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"  What woman hasn&amp;#039;t complained, &amp;quot;My metabolism is sooo slow!&amp;quot; Or sworn, &amp;quot;My metabolism was sooo much faster before I turned 30.&amp;quot; We blame metabolism for our jean size, for the fact that we can&amp;#039;t eat (or drink) the way we used to without putting on pounds, and for the fact that all that working out just doesn&amp;#039;t seem to work. Most of all, we feel doomed to muddle through with the metabolism we&amp;#039;ve got. But raise your hand if you can explain what the M word even means. Anyone? Anyone? Here&amp;#039;s the deal: Yes, your metabolism affects your size, and the faster your personal motor runs, the more calories you&amp;#039;ll burn. But the truth is, a slow metabolism isn&amp;#039;t the real reason you&amp;#039;re packing on pounds. You are the reason. It&amp;#039;s what you do \u2014 or don&amp;#039;t do \u2014 with your body&amp;#039;s calorie-burning machine that will determine whether you&amp;#039;ll fit into those high-school jeans or not. Yes, it can be irritating that we have only ourselves to blame, but the good news is, that means you are in control of your weight. Once you understand what metabolism is and how it works, you&amp;#039;ll need to make only a few simple changes to make the most of yours \u2014 and to achieve a healthy weight you can maintain. Here are all the burning facts you need to know about that mysterious calorie-burner we call metabolism. Metabolism fuels your body using calories you&amp;#039;ve eaten. You probably associate the word metabolism with weight gain and loss, but it&amp;#039;s really a name for the process by which your body converts food into fuel. Even at rest, your body needs energy \u2014 in the form of calories you&amp;#039;ve eaten \u2014 for basic functions such as circulating blood, breathing, and growing and repairing cells. Up to 75 percent of the calories you take in every day go toward this resting metabolic rate, or RMR (sometimes called basal metabolic rate, or BMR). The remainder gives you the fuel you need for daily activities and helps with digestion. (Yes, the mere act of processing foods burns calories!) Most women need 1,200 calories a day to support their RMRs, plus 200 to 400 extra calories for daily activities (and even more if you exercise regularly). Unfortunately, whatever surplus your body can&amp;#039;t use ends up stored as junk in your trunk (or thighs or belly). &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s simply a matter of intake versus output,&amp;quot; says cardiologist Joseph Klapper, M.D., author of The Complete Idiot&amp;#039;s Guide to Metabolism. &amp;quot;Consume more calories than your metabolism needs, and you&amp;#039;ll gain weight.&amp;quot; Muscles boost your metabolism (and your ability to burn calories). Many women avoid weight training because they&amp;#039;re afraid of bulking up. But a little heavy lifting is actually your number-one key to calorie burn: The more lean muscle you have on your body, the faster your metabolism, the more calories you&amp;#039;ll burn, and the slimmer and trimmer you&amp;#039;ll look. That&amp;#039;s because even when your muscles are at rest, they still require three times more energy than fat for tissue maintenance and rebuilding. &amp;quot;The only way to keep up your metabolic rate is by building muscle through physical activity and strength-training,&amp;quot; says David Heber, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Center for Human Nutrition at the University of California \u2014 Los Angeles and author of The L.A. Shape Diet. Studies suggest that women can naturally lose up to 15 percent of their muscle mass before age 50. Women who weight-train three days a week, on the other hand, can gain nearly three pounds of fat-free muscle mass in six months. For the optimum metabolic burn, experts suggest getting at least 30 minutes of cardiovascular activity most days of the week and doing strength training twice a week. This doesn&amp;#039;t mean you have to join a gym, or even that you have to do a straight half-hour of cardio. You can do weight-bearing exercises like push-ups and sit-ups and use inexpensive elastic resistance bands at home. Even everyday activities like walking, stepping onto the stairs (instead of the elevator), and gardening count toward your 30 minutes of aerobic exercise. &amp;quot;You can even squeeze in activity in 10-minute spurts throughout the day to see benefits,&amp;quot; Heber says.  Chances are, you don&amp;#039;t have a medical condition that&amp;#039;s slowing your metabolism. Some women do suffer from hypothyroidism (or underactive thyroid disease), a condition that meddles with all of the chemical reactions in your body, including your metabolism, and can lead to weight gain, among other symptoms. Less than 12 percent of the population has the full-blown disorder, though. A slower metabolism and subsequent weight gain can also be symptoms of Cushing&amp;#039;s disease, a condition that occurs when your body produces too much of the stress hormone cortisol \u2014 and which affects 10 to 15 million people in the United States each year. It is true that certain medications for depression, bipolar disorder, and other mental illnesses can put the brakes on your metabolic rate, but experts stress that for the vast majority of us, it&amp;#039;s our lifestyle choices \u2014 how much we eat, how little we move \u2014 that are to blame for turtle-like metabolisms and unwanted pounds.  Just because you&amp;#039;re overweight doesn&amp;#039;t mean you have a slow metabolism \u2014 and your slim friends don&amp;#039;t necessarily have fast ones. The relationship between your weight and your metabolism is a complicated one. You might presume that the larger your size, the slower your metabolism, yet overweight people tend to burn through calories more quickly because their muscles have to work harder to move those extra pounds. Of course, if you&amp;#039;re more sedentary (as many overweight people are), you aren&amp;#039;t engaging your muscles much, so your calorie expenditure is still low. On the flip side, when you lose weight, your metabolism doesn&amp;#039;t speed up \u2014 in fact, it slows. It&amp;#039;s not fair, we know, but your metabolic rate drops when you drop pounds because your body now needs fewer calories to function. A loss of up to 20 pounds can reduce your RMR by up to 70 calories per day, but don&amp;#039;t despair. &amp;quot;A woman eating 1,500 calories a day only needs to cut 150 calories from her daily diet or walk some extra steps to compensate for the change in her metabolic rate,&amp;quot; says Heber. What you don&amp;#039;t want to do is drastically cut your calories to below 1,200. &amp;quot;A body in self-starvation mode holds on to calories \u2014 so you&amp;#039;re actually hurting, not helping, your metabolic rate,&amp;quot; says Amy Jamieson-Petonic, R.D., spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association. Not to mention, there&amp;#039;s no way your body can get all the nutrition it needs on such a severe diet. Men have faster metabolisms, so they lose weight more easily.  It&amp;#039;s hard not to hate your husband when he eats foot-long subs every day and drops five pounds while you chew on nothing but lettuce and lose only one. But when it comes to metabolism, men have it made. &amp;quot;Men naturally have more lean muscle, so their metabolic rates run about 10 percent faster than women&amp;#039;s,&amp;quot; says Liz Applegate, Ph.D., director of sports nutrition at the University of California \u2014 Davis. Women&amp;#039;s bodies, on the other hand, are designed to hold on to body fat to nurture and grow babies. Our hormones might also play a role: A 2006 study from the University of Missouri \u2014 Columbia suggests that metabolism slows as estrogen levels drop, resulting in post-menopausal muscle-mass loss and weight gain. Still, this metabolic slow-down isn&amp;#039;t a given, Applegate says. &amp;quot;You won&amp;#039;t build muscle and burn calories by watching your kids play sports. You need to be active too, or your metabolic rate will take a hit.&amp;quot; What you eat does affect your metabolism. Your body uses slightly more energy to digest protein, but loading up on eggs, yogurt, and steak isn&amp;#039;t the key to long-term weight-loss success. &amp;quot;You need carbohydrates and fat for energy too,&amp;quot; Jamieson-Petonic says. &amp;quot;Whole-grain carbs like brown rice and whole-wheat bread are more slowly metabolized by the body than refined ones found in white bread and pasta, so they keep you feeling full and energetic longer.&amp;quot; And if you want to keep that metabolic fire burning, don&amp;#039;t skip \u2014 or skimp on \u2014 breakfast. &amp;quot;Women mistakenly think they&amp;#039;re &amp;#039;saving&amp;#039; calories for later in the day, but they actually end up overeating and gaining weight,&amp;quot; notes Jamieson-Petonic. Several studies show that high-protein, high-carbohydrate breakfasts actually aid weight loss by jump-starting your metabolism and helping you feel full longer. Try yogurt as your morning meal, or eggs with fruit or oatmeal and a glass of milk. Hitting Starbucks may also help: Studies suggest that drinking three cups of caffeinated coffee revs your metabolic rate 10 percent (just stick to plain java and steer clear of the high-cal mocha lattes).  One thing your body doesn&amp;#039;t need is one of those so-called &amp;quot;metabolism-boosting&amp;quot; dietary supplements or drugs. A review of studies published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found no evidence to suggest that weight-loss supplements, including the popular chromium picolinate, actually help shed pounds; meanwhile, the FDA has banned products such as ephedra and Hydroxycut for causing dangerous side effects such as liver damage and even death. Put your money toward a gym membership or hand weights to use at home instead. In the end, your best bet for boosting your metabolism is to keep moving. It really works, and in these roller-coaster times, it&amp;#039;s at least one thing you can control!  How many calories should you eat a day? When you know how many calories your body needs for basic functions like breathing and cell repair (your resting metabolic rate, or RMR), you can more accurately determine how many calories you should consume each day to properly maintain your body&amp;#039;s functions and still lose weight. One of the most precise ways to determine your RMR is with a handheld calorimeter, which many gyms have. The device measures how much oxygen you consume when breathing (oxygen is used in the metabolic process to create energy) and provides a reading of how many calories your body requires each day. If your gym doesn&amp;#039;t have one, you can get a rough estimate of your RMR by using this formula: RMR = 655 + (4.35 x your weight in pounds) + (4.7 x your height in inches) - (4.7 x your age) Keep in mind that this equation doesn&amp;#039;t factor in lean-muscle mass, body fat, or how much you exercise \u2014 so trim, athletic people likely will need more calories a day, while overweight folks probably need fewer. For instance, someone with an RMR of 1,400 calories who burns roughly 300 calories in daily activity would need 1,700 calories a day to maintain her current weight. Slashing 15 percent of your RMR from your daily diet (so about 200 calories in this example) should trigger weight loss. From RealAge.com: Get the most nutrition from your fruits and veggies. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.redbookmag.com/body/health-fitness/advice/a5091/burn-calories-fast/>