Will I Gain Weight If I Stop Eating?
Can You Gain Weight If You Don't Eat Enough? 3 Experts Explain "Starvation Mode"
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If you think you're experiencing a weight loss plateau from starvation mode, there are a few ways to break out of it. Technically, Dr. Lofton told POPSUGAR, you could try to cut even more calories from your diet. That might result in weight loss, but she noted that it's not sustainable. "The problem with lowering your calorie intake further is that that's when the hormonal mechanisms to make you more hungry kick in. It becomes very hard to sustain that lower calorie intake," Dr. Lofton explained.
The other option is to take steps to boost your metabolism. Try eating more protein, drinking lots of water, moving more throughout the day, and increasing your muscle mass by doing resistance training, Dr. Lofton said. (Here are even more ways to increase your metabolism.) Not only are those options more sustainable than continuing to cut calories, they're also healthier and will help you feel better overall than you would with extreme dieting.
Dr. Lofton noted that you and your doctor should also look into other factors that might be causing a weight loss plateau. Some medications, for example, might hinder you from losing weight. Hormones and hormonal changes, like perimenopause, could be at play as well.
A good weight loss practice, in terms of starvation mode and just in general, is to choose long-term lifestyle changes over extreme, restrictive measures. Dieting, Casper explained, tends to be all or nothing: slashing calories, sugar, or carbs. If that leads to major and prolonged caloric restriction, as can sometimes happen, your metabolism can slow down and make weight loss difficult, even if you don't technically enter starvation mode. Not to mention that restricting your food can lead to other unhealthy habits, like overeating when your hunger gets intense enough. "To lose weight and stay healthy for a lifetime," Casper said, "it's important to build healthy habits that work for you and are sustainable, instead of focusing on a short-term restrictive diet."