Have You Crashed Your Metabolism?

Do you know anyone who has struggled with weight loss despite eating a very low calorie diet and performing hours of exercise? There are lots of individuals out there who seemingly can't lose weight and don't know why.

In fact, when you begin to understand the breakdown of the science behind this issue you will start seeing noticeable results in a very short space of time, starting with feeling better and eventually resulting in consistent fat loss. []

Having difficulty with fat loss is not a new issue. It's actually a very common trait in today's society and that's largely down to the obsessive nature of pop culture, with many celebrity magazines promoting the rather misleading idea of 'get fit quick' diets which claim to yield impossible results. This leads to a condition known as metabolic damage. The following two things are usually common traits displayed in those who suffer with it:

1. A drastically low calorie intake.

2. An exhausting, long cardiovascular workout plan involving many hours on treadmills and elliptical trainers.

Almost every individual who has damaged their metabolism as a result of trying to shed body fat follow at least one of the two things listed above. Let's take a deeper look into each factor so you can determine whether this issue has happened to you.

Poor eating habits are the main cause of a damaged metabolism. Going from one extreme to the other with your food is exactly what your body does not enjoy. Usually, people will find it more difficult to lose body fat when you are following a very low calorie intake because many people don't know when they have gone too far and pushed their body into survival mode. The body begins to shut down it's metabolism, to prevent you burning fat so that it can keep you alive. This issue is often found in those who follow very low calorie, restrictive diets often associated with celebrity gossip magazines.

Also, you'll usually see these individuals then following an intense workout program which involves many hours of cardiovascular exercise each week. If you are spending hours of your time in the gym each day running and cycling while following a very low calorie diet you are not helping yourself.

Your body has reacted negatively to this routine and is simply fighting to keep your bodily systems functioning. It does this by taking over and preventing you from doing any further damage to yourself.

What generally transpires after this stage is the individual gets very frustrated at their lack of results and begins mistakenly blaming their failure on their lack of effort. They quit and binge, resulting in a drastic upturn in calories that the body cannot deal with at this stage. Remember, your metabolism has effectively been shut down so hitting it with a massive intake of calories suddenly is going to result in a big gain in unwanted body fat. This is how yo-yo dieting begins.

When they do come off the rails, they tend to then go back in the opposite direction and try to exercise even longer or cut calories even further, causing even greater damage.

So how do you fix this issue?

Correcting a damaged metabolism is actually relatively easy, the main problem comes in getting somebody to recognize they have the condition in the first place. They are usually so caught up in the idea of dropping more fat that they don't want to hear the solution. Getting your metabolism back on track requires a slow, gradual increase in your daily calorie intake over the course of anything from six months to a year. Small increases of around 5% have been shown to yield the most positive results. It's simply about teaching your body how to maintain your weight despite eating more food. You can still exercise during this time, of course, but you should switch your focus away from endless cardiovascular exercise and towards high intensity interval training. It's been shown to yield far superior results as well as requiring much less time in the gym.

Fixing metabolic damage can take a while, sometimes over a year, so be patient. But if you can't lose weight no matter what you do in the gym and you recognize these symptoms from your current lifestyle then you have no reason to carry on with your existing routine. Understanding weight loss is often turned into a form of rocket science, but the facts are simple when you clear away the nonsense. If you have damaged your metabolism, your body needs to repair it before it will allow you to diet effectively.