Can Calorie Counting Help With Weight Loss?

Seeing as though you have to build up a calorie deficit in order to lose weight, it makes sense that calorie counting would help with weight loss. To ensure you consume fewer calories than you burn, it is a good idea to know just how many calories are in the food you eat, so that you can make a few adjustments to bring that number down. Of course, you also need to know what your calorie requirements are if you are going to bring down your calorie intake enough to lose any weight. To able to lose a pound of fat, you have to build up a calorie deficit of 3,500 calories, which means reducing your calorie intake to 500 calories less than you use a day.

It is one thing to know how many calories are in your food, but to actually stick to your calorie requirements is another. The trouble is that you don't always have the time to plan what to eat and sometimes it is just too difficult to tackle your bad eating habits. It may be that you comfort eat or that you graze on snack foods all day or that you just serve too much food. At the end of the day, if you want to lose weight you have to recognise that your eating habits are going to have to change. You may be able to use your daily calorie allowance in whichever way you want, but it is probably a better idea to aim for a balanced diet than to try to live on one type of food.

This is where many people fail. The chances are that if you go on the cabbage soup diet you will lose weight, but how likely are you to be able to keep that weight off? You don't have to worry about counting calories when on such a restrictive diet, because the diet contains so few calories to begin with. However, as soon as you come off the diet you will be faced with everyday temptations, and this is when you could find yourself struggling, as you simply eat the foods you ate previously and in similar quantities. Having subsisted on so little, your body is going to want to hold on to those extra calories, so that you just end up gaining weight.

At least calorie counting can help with weight loss and weight maintenance, so you don't have to find yourself continually gaining and losing weight. You are in a better position to control your weight in the long run, as long as you know how many calories your body needs, because you can then adjust your diet accordingly. There may be days where you overdo it, eating and drinking too much, but at least you can take steps to balance it out during the week. By calorie counting, you will become familiar with which foods are highest in calories, and thus have to be eaten in smaller quantities, and which foods you can eat more of because they are lower in calories.