How to get through fat loss plateaus
Plateaus are totally normal, and should be expected if you’re on a weight or fat loss journey. (Unfortunately, progress in that department is almost never linear.)
The good news: while it often takes a little trial and error to keep progress going, there are several strategies you can try to fight through these plateaus! Here are a few of our favorites:
Increase exercise frequency or intensity.
Your metabolic rate slows as you lose weight, and also as your body adjusts and gets more efficient at performing your exercises. So try mixing things up a little, or push yourself to use a heavier weight!
Track everything you eat, if you’re not already.
Every BLT (bite, lick, or taste) adds up! If you’re not already, make sure you are accurately logging your food and accounting for everything.
Manage stress.
Stress can trigger comfort eating, food cravings, and also increases your body’s production of cortisol. While you likely cannot eliminate your stress entirely, learning to manage it better can help. Practices like yoga, meditation, breathwork, journaling, warm baths, and others can help lower stress and improve mood.
Increase fiber.
Fiber slows the movement of food through your digestive tract, which decreases appetite and can help in reducing the number of calories you consume and the number of calories your body absorbs from food. The typical recommendation is 18-36 grams a day.
Avoid alcohol.
Alcohol has essentially no nutritional value, and has been shown to suppress fat burning, promote belly fat accumulation, and loosen inhibitions that may lead you to overeat or make rash food choices.
Increase and/or improve sleep.
Sleep is extremely important for healthy mental, emotional, and physical health. Insufficient sleep can reduce your metabolic rate and shift your hormone levels to promote hunger and fat storage. Aim for 7-9 hours of quality sleep each night.
Increase daily activity.
Although formal exercise is important, many other factors go into how many calories you burn each day. Fidgeting, changing posture, walking, standing, stretching… all of these contribute to “NEAT” or non-exercise activity thermogenesis. Find small ways to move more each day!
Take measurements.
Sometimes the scale stops moving because we are changing our body composition. Muscle weighs more than fat, so if you are building muscle as you are losing fat, the scale could stay stagnant for a bit. Use measurements (and/or photos) for a better gauge of progress.
Take a break!
This might not be everyone’s favorite idea, but it can be a game changer for long-term progress, which is what we want to stay focused on! It’s not helpful to be in a calorie deficit forever - sometimes we need to increase our calories slowly to get back up to maintenance level, maintain there for a few weeks to reset our metabolism, and then start cutting calories again to get a response.
Fat loss is a complex journey that takes some time and usually some adjustment as you go. If you keep some variables the same and change only one or two things at a time, it is easier to see what works for you and what doesn’t. If you are constantly going from diet to diet and changing the whole experiment every time, you could be missing that “sweet spot” where fat loss happens.
Whatever you do - don’t give up! YOU are worth fighting for and worth the time and investment it takes to learn your body and how to fuel it best and keep it healthy. Slow progress is still progress. One day you will look back and be so glad that you stuck with it and took control of your health.
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