The Christmas Dieter Issue #1- Tips to keep the weight down during the Christmas period

Comments : No Comments - February 6th,

Christmas is coming. A time of year most people love, yet the dieter hates and fears. It can be the dieters number one enemy. It is very hard on Christmas day and the surrounding weeks not to pile on pounds. If you live in an area with a colder November – January climate you will want to eat more just so your body burns food and stays warm. So are you doomed to the post X-Mas Diet or can you prevent putting on so many pounds this year?

During this feature – The Christmas Dieter – we will be looking at low fat alternatives, healthy but fun Christmas meals and snacks, and whatever other healthy festive tips we can think of.

Today we are just going to look at a few tips to minimise weight gain around Christmas.

Tips and ideas

  • Let people know you are on or still on a diet. This way they wont buy you chocolates and other tempting treats. Heck, you might get something you want off them instead! :)
  • Make your own festive foods this year! Instead of buying cookies, chocolates or mince pies make your own from low fat ingredients and alternatives. You can make them look very festive and impress everyone you offer them to, too! Buy nuts without salt and dried fruit instead of chocolate covered fruit. Prepare early so you are not rushing around last minute buying loads of snack junk food
  • If weight gain is inevitable on Christmas day, fine – why not break your diet for one special day. But at the same time dont pig out just for the sake of it. Also prepare for this weight gain by losing a bit extra from now till then. Lose 3 extra pounds before christmas, then when you put it on you will still be heading for your targets
  • Go for lots of walks. There is usually something good to have a look at during this seasonal holiday. Go make the most of it.
  • If you work, find something to do with your time off. Dont just sit down or you will eat just for the sake of it. Distract yourself by sending loads of X-Mass cards or shopping for the perfect present.
  • Keep yourself and your house warm if possible. If you are cold your body will crave food.

In the upcoming issue we will look at a healthy Christmas Dinner/Lunch for you to cook.

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Weight loss support- Honest weight loss aid for ladies

Comments : No Comments - February 5th,

Write-up by Opinions On Heath, Fitness, & Weight Loss

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Diet A-Z: Detox Diet (the secret detox) – What, Why and Review

Comments : 1 Comment - January 25th,

Detoxing your body means removing lots of nasty things inside your body, such as toxins, by consuming particular foods and drinks. Differnt detoxes have differnt foods and drink you must take, and often very different results. Not everyone finds detoxing makes a huge differnce for them but for others it can make them feel like a new person.

The Secret Detox Diet (found here), makes some rather large claims, not only about what it can do but also about how bad your body is right now. With slogans such as live for longer and lose lots of fat without dieting, i thought it would be interesting to put this detox diet to the test.

How do you do the Secret Detox Diet?

Firstly you go to the page listed above and buy the doctors ebook. Its around $35 at time of writing – quite steep perhaps, but easily worth it if it lives up to its claims. But does it?

Lets quickly look at some more of its claims, as they are very interesting.

We are all fat apparently, not because we eat too much or the wrong foods, but because there are lots of parasites inside us that make us fat! Luckily a good detox likes this will wash them all out. Not the most convincing of claims to be honest, but coupled with the pictures on the site it suddenly becomes a lot more really and viable. But the truth is we all have parasites in us anyway, just they are not usually harmful as far as i know. The other statement that was of interest to me was that our bodies are lines with plague that is presumably slowly stopping blood flow and such, and slowly killing us. The detox also sees to that. Great!

Now sadly i cannot go into how to do the diet in great detail here as the information must be purchased, but i will tell you it is a natural detox – plants, herbs and that kind of thing. You only need to go on it for a matter of days but it will means a few days of huner (not starvation), or it did for me.

Results

Well a week after going on the detox i did feel better and i was down a few pounds (5 pounds). Did i lose parasites and plague along the way? Well to be honest i have no idea but i like to think i did. I will recommend this detox, but i cannot vouch for its claims even after completing it. Infact it was the weight loss and the extra energy i gained that really impressed me. Shame they didnt just concentrate on that on the main page of info. Once you are off the detox you are recommended to go back on to a healthy diet so whether the continuous weight loss was due to detoxing or going back to my healthy dieting i cant say. I do think its worth ago though, especially if you have never detoxed before!

The diet can be found HERE

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5 Reasons Why You Are Eating Too Much Food and How to Stop Yourself!

Comments : 1 Comment - January 20th,

The trouble with dieting is that you often want to eat when you don’t really need to. You get hungry because you are bored, hungry because you are eating the wrong foods, hungry because you are eating at the wrong time of the day, etc. So lets change all that by looking at why you are eating too much food and why you want to eat that much food.

1. You Are Eating The Wrong Foods

If you have your breakfast at eight and are hungry again by ten then there is a good chance you are not eating the right kind of foods in the morning. Same applies to lunch and dinner. So take a look at what you are eating! Would it count as junk food? Is it high in sugar? What you should eat more of are complex carbohydrates – foods that are hard for your body to break down. That means that it will take longer for your body to digest these foods and you will feel full the whole time that digestion process is occuring. Fiber is an excellent source of complex carbs. Most Americans eat way too little fiber and far too much sugary junk food.

If you find yourself feeling hungry all the time try adding a few of the following to your meal plans:

Brown Bread

Shredded Wheat and similar whole grain cereals

Lentils

Beans

Porridge

Pasta (brown preferably)

Potatoes

Spaghetti

Corn

Soy Milk

Onions

Apples, pears, plums, strawberries, prunes

Protein rich foods such as chicken and beef will also keep you full for quite a long time and won’t have too many calories (as long as they are not processed meats).

2. Your eating because your bored

We have all been there. ‘Hm I’m bored, maybe il go make a snack whilst i think about what i can do today..’

Its really not a good idea. Sometimes you don’t even notice yourself doing this. For a lot of people its routine. To stop you have to notice yourself doing this and then apply a lot of restrain. It really inst easy so the best thing to do is occupy yourself when you have free time. Food is not the only thing you can do for fun. Play a game, a musical instrument, watch tv or take up a new hobby. I really think eating due to boredom is up there in the top three weight gain reasons so give it the credit it deserves and avoid it.

3. Your portions are too big , your eating too fast- and whats that, your having seconds?!

It takes 10 – 15 minutes for your stomach to tell your brain that it’s full. That means that if you are one of those people that shovels food down far too quickly, you are going to be eating more than you actually want and certainly more than you need – you just don’t realize it till its too late. The key then, is to slow down your eating. This will help with digestion and means by the time you finish you will actually feel full.


4. You are eating because you are depressed

I’m not a psychologist, (In fact I’m not even sure i can spell the word correctly) but a lot of people eat because they are sad or depressed. Food, unfortunately, does have a comforting effect on most people, but it wont solve anything in the long run. If you think you are eating because you are depressed talk to someone about your problems – leave a comment and i’l try helping – but its best to talk to friends or family about your problems. I know its not as simple as you talk to someone about your problems and your no longer depressed, then hey presto you start losing weight, but it will be very hard to lose weight if you dont get your self happy. So start now with a huge smile, and from now on start each day like that too! Smile and say hello to people you pass on the street or meet on the bus. It will make both you and them feel much better!

5. You are eating at the wrong times of the day

Breakfast lunch and dinner are the three meals of the day – try not to skip any of them. Eat a proper meal for each and make sure you eat them at the right times. Alternatively try eating four smaller meals a day spread evenely throughout – its the best way of keeping your metabolism going as long as a Duracell battery and it will keep you full all day through! If you are hungry in between meals have a piece of fruit – an apple or a banana are both good choices.

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10 Rules To Follow When Trying To Lose Weight, and 10 Important Things Not To Do (Pitfalls)

Comments : 3 Comments - January 16th,

Here are some simple but very useful rules to follow then trying to lose weight. After that are 10 things you should not do and to look out for when on a diet. These are from my own experiences.

10 Things To Do

1.Eat 4 smaller meals a day

This spreads your calorie intake over more time and makes it manageable for your body. The 4 meals should add up to your usual amount of calories (for the diet you are on). Remember, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. It kick starts your metabolism – try fibre loaded breakfasts to keep yourself full or eat a couple of pieces of fruit as a healthy alternative.

2.Drink water or eat fruit when you are feeling hungry

Swap all your sweets and chocolate for fruit, or even nuts (a good source of fibre – but don’t buy salted!). If you are still hungry down a half glass of water, or just half a glass. This will suppress your appetite till your next meal. And that brings us nicely onto..

3.Drink 8 glasses of water a day

Not only will this suppress your hunger but water helps rinse out your body of all the bad stuff, such as toxins that plague it. 8 glasses is recommended, but really it depends on your build.

4.Add a little exercise to your day

I’m not talking about going for massive runs or taking up American football. What I mean is park a bit further away from work, get off the bus a step early, don’t take the lift or escalators, walk around the room on your break. Anything you can, it will all make a huge difference even though it might not seem like it at the time – and once you get used to these things they will become second nature!

5.Eat your meals slowly

It is important to eat slowly for a good reason. It takes about 5 – 10 minutes for your stomach to tell your brain that it is full. That means you could be shovelling food down for that period of time even though your full, you just don’t know it yet. So eat slowly! It will also help with your digestion if you chew your food well.

6.Cook your own meals

Supermarket microwave meals or oven box meals are out. You must buy your own food and cook it from scratch. So much rubbish goes into most of those quick meals and you have no control over it. At least when you buy and cook it all you know what’s in it! That’s good news for your health. Avoid too much salt, its bad for your blood pressure amongst other things. In fact look for a salt alternative – there are some good ones about. Whole grain foods are in, as are fresh meat, herbs spices, fish, and of course fruit and veg.

7. Eat your last meal of the day at least 3 hours before you go to bed.

You burn off calories buy moving, thinking, watching and using, but not by sleeping. Eat a big meal then go to sleep and you are just asking for weight to pile on.

8.Weigh yourself everyday.

This is not to see a pound fly off every day (as that wont happen), it is for motivation. See what you weigh and then think of what you want to weigh and want to look like. Invest in digital scales if you like, then you can see just the slightest change. If you did put on weight analyse what you did wrong (if anything) and adjust your diet so this doesn’t happen again in the future.

9.Keep a journal of your food eaten and exercise taken

There are some great free food journals on-line, such as fitday, where you will put down everything you have eaten, drunk and all the exercise you have done during a day. Then it will work out the calories you have eaten and the calories you have burned and generate stats and graphs for you to gaze at. Again, adjust if you see something not going according to plan. It is easy to find and eliminate what you are doing wrong this way.

10 Stick with your diet

This is the most important thing to do. A diet is a lifestyle change. You are not trying to look good or be healthy for the next 10 months. You are trying to change how you live life, you are trying to look good for ever, to live for longer. Stick with it. It will work.

10 Things Not To Do

1.Don’t put off starting your diet for another day.

We all love to make excuses. This time its your health we are concerned with. Forget tonight’s gorge, tonight ice cream or chocolate. Start right now! Go on!

2.Don’t think binge eating just this once is OK, and that you will never do it again.

Iv been there, iv eaten a lot and said I will make up for it the next day. But seriously, you cant make up for it in one day. It will probably take a whole week of increased exercise or dieting to make up for a huge pizza or Chinese takeaway, and it really is not worth it. If you have to, really limit your self, or better yet, cook it yourself from fresh.

3.Don’t give in to peer pressure

It doest matter how old you are, when you are with friends its hard to resist acting like everyone else. When going out for a meal it probably means having a big main course instead of a light dish or salad. Don’t listen to your friends, do what you think is right.

4.Don’t go on yo-yo diets

On and off diets are awful for your body. The more times you do this, the less effective diets become as your body gets used to them and will eventually just shrug them off. Remember, a diet is a life style change, not 90 days on 90 days off.

5.Don’t believe the fad diet hype

Fad diets don’t tend to work in the long term, even if they make you drop 12 pounds in a week. Which they wont. They are impossible to keep up because invariably they mean ridiculous eating habits such as cabbage soup only.

6.Don’t Drink too much alcohol

All alcohol is calorie laden, even spirits that look like water (vodka). On top of that, our bodies treat alcohol as poison and need food, make you crave food, to get rid of it or help absorb it (well it doesn’t literally absorb it but it has the same effect).

7.Don’t hide the fact that you are on a diet

This is very important. Tell everyone you know you are on a diet. They will almost all be supportive. You cannot hide the fact that you are on a diet or your diet will be a failure from the get go. It is not something to be embarrassed about. Losing weight and getting healthy is something to be seriously proud about.

8.Don’t set your targets too high

Short term targets that is. Do not tell your self you are going to lose 3-4 pounds a week because you wont do that each week. You may at the start, depending on your weight and water retention, but you wont all the time. And once you don’t hit that target you might feel like giving up. Set a realistic goal, a small goal. 1 – 2 pounds a week should be your usual aim, and if you don’t hit it, that’s OK – figure out where you went wrong and get back on the bike.

9 Don’t give up!

You will lose the weight as long as you stick with it. Things will go wrong, you will break some of these rules, you will snack and gorge and feel bad. But don’t give up, get back on track, analyse your mistakes, become stronger. You will get there if you keep going. Its not easy.

10.Don’t give up!

There are two good reasons I have repeated this step. One – it is the most important rule. Two – I ran out of rules. OK, there was one good reason. But seriously don’t give up and you will get there!

When feeling down look for inspirational stories on the net, or before and after pictures. Talk to friends and family. Leave comments on my blog. If you want to take up exercise find a sport you enjoy, it is the only way you will stick with it. It doesn’t have to be the best fat burning activity, just something you take pleasure from.

OK that’s it. Good luck everyone!

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