Simple tips for weight loss that don't include fad diets

Dr Nick Fuller is a leading obesity researcher at the University of Sydney and the resident weight loss expert for Channel’s 9’s TODAY EXTRA breakfast morning show. He has helped thousands of people with their weight loss and lifestyle journeys and says there's a straightforward reason fad diets don't work - they go against our human biology.

Through his research at the Charles Perkins Centre, Dr Fuller has discovered that each person's body has a natural weight 'set point', which it is geared to protect by changing how the body functions - slowing down your metabolism, increasing your appetite hormone signalling and shifting your energy source consumption from fats to carbohydrates, so you hold on to weight.

With a healthy eating plan and imposed weight loss breaks, Dr Fuller says you can overcome your bodies biological protections and redefine your set point, allowing you to safely lose weight and maintain it. He now advocates for Interval Weight Loss™, an evidence-based, sustainable weight loss program that adopts a stepped approach to success.

These are his top five tips for losing weight and keeping it off for good.

1. Jump on the scales regularly, but don’t count calories.

Weighing yourself daily and counting calories will only result in an obsession with your weight and it's not helpful because our body weight can fluctuate up to 1.5 kg in any given day. Weighing yourself weekly is the key to a healthy relationship with food and a successful path to your weight loss goal.

2. Have five meals a day, but don’t skip meals.

Eating regularly will prevent the all-too-common scenario where you skip meals and end up ravenous, only to end up reaching for anything you can get your hands on. Taking control of your hunger signals will allow you to make sensible food choices and prevent bingeing.

3. Eat your dinner at the table.

Dinner is the most important meal from a social and cultural perspective but least important from a portion size perspective. Eat at the dinner table, away from technological distraction, and use chopsticks to slow down your eating speed. This will allow sufficient time for your hunger signals to reach your brain, telling you that you’re full.

4. Enjoy eating out, takeaway and ‘treat’ foods while on the path to weight loss.

You should never cut out any foods on your weight loss plan. We can all cut out certain foods for a short period of time, but then cravings for these foods come back with vengeance. This is your biology kicking into gear to defend your starting weight – your ‘set point’. Instead, you can retrain your brain to rely on these processed and fast foods less often.   

5. Eat your vegetables… and carbs, oils and nuts.

Despite what you may have been led to believe, fruits, vegetables, carbs, dairy, nuts, and olive oil don’t cause weight gain, they actually help with weight loss. These are the very foods that should be key weapons in your weight loss arsenal.