If you don’t have the perfect body, you’ve likely tried to lose weight. However, this is often easier said than done. There are plenty of fad diets out there, most of which aren’t good for you and don’t produce long-lasting results. Struggling to lose weight is disheartening, especially when you change your diet and incorporate exercise.
Dr. Kimberley Shine and her team at Shine Health and Wellness help you finally achieve your weight loss goals through interpreting your body composition. If you’re having a hard time getting rid of excess weight, Dr. Shine provides expert guidance and a composition report to get you started on the path to success.
What’s an ideal weight?
A lot goes into determining your ideal weight. Typically, one of the ways to figure out if you need to lose weight is through your BMI, or body mass index. This is a calculation of your height and weight to determine your body fat percentage.
A high BMI can indicate a large amount of body fat, which isn’t good for your health. Too much body fat leads to problems like type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and other chronic health problems.
However, BMI isn’t the only way to determine your overall health. In fact, it’s sometimes flawed, as it doesn’t take into account your physical activity or muscle mass when determining your BMI number. Muscle typically weighs more than fat, meaning your BMI could be high, even if you have a low percentage of body fat.
Your ideal weight has to do with much more than your BMI. You have to take into account how you feel, your normal physical activity, among other factors to determine if you should shed a few pounds.
Reasons you’re struggling to drop weight
If you’re determined to lose some weight, the usual first steps are to change your eating habits and start exercising. However, this doesn’t always work for everyone. Your body’s metabolism is complex, and it gets harder to lose weight as you get older.
Though there are many reasons that you aren’t losing weight like you’d hoped, three of the most common reasons are:
1. You aren’t incorporating weights
Though all exercise is important, weight training and resistance training are vital for weight loss. This is partially because muscle burns a significant amount of calories, much more so than fat.
Lean muscle mass also helps prevent your metabolism from slowing down. Keeping your metabolism high helps you burn the calories that lead to weight loss.
2. You’re eating too much
You can’t lose weight efficiently if you’re simply eating too many calories in a day. It isn’t easy to estimate your caloric intake; in fact, you’re likely underestimating how much you’re eating by quite a bit.
The best way to overcome this obstacle is through counting calories and weighing or measuring your food. This gives you an accurate depiction of how much you’re eating throughout the day. This helps you cut calories efficiently to finally lose some weight.
3. Your gut health isn’t the best
The bacteria in your gut plays a huge role in your ability to lose weight. All the food you eat passes through your stomach and intestines and affects the overall health of your gut. When you don’t have enough good bacteria, it results in poor gut health, which impedes weight loss.
The best thing you can do is start taking a probiotic or prebiotic. These contain millions of good bacteria to strengthen the health of your gut. The healthier your digestive system is, the better off you’ll be when you try to lose weight.
Benefits of a body composition report
If you’re struggling to lose weight, you aren’t alone. Dr. Shine and her team are experts in helping you achieve the weight loss you desire. One of the ways she does this is through a body composition report.
Body composition is a way to determine how much of your body is made up of fat, muscle, water, and other substances. This helps guide you to how much weight you should lose based on your specific body composition. This test has many benefits, some of which include:
- Obtaining your baseline
- Giving you an accurate body fat percentage
- Determining your specific caloric needs
- Helping you make a customized fitness plan
- Self-monitoring your progress accurately
- Helping you make realistic goals for weight loss
Your body composition report helps both you and Dr. Shine make a customized plan to allow you to improve your body composition. This includes nutrition counseling, personalized exercise routines, and progress checks during your journey.
If you’re in need of a sure-fire way to lose weight, don’t hesitate to call our office today, or book an appointment online with our expert team today.
