How to Lose Fat Quickly (or Not!)

If you’re 50+ pounds overweight and want to lose fat quickly, I’ve outlined how you can do that. As your Health & Wellness Coach, I’m giving you the protocol I use with my clients IF their goal is: 50+ pounds fat loss, reduction of medications, and regaining their health.

This allows you to make an informed decision about this course of action, including:

• The benefits and consequences of rapid fat loss,
• Methods you can use to create rapid fat loss,
• Things to keep in mind if you want to reduce the risk of experiencing some consequences I list initially.

If you have less than 50 pounds you want to lose, please pay attention to the very last bullet point starting with “We’ll also change the % we decrease your calories as you go along, too…” This is the guideline for those with less fat to lose (because this matters a lot!)

Note: to understand the content, it’s important you understand the context… I wrote this as a response to a request for rapid fat loss (i.e. any diet promoting over 5 pounds of weight loss per week). Email me or comment below, should you need any clarification with any of it. As always, thank you for your consistent and continued efforts in improving your health!

Thank you for reaching out and letting me know your goal. I understand you want to lose weight quickly, and I’m here to help you make the best decision possible for you. I’ll explain a bit of what happens when you take this approach versus a much slower approach, so you know what to expect.

I’ll give you some methods that may work and ways to lower any consequences of rapid weight loss. I’ll also give you information on how you can keep the weight off after losing it, since this is a major hurdle I’ve seen with many people. Since you want to lose 50 pounds, we have a lot of options for you, which is wonderful!

Pros/Cons of rapid weight loss vs. slower approaches:

• • Rapid weight loss pros: you’ll see results quickly, which boosts your confidence and helps you stick with this process for the long run. Since you’re looking to lose 50 pounds, this initial rapid fat loss may lead to greater total weight loss. You may find less weight adaptation later if we mix short blocks of dieting hard with a maintenance period (more on that shortly). This will also minimize the increase of cortisol, a hormone that, among many other things, increases water weight.
  • Rapid weight loss cons: you’ll have to cut calorie intake significantly. Also, for now, we don’t have to worry about this, but as you lose weight, you risk lean tissue loss—we’ll want to make sure you’re moving regularly to start a healthy exercise habit. Another consequence of rapid weight loss I see in a lot of popular diets and have learned from clients is this: there aren’t as many good eating habits created. Of course, we’ll work together during this whole phase of your journey, so you see what works and what doesn’t work for you. We can always transition some of those into long-term habits.Typically, rapid weight loss doesn’t teach you how to eat at the calories you need to maintain your weight (AKA “maintenance”), so I’ll also work with you to show you this, should you decide this is the path for you! Since hunger is a common issue people struggle with, we’ll talk about how planned breaks decrease this, so your hormones adjust accordingly (e.g. diet for 3-4 months, then take a 1-2 week maintenance break).You may also see an increase in cravings, fixation around foods with this approach, rather than a slower calorie decrease.

Methods for rapid weight loss:

1. 1. Calculate the amount of calories you need, based on your age, gender, height, weight, and your current activity level. I can give you this formula, or do the calculation for you, since it’s very specific.
   2. Decrease calories by a maximum of about 25% to lose about 1.5% of body fat per week (about 2-3 pounds per week)—this will keep you from feeling hungry all the time, which many rapid weight loss programs don’t take into account.
   3. Increase your protein levels to 2-3 grams/kilo (1 kg=2.2 pounds for those of us in the United States); this amount of lean protein will keep you from losing lean tissue, while also keeping you feeling full.
   4. Get your fat between 20-30%, and your carbs will fill in the rest of your daily calories. We want to keep a healthy level of carbohydrates, as they keep your ghrelin levels lower (hunger hormone), decreasing excess hunger.
   5. I’ll show you how to calculate a portion, since we don’t all work well with macros. That way, you’ll know the calories, macros, and portions, so you can decide on how you want to track forever.
   6. Some of the weight you lose initially will be water weight, which is perfectly normal with any quick weight loss program.
   7. I’d like you to start a food journal, because this helps us understand what’s working and where we can make minor tweaks that make the most impact.

To reduce the risk of some cons I mentioned earlier:

• • As I mentioned earlier, you may find less weight adaptation later if we mix short blocks of dieting hard with a maintenance period. A maintenance period is when you’re eating well (more whole foods, lower fat, and lean proteins), and you’re not trying to lose any weight.

When we initially calculate your daily caloric needs based on your activity level, this is a maintenance number. When we decrease that number by 25%, for instance, that’s a fat loss period.

We could do a short block of 8 weeks of fat loss of 2 weeks of maintenance, for example.

• • Make sure you’re not cutting out any food groups/macros. While we’re working together, I’ll explain the importance of eating carbs, protein, and fats. We’ll adjust the quantities you’re eating based on how you’re feeling about your weight loss journey and your exercise routine.
  • We’re going to incorporate some resistance training as we go through the process because, as you lose more body fat, we want to mitigate you losing lean tissue.
  • Once you reach your goal weight, we’ll slowly increase your calories back to the maintenance level. We can increase your calorie level to about 15% below maintenance for a week, then up to maintenance the following week… this may not be necessary, but we’ll see how you feel about it when you’re close to that point.
  • We’ll also change the % we decrease your calories as you go along, too—we can start with 25% now, but as you become leaner, we’ll lower this to about 10%–we can also lower the amount of protein you’re eating and slightly increase your carbs at that point, too. These will keep you from feeling hungry, which is because of leptin, a hormone made in fat cells, that protects us from losing too much weight (this is the first time in human evolution that many of us have lived with an excess of food, so we’re just not wired to lose weight too quickly).

I hope this information helps a bit—if you have questions, ask. Also, please let me know if you still wish to opt for a rapid fat loss plan, and we’ll put together all the calculations. Thank you again for reaching out to me with your goal and I look forward to talking to you about this further!