We should focus on health, healthy lifestyle and improve functionality of our body. Unplanned dieting, extreme exercising and fasting may induce hormonal imbalance and belly fat specially in females. These can also leads to micronutrient deficiencies and disorders. There are some tiny steps which help in your weight loss journey without dieting, fasting and exercising:
1. Eat Balanced and Healthy Diet:
Balanced diet is very important for maintaining our health as well as body weight. If we eat balanced diet, it will provide us all essential nutrients and other important substances like carbohydrates, proteins, good fats, vitamins, minerals, water and dietary fibre. It will provide phytochemicals and antioxidants, which have positive effects in our body. According to ICMR, balanced diet should provide 50 – 60% of energy from carbohydrates specially complex carbohydrates, 10 – 15% energy from protein and 20 – 30% energy from visible and non visible fats. According to US Department of Health and Human Services recommendation 45 – 65% of daily calories should come from carbohydrates.
Add one or two semi cooked vegetables in every main meal like breakfast, lunch and dinner. You should include carrots, beans, capsicum, beetroots, broccoli etc in your daily diet. Your diet should consist one or two types of seasonal fruits which is very beneficial for maintaining your weight and provide and antioxidants, dietary fibre and micronutrients like vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals
A good quality protein (one source) should include in every main meal.
2. Choose Good Carbohydrates Instead of Bad Simple & Refined Carbohydrates:
Simple and refined carbohydrates like glucose, table Sugar, cake, pastry, refined flour, white bread, candy, syrups, sugary drinks, white rice, carbonated beverages etc. has Higher Glycemic Index (GI) which suddenly raise blood sugar levels after eating. They have short chain of monosaccharides (specially glucose) molecule that are easily broken down quickly in our body and cause a rapid increase in blood sugar. So they are easily digested and absorbed by the body. Use high amount of refined and simple carbohydrates can lead you to consume more foods and more calories because they do not retain longer time in your stomach and do not feel you full for longer. It can leads to make you obese.
Besides, complex carbohydrates like whole cereals, whole grains, brown bread, brown rice, whole wheat, fruits and vegetables (some fruits may contain simple sugars but they also have micronutrients like vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, fibres and phytochemicals ; so it considered as healthy). They have lower GI (Glycemic Index) because they are longer chain molecules of monosaccharides. They are digested slowly by our intestine. They do not cause sudden raise in blood sugar levels, they cause our blood sugar levels to raise and fall slowly and have high satiety value which may help you feel fuller for longer and helps in controlling our appetite and may be helpful in managing our body weight.
3. Hydrate Yourself:
Water plays an important role in maintaining our bodies function and metabolism. It detoxifying our body. Every individual should consume 35 ml of fluid per kg body weight. It can be differ according to age, physical activity and season. We should start our day with one or two glass of warm water, eases bowel movements and reduce transit time of stool and boost metabolism which help us to managing our body weight.
4. Say No to Junk Foods:
Junk foods have minimum essential nutrients and they contains a lot of fat, sugar or salt and also high in calories. It has low satiety value and we do not feel fuller for longer, so it results overeating and we can gain weight easily. So, we should first get rid junk foods like pizzas, pastries, burgers, chips, or cold drinks etc. from our diet.
5. Use Natural Sweeteners Instead of Table Sugar:
Natural sweetness like honey, dates, jaggery etc. tastes in sweet but also have nutritional value and it is a healthier option and has many other benefits on health.
On the other hand, table sugar has high Glycemic Index (GI) and do not contain any nutritional value as such and high in calories, it leads to gaining weight.
6. Use Less Salt, Do Not Use table salt (NaCl) :
If you consume excessive table salt (mainly sodium) in your diet, it causes water (fluid) retention in your body and cause short-term weight gain.
7. Stay Active, Walk When You Talk:
By being more active throughout the day in relatively simple ways to achieve the recommended activity levels. If you work in regular basis or you stay active throughout the day you can easily achieve 10,000 steps in a day.
Walking is a very good safe and effective way to lose weight. There is many benefits of walking as well. If you add strength training ( Minimum 2 to 3 times a week ) it slowly helps in retain muscle mass and flexibility in your body.
8. Take Good Quality and Quantity of sleep:
Sound regular sleep at least 7 to 8 hours helps in reduce stress level by decreasing stress hormone cortisol levels. It increases Human Growth Hormone (GH), which is essential for our bodies growth and development, regulate hunger hormone and helps in maintaining hormonal balance. As a result, it eases in weight loss.
9. Eat Mindfully:
Your brain needs 20 minutes time to register your foods. We should eat mindfully without destruction of TV, mobile or any other gadgets. Now-a-days, multitasking is a part of our life due to our busy lifestyle. Do not do other work or watching TV or mobile whenever you eat. Eat slowly, chew your food properly and stop eating in a hurry. If you eat in a hurry, it may cause overeating and as a result, you can gain weight easily.
10. Take plenty of dietary fibre rich foods:
Dietary fibre rich foods have low calorie density and greater satiety. It has low GI value, it retain in our small intestine for longer time, we fell fuller for longer, it controls our hunger or appetite, as a result we do not overeat. Moreover, it has various positive health benefits like good for diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular disease, controls total cholesterol level, beneficial in constipation, prevents colon cancer and also aids in weight loss. Green leafy vegetables, whole fruits, other vegetables (except roots and tubers), whole wheat, whole cereals like oats, jowar (sorghum), bajra, ragi and pulses, some seeds like flex seeds, chia seeds have high amounts of fibre which we should include in our diet. Dietary fibre rich foods promote fat oxidation.
Higher intake of fibre automatically reduce fat and calorie intake. British Nutrition Foundation (1990) has established the effectiveness of dietary fibre intake in achiving significant reduction in body weight without any side effects. Medical treatment of obesity is considered more expensive and torturous than taking high fibre diet. By slower rate of digestion and absorption in the small intestine, nutrient receptors in the gastrointestinal tract are stimulated for a longer period of time resulting in prolonged feedback (through signals such as cholecystokinin and glucagon like peptide) to the satiety centre of brain.
11. Intermittent fasting:
Now-a-days intermittent fasting is one of the most popular trends to weight loss. It is an eating pattern where people consume food for a certain hours of everyday, called as eating window. People limit their food consumption to certain hours of the day called fasting window.
Beginners can start with 12:12 window, that means they consume food for 12 hours and they restrict their food consumption for 12 hours. Then gradually they should increase their fasting window to 13:11, then 14:10. 16:8 Window is the standard window, but not suggested for beginners. We can not change our system within a day or in a short period of time. We should gradually change our habits, so that our body do not go into shock. In 16:8 Window people consume foods for 8 hours and fasting window remains 16 hours.
Some benefits of Intermittent fasting :
- boost metabolism for fat loss
- helps insulin level drop and Human Growth hormone increases
- reduce risk of cardiovascular disease
