DOES COUNTING CALORIES REALLY WORK?

Calories in calories out, we all have heard before correct?

In the last few years, many people are claiming that calorie deficit is not the only way to lose weight, so let’s go deeper to understand what it all means.

What Are Calories?

Calories are a  measure of energy. it’s defined as the amount of energy required to raise the temperature of 1 kilogram of water by 1 degree Celsius.
In order for our body to sustain itself, we need to consume a certain amount of calories to support our system
In order to know the exact amount of calories you need you will need to calculate by a number of different factors, including your gender, age, weight and activity levels.
Any excess calories you eat will be stored as fat, and consistently eating more than you burn will cause weight gain over time.
Consuming fewer calories than what your body needs is the only way of the body getting rid of fat, which means in order to lose weight you need to be on a calorie deficit
A caloric deficit is any shortage in the number of calories consumed relative to the number of calories required for maintenance of current body weight.
So Counting calories will always lead to weight loss, of course as long that you are counting correctly.
Calories counting has pros and cons.

Pros:
Will help you lose weight and have a better understanding of portions.
You can track your calories easily with many apps that can monitor your daily consumption
You can have a more flexible diet and can choose the source of calories.

Cons:
1. Counting calories can be tedious and very time consuming
2. Counting calories will help lose weight but it won’t necessarily  means that you will choose the best and healthiest options.
3. You don’t always have the best estimation of the quantities and portions
4. Your body will go through adaptation and you might need to change the number of calories in order to continue losing weight.

Bottom line – you can continue losing weight as long that you are on a calorie deficit, the hard part is always keeping track, counting and figuring out what is the ideal number of calories your body needs in order to continue losing weight.

In my personal opinion, calories do matter, but I personally don’t count  calories and believe that the ideal combination, is to choose healthy, real whole foods, in the right portions and quantities , but whats really matters is to choose a way of life that you can see yourself following for years, with foods that you love and a real understanding of what a healthy lifestyle means.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *