How to Lose Weight Realistically within 3 months?

Overweight and Obesity is a growing problem also in Philippines. Although the problem is not as serious as in the Western countries; there are still a lot of overweight Filipinos particularly in the middle to upper class. The primary cause of this overweight is the emergence of new culture and adoption of foreign traditions. 60 years ago there are a lot of Filipino fishermen and farmers, and most of them wake up very early in the morning to work and cook food for their family. And then stop working at the late afternoon. They eat healthy foods like fish, corn, and other vegetables. Their nature work is physically demanding, my grandfather is a fishermen and I can imagine the weight of the fishing nets as well as the hours spent swimming in the water in a daily basis.

It explains why most Filipinos 60 years ago are healthy, slim and does not have overweight problems. Here comes today, most Filipinos commute and drive cars. They do not bother doing physical exercises anymore. And spend a long hours sitting in the office. Most Filipinos today are working in the call centre and other offices. To add to the problem, I observed that the popularity of eating fish and vegetables decreases. They now love eating g burgers, lots of pork, eating in fast foods frequently and indulge in unhealthy habits such as drinking and smoking. It explains why there is an increasing trend of overweight Filipinos.

This post will teach you how to lose weight within 3 months by combination of slight physical exercises and eating the right kinds of food. Remember that the most important component in losing weight is your commitment and discipline to follow the plan. Without this, your weight loss goal will fail miserably no matter what you do.

Step1.) Commit to at least 3 hours of aerobic exercises per week. The best form of aerobic exercise is slight jogging whether outside in your home or in your treadmill. You need to buy a heart rate monitor to avoid overexerting or under exerting yourself. Without this piece of equipment it is easy to go overboard or go under board. So to make sure that each exercise counts, you need a feedback device called heart rate monitor. You can buy heart rate monitor for only 2000 to 3500 pesos. You can exercise without heart rate monitor but the risk of injury increases with overexertion. If injury starts to conquer you, your weight loss program will put stress in your daily activity instead of contributing to your well-being. Also under exerting yourself means you are not burning fat calories enough and hence you cannot see physical results after 3 months of workout. This is why a heart rate monitor is important.

You can decide how you will spend your 3 hours per week of aerobic exercise. If you are working daily from Monday to Saturday; you can set at least 30 minutes of workout per day for 5 straight days (Monday to Friday). Or spend 1.5 hours on Saturday and 1.5 hours on Sunday. It depends as long as the total number of aerobic workout should be 3 hours per week. Also; for your workout to be effective, you should aim for a minimum of 30 minutes workout. So no workout should last less than 30 minutes. This is your minimum. The maximum is around 90 minutes or 1.5 hours, only do this if you are comfortable.

Step2.) Define your workout heart rate. Since it is aerobic, use the following formula:

Minimum workout heart rate =0.65 x (220-age)
Maximum workout hear rate = 0.75 x (220-age)

Supposing your age is 25 years old, the minimum heart rate that you should maintain in the workout to optimize the burning of fat calories is:

Minimum= 0.65 x (220-25) = 127 beats per minute
Maximum = 0.75 x (220-25) = 146 beats per minute

What does this imply? It means that every time you work out (running or jogging for example) using your heart rate monitor. If your heart rate falls below 127, it means you should exert more so that it’s above 127 beats per minute to burn substantial amount of fat calories. But if it exceeds 146 beats per minute, you should slow down so that it is within the maximum and minimum range. If you are doing workout consistently above your maximum aerobic heart rate (146 in the example), you increase the risk of injury.

Step3.) Drink a lot of cold water before, during and after the exercise. Cold water burns a lot of calories and prevents dehydration from sweating; you should have a bottle of water to bring anytime you exercise more than 30 minutes.

Step4.) You should eat the following foods as part of your snacks and main diet (it is best to take these foods 1 to 3 hours after any workout, you can choose below but not all of them at once):

a.) Milk or Chocolate milk. You can read my tutorial on how to prepare a delicious Anlene chocolate drink.
b.) Protein foods- chicken and beef are the best because of lower cholesterol levels.
c.) Fish and oysters – for iron supplements, boost red blood cell production.
c.) Rice- no limits here as long as you can be able to maintain 3 hours of aerobic exercise per week. These carbohydrates will be burned and will not be stored as fat during your exercise so rice is important.
d.) Dried fish and eggs – these are your extra sodium and protein supplement.
e.) Bananas/Avocados/Orange- fruits are very important part of the diet when losing weight. This will give you extra boost of vitamins and minerals without having to eat a large quantity of foods.
f.) Any vegetables 3 times a week.
Question: Do you really have to minimize your eating habits while following the weight loss programs? Not necessarily, as long as you do not increase your food intake with the increase in physical workouts you are on the way of losing weight. You should eat normally to avoid collapsing during any workout! You will easily lose a couple of kilos after 3 months (around 3 to 5 kilos). Of course you can continue your workout after 3 months if you are happy with the results. You should become fitter and sexier as ever!