Dieting these days can be crazy, especially when it comes to trying to choose which route to go towards. Having everything from detox diets, Twinkie diets, carnivore diets, water diets, stand on your left foot all day diets, etc… Nowadays we as individuals have so many options to choose from that how do you know what route to go. To keep it simple the concept of weight loss is calories in versus calories out. If you burn more calories consistently on a daily basis than what you are consuming you will lose weight. So in reality it doesn't seem that hard, right? Well if you have kids, stress, job, or pretty much a life in general, it can get difficult. In my opinion, understanding what you are eating and having a simple plan that accommodates you and your life is the best way to help living a healthier life.
What is a Macronutrient? Why is it important? What do I do with it? Macronutrients are environmental substances used for energy, growth, and bodily functions by organisms. So essentially what keeps us going on a daily basis, depending on the nutrient so are needed in larger or smaller amounts. Today I’m just going to speak on the three main ones.
Protein
Carbohydrates
Fat
Depending on what you are trying to accomplish this can get difficult depending on how many of each one you need to consume on a daily basis. This answer goes back to what I said earlier about making sure it fits your lifestyle, not Timmy or Janes’. The reason why I harp on this is because we all have different bodies and different atmospheric impacts.
Macronutrients are important; they are guided points to help us get to our goals. When figuring out how much you need of each, the simplest way is to make sure you have a realistic goal that you are wanting to accomplish. Then figuring out your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate), which is what your body burns on a daily basis if you were to lay in bed all day. I’m providing a link that will route you to a BMR calculator so you don’t have to calculate the math yourself. Once you figure that out, the next step is to figure out your TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure), which is what you burn on a daily basis, with activity (visit here for a TDEE calculator). Before going any further, I wanted to state a few things: realize these formulas aren't taking into consideration if your body is functioning properly. They do not calculate stress levels, hormones, gut imbalances, etc. I like to use the analogy that your body is like a used car, so there is some natural wear and tear. It might pull to the left a little, but could look normal on the outside. It's not brand new, and the warranties have expired. Realize we all have our opinions on what “Healthy” means to us. Having a balanced diet that can be easily adapted to your lifestyle and goals should be the focus.
Now that you have established how many calories you burn a day, we can set up the three major macronutrients. Protein, carbohydrates, and fats. Remember your macronutrient ratio does not directly influence weight loss, gain, etc. The acceptable macronutrient distribution ranges (AMDR) are 45–65% of your daily calories from carbs, 20–35% from fats and 10–35% from protein. For example if you burn 2,000 kcal a day, to maintain your current weight, your daily macro breakdown could look like this: carbs: 200g (40%), protein: 150g (30%), fats: 66.6g (30%). To lose weight you have two basic options: either increase daily activity to burn more calories, or decrease your caloric intake while maintaining your current activity level. To get the macronutrient breakdown from calories to grams, the conversion is 1 gram of protein or carbohydrate equals 4 calories and 1 gram of fat equals 9 calories. There are numerous ways you can manipulate your macronutrients when trying to achieve what you want.
One of the best tools you can use is a meal tracker. Meal trackers helps counting macros and staying accountable to you goals. At True Results all of our clients get access to our Meal Tracking via the True Results App. In our app you can manage meal tracking via food library, barcode scanning and custom macro counting. Take pictures of your meals to build an album of your history and learn what works and what didn't work. Not a member? Try our two week trial or contact us to get started!
"Overall being consistent will trump anything."
The reason I say this is because while being consistent you will start to learn things about your body. How you tolerate a certain amount of fats at a given time, or if you are intolerant to a specific type of food. Realize we are all genetically different. What could work for someone else, could either work or not work for you. Also what worked for you in the past, doesn’t necessarily mean it will always work, because our bodies change over time in many ways.
Comments