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Overcoming Obesity

David Hamm — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 19:42:35 +0000

5 Key Questions About Weight Loss

By Alice Park
With all the studies, surveys, diets and weight-loss claims pummeling you with advice everywhere you turn, it’s no wonder that so many myths and misperceptions about weight loss persist. To help clarify the fact from fiction, TIME put a few pressing questions to the experts.

Why doesn’t exercise help you lose weight?

This is a controversial issue that researchers are still debating. It’s true that as people start exercising, they may not lose weight because they tend to eat more to compensate for increased hunger, or as a reward for working out. It’s also true that with exercise, people lose fat but gain muscle, which is heavier than fat. But it’s not necessarily true that exercise doesn’t help you lose weight.

It’s worth noting that weight loss does not depend on exercise alone. Weight loss happens only when you take in fewer calories than you burn. And people are notoriously good at miscalculating how many calories they sweat off at the gym. Think an hour on the treadmill can work off an entire chocolate cake’s worth of calories? Not even close — 60 minutes of running barely accounts for a single slice.

Exercise clearly doesn’t guarantee weight loss, but it’s a pretty reliable route to good health — exercise buoys mood, keeps your brain sharp and lowers your risk of chronic disease. But just remember that to drop pounds, it takes a lot of time and sweat to burn calories, plus equal effort to reduce the amount of calories you eat.

Which is better for my health — more frequent sessions of moderate activity or fewer bouts of intense exercise?

There’s no right or wrong way to exercise, say obesity experts. How much you should move depends on what your goals are — to stay healthy or to lose weight — and what level of physical fitness you’re starting with.

If you are currently sedentary or get very little exercise, for example, most fitness professionals advise starting slow. Rather than focusing on the amount of activity you do, just focus on doing something. That can include walking for even a few minutes a day; studies show that sedentary women who began walking 10 minutes a day saw benefits in heart health. “There are such huge returns on the investment of just getting off the couch,” says Dr. Tim Church, director of preventive medicine research at Pennington Biomedical Research Center.

The point is to avoid being sedentary. Some exercise is better than none, and most people should stay as physically active as their bodies allow, ideally exercising every day. Check out the U.S. Department of Heath & Human Services’ Physical Activity Guidelines for solid activity advice by age group.

Why does it get harder to lose weight the older I get?

Age is a major contributor to weight gain, for many reasons. With each passing year, adults lose more muscle mass, the biggest consumers of calories we have. That’s why resistance training — working out with weights to build muscle — is important, even for aging adults. Strong muscles help keep excess pounds off, and lower the risk of dangerous falls.

Another reason weight loss gets harder with age is that the body’s metabolism slows down, as cells and organs begin showing the wear and tear of years of faithful service and get less efficient at consuming calories. Starting regular exercise in childhood — though it’s never too late to start — is a pretty good way to keep the body running more efficiently later in life.

And, finally, don’t forget the social factors that make weight gain easier in adulthood. In midlife, people are more likely to be able to afford more and richer foods than they could in their younger days. They’re also less likely to have as much time for physical activity because of job and family pressures, and they’re also more likely to give up walking or biking for more comfortable modes of transportation, like driving.

Can diet sodas actually make you gain weight?

Diet soda contains fewer, or no, calories compared with the sugared versions, but recent studies have shown that people who drink diet soda tend to gain more weight than those who drink regular soda.

The reason may be that the brain can’t be fooled by the artificial sweeteners found in many diet drinks and foods. While the sweet taste of diet soda may satisfy the palate, the body feels swindled out of the calorie rush it was expecting. That may only whet the appetite, encouraging diet-soda-consumers to seek out sugar from other sources, or alter their metabolism as if they had actually consumed the sugar — both of which may lead to weight gain.

Another reason may involve the amped up sweetness of artificial sugars, which are 100 times sweeter than natural sugar. It’s possible that people who eat a lot of artificially sugared foods become so accustomed to intense levels of sweet that their palates can no longer appreciate natural flavors, of fruit or other foods. Since natural foods are more nutritious than artificially processed alternatives, people may start to choose less healthy foods overall.

The evidence is still coming in, but it’s an area of intense research to figure out how our bodies react to the mismatch between artificially sweetened taste and the absence of corresponding calories.

Why is it so hard to lose those last five to 10 pounds?

The bigger you are, the easier it is to lose weight. When an obese, sedentary person starts a new exercise and diet program, those first few pounds will melt off pretty quickly. That’s because bigger people have a higher metabolic rate than smaller people, which means their bodies are faster to use up calories they eat. “Think of yourself as a big furnace chewing up calories,” says Pennington’s Church. “The bigger you are, the more cells you have in your body, and the more cells you have using energy. A very large person has a pretty high resting metabolism, or can burn a lot of calories a day just by existing.”

But as people continue to lose weight and shrink the number of cells they have, their metabolism slows down to match their reduced size — if it didn’t, they would be burning off way too many calories compared to what they take in. (Which wouldn’t be a bad thing from a weight loss perspective, but running a constant deficit and having always-hungry cells takes an unhealthy toll on tissues and organs that work overtime to survive.)

So as the weight comes off, you have to work harder to burn the same amount of calories. You may have started off walking 30 minutes a day, for instance, but that activity is no longer enough to push your body to eat up extra calories. Now, you might need to walk for 60 minutes or start running for 30 minutes instead.

Source

With all the studies, surveys, diets and weight-loss claims pummeling you with advice everywhere you turn, it’s no wonder that so many myths and misperceptions about weight loss persist. To help clarify the fact from fiction, TIME put a few pressing questions to the experts.

Why doesn’t exercise help you lose weight?

Which is better for my health — more frequent sessions of moderate activity or fewer bouts of intense exercise?

If you are currently sedentary or get very little exercise, for example, most fitness professionals advise starting slow. Rather than focusing on the amount of activity you do, just focus on doing something. That can include walking for even a few minutes a day; studies show that sedentary women who began walking 10 minutes a day saw benefits in heart health. “There are such huge returns on the investment of just getting off the couch,” says Dr. Tim Church, director of preventive medicine research at Pennington Biomedical Research Center.

Why does it get harder to lose weight the older I get?

Can diet sodas actually make you gain weight?

Diet soda contains fewer, or no, calories compared with the sugared versions, but recent studies have shown that people who drink diet soda tend to gain more weight than those who drink regular soda.

Why is it so hard to lose those last five to 10 pounds?

Stretching for the perfect body?

David Hamm — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 06:59:19 +0000

by KALPANA SHARMA(TOI)

A recent study has claimed that stretching before a work-out is not of any use. While gym instructors make it a mandatory cycle to stretch body parts before exercising, this study has raised some serious doubts.

As a rule people stretch before initiating strenuous exercises. But, if this study is to be believed, can we now do away with stretching? Fitness experts totally refute the claim and instead lay a lot of emphasis on stretching. Celebrity fitness guru Leena Mogre claims, “Stretching gets important with age. It is important to first loosen up the muscles before stressing them out.”

But to many fitness freaks, this news comes as a breather. Says Ritesh Sharma, “My fitness goal is to build muscles, but stretching and my warm-up routine eats up a lot of my exercise time. I literally drag myself through it. Infact my trainer never lets me pump weights before making me do stretching and cardio for at least 20 minutes.”

Fitness expert Deanne Pandey opines, “Nothing is bigger than nature’s own signs. Every morning when you wake up, before getting off the bed you stretch and it makes you feel better. This is the simple logic that applies to work-outs as well. You have to stretch yourself, so there is blood flow minimizing chances of injury.”

Not only is stretching beneficial in avoiding injury, but also helps in losing weight. Power yoga instructor Dinesh Dagar says, “I totally disagree with the study. Power yoga is all about stretching your body parts, which ultimately leads to flexibility and strength building. And I have many students who lost weight just be doing power yoga thrice a day.”

So what is the right way to kick start a work-out regime? Deanne advises, “There are two elements involved. One is warm-up and the other is dynamic stretching. Warm-up includes treadmill, cycling, spot jogging, skipping or any other movement, while dynamic stretching involves rotation and static stretches. It lubricates the joints and reduces the chance of injury or muscle pull.”

Here are few stretching tips that you can follow:

1. Hold every stretch for 15-30 seconds

2. Do not hold your breath while stretching. You must breathe in and out slowly. Take deeper breaths

3. Whenever your muscles feel tight, you must stretch. Even if it means doing it during the workout.

4. If you are feeling pain while stretching a body part, do not over stress. Stretch as much is comfortable and gradually you will see improvement

So, till the time researchers are able to truly validate their claims, keep stretching!

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Weight-Loss Tips You’ve Never Heard Before

David Hamm — Tue, 12 May 2009 05:16:10 +0000

Avoid snacking when you get home from work by distracting yourself for at least 15 minutes. As if you needed an excuse to hop on Facebook.
Instead of guzzling several high-cal drinks when you’re out for a cocktail, order one strong drink with hardly any mixer that you’ll nurse all night long. (Like a tequila with a splash of orange juice. That has about 100 calories, versus a few frozen margs at about 250 calories a pop).
Eat before you overeat. If you’ve been banking calories all day long, saving up for dinner out, you could go gangbusters. Have a snack (try to keep it under 200 calories) like string cheese, a non-fat yogurt, or a soup, and you’ll eat less at dinner.
Sleep enough. Getting fewer than seven hours of sleep over several nights causes your cortisol, a stress and appetite-inducing hormone, to jump. Cut caffeine after 2:30, and avoid booze within three hours of bedtime.

Weight-loss surgery boosts sex life

David Hamm — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 05:12:08 +0000

Does weight-loss surgery boost a patient’s sex life or libido? Yes, it does, especially when he is suffering from obesity-related erectile dysfunction or ED.
Obese men with ED have low levels of testosterone, and lower still if their girth is greater. Excess abdominal fat, cardiovascular disease, high blood lipids and type-2 diabetes have been associated with ED.

“This is a landmark study that shows sexual health is clearly linked to overall health,” said Irwin Goldstein, who directs the sexual medicine programme at San Diego’s Alvarado Hospital.

However, similar benefits are not as clear for women. Obese women do report more sexual impairment than obese men. Published studies indicate this may be more related to low self-esteem, unsatisfactory relationships, social stigma, and other psychological issues.

“A woman’s libido can be affected by many factors, such as the stress of caring for a sick relative,” Goldstein said. “There is no evidence yet to indicate that weight-loss surgery automatically makes sex better.”

He said when it comes to sexual activity, body size doesn’t always matter. Thin, healthy people may be perceived as having the best body image and sexual function, but that is not always the case.

“There are plenty of sexually active heavy people and sexually inactive thin people,” Goldstein said. “I see them everyday in my practice.”

Then there’s the new reflection in the mirror. A weight loss of 100 pounds or more may leave folds of excess skin. Plastic surgery is effective, but it is costly and not always covered by health insurance.

Psychologist Lisa Steres, who provides counselling for bariatric (removal of fat) surgery patients at Alvarado Hospital, says it can take years for a patient’s brain to catch up with the new body, said an Alvarado Hospital release.

“Body image greatly impacts libido, particularly in women,” Steres said. “Young women typically have better body image, and some women are sexually confident at any size.”

These findings were recently published in The Journal of Sexual Medicine.

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Weight-loss surgery cuts diabetes risk, us fertility

David Hamm — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 05:33:56 +0000

For people considering weight loss surgery, the operation can offer significant health benefits ranging from reversal of Type 2 diabetes to
Weight-loss surgery
Weight-loss surgery cuts diabetes risk, improves fertility (Getty Images)
improving fertility and increasing an individual’s lifespan, says an expert.

Dr Nick Nicholson, weight loss surgeon on the medical staff at Baylor Regional Medical Centre at Plano revealed how the surgery can actually improve certain health conditions.

“Because obesity is the primary risk factor for Type 2 diabetes, weight-loss surgery can have a profound impact on the condition,” said Dr. Nicholson.

A study showed that 82 percent reversed their diabetes in less than two years, and 62 percent remained of patients who had weight-loss surgery diabetes free two years following surgery.

The surgery can also improve fertility. Although most obese women are not infertile, ovulatory functions and pregnancy rates frequently improve significantly after weight loss in obese women.

Another study showed that hypertension was eliminated in 61.7 percent of weight-loss surgery patients and significantly improved in 78.5 percent of patients. Weight-loss surgery can also ease the pain caused by the stress of extra weight on joints;

A 2004 study showed the number of painful joints and other painful areas reported by the obese adults in the study was cut in half six to 12 months after weight-loss surgery.

“Partnered with improved quality of life, the medical benefits of weight-loss surgery can’t be taken lightly; the surgery can truly lead to greater physical and emotional health and wellness,” said Dr. Nicholson.

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Want a hot body and tight booty?

David Hamm — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 09:01:50 +0000

by Carol Bardelli (www.examiner.com)

What makes a body sexy? What gets your booty tight? Whether you’re male or female the answer is the same. Lean muscle and low body fat equals sexy.

How do you get a great body? Resistance training builds the body you crave. It’s a simple fact few people grasp. Just watch The Biggest Loser. If you want to burn body fat and look sleek and sexy afterwards you must build muscle. Muscle plays a key role in having a fast metabolism. It’s also what makes your body look sexy and firm. And you’ll lose fat fast. See videos below.

Weight loss diets alone don’t work. Proper diet and resistance workouts do work. The goal of resistance training, be it working out with body weight (calisthenics and isometrics), free weights, resistance bands, or machines, is to build muscle. Ladies and gentlemen, don’t be afraid to do a little resistance training to get the body you really want. As little as ten minutes a day will transforn your body. Check out Tony Horton’s 10 Minute Trainer.

The key principles to bodybuilding or resistance training (the do’s) are straightforward: stimulate muscle adequately to make them grow (micro tearing called hyperplasia), supply muscles with adequate nutrition and sleep to rebuild (grow bigger), exercise aerobically to flush out lactic acid from muscles and to aid fat burning, avoid and cope with stress to prevent cortisol release, and having the ability to exercise mental and spiritual toughness to get through challenging workouts.

Factors that influence your results:

1. Resistance Workouts

2. Diet and Nutrition including supplementing

3. Aerobics

4. Sleep

5. Stress

6. Mind and spirit

7. Genetics

Today I’ll cover number 1: Resistance Workouts

The don’ts of resistance workouts are as straightforward as the do’s, but the don’ts are all too common among beginners and long time exercisers who have failed to change their body composition.

Not lifting heavy enough is the biggest don’t. Women are the guiltiest of this but I’ve personally encountered men who have failed to meet their mass goals because they don’t train hard enough to stimulate muscle. If you can lift a weight easily beyond 8-12 repetitions you will NOT stimulate growth. Unless you’re practicing a training change-up for a few weeks such as higher reps, if you regularly lift too light you will impede your progress. Less is more is you lift heavy enough of a weight or use a challenging resistance band.

Working the same body parts too often is even worse. Muscle requires stimulation to grow, then adequate protein and calories, then REST. Muscles do not grow during workouts, they grow during rest. If you stimulate a muscle too often without allowing it adequate rest it will BREAK DOWN.

Proper weight lifting / resistance training protocols are available in any weight lifting book and many reliable websites like Bodybuilding.com.

A typical beginner workout looks like this:

Monday – Upper Body (Chest, Back, Biceps, Triceps, Shoulders

Thursday – Lower Body (Legs, Abs)

Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday – Cardio for weight loss or rest for those not trying to lose body fat.

A typical intermediate workout schedule looks like this:

Monday – Legs

Tuesday – Biceps, Triceps, Shoulders

Thursday – Chest and Back (Your biceps, triceps and shoulders are worked again)

Saturday – Abs and Lagging Body Part (Any One Of The Above)

Wednesday, Friday – Cardio or rest.

Advanced or professional schedule

Monday – Chest, Shoulders and Triceps

Tuesday – Legs

Wednesday – Back and Biceps

Thursday – Rest

Friday – Two lagging body parts like Chest and Back, or Legs and Shoulders, or Back and Biceps, etc.

Notice that in all these schedules REST IS BUILT IN. No one can work the same body parts two days in a row and expect results. The human body is not designed to build muscle mass in a situation where it is OVERSTRESSED regularly.

Be bodybuilding smart, rest each body part between workouts. If you’re older you may find you results are better with two days of rest between working a body part again.

And of course, there’s always an exception to the rule. Some advanced and pro bodybuilders occassionally use over training – called a back cycle or back cycling – for brief periods of three weeks or less to shock their bodies. This should be done with extreme care and is not recommended for beginners.

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Principles for healthy weight management

David Hamm — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 08:17:44 +0000

Tired of fad diets that shed the pounds quickly but leave you feeling deprived? Ready to lose weight the safe and healthy way? Get off to a great start with these basic principles for healthy weight management.

♦ Decrease your calorie intake: Losing weight may seem complicated, but it really comes down down to this: take in fewer calories than your body burns every day. So to lose weight, we must create a negative calorie balance, or calorie deficit. In other words, the amount of calories we consume from food and beverages must be less than the amount of calories we use to exercise and to function in everyday life. Although you can obtain a calorie deficit by increasing your activity, most attain it by altering what they eat. For optimal results, eating fewer calories in combination with increasing activity can make a big difference in both weight loss and weight maintenance.

As a reference, 3500 calories equals one pound. So if you reduce your calorie intake by 500 calories or create a 500 calorie deficit per day for one week, you should lose one pound. The American Dietetic Association (ADA) recommends losing no more than 1 to 2 pounds per week to ensure that any weight lost is not lean body mass but fat mass.

♦ Monitor your portions/servings: Confused about what an adequate portion of food is? It’s not surprising given the “super-sized” menus available in many fast-food restaurants. When we are served larger portions, we tend to eat more. Studies have shown that people consume 30% more food when offered a larger portion, even though they were just as satisfied with a smaller portion. Check out the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Pyramid Guide for more details on recommended servings.

♦ Keep a food journal: More than enough research has shown that those who monitor their food intake are more successful with lifestyle change. Keeping a record of the foods you eat can help make you aware of your calorie consumption so you can reduce it; many find it helpful to record the amount of calories that they consume in the first few weeks of a weight loss program. If your budget will not allow for the assistance of a registered dietitian, then a great online resource is MyDailyPlate.com.

♦ Focus on body composition: A typical bathroom scale is not the best way to measure weight loss; it merely indicates the number of pounds, which does not clarify what those pounds are: fat or muscle. Furthermore, a scale often shows mere shifts in water retention, which are temporary and do not reflect changes in one’s amount of body fat. The best way to get an accurate picture is to measure your body fat percentage. One of the more popular methods to measure body fat is with skin calipers, a method considered easy and accurate when performed correctly. Ask a personal trainer at your gym or other reputable fitness professional to assist you.

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Calcium Helps To Lose Weight

David Hamm — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 05:00:20 +0000

Forget forcing yourself into gruelling exercise regime to shed those extra pounds, for a diet rich in calcium is more than enough to spur weight loss, say researchers.

A research team led by Angelo Tremblay from Universite Laval’s Faculty of Medicine boosting calcium intake can aid in losing weight, but only in people whose diets are calcium deficient.

During the study, the team conducted a 15-week weight loss program
on obese women.

The participants consumed on average less than 600 mg of calcium per day, whereas recommended daily intake is 1000 mg. In addition to following a low calorie diet, the women were instructed to take two tablets a day containing either a total of 1200 mg of calcium or a placebo.

The researchers found that those who took the calcium tablets lost nearly 6 kg over the course of the program, compared to 1 kg for women in the control group.

“Our hypothesis is that the brain can detect the lack of calcium and seeks to compensate by spurring food intake, which obviously works against the goals of any weight loss program,” said Tremblay, holder of the Canada Research Chair in Environment and Energy Balance.

“Sufficient calcium intake seems to stifle the desire to eat more,” he added.

Therefore, it is important to consume sufficient calcium to ensure the success of any weight loss program.

In previous studies Tremblay has shown that women who consumed diets poor in calcium had more body fat, bigger waistlines, and higher bad cholesterol levels than those who consumed moderate or large amounts of calcium.

In another study, researchers showed that the more people reduced their consumption of dairy products over the six-year period examined, the more weight and body fat they gained and the bigger their waistlines grew.

The study is published in the British Journal of Nutrition.

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Xenical shows positive weight loss results for teenagers

Laura Reigel — Tue, 05 Sep 2006 09:58:30 +0000

New data for obesity drug Xenical (Orlistat) showed that the treatment caused significantly higher weight loss in adolescents than placebo.These data were presented at the International Congress on Obesity (ICO) in Sydney, Australia.

Obesity is the most prevalent nutritional disorder among children and adolescents in the majority of developed countries.

Childhood obesity also results in an increased risk of health problems and mortality in adulthood.

According to the data of the one-year study presented, treatment of Xenical led to overall better results in adolescents that initially responded faster to the treatment.

Source Know More about Xenical Buy Xenical online Save 20%

Kirstie..from TV hottie to Fat Actress and back again

Michelle Miller — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 08:50:51 +0000

BLONDE, beautiful and with a body to die for, actress Kirstie Alley looks like a new woman.

The former Cheers star who fought a very public battle with the bulge is proudly showing off her curves after losing a staggering 5st 5lb.

The 55-year-old once tipped the scales at 15st 6lb.

But today, she’s celebrating the return of the slim self that shot her to fame as sexy Rebecca Howe in the hit sitcom.

Kirstie now weighs 10st 3lb and has promised to appear on the The Oprah Winfrey Show wearing only a bikini.

She’s thrilled after beating her original weight-loss goal by 15lbs – and she puts her success down to the Jenny Craig diet she has followed for the past two years.

Kirstie says: "I would like to look the best I could. That means kicking myself in the a** and working out constantly. "

After struggling for years with her ballooning weight, Kirstie was starring in a show called Fat Actress that poked fun at her size when she signed up with the Jenny Craig weight loss programme.

It combined a healthy diet with pilates, yoga and strength work.

Her personal trainer Tania Azar said: "It’s a very well-rounded programme.

"She can eat the things she really wants and, at the same time, modify and have healthy eating habits and encourage activity at the same time."

Kirstie writes a diary which is regularly posted on the internet telling of her bittersweet battle with calories.

Her career has been dominated by pressure over her size. She first hit problems during her time on Cheers when she was called in to an executive’s office and told to lose weight.

When she starred in her own series, Veronica’s Closet, Kirstie was again warned to drop some dress sizes.

Ignoring the advice in image-conscious Hollywood eventually did her out of a job on TV altogether.

Instead she was captured in unflattering shots in gossip magazines, eating doughnuts and crisps in her car.

Kirstie said: "I was never comfortable with being fat, but I was just tired of the effort of being thin so I said, ‘Screw it’."

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