Weight loss plateau while on diet and exercise program.

Question
My husband and I are both 60 yr old, overweight, physically active and we don't look like we weigh as much as we do!  My husband had a heart attack which was a real wake up call for my entire family.  I have high blood pressure.  About a month ago we went on a low fat, heart healthy diet.  My husband owns a construction company so he gets physical activity each day and is usually too tired to do "exercise" when he gets home but on weekends we try to walk and he does some weight lifting.  I do 60 minutes of strength exercise every other day and ride a stationery bike on the "other" days for 30 minutes.  We have not cheated on our diets AT ALL.  

During this month my husband has consistently lost 2 to 2 1/2 lbs a week for a total of 11 lbs.  I have lost 1 lb,, gained 1/2 lb, back and forth at the end of the month I'm up .2 lb.

What can I do?  Obviously I'm very discouraged.  The only reason I'm continuing, at this point, is because I want my husband to continue his weight loss - but I want to lose too!  At the beginning of the diet he was 254 lbs, 6' tall and I was 194 and 5/6".

Thank you - Diana

Answer
Diana,

Unfortunately, it's no more agreed upon in medical community that low fat diet is healthy for the heart: usually, it's too many carb grams in it and too little of essential fats. The very long-term, large cohort nurses study showed that this type of diet provide no benefits to heart health.

Also, one important type of exercise can be missing in your routine: interval training. Your strength exercises might not contain short periods of very high intensity bursts.

What I am talking abut might be not true for everyone, but your weight loss plateau maybe signals you about it.

I suggest that you read about a different approach at http://bantadiet.com and then ask me further targeted questions.

Tanya Zilberter

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