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How to Help Your Teens Lose Weight Fast

Given the rise in the teen obesity rate in the US and all over the world and the current pandemic situation driving teens to spend more time indoors, more and more parents want to know how their teens can lose weight fast. After all, there are many known health risks of obesity in teens.

Although there are plenty of tips available on the internet regarding teen weight loss, few of them provide practical insights and almost all of them have limited and feeble quality discussions on parents’ role in helping their teenagers.

Understanding more about the setbacks of losing weight and the best ways to effectively support your teenager can help a great deal.

It is also essential to work together with your kid’s doctor to figure out a practical, sustainable weight loss goal. Alternatively, you can always consult a nutrition and weight loss clinic that specializes in teen weight loss to carefully design a diet for your teen.

As a parent, it can be very frustrating if your overweight teen is trying to lose weight but to no avail even with your assistance.

Before we discuss how you can play an effective role in your teen’s health and weight management, remember that teens don’t develop at the same rates. Hence, it can be hard to tell whether a teen is actually overweight or has a healthy weight. Let us see why teens gain weight in the first place.

Why Teens Gain (and Keep) Weight

All weight loss plans need to begin with understanding the reasons behind gaining weight.

Too little exercise and poor quality calories are the two main explanations behind teen obesity. To break down further, a lot of children and teens gain due to the following reasons:

  1. Eating fast foods too often
  2. Additional calorie intake from fruit and soda drinks
  3. Large food portion sizes
  4. Spending too much time on computers and devices
  5. Watching too much television
  6. Less active time
  7. Eating too many processed foods at home and school

Sadly, the percentage of children and teens dealing with obesity has increased by 200% since the 70s, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Common Weight Loss Mistakes and Setbacks

Considering some of the reasons teens become overweight, losing those pounds might seem like an easy thing to do. Teens just focus on consuming fewer calories and doing more exercise to lose weight fast. But of course, it is never that simple to lose weight.

Moreover, teens also experience setbacks and struggles as adolescents do and in many cases. These setbacks are caused by the following:

1. Not Being Realistic

A common issue is not setting attainable weight-loss goals.

For instance, at our weight loss clinic, we often find that teens set an arbitrary number based on what they think they should weigh or what their friends weigh. Physicians may also inadvertently contribute to this unrealistic goal if BMI alone is used to set the goal weight.

Solution:

A great way to set realistic goals is to have a body composition analysis performed to evaluate the lean mass and body fat percentage.

This metric is a better indicator of progress. By focusing on this percentage rather than weight alone makes it easier to set realistic goals that are attainable and sustainable.

2. Trying Too Much

One common setback to weight loss is quitting because of doing too much at a time.

For instance, a concerned parent may cut out all fruit and soda juice, change from whole to fat-free milk, and disallow any unhealthy snacks or junk food. Concurrently, they might have the child registered for a sport or start taking them to a personal trainer.

This type of extreme scenario is bound to fail.

Solution:

We often suggest that parents do things one at a time. Begin with the little changes and build up from there. Moreover, as a parent, there are certain things you should not say to teens while they are trying to lose weight.

3. Lack of Adequate Physical Activity

Not including more exercise in a weight loss plan can slow your teen’s progress. For instance, doing a minimum of 60 minutes of moderately intense physical activity per day and more rigorous physical activities three days per week should suffice.

Solution:

Initially, they may need to begin with just 15-20 minutes every day and slowly build up to 60 minutes a day.

4. Sticking with Old Hobbies

Teens who spend a lot of time watching television, playing computer games, or taking part in sedentary activities, should be encouraged to participate in new fun activities.

While cutting out old pastimes can help, many parents find that it’s best to place time limits on them.

As seasoned weight-loss coaches, we know it’s easier said than done and this is what you will find from most parents of teens.

Solution:

This difficulty is why it may be helpful to integrate some new activities with their old habits. There are so many exercise games to choose from for the Xbox, such as Zumba fitness, Kinect Star Wars, UFC Personal Trainer, and even the series of Wii Fit Video Games.

These indoor activities can be highly beneficial for teens who are unable to go to their gym, sports classes, dance classes due to the pandemic.

5. Lack of Meal Planning

Parents and teenagers need to monitor serving portions and increase vegetables to free themselves from less than stellar eating habits. As an example, many teens may revert to large after-school snacks due to loneliness rather than hunger or skipping essential meals like breakfast.

Solution:

Teens need more than four servings of fruits and veggies per day and to accomplish that, some advanced planning may be required.

6. Avoiding Meals or Not Eating Enough

You need to eat during the day to retain energy and maintain your metabolism. Therefore, avoiding meals, particularly breakfast or lunches, can have a negative effect.

Solution:

At BioIntelligent Wellness, we perform resting metabolic rate testing to precisely reveal what a teenager’s body needs in a day.

Based on the results, our weight loss coaches will then create a diet for your teen that they will be able to follow. Try to help your teen focus on making healthy food decisions, not only trying to cut down calories.

7. Not Feeling Motivated

For both teenagers and adults, the hardest part of shedding weight is not being motivated to make the right changes.

Solution:

Involving your teen in the weight loss process, educating them about why it’s needed, and rewarding each triumph and progress can go a long way.

It can also help to have other family members involved with diet and physical activity habit changes because teenagers tend to copy what they see.

When Your Teen Cannot Seem to Shed Weight

For most overweight teens, trying to lose weight fast is like boiling down to an imbalance between the quantity and quality of energy they’re taking in (calories from drinks/food) and the quantity of energy they are expending (exercising and everyday activities).

Even if these teenagers believe they are doing everything the right way, they may need to approach weight loss differently for their unique chemistry and composition.

You can help your teen lose weight fast by:

  • Offering positive reinforcement on how well he/she is doing by eating healthier foods, reducing screen time, and being active.
  • Motivating your teen to exercise by looking for a sport he/she may like to engage in is more.
  • Going for jogging on a treadmill or walking around the neighborhood.
  • Eating better as a family by offering healthy foods, drinks, and snacks and not purchasing junk food.
  • Involving the entire household in being physically active every day.
  • Provide positive feedback for their smaller milestones, like planning meals in advance, eating fast food less often, or eliminating juices or soda.

Seek Out if Hormonal Issues are Responsible

If your teen stops losing or continues to gain weight despite changes, parents need to defer to their child’s doctor to see if they are suffering from a hormonal issue.

If your teen struggles to lose weight even after taking healthy modifications recommended by the weight loss clinic, then it may be time to speak with your teen’s doctor rather than assuming it is due to non-compliance.

Your teenager’s doctor can assess him or her for medical conditions that may be responsible for weight gains, such as hypothyroidism or Insulin Resistance.

If there is no particular medical condition responsible for the weight gain, or if his or her lifestyle is making the situation worse, the following options may be recommended.

Try Weight Management Programs with Experienced Clinics

Your teenager’s physician or gynecologist may suggest a weight-loss program that teaches teens how to alter their lifestyle to drop weight.

Teen weight management programs, like BioIntelligent Wellness’s Teen Program, encourage young people to work with members other than the family. This is to help them change behaviors and habits today that will translate into maintaining a healthy lifestyle throughout adulthood.

These programs include education and coaching sessions for the teen and his/her family. The age and health of the child determine the type of plan created.

Ideal Protein Weight Loss Program offers an excellent weight loss and maintenance plan for teens over the age of 12 with a doctor’s and parent’s approval. So far the program has yielded marvelous results in teens.

Working with a Qualified Nutritionist

An experienced nutritionist can figure out your teen’s specific weight loss needs and how the type of foods he or she consumes affects them.

At BioIntelligent Wellness, we start with RMR testing to create a customized plan for weight loss while ensuring the teen receives the nutrition needed to support optimal development, feel healthy, and be active.

This type of program is an excellent choice for many parents as it allows the nutritionist at the weight loss clinic to directly provide supportive education and identify resources best suited for the teen.

Today, there are many apps and programs to help teens create weight loss goals and monitor their exercise, food choices, and progress.

As parents, we want the best for our teenagers, and being the parent of a teen who struggles to lose weight can be debilitating. If you are wondering what the missing piece may be, schedule a complimentary consultation or call us at 858-228-3644.

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