Frustrated that your efforts to lose weight aren’t paying off? You may be sabotaging yourself without realizing it. Here, five common dieting mistakes many men make – and simple ways to correct them.
#1: You ignore veggies
More women than men eat vegetables at least three times daily (31 percent vs. 21 percent), a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention survey reports. Men just don’t associate vegetable consumption with health as much as women do, according to Tanya Zuckerbrot, RD, a New York City-based nutritionist who counsels many men. And ordering a burger may seem more manly than bellying up to the lunch bar for a…salad.
Solution:
Incorporate low-calorie veggies into all meals. Ordering an omelet? Ask for spinach, peppers, and mushrooms, or whatever veggies you like. Out to lunch with the boss? Order the steak, but opt for the side of string beans over the mac and cheese.
#2: You don’t count liquid calories
Men often overlook the calories in sport drinks and energy drinks, as well as sodas and sugary fruit juices. But liquid calories are the best ones to drop to lose weight: Cutting 12 ounces of sugar-sweetened beverages a day resulted in greater weight loss than cutting calories from solid food over an 18 month period, according to a recent study by the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
Solution:
Eat your calories, don’t drink them. Choose water over high-calorie sports drinks post-workout. Watch alcoholic beverages, too: A 12-ounce bottle of Bud has about 120 calories. How many were you planning on drinking?
#3: You have portion distortion
It’s easy to assume a sensible portion is what is served to you. But restaurants can pack double or triple or quadruple portions on one plate, so it’s easy to down more calories than you realize.
Solution:
Get into the habit of taking notice of how much is on your plate and if it looks like a lot, don’t eat everything. Eat some food, take a break, and ask yourself if you’re still hungry before you start eating again.
#4: You think you know it all
When women decide to diet, they usually will spend more time in the grocery story reading labels. But men may categorize foods as healthy or unhealthy — and then grab and go. Just because its low-fat, though, doesn’t mean it’s low in calories.
Solution:
Read nutrition labels and serving sizes. Familiarize yourself with what’s junk and what’s actually providing you the best calorie bang for your buck.
#5: You skimp on sleep
Sleep deprivation makes it harder to shed pounds and keep them off. Researchers found that healthy men who got only 4 or 7 hours of shut eye for 6 nights in a row had higher blood sugar and insulin levels. That’s bad news if you are trying to lose weight, because insulin helps your body store fat. And being tired makes it easy to succumb to unhealthy food temptations.
Solution:
Make sleep a priority. How much sleep you need varies from guy to guy, but almost everyone needs at least 6 hours, and some as many as 9. If you’re tired when you wake up in the morning, that’s a good sign that you need more shut-eye.
