If you’ve been reading about medical weight loss, or just weight loss in general, you probably understand that your metabolism is one of the major keys to succcess. Specifically, you need to burn more calories through activity than you consume through food. That’s how your body is forced to tap into stored energy, via your fat cells, and burns energy to meet the deficit.

But if you’ve been following a medical weight loss plan and you’re not seeing results as fast as you wanted, you might suspect that your metabolism simply isn’t “fast” enough. And you might be right! So what else can you do?

Obviously, more exercise will help you burn more energy. But most of us only have so many hours in the day. The real key is to increase you resting metabolic rate, so that you burn more energy even when you’re sitting still (sleeping, working at your desk, watching TV, etc). You can do this by increasing your muscle mass, because muscle requires more energy to maintain itself. When your body is composed of more muscle tissue, it burns more energy around the clock.

This means that even while at rest, you’ll burn more calories than someone your same weight who has less muscle mass. Pretty cool, right? And you can accomplish the goal of building more muscle tissue by simply performing more weight training activities, for 20 minutes at a time at least three days per week.

It’s so simple that just doing a series of squats, push-ups. lunges, planks, and other body-weight activities during your work breaks can change your body composition over time. Or, you can get a bit more serious about it and consult with a personal trainer at the gym. Within a month or two you will find that your metabolism begins to adjust, and you’re burning more calories even when resting.

Just remember to eat plenty of lean protein to support your muscle growth, and drinks lots of water to replace fluids while working out. And of course, come see us before starting a new exercise routine. We can screen you for underlying conditions that might complicate your plans, and review your medical weight loss goals to help you stay on track.