How many times have you or someone you know complained about
a slow metabolism? The phrase “I can just look at food and gain weight!” is
something I’ve heard many times. While it is true that many people do have endocrine problems that
make weight loss harder, the vast majority of people who complain about slow
metabolism don’t have a metabolism problem at
all. They have a movement problem – or, more accurately, a lack of movement!
So what about those that are thinking, “But I work out every
day. I’m super active! I definitely have a slow metabolism”?
When it comes to weight loss, or gain, we are playing a game
of numbers. To put it simply, too much food and not enough energy expenditure cause
you to gain weight (be it fat or muscle). The opposite is also true. Eat less
and move more and you will lose weight. This means that if you do not have
diagnosed endocrine problems, it is time to address the real issues.
NEAT and
What It Means
Your basal metabolic rate (BMR), plus the thermic effect of
the foods you eat, added to something often referred to as Non-Exercise
Activity Thermogenesis (NEAT) makes up your energy requirements for each
day. Simply put, NEAT is basically
energy expended for everything we do that does not include sleeping, eating,
physical activity or exercise. This is anything ranging from fidgeting, to
standing or just moving about. NEAT is a big part of that equation.
BMR +
thermic effect of food + NEAT = daily energy requirement
BMR, or Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR), is the energy
requirement of your body either without any activity or while lying motionless.
BMR/RMR accounts for about 60-70% of your total daily energy requirements. The
thermic effect of food (the amount of calories needed to digest food) accounts
for about 10% of your energy requirements. The rest of your energy requirements
are dependent on how active you are in both intentional exercise and NEAT
activities (normal life activities like cleaning, shopping, walking, etc.).If a
woman has a BMR of around 1,000 calories, she’ll burn about 150 calories
digesting the food she eats each day. She may also burn anywhere from 150 to
500 calories more per day depending on whether she has a day full day of
walking around, shopping, and cleaning or if she spends the day sitting and working
on the computer.
We’re also going to say our person didn’t engage in any
intentional exercise on this particular day. So, on the low end of things, she
is going to burn approximately 1,300 calories. If her NEAT activities are on
the higher end, she’s going to burn 1,650. That’s a 350-calorie per day
difference between those activity levels. Now, I don’t know many people who eat
only 1,300 calories per day, but I know plenty of people who have office jobs
and don’t exercise. Couple sedentary lifestyle with a daily surplus of calories beyond your basic energy requirements and over
time you have weight gain.
The
Truth About Your Activities
Many people think they workout and they are incredibly
active that they are covered. Consider this, the average number of calories
burned during an hour of intentional exercise is about 328 calories for every 100
pounds of body weight, as a general rule of thumb. Then consider that most of
us aren’t engaging in a solid hour of nonstop exercise every day.
If you’re a 150 pound women and you’re doing thirty minutes
on the elliptical then you might only be burning 246 calories. That’s about the
amount in two-tablespoons-plus-a-smidge of almond butter (which isn’t that
much!).
If you’re working out like a fiend and are still not where
you want to be physically or in terms of body fat percentage, then consider the
following. Multiple studies have shown that people who engage in intentional
exercise either unconsciously either ate more to compensate or overcompensated for
the calories burned by moving less after the exercise and thus negating their
efforts to a degree. Translation: you can’t workout and then sit around all
day, and you also cannot account for that post-workout snack.
What
"Naturally" Lean People Do
It’s easy to lose sight of all this information when we
compare ourselves to others who seem to effortlessly lose weight or stay lean.
We often compare how much we are working out and how much we are eating, and
then we blame our genetics for us hanging onto fat.
My guess would be that your naturally thin friend quite possibly
has a very active job, as opposed to sitting at the computer, in meetings, or
answering the phone all day. “Naturally” thin people may also workout on top of
their active jobs, adding to their daily calorie burn. Their metabolisms aren’t
any better, they just move more. This daily surplus of movement and expended
calories adds up over time, just as non-movement and surplus calories can.
The subtle but consistent differences in activity and
lifestyle make it appear that we have two camps: those who stay thin
effortlessly and those who do not. In reality, it’s a case of those who are
active in an effortless or routine way and those who are not active. So, maybe
you don’t have a slow metabolism at all. Maybe you just need to get up and MOVE
more?
References:
1. Levine, James. "Nonexercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT): environment and
biology." American
Journal of Physiology - Endocrinology and Metabolism. no. E675-E685 (2004).
10.1152/ajpendo.00562.2003 (accessed December 15, 2013).
Vanessa
Bennington, Contributor
- Nurse Practitioner
Fabio
Comana, M.A., M.S., director of continuing Education for NASM
