By fitlifemonthly 
If you’re thinking about losing weight, counting calories and eating less might seem like the way to go. However, Terry Fairclough, a leading personal trainer and co-founder of Your Body Programme, believes it’s not that straightforward.
As a personal trainer, I hear a wide range of opinions and questions about the best diet for weight loss. Should we count calories? How many should we eat? Should we focus on low fat, low carb, or high protein diets? What about fasting or eating small, regular meals three times a day? While all these methods might have their place depending on your body type, goals, and activity levels, one thing you shouldn’t do is under-eat.
Many people think drastically cutting calories to get ready for a beach body is effective, but while you might lose weight, it’s not usually fat loss, which is what most people aim for. The typical Western diet involves consuming more calories than necessary, leading some to think that under-eating is the answer to weight loss. This isn’t correct.
When we eat, our bodies break down carbohydrates into glucose, which fuels our cells. If we don’t use this glucose immediately, it’s stored in our muscles and liver as glycogen, which consists of glucose molecules and water. When we cut calories, what we’re losing is often this stored carbohydrate and water, not fat.
Continuously restricting calories can actually cause the body to store fat and break down muscle protein instead. Regular protein consumption helps burn more fat by maintaining muscle mass, even when at rest. Therefore, it’s crucial to eat a balanced diet that includes adequate fats, carbohydrates, and proteins.
Contrary to popular belief, fat is an essential and long-lasting energy source, providing more than twice the energy per gram as carbohydrates or protein. Our muscles even store fat for use during exercise. Completely cutting out fat can leave you without the energy needed to burn the fat you hope to lose.
Severe calorie restrictions can also lead to nutrient deficiencies, weakening your immune, liver, and digestive systems, potentially slowing down your metabolism. Other health issues from under-eating include fatigue, malnutrition, osteoporosis, anemia, and hormone-related conditions. Additionally, chronic stress from extreme diets can trigger cortisol release, which may slow down your metabolism and cause more fat to be stored, particularly around your belly.
Overall, under-eating hampers your ability to properly digest and absorb essential nutrients, negatively impacting your health and weight loss efforts. Poor sleep due to low blood sugar can further disrupt your metabolism and overall health.
Bodybuilders might restrict calories to get lean but often fall ill if they don’t transition back to a higher-calorie diet correctly. Continual calorie cutting can lead to a point where the body starts breaking down, making weight loss nearly impossible as the body enters famine mode, saving every calorie as fat.
Ultimately, you need to eat the right number of calories and get a proper balance of macronutrients tailored to your body type, goals, and lifestyle. The Your Body Programme (YBP) helps individuals determine their specific calorie needs.
Eating a balanced diet with plenty of lean proteins, healthy carbohydrates, and fats is key. This includes foods like lean beef, chicken, eggs, fish, tofu, legumes, fruits, vegetables, sweet potatoes, brown rice, and healthy fats from avocados, nuts, seeds, and olive oil.
Terry Fairclough, one of the founders of Your Body Programme, is committed to helping people achieve their health goals without extreme calorie restriction.