Cause of Low Metabolism

The cause of low metabolism is not always something that can easily be determined. Sometimes low metabolism is related to heredity, sometimes to illness, and sometimes just to not eating the right foods.

Ways of Treating Low Metabolism

Do you often wonder why children and teens can eat huge amounts of food and not gain weight? The answer has to do with metabolism, a process that can be described as how much the body burns calories every day. Children and teenagers have faster metabolism, which means their body is able to burn calories faster instead of having those calories stored in the body as fat. As we age, our metabolism slows down, which explains why, even if we eat the same amount of food as we always do, we end up gaining weight anyway. Weight gain as a result of low metabolism can be countered, though. And this usually involves making lifestyle changes and developing healthy habits.

What Causes Low Metabolism?

Low metabolism can be a combination of genetics, lifestyle and eating habits. People who live a sedentary life, get into crash diets and prolonged fasting, eat sugary foods and have hypothyroidism (under active thyroid glands) tend to have low metabolism. Fasting and crash diets promote weight loss, but only temporarily. What they do to the metabolism is slow it down since the body experiences low calorie intake, prompting the body to store the fat and burn it at a slower rate.

How to Increase Metabolism

You can increase metabolism in a number of ways. While metabolism can be increased through treatments and administering medications, the more effective ways are natural forms. If you have low metabolism, the first thing you should do is shun diets that require you to skip meals. You may lose a few pounds if you skip breakfast, lunch or supper but the weight loss is only short term. When you resume normal eating, you will quickly discover that the pounds come back, but this time they're twice as much as you have lost!

Another way to naturally treat low metabolism is to exercise regularly. If you can afford it, sign up for a gym membership and engage in muscle building and strength training as doing so will help further increase your metabolism.

Keep yourself hydrated by drinking water throughout the day, at least eight glasses of it. Avoid caffeinated, carbonated and sugary drinks. If you drink, try to cut back on your alcohol consumption. Limit yourself to an occasional glass of wine. Any attempts to raise your metabolic rate and lose weight would be futile if you can't cut back on drinking beer.

Foods such as green and red peppers (chili, cayenne, serano, habanera), protein rich foods, beets, mustard, cucumbers, celery, garlic and green tea are effective helping people with low metabolism. It is recommended that you snack on a celery stick or any of the foods mentioned in between meals to keep your metabolism occupied.

Don't skip breakfast. As much as possible, eat a healthy breakfast each morning. While you sleep, your body's metabolic rate has slowed down so for breakfast, you need to eat foods that are longer to digest so you will have more energy throughout the day. Instead of donuts, eat oats for breakfast. Ideally, you should consume about 400 calories for breakfast.

Metabolism and Thyroid

In the last decade or so, people have come to know more about the problem of thyroid deficiency and how widespread it is. Hypothyroidism, which occurs when the body is not producing enough thyroid hormone, is responsible for a whole host of symptoms, including low metabolism.

Some people with thyroid problems have very obvious symptoms, while others do not. There is such a range of possible symptoms that many other ailments may be tested for first before levels of thyroid hormone are checked. Some of the other symptoms people with hypothyroidism might include:

• Weight gain
• Anemia
• Muscle cramps and joint pain
• Fatigue
• Depression
• Migraines
• Impaired memory
• Increased sensitivity to heat and cold
• Paleness
• Brittle fingernails

A blood test can determine if someone has a thyroid problem, and there are several different treatments that should make this cause of low metabolism relatively easy to tackle.

Other Causes of Low Metabolism

Of course not everyone who has a low metabolism has a thyroid problem. The fact is, most people’s metabolisms decrease as they age There are all sorts of reasons for this, some of which are beyond our control. But there are some things you may do that can be the cause of low metabolism, so changing your behavior may change the way you feel.

Diet

One of the biggest factors in metabolism is actually what we eat. If you’re fasting or on a very low-calorie diet, odds are you have slowed down your metabolism to the point that you still aren’t losing a lot of weight even though you’re miserable from not eating.

The body needs nutrients and calories in order to work properly, and a lot of research seems to indicate that eating more often is better than eating only a couple of meals a day. That’s because it takes energy (calories) to digest and process food, and it keeps blood sugar levels more even when you eat regularly, which also keeps you feeling full.

Not only does how often you eat make a difference, what you eat can have an impact. Lots of high-sugar foods can mess with your metabolism because of the fluctuation of blood sugar. There are also foods that increase metabolism that should be consumed more often.

Water

Drinking enough water is important for a lot of reasons, but not being properly hydrated can really slow your metabolism. Most of the body’s functions, including digestion and metabolism, require water. If you’re not getting enough, your body can’t function at its peak.

It’s easy to start drinking more water if you make a habit of carrying a bottle or mug of water with you through the day. Replace sugary sodas with water and you’ll be doing your body even more of a favor.

Exercise

When your body is in good shape, everything works better. Having more muscle raises your body’s resting metabolic rate, or the number of calories burned just through regular function of the body.

A regular regimen of weight training can allow you to burn around 100 more calories each day. That may not sound like much, but if all other things remain equal that would lead to a weight loss of about 10 pounds in a year.

Stress

Stress may also play a role in decreasing metabolism because when the body is stressed, systems start working less efficiently. Also, people tend to overeat, eat the wrong things and not exercise when they are stressed, so it all goes together.

Ways to Improve Metabolism

• Drink more water.
• Eat smaller, more frequent meals.
• Cut back on sugary foods and beverages.
• Try to exercise at least 30 minutes a day most days of the week.
• Do some weight training if you’re not doing so already.
• Try to cut some stress from your life or learn better ways to handle it.
• If something still seems wrong, check with your doctor about getting your thyroid tested.

• It is advisable to eat smaller meals at frequent intervals, rather than eating a full meal on your fixed timings. This will help in increasing your rate of metabolism.
• Introduce a cut in your sugar intake. Regulating your consumption of beverages and other sugary stuff will be of great help in speeding up your metabolic rate.
• Try to do some form of workouts on an everyday basis, to pump up your metabolism. Daily exercise of minimum 30 minutes is the key to maintaining a speedy metabolism throughout the day.
• Undertaking some weight training is also highly beneficial.
• Try to keep yourself stress free and seek ways to lead a more healthy and relaxed life.
• Drink plenty of water, not just to cure slow metabolism, but also for keeping your body hydrated for the entire day.
• If nothing seems to be working, consult a physician and get a thyroid test done at the earliest.