These skinny jeans fit just last week… Did I accidentally put them in the dryer too long?
That’s the question running through your mind while you struggle to button them as you’re getting ready for Friday night out with your girlfriends.
Trust me, I know how frustrating not getting the weight loss results you want – or worse, rebounding with that weight – especially when you’ve been focused and gone or continue to go that extra mile to get results.
My Go-to Plans for Fast, Lasting Fat Loss
For nearly everyone, the Virgin Diet and Sugar Impact Diet work amazingly well for fast, lasting fat loss.
On the Virgin Diet, you drop the top 7 highly reactive foods for 21 days. These are the foods that make you feel tired, unfocused, and moody, but they’re also the hidden cause of weight gain and weight loss resistance. They sabotage your fat loss success and send your metabolism into a tailspin.
After the Virgin Diet came out, I learned that sugar in all its sneaky disguises often trips up even the most health-savvy person. That’s why I created the Sugar Impact Diet. If you had success with the Virgin Diet but you’re still looking to lose those last stubborn pounds, the Sugar Impact Diet is your answer.
The Sugar Impact Diet tapers you off high-sugar impact foods and transitions you to a diet filled with low-sugar impact foods. Doing that pulls you out of the sugar-burning, fat-storing cycle and transitions you to being a fat burner, which is exactly what you want to be to lose weight fast and keep it off.
Still Stuck? Here are 5 Reasons That May Be Happening
Most of my readers find that when they drop the top 7 highly reactive foods in the Virgin Diet for 21 days, they lose up to 10 pounds (maybe even more!), and look 10 years younger.
For many others, the Sugar Impact Diet was that powerful needle mover to ditch those last stubborn pounds.
Even so, a few people hit roadblocks along the way on both plans. Their fat loss stalled, or worse, they started gaining weight they worked so hard to lose.
When I looked closely at their food journals and their daily habits, I discovered some things they considered “healthy” were getting in the way of their success. These 5 frequent offenders stood out.
1. You’re not sleeping well. Our do-more society rewards working late hours to meet deadlines. (More often, I find Netflix binges contribute to bad sleep habits!) In the bigger picture, subpar sleep will cost you productivity. It can also sabotage fast fat loss, drown your energy levels, dial up your stress levels, and leave you hungry and craving the following morning.
The solution: Aim for at least 7 (and preferably more like 9) hours of solid, uninterrupted sleep every night. If that’s not regularly happening, you’re not going to be happy with your scales or skinny jeans. If sleep becomes a struggle, Sleep Candy™ is my secret weapon for falling and staying asleep. In this podcast, I’ll share more about how to make great sleep consistently happen.
2. You’re drinking too much water at meals. Staying hydrated is critical for glowing skin, fighting off infections, boosting memory, crushing fatigue, and curbing your hunger. Too much water during your meals, however, can dilute stomach acid and impair digestion.
The solution: Drink up, but limit your water intake during meals. Curb your water intake about 30 minutes before meals. (Find out how much water you should be drinking here.) Speaking of meals, stress and age can lower your body’s production of digestive enzymes, which are critical to breaking down food to get the nutrient support your body needs for weight loss. Taking Protein First Enzymes before meals provides the digestive enzyme support you need to get the scales moving again.
3. You’re skipping breakfast. I’m not talking about intermittent fasting here. If you’re fasting, you’re mindfully choosing to forego breakfast. Nope, I’m talking about people who aren’t hungry in the morning, so they order a high-sugar impact latte with skim milk and then passively snack at the office. That’s a surefire formula to spike and crash your blood sugar, meaning that you’ll be hungry and craving late morning.
The solution: Breakfast sets your day’s metabolic tone, gives you steady sustained energy, and promotes fast fat loss. A protein shake makes the perfect way to start your day out right for fat loss success. (Learn how to make the perfect shake here.) By the way, you can do intermittent fasting and still have breakfast! Simply push breakfast forward to, say, 9 or 10 a.m.
4. You’re snacking throughout the day. The graze-all-day approach to eating is a surefire way to stall fat loss. Every time you eat, you raise insulin, which stores fat.
The solution: If you can’t go more than a few hours without eating, you’re probably a sugar burner rather than a fat burner. (Not sure? Find out here.) Ideally, you’ll be able to go 4 to 6 hours without grazing. If you need a snack (hey, it happens!), eat one that stabilizes your blood sugar levels, like my super-yum Fiber Bars.
5. You’re not exercising correctly. Spending an hour on the treadmill or spin class, but not getting the results you want? With exercise, more does not equal better. While some experts debate whether high-intensity interval training (HIIT) is superior to longer-duration medium-intensity exercise for weight loss, HIIT has a clear time-efficient advantage.
The solution: If you’re not getting the weight loss results you want, skip the time-killing elliptical machines and aerobics classes for burst training, which significantly boosts growth hormone to make you a better fat burner. Learn more about burst training in this podcast.
For many people, addressing these 5 habits becomes the needle mover for fast, lasting fat loss.
If you’re incorporating these strategies and not getting the results you want, you may need to dig deeper. I encourage you to work with a Functional Practitioner, who can uncover hormonal imbalances and other health saboteurs that may be hijacking your success.
