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Dieting: My Food Intake is Minimal So Why Can't I Lose Weight?

Diet Article: When too little food equals too little weight loss.

Dieter Lily was struggling to lose those unhealthy, unwanted pounds but they appeared to be adhered to her body like some sort of super adhesive.

She had cut out all of her favorite foods in her daily diet; in fact - she wasn't eating hardly anything. A stick of celery here, some baby carrots there - some shredded cabbage there and a cucumber now and then along with an occasional olive studded with a red pimento.

But when she begrudgingly stepped onto her bathroom scales - nada. Absolutely no sign of weight loss. At first she'd considered that the brand new pair of bath scales were defective; so she'd returned them and traded them out.

Once home, they registered the same crummy numbers, so it was back to the store. This time she got her money back and purchased another brand which was a bit more expensive. But she figured that those cheaper set of bath scales delivered cheap results.

Once home, she unpackaged her new scales, hopped on board and screamed. The numbers on the more expensive scales mirrored those on the cheap bath scales. What - oh what was she doing wrong?

Could be that she has thrown her body into the vortex of 'Starvation Mode' and her body's metabolism has found a way to ingeniously utilize those few calories that she is consuming. After all, Lily has no effective means of getting in touch with Miss Metabolism and sitting down to have a one-on-one chat. She has no way of telling her, "Just burn the fat, baby".

But, Miss Metabolism is just doing her job; she believes that Lily is in trouble because the energy sources have all but stopped. What if there is no food sources to harvest? What if the crops didn't make it this season? And if Miss Metabolism doesn't conserve all of the precious energy sources, then it's curtains for Lily. After all, the metabolism is a rather basic and crude element. Unlike the advancement of humanity and the modern age of technology, the metabolism is still stuck in the middle ages - at the beginning of time, actually. And it will never advanced. It was created based on the foods that were available to the first cavemen and cavewomen that walked the earth. Food was first found in the areas populated by cavepeople - and then when they learned that the seeds could grow new food, their harvest increased.

As to Lily's metabolism - she, like all of us, have the cavewoman or caveman metabolism and we always will. While it wisely distributes and utilizes our energy - it will never know that we're purposely restricting calories. In fact, the body was built to take in as much precious energy as could be fed, the excess being stored in the cells as fat. It's the process that adds plump to our bellies, girth to our shoulders and curves to our hips. Sometimes those curves are so sharp that the eyeballs fall off the stems - and sometimes they are so rounded that they sorta slide down into our shoes. But whatever size they might be, it's due to the amount of energy we insert into our body.

If Lily's stuck-in-neutral situation sounds familiar, try to increase your intake of calories - especially if you have slid under the '1,200 calories per day' mark. You may experience a weight gain for a couple of days, but it should rapidly decrease once your body's metabolism levels off and kicks into high gear again. It will be much happier - knowing that the energy supplies aren't due to a scarce harvest.

Other Causes for Stalled Weight Loss

On the other hand, if you are experiencing a stall in weight loss - and if you are eating healthy daily meal plates three times per day, you may have reached the ideal weight for your body size. Check the weight charts at Diet Bites and if you see that you are in the acceptable range, odds are - that is exactly what has happened.

However, meet with your family doctor or dietitian if your calorie intake is below 1,200 calories. You may need assistance with hidden medical problems, such as thyroid or hormonal imbalances which can trigger weight gain, even when caloric values are lower than required energy per current weight.

One last key could be in the actual number of calories that you are consuming each day. Take time to add up your calories - not only for 1 day, but for several days in a row. It's so easy to incorrectly estimate our total caloric values as foods contain an inconsistent amount of caloric values - even when they are the same food. Not all apples are created exactly alike; one may contain 70 calories or even less while another contains over 150.

You could be eating more than you realize as most people underestimate the number of calories they consume each day up to 30%. That's about 1/3 the calories for all of the daily meals.

Another reason for stalled weight loss is the notorious weight loss plateau.

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