 2 drinks a week that way you are able to still socialise and enjoy yourself without feeling like your missing out. These are just a few examples of how you can adjust your habits to be suited to your lifestyle.