Weight Gain That Begins During Teen Years
Written by Sky Taylor, Diet Bites
Why Teens Gain Weight
Peer pressure, parental pressure, uncertainties about the future - that's a lot to deal with! Then we've got those 'adult' issues that creep in, such as bumps popping up on the face for both boys and girls, with romantic interest hopping on board, sweat glands exploding and so forth.
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Keeping these issues in mind, the next step is to take a look at your diet and activity level.
Foods Associated With Teen Weight Gain
Some of the common favorite foods among teens are: pizza, soft drinks, burgers, fries, chips, snack cakes and tacos. Unfortunately, all of these goodies are packed with significant calories - and most of these goodies are packed with fat. The unhealthy types of fat - saturated and Trans fat.
Slimming down doesn't necessarily mean that you'll need to ditch all your favorite goodies - although making food choices that are lower in fat and calories will certainly get the body subtracting pounds at a faster rate than not.
Here are a few tips that we can assist.
Trimming Calories From Food Favorites
Tips to Cut Hamburger Calories - cut the cheese, double meat and Mayo in your burger; opt for mustard and ketchup. Also order the smaller burger when dining away from home. Request that lettuce, onion and tomato be added to the burger. That smaller hamburger bun can also save you calories.
One small burger contains about 300 calories at most fast food restaurants.
Pizza Tips for Teens
Tips to Cut Pizza Calories - Deep dish pizza contains more calories than thin crust pizza. Opt for veggie toppings over meat toppings. And if the pizza has a lot of visible oil sitting on top of it, take a paper towel and carefully dab away what you can. At 120 calories per Tablespoon, oil adds up quickly.
One slice of a thin crust pizza with cheese and pepperoni contains about 220 calories.
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Tips for Fries, Chips & Snacks
Tips to Cut Fries, Chips, Snack Cake Calories - Opt for baked chips; limit fries and order small rather than supersizing. If you're dining at home keep pretzels on hand as they are less fatty than potato chips.
Those packages of fast food fries will cost about 250 calories at most fast food restaurants for the small order. Onion rings contain about 50 calories each - if they are large rings. Smaller rings weigh in at about 40 calories.
Potato chips contain about 10 to 15 calories a piece. If you're dining at a fine restaurant and giant tortilla chips are resting in a basket on the table alongside of salsa, those chips will contain 20 to 25 calories each. Try loading your chip with as much of the Mexican salsa as possible; eat less chips - more salsa.
Soda Tips for Teens
Tips to Cut Soda & Soft Drink Calories - Make water the star of your Beverage Day. Allow a couple of beverage treats and if you make at least one of those diet, you're doing very well.
Check out the reduced sugar juices such as the TROP50 by Tropicana. They contain a skinny 50 calories per eight ounces and they taste quite delicious. You most likely won't even miss the sugar content.
Activity & Relieving Stress
From hiking to playing tennis, activity will help shape, tone and trim your body.
Stress & Peer Pressure - Try not to let peer pressure sap your day. Set your own pace; compare yourself to no one because you are unique.
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