Many people who are overweight want to experience fast fat loss. Well, who can blame them? They are sick of being fat and blubbery and want to be lean and healthy–or, presumably healthy. How fast is fast fat loss? How fast is it supposed to be, if it is done in a healthy way? Is there any such thing as losing weight too fast? And if there is, what are the consequences to your health?
The healthy way to rapid or fast fat loss is through a change in the diet and, probably, an enhanced workout program. The way to change your diet is to start eating differently. If you are overweight, you must be eating foods that are not the best for you insofar as your weight goes. But you are likely also not getting enough physical exercise. These two conditions and bad habits typically go hand in hand, with one playing into the other in a vicious circle of staying fat and perhaps gaining more weight.
When you start eating different foods than normal, you alter your body’s metabolic rate. Foods that require more energy to digest raise the metabolic rate. Eating more calories also raises the metabolic rate–but the important point here is that eating additional calories must give you healthy calories, not the empty ones that have led you to being fat. And of course, when you start exercising more you place greater demand on your body and this in turn burns off more of your fat stores.
But, what if you decide you want to quickly lose weight by simply going without eating as much? And, what if you eat as little as possible plus add more exercise? Won’t that really get you the best results in the least amount of time? Isn’t it all just about discipline and will power?
Seeking fast fat loss in the above way is not healthy. For one thing, it really doesn’t work for most people for very long. Going on a semi-fast feels great for a few days or even a week, and you may feel light and giddy, but soon the need for nourishment of the body returns in great force. You will find yourself eating like a glutton to make up for the days when you ate little.
And as far as exercising more while eating little does help, you may as well be trying to kill yourself. Rapid weight loss through non-eating almost always leads to muscle loss. People who try rapid weight loss diets eat very little fats and proteins, and so the body begins eating itself to survive. You need plenty of muscle and fat to burn for hard exercise.
Other negative side effects of rapid weight loss include hair loss (hair needs protein to grow), dehydration (your body flushes itself out as it loses water-rich muscle), chills, loss of sex drive, and ugly loose skin (your skin cannot re-shape itself to your sudden muscle loss fast enough). You want to lose weight by trimming fat, not by losing muscle. And the way to do this is to get on a diet and exercise plan that has you losing just one to three pounds (of fat) per week. That’s authentic fast weight loss.