6 of the most common reasons for fat loss plateaus - The Fat Loss Files - Ep. 216

So let's start with reason number one.

Your calorie target is inaccurate or it's no longer accurate.

So let's talk about a calorie target that's inaccurate to begin with.

This usually happens because you've recently started a diet and you used a calorie calculator to work out your targets.

Now, it's possible that the calculator was simply inaccurate.

I've recently talked about the inherent inaccuracy of calorie calculators in episode 213.

So I'm not going to rehash the same points.

In short, calorie calculators aren't useless.

And for some people, the target they get is a perfectly reasonable starting point.

But I find that these calculators can be particularly unhelpful for gender diverse people taking gender affirming hormones.

Most calculators ask you to select male or female without accounting for your hormone profile, body composition, dosage or how long you've been on hormones.

That's why I usually take a more personalized approach to calculating a client's starting targets.

And I explain this approach in another YouTube video, which I titled Stop Guessing Your Maintenance Calories Trans Edition.

And I'm going to put a link to that in the show notes.

So if you are consistently hitting the target that the calculator gave you, but you're not seeing results, the calculator may simply have overestimated your calorie needs.

And if you used to lose fat on these calories, but now it's no longer happening, and nothing else about your approach has changed, then your metabolic rate might have decreased to the point where these calories cause very slow fat loss or non-etsu.

And this is part of the metabolic adaptation to dieting process, which I covered in detail with Dr. Eric Schraxler in episode 106, if you want to check that out.

In addition to metabolic adaptation, smaller bodies burn fewer calories.

So when you lose a considerable amount of body fat, your maintenance calories will be reduced.

And therefore, if you're eating the exact same calories in order to lose body fat, the size of that deficit will also be smaller over time.

Unfortunately, you can't undo metabolic adaptation while still being in a deficit.

So if your body has adapted to what was originally a deficit and now it's either a smaller deficit or it's no longer a deficit at all.

The only way to overcome this plateau is to decrease calories, increase your activity, or a combination of the two to kickstart fat loss again.