Nutrition Plateaus

By Tim Quek

There is perhaps nothing more frustrating when you’re trying to achieve a fitness goal than hitting a plateau. It’s like gunning down an open highway on a road trip only to run in to gridlock traffic. This is not the time to panic and abandon your diet, nor your fitness programs.

Instead, use your time on the plateau to deconstruct your goals, diet and fitness programs to see if they’re working for you. Here are five tips for busting through those dreaded nutrition plateaus.

Tip #1 – Reassess Your Success

Way back when you started your diet and fitness program, you likely set forth some personal goals. Do you remember what those were? They could have been as vague as “lose five pounds”, or they might have been more specific and detailed. Whatever they were, you have to assess if you’ve reached them.

If you haven’t achieved what you set out to do, then determine why you came up a little bit short. Don’t be dismayed by this. Remember that any plan – whether it’s fitness, performance, nutrition or atheistically based – is a life long commitment. Ask yourself simple questions to hold your own feet to the fire. Did you follow your plan? Were you strict with your diet? How often did you cheat on your diet? Why did you cheat on your diet?

I will be the first to admit that changing any habitual practice in one’s life is hard. Identify what led you astray on your path to success – as you would with any other goal setting exercise – and do your best to reduce or strike these factors from your lifestyle. The first step in any rebuilding process is admitting and identifying mistakes. Be honest with yourself at all times.

Tip # 2 – Set New Goals

Let’s say that you have achieved your goals. Congratulations…your work is just beginning! Now you get to set new ones. This should be far from discouraging. Fitness and lifestyle goals are all about milestones, and you will need to set new goals for yourselves as you accomplish ones previously set.

Basing your nutrition goals around your fitness and life goals is perhaps the easiest way to go about things. Are you happy with your bodyweight? Do you want to gain muscle mass now that you know your way around the gym? Do you want to slim down for that upcoming spring vacation? Is a marathon in your future plans?

A simple tip is to ensure that your new ambitions are attainable within a reasonable amount of time. Think “baby steps”. Pick a fitness goal that is in your immediate future and build a nutrition plan around it. Couch potatoes are stagnant. Keep moving forward towards new heights!

Tip #3 – Cheat!!!

Cheating isn’t always a bad thing, especially with your diet. Some people have a “cheat day” or “cheat meal” where they trek to a fast food joint to plow through a few greasy burgers and a plate full of fries. Think less like you’re cheating, and more like you’re treating yourself.

Personally, I am a portion control freak. I have a big appetite and I can keep eating as long as there’s food in front of me (which is why the word “buffet” is music to my ears!). During the week, I eat 6-to-8 medium sized meals per day. On the weekends, I upset the balance of my diet and gorge on gigantic, healthy meals. It makes me happy, and it keeps my body guessing. Most importantly, increasing calories on weekends gets results.

If your body knows what to expect, it gets bored. That’s the layman’s way of thinking about these things and the general rule you have to work against. Keep it guessing by mixing up your diet one day, or one meal, a week. It’s like taking one step back to take two steps forward. If you’re strict with your diet, you deserve to let loose every now and then. Trust me, your body will be thankful for it especially if you conceptualize the “cheat” element of your diet as a “treat” or “reward”.

Tip #4 – Take a Break

There was a time that I gorged on so much protein that it practically felt like I was sweating meat. Then I went to visit a friend overseas, who happened to be a vegetarian, and I was forced to cut down my protein intake. I only managed to go to the gym twice over the ten days I was away from home.

The timing of it could not have been more perfect. My strength had hit a plateau, and my frustration levels were starting to peak. I thought that when I got home after a week of veggies and no serious training that my strength and fitness would plummet.

Boy was I wrong.

The week off was fantastic for me. My body seemed re-energized. I felt like a million bucks. Fitness professionals will tell you that after about 8-10 weeks of training you should take a week off. Same goes for your diet, surprisingly. If you’re always doing the same thing and eating the same thing, your body and mind will become complacent.

Take a week to do something different, and I don’t mean eating fried chicken every meal (as tempting as that sounds). Eat a lot of protein? Try being a vegetarian for a week. Straying from your diet doesn’t necessarily mean eating fast foods. You can make healthy alternatives for a short period to re-energize your body and remind it of what it really likes to eat.

Alternatively, switching up your diet might reveal new food types and diet structures that your body thrives with.

Not all diets work for all people, which explains why there are so many potential solutions out there. For me, it turns out ingesting a mountain of protein every day wasn’t the best diet for me. My wallet and digestive system have thanked me ever since I cut my meat consumption in half.

Tip #5 – Determine Food Allergies

This does not apply to everyone, but it certainly applies to some people. It’s important to keep in mind that even if you do not display severe symptoms of a food allergy (i.e. stomach cramps, lethargy, loose stool etc.), you still may still be affected in part by certain foods.

This is perhaps best exemplified through my own personal experience. I am partially allergic to both gluten and lactose. A single serving of pasta or milk won’t kill me, but if I ate either multiple times a day then I would definitely feel it. My stomach hurts. I feel bloated. I most certainly feel fatigued.

The crazy part about this is that I had no idea I had this allergy until I tested it outright. Basically I ate gluten with every meal for a week and wrote down how I “felt” using a numbered scale of 1 (not so great) to 5 (totally awesome). The following week I ate completely gluten-free and my diet diary was dotted with fours and fives next to every meal.

I didn’t need to spend money on a nutritionist, see my doctor or make an appointment with an allergist. All three of those medical professionals would’ve been able to help me, but I saved myself some time, energy and money by doing some self diagnosis. Please keep in mind that this is my personal experience and if you want to find out about yourself, I suggest that you see your family doctor before making any decisions.

Food is supposed to make you feel better; it’s meant to provide you the type of positive energy that makes your days and workouts smoother and more efficient. By targeting which types of foods made me feel good, and thusly which foods made me feel bad, I was able to eliminate foods that didn’t work for my body.

We are all built differently. Some people thrive on pasta and beef. Others are better with chicken and rice. What works for some people may not work quite as well for others. Eliminating foods that your body doesn’t respond to properly is optimal, and a lengthy process, but it is a proven science that will help you achieve your goals. If you want to do your own research on this type of diet deconstruction and reconstruction, then look up Metabolic Type Dieting. There is plenty of literature on the subject.

Complete avoidance of partial food allergies is not always 100-percent possible in one’s life, but knowing what to avoid will help you approach your goals faster. The better you eat, the better you feel, and being positive is an invaluable asset in achieving your dietary goals.

Tim Quek is an avid health enthusiast, a C.H.E.K. Institute Exercise Coach and Holistic Health Practitioner, NSCA Certified Personal Trainer and is enthusiastically involved in Rugby, Soccer and Speed Training. He can be reached at timquek@hotmail.com

Reviews