Advice needed on boosting my initial weight loss?

Question
I am starting a new weight loss/get healthy plan. I am 6 feet tall and weigh 245 pounds. My overall goal weight is between 180 and 190 pounds.

I am doing aerobic exercise 5-6 days a week, push-ups, pull-ups, sit-ups, and lower body strength training every other day.

I am keeping my daily calorie count between 1,000 and 1,500 a day.

That said, do you have any advice on boosting my initial weight loss over the first few weeks?

Any and all advice is welcome. Thank you.

Answer
Hi Lee,

Great question!

First of all, I'm very different than most "weight loss experts" because I only teach and recommend healthy and natural weight loss practices - a healthy diet and exercise. I never recommend diet pills, fad diets, or surgery (although let's leave that up to your medical doctor to decide).

It sounds like you're doing fantastic with the exercises. You might even cut back to 3-4 days a week and still be fine, just make sure you don't injure yourself by going too hard too fast. Most people find it difficult if not impossible to go from 0 to 5-6 days/week working out and stick with it consistently.

As for your diet, I never have and never will recommend restricting calories or counting calories. As far as I've been able to tell with hundreds of customers and clients, no one has ever gained weight eating fresh fruits, vegetables and berries. These should be the stable of your diet and when you eat them raw and unprocessed you do not need to ever count calories or worry about whether you ate too much spinach.

I believe calorie restriction like you're doing, especially with the amount of exercise, is very dangerous long-term. When you exercise more, you need to eat higher quality foods that are more nutritionally dense to protect your body from the extra oxidative stress caused by exercise.

Oxidative stress is a natural process that occurs when your mitochondria in your cells burn food for fuel with oxygen. This reaction creates ATP (energy) from glucose but as a byproduct creates free radicals (oxidative radicals) which damage your cells, DNA, and other tissues and this process is sped up dramatically during intense exercise. So it's very important you eat more fresh raw fruits, veggies and berries to get enough antioxidants to protect yourself.

As for boosting initial weight loss, you will find that the quickest way to lose weight is to clean out your gut and colon. The average American has 12 lbs of feces rotting in their gut because of a poor diet that is low in fiber and harmful antibiotics from medications and in the food supply that damage the gut ecology.

Thus, the quickest (healthy!) way to lose weight is to go on a gentle cleanse to remove this excess feces (and you'll find your body will release excess water as well). However, with your intense exercise schedule I do not recommend a formal cleanse program because you will need more fuel for your exercises.

So you can load up on green leafy vegetables and maybe make a green smoothie with flax seeds or chia seeds for extra fiber. Make sure to drink lots of extra water as well! This will give you a gentle laxative effect, and furthermore the antioxidants and the healthy Omega-3 fats from the chia and flax will be great for your body too.

Anyone who promises you another way to lose weight quickly and rapidly, I would shy away from. To me, health is far more important than overnight results when it comes to weight loss. Remember, your health is FAR MORE IMPORTANT than your weight. And I'm guessing it took years to gain the weight - so it will take some time to lose it (not a whole year though if you keep with the exercise and follow the diet I recommend).

We go into much greater detail about natural weight loss dieting and nutrition tips in our newsletter with Dr. Candace Corson's Top 5 Nutrition Tips. You can get your free copy at www.AuthenticHealthCoach.com

Hope that helps!

Wishing you wellness,
Tom

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