4 mistakes halting you from your weight loss goals

Losing weight can be a daunting task. You may try increasing your workouts and different diets but sometimes your lack of weight loss could be due to hang ups that you are not even aware of. Have a look at a few things that may be holding you back:

Your love for carbs: As much as carbs provide energy, you need to stay active. Eating too much can lead to weight gain because your body somehow stores any extra energy as fat. Also, when you snack or eat meals comprising only carbs, your body quickly converts such carbs into simple sugars then sends such sugar off into your blood stream.

This spikes your blood sugar and a sugar rush hits you leaving you with low blood sugar as you gnaw in hunger pain. You will need to practise portion control with carb-heavy foods to avoid exceeding your required caloric requirement for the day. Try to avoid snacks and meals like bread, pasta, crackers, cakes and dry cereals. Opt for healthy sources of carbs like legumes, whole grains, veggies and fruits.

You don't sleep enough: There are two hormones that usually affect your hunger. These are leptin and ghrelin. Ghrelin is the “hunger hormone”. It signals when nourishment is needed. Leptin on the other hand signals your body that you are full. When you hardly sleep well, you are more likely to cause hormonal imbalance therefore distracting production of the named hormones, creating the feeling of hunger even when you are not really hungry.

 And with that, you will find yourself snacking or eating even when you are not supposed to which will eventually lead to weight gain. This is one of the reasons you need to have at least eight hours of uninterrupted sleep every night.

You don't hydrate enough: We hardly drink enough water and instead opt for drinks such as juice, soft drinks and beverages. Instead of such drinks quenching thirst, they actually fill us up with sugar. Such excess sugar in the body will be stored as fat leading to weight gain. Drinking water now and then will not only flush toxins out of the body, it will also speed up your metabolism and reduce the risk of getting headaches.

You consume processed foods: Such foods contain extra high quantities of sugar and unhealthy fats. Meals such as canned food, chips, pizzas, burgers, biscuits, cakes and mandazis are easy to over eat and can contribute to weight gain. If you seriously want to shed some weight, these are the kind of food that need to go first and you will start seeing results without strenuous exercise or dieting.