Lose Weight

Okay, so you are at the point that you know you are overweight. Most people have a sense of this but do you know how overweight you are?

The popular method of determining how much you need to lose is by a measurement called the body mass index (BMI). The body mass index measurement looks at your weight in comparison with your height and current age to determine how overweight you are. Keep in mind, it should be used as a guideline and should not been determined a hard and fast rule. Life insurance companies often consider the BMI as one data point to determine your health risk so one should not ignore this especially if you are considering purchasing life insurance. A BMI ranging from 18.5 to 24.9 is considered normal.

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Once you know just how overweight you are, you need to determine your weight goals. The BMI can also help here, but you also need to consider what is comfortable for you. For instance, people with more muscle mass would usually have a higher BMI.

Now that you have established your weigh goals, a handy tool for determining your daily calorie requirements is to determine you basic metabolic rate (BMR). The BMR considers you sex, weight, age and height along with your current activity level to estimate the number of calories it takes to maintain your current weight. Once you know this you should reduce your calories by around 3000 per week if you want to achieve a weekly reduction in weight of about 2 pounds. Most experts recommend gradual weight reduction as reducing caloric intake more often results in the starvation effect. The body reacts to rapid reduction in calories by actually storing more. Also aggressive caloric reduction increases your chance of period “binge eating”. The net effect is you can actually gain weight if you are too aggressive in caloric reduction.

Finally exercise plays an important role in increasing your body’s metabolism. It actually increases your body’s efficiency in burning calories. Start out with simple activities especially if your BMI is way too high. For most people a good 30 minute daily walk could work wonders.