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Creating a Calorie Deficit
Hi all,
If you are a Sensa user you know that Sensa works by making you feel fuller faster so you consume less food. In doing so you essentially create what is known as a “calorie deficit.” Now, you may have found yourself wondering exactly what a calorie deficit is and why it is important to your weight loss journey.
Remember that a pound of fat is the equivalent of 3,500 calories. So, in order to lose a pound of fat on the scale you need to come in short roughly 3,500 calories. Over a week this would calculate out to 500 calories less a day.
There are 2 ways to accomplish this:
1) Eat Less!
Sensa allows you to feel full on less food so you’ve got this part covered! Simply sprinkle liberally on every meal and make sure that you eat slowly so that your brain can register that you are full before you demolish your entire plate. You should notice that you start eating less over time.
Now, here’s where it gets tricky. Assuming you want to lose a pound every week you would need to eat 500 calories less a day than you burn (through daily activity, the gym, just being alive etc). However, if you regularly eat far more calories than you normally burn you would need to cut even more to start losing!
Lets look at the math…
Say you need 2000 calories a day to run your body normally. You would need to cut down to 1500 on average every day to lose weight. However if you need 2000, but normally eat 2500, you would still need to cut down to 1500 to lose. If you merely shaved off 500 calories you would maintain your weight, you wouldn’t drop lbs. Additionally, if you kept eating 2500 calories on average when you only need 2000 you would notice a gradual gain in weight.
2) Move More!
Instead of shaving a full 500 calories a day you could split the difference and pick up more activity to get you to your goals. Sometimes it isn’t possible for you to cut 500 calories a day, or you might just not want to. Really, it makes sense to raise the level of daily calories your body needs to operate through exercise. If you are burning off 250 calories a day you can add that on to your daily total and eat an extra snack! That might mean you don’t have to give up your favorite Starbucks drink or Pinkberry yoghurt cup. Additionally, if you add some weights and toning exercises into the equation you will boost your metabolism which naturally raises the number of calories you burn a day. That’s a win win!
So let’s do the math again…
You still need 2000 calories a day. You cut down to 1500 to lose weight. You start incorporating exercise which burns an additional 300 calories a day. You can now raise your daily total to 1800 and still keep losing a pound a week! Doesn’t that sound manageable? You can check how many calories your body burns at various exercises when you log into the Sensa Community Forums and click on Tools and Calculators.
If you are just starting Sensa and are having trouble getting touch with your hunger/satiation signals you should also consider keeping a food journal for a few days and tracking your calories just to see where you are coming in at. Again you can use the Tools and Calculators to aid you in this project. If you find that you are eating far more than you need you probably need to really concentrate on eating slowly and stopping as soon as you START to feel full, not after you’re already stuffed. Conversely, if you are eating substantially less than your body needs to operate you are actually doing yourself a diservice. Once your body enters starvation mode (for most women this happens when you drop under 1200 calories) you will find that your body hangs onto fat to protect against what it perceives as the coming famine. Do yourself a favor and gradually increase your food intake until you get within 500 calories of your daily needs so that you can pull out of starvation mode and see results.
So in short, sprinkle Sensa, eat less, move more and see results!
Feel free to leave your tips and tricks too! We’d love to hear how you’ve hit your goals.
xoxo,
Miss T
January 30th, 2009 at 5:25 am
Thank you for the maths. Fantastic!