Birthdays, sugar highs and metabolism

So I turned one year older yesterday. I don't know that I would call this particular birthday a "milestone", as I hit 34.

But, as I lay in bed trying to get to sleep last night, awake due to my sugar high from TWO pieces of cake (Yes, I know!), I realized that it's time to take it up a notch! I was officially "not getting any younger", and I haven't done everything I can to make this healthiness happen.

A co-worker used a term a couple of weeks ago that has stuck with me since. The term was "stupid weight". So what is "stupid weight", you may ask? That is the weight that you can lose just by cutting back on the bad things you have been eating. It's that initial weight that everyone loses when they choose to lose weight, just by cutting out the tacos, pizza and fried chicken.

So why is this? Simply put, it's the balance between the calories you consume and your metabolism. A great place to start is your basal metabolic rate. This is the rate that your body burns calories when your not active. There is a conversion that you can do yourself to get an idea of your BMR (This is just an estimate). Simply multiply your weight by 9.5 for men, 8.5 for women (You can use a search engine to search for Basal Metabolic Rate Calculator online to get a more accurate estimate). In my case, that would be approximately 2300 calories that I can burn in one day when i'm not active. If I eat absolutely nothing and do absolutely nothing all day (like I did a few weeks back when I had the flu) my body will burn approximately 2300 calories throughout the day, and I will lose weight quickly. But if I eat 2300 calories in a day, and my BMR is at 2300, I will not gain or lose any weight. Anything over 2300 calories will cause me to gain weight.

About 500 calories less per day will cause me to lose about a pound a week. There are two ways to cut calories. The first is to simply take in as many calories as you were. The second is to supplement your calorie burning with exercise. If you can burn an extra 150 to 200 calories a day, that means you can eat an extra 300 calories or so and still lose weight. But the even better news is that it will actually speed up your metabolic rate, causing you to burn more calories (Remember, muscle requires more calories than fat to operate, and exercise builds muscle). This is why a combo of exercise and fewer calories will work so much better than just diet.

So, the bottom line from this little lesson is the same thing I think we've known all along. In order to get healthy, we must eat fewer calories and exercise regularly. So my next step is to try to find a way to get more active!