What To Do If You're Exercising and Eating Healthy But Not Seeing Results
Weight loss is one of the most common reasons people aim to live a healthy lifestyle. When I meet with new potential clients, this is almost always the “why” or goal they have in mind. SO, they get that gym membership, hit the gym, change the fast food to a home cooked meal with lean meats and veggies, and things start moving! And then all of a sudden there’s a stop…
Have you been there before? Are you there right now? Nothing can be more frustrating than working so hard towards your goal and not see it come to life. I’ve worked with a lot of clients over the years to help them build a healthy lifestyle and achieve their goals. What they come to realize is that it takes more than a good workout routine and healthy meals to help them see true, long term weight loss.
Before you get too bummed out, there is hope! What I want you to know is this; exercise and good nutrition are KEY components to your weight loss success. If they weren’t, I wouldn’t be a personal trainer or nutrition coach. ;) But, you shouldn’t have to be hitting the gym EVERY day and eating “perfectly” to see results. There are other elements that make up for a healthy system that are important to consider as you work towards a weight loss goal.
What To Do If You're Exercising and Eating Healthy But Not Seeing Results
Like I just mentioned, establishing a consistent workout routine and healthy eating habits are two HUGE components of weight loss. With this alone, I’ve seen clients lose lots of weight! Sometimes 20-80 lbs! However, I have seen cases where clients are so committed to their exercise and nutrition and not seeing the scale shake. Something we have to acknowledge is that our bodies are complex machines with lots of different processes and pathways to help it function. Not only that, but we all have different pasts with our health and each have our own unique genetic makeup.
There are several reasons why you may be struggling to see weight loss, so, I’m here to share more about what a weight loss plateau is, how it happens, and some major keys to consider to help push past it!
What is a Weight Loss Plateau
A weight loss plateau is when you’re not seeing movement on the scale. Keep in mind, our weight can fluctuate a few pounds up or down within a given day. But if you’re not seeing any consistent movement over time in the same direction, you might be experiencing a weight loss plateau.
Why does Weight Loss Plateau
When I’m working with someone on their weight loss goal, the beginning stages are usually where we see a big impact of some sort. We are doing some 180 degree changes from what routines they already had in place! We go from light walking, to adding in strength training 3 times a week, or no patterns with food, to establishing a routine of healthy meals. Our bodies can adapt pretty quickly in some ways but also very slowly in others. I’ve seen the scale trail behind for weeks beyond when you first implement new habits. This is NORMAL!
The scale can come to a halt for a laundry list of reasons. Our bodies are complex and delicate machines that have cascading impacts. It can be one thing, that led to the next, that led to the next, and THAT THING was what directly impacted our weight plateau. SO, addressing your exercise and nutrition needs are step #1. Having a healthy lifestyle is so important regardless of what the scale reads! From there, we trail into the deeper elements of our bodies function that will help you find the root problem and allow you to fine tune those details.
How to Break a Weight Loss Plateau
Alright, so where do we start? On top of creating a healthy routine of exercise and nutrition that fits you best, here are 6 key elements of your health I want you to evaluate if you’re stuck in your weight loss journey.
Sleep Quality and Quantity
Stress Management
Gut Health
Reproductive Hormone Health
Medications
Thyroid Function
Sleep Quality and Quantity
We’ve all heard that getting our rest is important and seen the trending reels on how to establish a good sleep routine, BUT are you truly aware of how being sleep deprived impacts your body?
During our sleep, our body does AMAZING things! It releases hormones and chemicals that help heal and repair from cellular damage, keeps our appetite hormones (ghrelin and leptin) in balance, regulates our release of insulin (which helps keeps your blood sugars stable), releases hormones that help with our growth and development, AND keeps our immune system strong to fight off sickness. WOW!
At best, low sleep quality and quantity can impact our mood, energy levels, alertness, appetite and blood sugar balance. At its worst, the impacts are higher risk for diabetes, heart disease, and obesity.
All in all, a lack of sleep can hinder your ability to lose weight by impacting your meal frequency and portions, allow you to get sick more often (causing inflammation in the body), and decrease the energy levels you need to exercise and take on the day!
So, what can I do?
Sleep Quantity
Aim for 7-8 hours every night
Sleep Quality
Aim to make those hours at consistent bed and wake times
Establish a healthy habit bedtime routine that you can stick to consistently
Get off electronics 30-60 minutes before bed (Enjoy a quiet activity like reading, stretching, or meditation to help calm and quiet the mind and wind down for the night)
Set your home to a cool temperature (between 68-72 F)
Dim the lights in the evening
Have a routine for your skin / body care (face wash, brushing teeth, lotion, etc.)
Stress Management
We all experience stress at some point in our lives or in our day. And that’s OK! Some stress is actually important to be able to experience. It’s the chronic, ongoing stress that can be too much for the body and impact our weight loss capabilities.
When our stress levels are high, our body is in its “fight or flight” mode. Think you’re being chased by a wild animal type situation (or just think about the wild chaos of your everyday life). What does this do? For one, it holds onto all of its resources with a tight grip. It doesn’t want to get rid of any energy it’s going to need to get out of that situation. Why would it want to be burning energy (a.k.a. fat) when it may need it for energy? It also shuts off all non-essential functions and can block communication to other systems! One of those systems being our digestion system. Our body isn’t worried about digesting food when it’s trying to save its life! When your digestive system is out of whack, you can experience symptoms like gas, diarrhea, constipation, bloating, and a fluctuation of your appetite either up or down. When our food isn’t being properly digested, a plateau can hit our weight loss journey.
I know most of you aren’t being chased by a bear on a daily basis, BUT I can take a good guess that with a chaotic and busy lifestyle, living by consistent routines can be tricky. The unpredictability of our food intake, sleep, and exercise puts the body under stress. When this happens, the body doesn’t want to release stored energy when it’s unsure of what’s to come next.
So, what can I do?
Establish consistent routines about your day several days a week (sleep routine, activities, work, rest time, meal times etc.)
Get active with a good workout routine several times per week
Incorporate a rest day: from exercise, work, and responsibilities
Create healthy boundaries between your work and home life
Stretch/Meditate to help the body calm and the mind to relax
Create and maintain good relationships with friends and family to provide a good community and support system.
Gut Health
The gut microbiome is one of the most fascinating systems in the body! Our gut is the host of hundreds of thousands of bacteria that help process what enters the body and helps keep our system in balance. When we lower these good/diverse bacteria in our body, it can impact the permeability of nutrients in the body. Lower biodiverse guts have been linked to obesity, inflammation, and insulin resistance. Weight loss was also found to be associated with an increase in biodiversity in the gut microbiome. The more diversity, the better!
Another interesting link here is that poor gut health has been linked to brain fog, irritability, and challenges with mental health. When our gut can’t process our intake properly and our mental health isn’t in a good place, weight loss can be tough to see in this state.
So, what can I do?
Consume adequate amounts of fiber (prebiotic and probiotic forms)
Lower your intake of sugar, alcohol, and processed foods
Eat a healthy variety of foods, especially in your fruits and veggies (eat the rainbow of colors!)
Consider (temporarily) removing common food sensitivities (like eggs, gluten, peanuts, and dairy) then slowly reintroduce one by one to assess your body's tolerance to them. I’d recommend working with a nutrition coach on this one to ensure you’re establishing a proper and wholesome nutrition routine for you!
Reproductive Hormone Health
There’s an incredible team of hormones that work to support our reproductive health and overall bodily functions. Estrogen, Progesterone, and Testosterone are 3 major ones.
For a very quick rundown of these hormones, estrogen's responsibilities range from supporting our reproductive organ health, cardiovascular health, and bone health while progesterone can impact insulin sensitivity, metabolism, and helps regulate estrogen levels. Testosterone impacts our bone mass, fat distribution in our body, muscle mass, overall body composition, and red blood cell production.
One key here is that our balance of hormones will be different in different stages of our lives. For women, pre menstruation, menstruation, pregnancy, postpartum, and post menopausal periods will call for a different balance of all your hormones. Weight gain and difficulty losing weight have been associated when any of these hormones are too high or low.
So, what can I do?
On an annual basis at a minimum, get blood work done with the panel including your reproductive hormones to assess their levels
Get good quality sleep
Manage your stress levels
Develop a good exercise program with variation of high and low intensity
Limit alcohol, caffeine, and sugar intake
Increase intake of fiber and healthy fats
Supplement magnesium
Medications
Medications have a powerful impact on our ability/speed in losing weight. This is one thing that is so ingrained in our routine that we don’t always consider as a part of our weight loss journey. Now before we go any further, medications are something we shouldn’t take lightly. It’s always incredibly important to consult your doctor or medical professional prior to adding, removing, or adjusting your medication needs.
Drugs that have been associated with weight gain are medications for diabetes, beta blockers, anti-hypertensive drugs, and antidepressants.
If you are taking any medications of this type, talk to your doctor or medical professional about options that can support all elements of your health goals!
So, what can I do?
Discuss and plan with your doctor about options that support your medical needs but don’t intervene with your weight goals
Thyroid Function
Our Thyroid is an organ in our body that helps regulate our metabolism. Hyperthyroidism and hypothyroidism are common conditions we hear of here. When someone is experiencing hyperthyroidism, their caloric needs are higher to keep up with the speed of calorie burn. A lot of people with this condition experience weight loss if they’re not sustaining that increased calorie need. When someone is experiencing hypothyroidism, the caloric needs are lower as the metabolism is moving slower in the body. If a sustained over consumption of calories is being consumed with this, weight gain could occur.
So, what can I do?
Lower your sugar and processed food intake
Find ways to reduce stress
Prioritize building lean muscle mass in your exercise routine
All in all, what we need to know about any of these potential factors is that there is a cascade effect involved. If you made it this far, you can tell that there are many interconnected points here! Taking that one step further in your health and fitness journey can be just what you need to see visible results on the scale that you’re looking for and make a breakthrough in your health and fitness journey!
This can be a LOT to process if you’re just getting started. If you’re feeling lost on where to start and how to navigate your weight loss journey, working with a personal trainer and nutrition coach can help you dive into these deeper details and help you see long term results. You shouldn’t have to settle for a lack of results after all your hard work! Set up a consultation today to discover what your first steps are. :)
