Imagine if it were that simple. In fact, if it were that simple we would not be in the weight crisis that America seems to be in now. For starters, most women are “starvers” before they are ever “eaters” meaning they will forgo food all day long only to eat one meal, possibly two that day and not overeat in the two meals that they do have because they are truly used to operating on such low cals. Secondly, women tend to be more active than men in their day to day lives and if it was just about cals in vs. cals out, activity would have to count for something once dieting and they would begin to drop something.

But it’s not just about that. There is so much more to it and it seems that every time I turn around there is some new “guru” out there telling you how you should just ‘push away from the table’. If you have been trying to lose weight, or better yet, optimize your physique by losing the last 10 to 15 pounds for a while and you have some clown telling you to just “push away from the table” when your diet is cleaner than a dish straight out of the dishwasher, it could get ugly. I find the battle to look good naked is not represented well in the diet arena. There are no studies done on those who are lean (18% to 20% body fat for women) trying to get leaner (12 to 14%). There is nothing out there that tells you the leaner you get, the harder it is to get there again should you gain weight. There is nothing out there that acknowledges REPEAT dieting and the struggles that you incur.

Plateaus, stubborn weight loss, weight loss after a sudden, dramatic gain, weight loss on a seasoned athlete, etc. all pose very difficult situations in which a person can try to lose weight and most likely not succeed on just the simple “cals in vs. the cals out” method. Some situations truly require patience, creativity and intimate knowledge of the human body to be able to shed the weight. Others require you to know a bit of endocrinology or holistic medicine. Regardless, just trying to balance eating less with working out more is not going to get you to your goal, you’re going to have to experiment some.

There are many factors that affect a person trying to lose bodyfat in an effort to be lean. Let’s look at some of them:

Diet History

If you have never dieted before, you will most definitely fall under the CIVCO umbrella the first time you try. In fact, you could even do Weight Watchers or Jenny Craig and get fairly good results. Whatever you do it does not matter because the body has never gone through a diet before so it will respond to a new stimulus almost immediately. However, if you are a career dieter, you will notice right away that the more you diet, the harder it is to lose. When I say this, I do not mean the length of time you are on a diet, I mean the amount of times that you have gone up and down in weight.

Hormone Profile

Hormones are complicated. Do I need to say anymore? Add in an autoimmune to the picture and you have a recipe for frustration. Hypothyroidism, PCOS, Syndrome X, faulty menstrual cycles etc. can slow your progress down to a grinding halt where you never seem to get past the “same 5 pounds” you keep going up and down. You may starve yourself to death but if any of these issues remain unresolved, you are doing nothing but digging yourself further into a hole emotionally and possibly physically.

Muscle Mass

Depending on the amount of muscle mass you have, weight may fall off easier for you than others. The more muscle you have the easier it is for you to get lean. This is not the same as losing weight, this is about losing body fat. If you desire a very lean appearance and you lack a considerable amount of muscle, you will find that you are required to do a bit more than the average person to achieve it. Now I need to be more specific here: I do not mean you need to be muscular or have popping biceps, I want to make that clear. But you do need to have some muscle on your frame. Whenever I have a client who is doing “everything right” and yet cannot seem to get as lean as they want it is typically due to the fact that they lack significant muscle mass for their frame. Again, not the same as needing to look like a body builder of any kind, but you lack the amount of muscle necessary to provide an adequate base BMR to help you out with your dieting.

Supplement Abuse

If you previously abused fat burners, energy drinks or other stimulants, you are in for a battle. Again, you can argue CIVCO all day long but in the end, you are in a permanent plateau until you re-establish equilibrium to your system. I find that it can take as much as one year of “fixing” for every one year of fat burner abuse. This, of course, is purely anecdotal information as I have never seen a study that addressed this phenomenon but I have had plenty of experience working with clients who once abused fat burners.

Set Point Theory

Most of us have heard of this theory and if you have not I will sum it up for you in this way: your body has a certain weight that it wants to be or stay at and it will take an act of nature to successfully move past it or keep from moving to it. If you come to me wanting to lose a particular amount of body fat and want to be a certain weight and have either never been that low before in your life or have not been it in more than ten plus years, I am going to give you the hairy eyeball first and ask you how much it means to you. Am I being a Debbie Downer? No, I’m being realistic. Before you embark on a hard journey, I am giving you a chance to adequately pack for it. So you need to get a big enough bag that can hold your emotional fortitude, ambition, motivation and resolve or be open to the fact that it might not happen.

You may honestly be in a true plateau right now as you try to reach your ideal (not your body’s ideal) body weight. If that is the case, do not be discouraged by those that tout the CIVCO mantra. Their experiences are much different than yours in that their clientele just wants to lose weight. That is much different than what you desire. Because you strive to be leaner, you do not apply to their general public studies performed on general public people who have lots of weight to lose and many habits to change. There are very few studies, if any, on lean folks who eat clean who want to lose another “10 or so” pounds but now find it hard to so. Instead, keep searching for information that speaks to your exact situation and that will help you to stay focused.

Now you know I am eventually going to cover every scenario in this post so stay tuned as I focus on metabolism this week. So much to cover and so little time to get it out to you. *sigh*