Today is “Fat Monday”. Apparently, according to as yet unconfirmed reports, today is the day that women feel fattest. It is also about now that most people start to give up on their new year weight loss plans. A dark time indeed for everyone.
Why is today Fat Monday? Well, now is the time that many people who ate excessive amounts of food over the Christmas period are just starting to think about their weight again. You may have noticed in the last few days that the travel agents are full again, and people are starting to book summer holidays. This is suddenly reminding many people of their plans to lose weight, and this is making people feel overweight.
In addition to this, studies have also suggested that most people that start a weight loss plan in the new year give up by the 6th week. This often results in regret after they realise that they are not going to be using their expensive gym memberships much more, although to be honest, most people live in denial and spend all year trying to convince themselves that the will go back to the gym and do some exercise.
So, how to combat the fat on Fat Monday?
Simple. Renew those diet plans, start exercising. General rules to losing weight are:
- Restrict calories to around 1500 a day.
- Eat protein for breakfast
- Eat soup for lunch
- Eat protein with dinner – fish, chicken, meat etc.
- Drink only water, tea or coffee. No soft drinks, no alcohol (or just a little…)
- Exercise 4-5 times a week.
Exercise is very important, as is protein. Without protein your muscles will start to burn up and reduce in size as protein is essential to body function, and if a diet is too restrictive you do not get enough dietary protein.
Exercise works on 4 levels:
- When exercising you burn fat
- After exercising, you continue to burn fat – raised metabolism
- Exercising builds more muscle, which raises metabolism
- Exercise gets you fitters, which means you can exercise even harder next time, and burn even more fat
To not exercise is to make weight loss very difficult, especially healthy weight loss. Starving yourself is always a very, very bad idea. Doing some cardio, some resistance training and eating a lean and healthy diet is really the only safe way to lose weight. Don’t let Fat Monday get you down, unless you plan to drop and do 20 push ups! Or just start with our very own Monday Workout and continue from there.