A teenage girl can rarely pass through a day without hearing some new tip or idea about weight loss. Some tips make sense, like eating more fruits and vegetables, while others are glaringly harmful and incorrect.
However, many weight loss tips fall somewhere in between. All these suggestions surrounding the topic of weight loss leaves many teenage girls confused and disheartened. So, what are effective weight loss tips for a teenage girl?
Lifestyle choices a teenager can develop to protect a healthy weight include eating a balanced diet, limiting high sugar or saturated fat food and drinks, avoiding restriction or under eating, exercising, increasing daily movement, getting adequate sleep, learning to appropriately manage stress and proper hydration.
A teenage girl should focus on developing habits that promote health and well-being, not on weight loss. Healthy behaviors can help a teenager maintain good health into her adult years. On the other hand, weight loss techniques often harm mental and physical health.
These choices will help teenagers maintain a healthy weight and increase well-being. Continue reading to find out more about weight loss as a teenage girl and healthy lifestyle habits.
Is it ok for teenagers to lose weight?
Attempts to lose weight during teenage years comes with many health risks. Weight loss techniques used by teens often involve extreme and unsustainable diets, exercise regimes or laxative use, which can significantly lower health.
Furthermore, losing weight usually comes with malnutrition. This lack of adequate nourishment during such a crucial period of growth and development will cause lasting negative effects.
Due to these negative outcomes, health experts recommend teenagers avoid weight loss, unless under the direction of a healthcare professional. Professionals can provide safe and science backed guidance along with helping a teenager decide if she actually needs to lose weight.
Instead, teenagers should develop healthy habits they can maintain for many years. Making these choices can help teenage girls grow into their weight and often leads to maintaining a healthy weight through the adult years as well.
Should a teenage girl go on a diet to lose weight?
The definition of a diet is the type of food a person generally eats. Making changes to improve the nutrient quality of a diet will improve health. However, the term “to go on a diet” usually implies adding restrictions or food rules. Restricting calories, food or nutrients usually leads to poor nutrition and other negative health outcomes.
Fad diets, or those that involve rigid rules and restriction, may lead to short-term weight loss. However, his weight loss comes mainly through muscle and water, which does not support a lasting healthy weight.
The extreme nature of these diets also makes them hard to follow for longer than several weeks or months, which then results in weight regain. On top of this weight regain, the body’s metabolism (the rate of calories burned at rest) decreases, making it even harder to maintain a healthy weight.
Outside of the detrimental effects of dieting on weight, restriction also harms overall well-being. Dieting increases risk of disordered eating, binging, vitamin and mineral deficiencies, certain diseases such as osteoporosis, depression and poor body image.
In summary, a teenage girl should avoid going on any diet that places restrictions or rules on foods, food groups or calories. She can make healthy changes to her overall eating pattern such as including more fruits and vegetables, eating foods higher in fiber and limiting foods high in sugar and saturated fats.
How can teenagers lose weight?
A doctor will follow a teenage girl’s growth trends. Sometimes a doctor may encourage slowing weight gain or losing some weight if BMI percentiles continue above the 95th percentile.
All teenage girls can apply the following tips to improve their lifestyle habits, but should only attempt weight loss under the supervision of a healthcare professional like a doctor or Registered Dietitian.
Emphasize nutrient dense foods
Foods that contain a lot of nutrients per calorie will keep a teenage girl feeling full longer and promote well-being. These foods include fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans/legumes, nuts/seeds, seafood, lean meat/poultry, eggs, healthy fats (plant oils, fatty fish, avocados, olives, seeds and nuts). Those with less nutrients per calorie may contribute to over eating calories and do not provide great nutrition.
Eat balanced meals and snacks
One problem with many diets comes from a lack of balance. For example, a common diet idea is to eat just salad. However, eating some vegetables without any other food will leave a teenager feeling hungry, irritable and tired. Extreme hunger than causes overeating at future meals or snacks.
In order to feel satisfied and full between eating occasions, meals and snacks should include a balance of carbohydrate, protein, fat and fiber. The carbohydrates provide energy and satisfaction. Protein, fat and fiber slow digestion for lasting feelings of fullness and prevent blood sugar spikes and crashes.
To make the salad a balanced meal, a teenage girl can add some beans and eggs for protein, avocado or an oil-based vinaigrette for fat with some quinoa or brown rice for energizing carbohydrate.
Avoid restriction and under-eating
When the body feels threatened by under-nutrition, it will protect itself by lowering metabolism and increasing hunger hormones. This survival mode can lead to overeating or binging following a period of restriction.
These adaptations by the body are some of the many reasons extreme dieting does not work and why under eating can ultimately cause teenagers to gain unhealthy weight.
A teenage girl should meet energy needs throughout the day by eating balanced meals and snacks. She should pay attention and respond to hunger and fullness cues.
Limit foods high in sugar, sodium and saturated fat
Completely restricting foods high in sugar, sodium or saturated fat may lead to increased cravings for these foods and subsequent binging. Instead of complete elimination of these foods, teenage girls should feel free to consume them mindfully, on occasion.
Focusing on an overall balanced diet of nutrient dense foods allows for favorite treats and snacks. No one food or choice will ruin health. Instead, health comes from consistent healthy and sustainable choices.
Choose unsweetened beverages
Soda, energy drinks and fruit flavored drinks contain mostly sugar with few nutrients. Furthermore, liquids lead to easy overconsumption of calories and sugar due to the lack of satiating factors.
Adequate hydration through unsweetened beverages benefits alertness, cognitive function, digestion, skin and hair health, and ability to properly identify hunger cues. The best drinks for daily hydration do not include added sugars. A teenager can drink water, milk, plant-based milk and some 100% fruit juice.
Prioritize sleep
A recent study among young adults showed an increase in sleep and a significant decrease in calorie intake after sleep counseling. https://www.medpagetoday.com/neurology/sleepdisorders/97048 This experiment, among many, highlight the direct impact sleep has on dietary habits and weight.
Inadequate sleep increases inflammation, cravings for higher calorie foods and fatigue. To achieve better health outcomes, teenage girls should sleep and wake at similar times each day for 8-10 hours of quality sleep.
Exercise
Health experts recommend sixty minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity daily for teenagers. A mix of both aerobic and resistance exercises best support strong organs, bones and a healthy weight. Physical activity also boosts mental and emotional health.
There are many exercises to choose from, and a teenage girl should find what works best for her. Ways to include more physical activity are walking, jogging, cycling, roller blading, skateboarding, swimming, climbing, hiking, jumping rope, etc. Also, it does not all need to happen in one sixty-minute episode but can be split up throughout the day.
Include more movement in the day
Non-exercise activity thermogenesis or NEAT refers to calories burned outside of eating, sleep and structured exercise. A teenage girl can improve her health by increasing NEAT through simple things such as taking the stairs, helping make or clean-up meals, standing or walking between classes or creating a craft instead of watching TV.
Manage chronic stress
Chronic stress elevates cortisol and inflammation. Some may find that stress also increases poor dietary choices and decreases desire to participate in physical activity. These consequences of unmanaged stress may contribute to poor health and weight gain.
A teenage girl should find ways to manage stress such as getting enough sleep, meditation, writing in a journal, prioritizing tasks and making time for hobbies. If stress seems unmanageable, she should reach out to a professional or adult.
Healthy meal ideas for a teenage girl
A healthy meal is a balanced meal. The My Plate model offers a great guide to creating balanced meals. https://www.myplate.gov. A good meal will provide nutrient dense foods that offer carbohydrates, proteins and healthy fats.
Breakfast ideas
- Chocolate peanut butter banana oatmeal
- Whole grain waffles with almond butter and berries
- Spinach, cheese, avocado, egg whole-grain burrito with a small green smoothie
Lunch ideas-add favorite fruit
- Shredded turkey, tomato, lettuce, avocado whole-grain sandwich with carrot sticks
- Lentil sloppy Joe with homemade sweet potato or potato fries
- Hummus and veggie wrap with whole-grain crackers
Dinner ideas-add favorite fruit
- Taco soup
- Greek style salad (chicken, feta, olives, etc.), whole grain pita
- Salmon, quinoa and roasted veggies
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