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Blog Is Now In Podcast Format

April 24, 2008 By

Headphones.

Hi everybody just a quick note to let everybody know, that you can now listen to my blog in podcast format if you choose to do so.

You may or may not have noticed that in the far top left-hand corner there is an icon at the beginning of the post, where you can click the play button and listen to it on the site.

Or if you choose to do so you can subscribe using itunes instead. This is quite a exciting move forward for me and my blog. And is something I felt would be beneficial for people who don’t have time to read, or don’t like reading.

If you would like to subscribe by itunes here is the link if you look at the bottom one there are more options to subscribe.

itpc://podcasts.odiogo.com/weight-loss-blog/podcasts-xml.php

http://podcasts.odiogo.com/weight-loss-blog/podcasts-html.php

If you’re not really 100% sure about podcasting etc here are some links that will clear things up for you

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcast

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_podcasting

http://www.podcastalley.com/what_is_a_podcast.phpthis

Filed Under: Miscellaneous Tagged With: ,

Are the Benefits of Drinking Water Overated ?

April 23, 2008 By

benefits of drining water,drinking water,drink waterDo we really need to drink eight glasses of water a day ? This is something that has been around for quite a long time now, and being as there are quite a few splits between people, as to whether or not you need to drink lots of water a day.

I myself have seen various claims about drinking water in regard to weight loss whether they hold any substance is another matter, all the ones I’ve come across are the following.

  • Drink water before a meal this is supposed to fill your stomach with water so you eat less
  • Drink ice cold water this is supposed to speed your metabolism up because your body has to warm the water up.
  • And just drinking water itself is supposed to help you lose weight.

But that’s not the main reason for writing this post is it’s more a case of what health benefits are there to drinking water all round. No doubt those people who spend a lot of money on bottled water, which is which incidentally is very big business these days are probably going to be quite disappointed by what they may read here.

The Facts

Some scientists have been digging around to see if this theory does in fact hold any water sorry about the pun. For all the people connected with the eight glasses of water theory it has now been proven, that there is no great benefit to drinking the suggested amount of water a day.

Stanley Goldfarb who conducted the research said “there is no benefit from drinking increased amounts of water” who is a professor at the University of Pennsylvania he goes on to say “that there is no solid scientific evidence to prove the theory of drinking lots of water ”

Stanley Goldfarb wanted to get to the bottom of where the eight glasses came from he “says that it is a necessary think there is a problem with drinking the water”, but that you might not need to do it. Looking back through medical archives there didn’t seem to be any evidence and/or studies to back up the claim.

So it seems that this was something that was started and took on a life of its own a bit like an old wives tale you might say, the researchers then went on to to look at some of the myths that are associated with water.

Which are as follows.

  • Helps to flush out toxins
    within the body the only thing they found with this claim was that it could dilute toxinsbut not
    necessarily flush them out of your body.
  • Water helps your organs function better
    This claim found came up with nothing as well
  • Drinking water before a meal or water as a whole makes you feel full
    They say that in studies for some people this worked and some it did not but Goldberg says this area could do with more studies and research.
  • Helps to make your skin look better One study showed that this there may actually be more blood flow to your skin as a result of drinking water but other than that nothing else conclusive was found.
  • Prevents headaches There was only one study that was found with any real relevance to this the people that drank more water reported having less headaches but the statistics didn’t hold much reverence whatsoever.

Conclusion

So it would seem that that the people that do support drinking lots of water maybe just have an overall placebo effect, this doesn’t mean to say that you shouldn’t drink lots of water far from it but you probably don’t need to specifically drink eight glasses of water a day as you probably think that you may need to it is merely more of a personal preference than anything.

I myself used to drink lots of water each day thinking somehow that I was gaining lots of benefit from it but now I am wondering if that is the case.

What are your thoughts on this particular subject matter ? any feedback or comments would be quite interesting to read based upon your own personal experiences of drinking water.

References webmd

Related articles
Filed Under: Healthy Eating Tagged With: ,

Do Slimming Pills Help to Lose Weight

April 16, 2008 By

slimming pillsWeight loss is such a big industry these days is it any wonder that there are more slimming pills and products that are supposed to help you to lose weight the question is do any of them actually work.

Today we are going to have a look to see if there is any scientific evidence to actually back up what is claimed, by these so-called slimming pills. It will be quite interesting to see what the actual results that were found regarding this.

Here are the results of each individual slimming pill and what was said about them.

Coffee slender : This is normal everyday coffee which contains a green coffee extract which is supposed to help with boosting metabolism speed it has an active ingredient which is called Svetol,

Does it work

There was a study done which involved 50 participants who drunk the coffee to see what effect it would have those who took 400 mg a day, lost roughly about 6% of their body weight, while some others on a placebo lost 2.8%. This was quite a marginal study so really more studies need to be done to warrant its effects. This gets a overall rating of one out of five.

Lipobind : This is supposed to bind itself to your fat, the theory behind how this this works is this, vegetables and fruit do contain within them the ability to bind themselves to the fat that in your stomach, and thus stopping them being absorbed into your body.

Does it work

This product contains fibre within it called opuntia ficus indica which is supposed to have fat binding properties, tests were done in test tubes and fat was shown to bind to this particular fibre.

Even though this is supposed to be proven by certain a study which was conducted on 10 people in 1998. There still needs to be more i research to prove any real valid proof. This has a overall rating of more 0.5 out of five.


Tesco’s slimming aid : This is a herbal remedy that is offered by Tesco which contains some seaweed, dandelion and something called boldo which originally originates, from South Africa.

Does it work

One of the active ingredients of this particular product is something called fucus. In a nutshell how this works is this, fucus contains a lot of iodine, which in turn helps to stimulate your thyroid gland which is one of the mechanisms within your body which helps with the burning of fat.

There was one mediocre study that revolved fucus and some obese people one group of participants took a placebo and the others when the results were compared there was hardly any difference at all between the two groups. This has a rating of more 0.5 out of five.

Boots diet aid : This is a herbal pill that contains the ingredients fucus, and something called boldo. It’s a similar-ish to the Tesco one in quite a few ways.

Does it work

Dandelion is known for its diuretic properties which just makes you go to the toilet quite a lot, and boldo is known for having some laxative properties but that is all you can say about this actual slimming aid. This has a overall rating of 0.5 out of 5.

4.3.2.1 Shape day and night : This is a product that contains extracts of green tea, fennel and barley.

Does it work

The only known ingredient that has weight loss properties as far is this product is concerned is Green Tea, some studies were done on some obese men who drank green tea and some other participants who had a placebo instead.

The group that drank the green tea whose metabolism was measured after a three-month period, did in fact have a high metabolism speed than those who were on the placebo, a recent study in 2006 which contains some of the ingredients that are mentioned above. Did in fact exhibit some weight loss properties but the overall formal was in fact very different.

So it’s very hard to say whether or not in fact it would be possible to lose weight using the ingredients within this particular product. This particular product gained a rating of 0.5 out of five.

Slimthru : n this product has a mixture of oils palm and another one the theory behind it is it is supposed to make you fuller for a longer period of time so so you eat less.

Does it work

Eating a meal which is quite fatty would more or less have the same effect, this is supposed to have less calories than fact, but the problem is there is no evidence to say that it will work. This gained a rating of 0 out of five.

Diettrim: this comprises of merely vitamins and minerals nothing else.

Does it work

If if you’re lacking in vitamins and minerals in your diet than this will lead to cravings perhaps some minor malnutrition, but it won’t help you to lose weight losing weight is all about a reduction in calories and making sure you have a 500 cal deficit per day which are obtained through exercise and eating calorie dense foods. There is no evidence to say that vitamins and minerals alone will help you to lose weight.

Hoodia Gorgonii : This is a extract that comes from a cactus people who live in the desert use it in order to suppress hunger pangs when they go on very long trips through the desert.

Does it work

This contains something called P75 which is supposed to give your brain the full signal so you stop eating so much food or so the theory goes.This gained a rating of three out of five.

Adios: This contains more or less the same ingredients as Tesco’s slimming pills apart from one different ingredient called butternut. And as we know there was no substantial evidence to support the fact that this indeed would help to lose weight also. This gained overall rating of more 0.5 out of five.

Conclusion

My own thoughts on are this the so many people who more overweight that companies are clambering over themselves to find ways to market to this particular group of people there is only one thing that drives this sort of thing, and it’s the old there is a market so that’s it we can tap into and make some money.

Anyone can make bold claims about a particular product but whether it actually works, or not is another matter, over the say last five or six years there has been a explosion in diet books exercise equipment and a whole plethora of gadgets gizmos pills etc that are supposed to help you lose weight.

I’m afraid the reality is you don’t need any pills whatsoever, eat the right foods get plenty of exercise and you will save yourself a fortune if you actually go to the websites of these particular products, you’ll be surprised at how much they actually cost.

It’s been quite interesting reading and writing about this particular subject as I had no idea how many particular slimming pills they were on the market.

So the moral of the story is save your money and spend it on some whole some nutritious food and do plenty of cardiovascular exercise and you will be fine. It would be interesting to get some feedback on this and see if anybody reading this has tried slimming pills and if they did or did not work.

References and source

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Filed Under: Weight Loss Tagged With:

Positive End To The Week

March 30, 2008 By

think_positiveHi everybody well what a great end to a fabulous week for me and my blog, I still have to keep pinching myself to make sure that it has all happened, but it has and this is yet another great achievement myself. One of the reasons for doing this particular post is.

I am looking for some people whom will be able to give real-life accounts, of how they have lost weight or just their story.

I just want to inject some real-life situations into my blog, or if you would like to be a guest poster on my blog then please feel free to contact me, or if you have written any health-related articles which would suit my blog I would be interested to read those also and publish them for you.

If you run a health-related blog and would like some exposure, I would be more than happy to write a post and put a link back to your blog, also I am looking to interview bloggers or I would be interested in being interviewed myself.

If you yourself or anyone you know runs a health-related blog and would like to exchange links I would also be interested in talking about that as well.

I am going to digress a little bit now and just show you how my blog has grown over the past few months it wasn’t until the end of January, when I decided that I had enough of being depressed and needed to do something, things did come together slowly, eventually I don’t know if you have ever suffered from depression .

But I felt like my head been hit with a spade, it took me a while to get used to doing things again. But that is now in the past, and I have to move on to bigger and better things.

Here are my stats for the last few months so you can see how things have changed, I don’t have any problem with doing this really because, I have nothing to hide some people might not think that they are not that, fantastic compared to some peoples traffic levels but to me they are certainly better than they have ever been.

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And here is my RSS feed subscribers

FB

If you have dreams of your your own and can’t seem to get motivated, please do at least get something up it doesn’t matter, If it isn’t a great work of art, at least have a go. I wish myself that I upgraded to WordPress ages ago now, and didn’t have such a great overwhelming fear of failure, but as time has progressed, I now realise that you do have to do fail a few times, In order to succeed.

And to quote a famous British Prime Minister of ours Namely Sir Winston Churchill who said
“never never give up”.

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Filed Under: Miscellaneous Tagged With:

Blogging Is It Good for your Health ?

March 18, 2008 By

Is Blogging good for your health my thoughts

This is what computers looked like back when we first made BloggerWell based upon my own experiences of blogging, I would say that most of my experiences have been good as far as blogging is concerned. The reason for writing this post is I came across a article on Discoveries website which speaks about this very thing.

How it helps

Blogging as a medium has a social aspect to it, which means you can tend to feel less lonely in your everyday life if you don’t come into contact with other people very often, also you have freedom to express yourself in writing, this can be very therapeutic if you have something on your mind that you would like to get off your chest. Lots of people write about lots of different topics as far as blogging is concerned whether it be a health problem, or what you did today it doesn’t really matter.

Blogging as a whole can give you a sense of community very much the same as in the real world when someone leaves a comment on your blog, it can mean such a lot especially if it is a positive one, you will get negative ones but that is just the very nature of blogging. Comments as a whole are a great way to get to know other bloggers.

The study information

In the study that was conducted it was found that the participants that blogged, felt that they were more socially supported, than those who didn’t blog. The mental health of people hadn’t blogged previously were put side-by-side, to see what differences there were, the researchers messaged 600 members on my space.com, who filled out a questionnaire. They said that what they would call potential bloggers felt less satisfied as people.

They felt they had no community connection with other people and felt more isolated and therefore a lot less happier, and they were far more likely to use vented anger, as well as expressing their emotions.

When they were more inclined to become bloggers it was as if they were saying to themselves “I’m going to do this because I know it will help me”.

Two months later the potential bloggers were asked the same questions again about how they felt as people. This time round they said they found that they felt a sense of community, with other people because they were interacting with other people whom were doing the same activity as them.

Also some participants who didn’t blog but networked socially through my space felt less stressed and depressed over the two-month study period.

How blogging helped me

Well firstly when I started this blog initially it was my way of documenting my weight loss journey but now it has evolved way beyond that now, for instance when I first started trying to lose weight I used to document my weekly weigh-ins. People would come along and leave a comment, and tell you how well you were doing which is like having support in the real world, in order to help you towards your goal. Which gives you moral support very much like in the real world.

But other aspects of it are doing the research for posts you become very knowledgeable about what foods to eat, which stop cravings and leave you feeling fuller for longer, what kind of exercise will give you the best benefits. I don’t think if I would have started this blog that I would know what I do now about food nutrition etc and exercise.

Also it gives you a focus, when you’re bored you’re far more likely to eat food rather than if you are doing something ,I know it tends to work for me. I eat far less when I am writing posts than I would do if I was doing some other activity such as watching television.

Conclusion

I would say that from my point of view I would agree with everything that has been said as regards the study, it would be interesting if anyone else reading this would be able to add their own experiences by leaving a comment thus proving that the theory of this does work.

So if you have had any positive experiences from blogging then please let us know.

Source Discovery

Filed Under: Healthy Living Tagged With: , ,

How to Stop Emotional Eating

March 11, 2008 By

This particular problem does affect quite a lot of people and can prevent them from trying to lose weight, some habits in particular this one are in fact very hard to shake off and overcome.

Here are some tips that hopefully that will will be able to help you if you’re one of those people that does have a problem with emotional eating.

What causes it ?

As with any kind of addiction normally you will probably find there is a root cause behind the particular problem, it is probably fair to say that some people do realise that they are doing it while others probably don’t.

As people our whole being depends on one thing survival, now the thing with food is some foods will give more of a euphoric feeling than others do. And you will probably find this is a starting point as to what is making you do it.

As with many addictions this is purely a habit based around a learned behavior as in you eat a particular food and it makes you feel good.

This is what is behind most habits/learned behavior you can apply this model to almost anything whether it be smoking, drinking or any other overindulgence that you may have.

Something say might have happened in your past it could be way back in your childhood so far back that you might not even remember.

I mean I dare say that we all remember how good we felt when someone gave us some sweets to eat, when we were feeling a bit miserable one-day and this somehow managed to cheer us up. This how habits become formed later on in life.

Emotional eating will stop people from feeling less anxious and or distressed, eating quite a lot of food will reduce blood sugar levels which in turn reduces the uncomfortable feelings. Over eating will eventually stop the pain that the person may be suffering from.

Some ways to prevent it

This list is by no means exhaustive but you may find that some of these, methods may help you with your emotional eating however some may not, but as with everything in life there is no harm in trying. I myself have always been an advocate of trying alternative different methods to stop particular learned behavior. So here are some ways that may be able to help you with your emotional eating.

Swap Foods

Ice cream: try this instead, put a banana in the fridge with the skin off it may not taste as sweet but, is a very good healthy alternative to ice cream.

Pizza: if you’re wanting to eat pizza have a go at making your own you can buy wholemeal flour and then top it with lots of vegetables, such as green and red peppers, mushrooms, just make sure that you use low-fat cheese for the topping.

Chips: we all like chips I do especially, but have a go at trying this healthy alternative get a sweet potato and cut into thin slices so you have potato wedges, put them on a baking tray with some cooking oil brushed lightly over each side. Sweet potatoes are full of goodness and a good source of fibre and many of the nutrients.

Hamburgers: If you have a bit of a Mc-D habit then try this healthy alternative instead, buy some of your own seeded buns wholemeal ones, then add some sliced turkey with lettuce and low-fat mayonnaise.

Chocolate: Have dark chocolate instead of plain chocolate also there is a chocolate substitute that you can buy from health food shops. You can use this to make the your own chocolate treats it will probably work out cheaper as well doing this.

Sweets: This may be one of the hardest things that you might want to stop as regards emotional eating, instead of eating hard-boiled sweets, substitute these for fruit such as pears, bananas, grapes, pineapple, cherries, strawberries, peaches and nectarines.

Keep a emotional eating diary

This is an important part of realizing when and how and what is causing your problem in the first place. If you can see in black and white that you are emotionally eating and once you become aware of it,it’s far easier to stop it.

NLP methods

The swish pattern

involves visualization the way it works is this you see the person you are eating the food that you shouldn’t be eating, in a picture in your mind then what you do is in the far right-hand corner of the image, there is a small dot of a picture of you eating a healthier option, what you have to do is quickly swish from the image to the other also attach the feelings associated with the problem to how you want to feel eating the better food and attach negative feelings to the other you eating the emotional food.

If you can’t get to grips with this then go to this website where there is a audio explaining how to do it properly swish pattern.

The picture frame

As a experiment try this think about eating something that you will eat when you’re feeling emotional. For example imagine that you are eating a cake one with sugar coating on the outside think about how it would feel as you are eating it. See yourself putting it into your mouth and the feeling of the sugar as you eat it.

You will probably find that you will start to get cravings for this particular food which goes to prove that it’s a associational thing, as well as being associated with a particular emotion also.

What you need to do is this imagine the food in a picture frame and remove all the colour so it is black-and-white, at the same time remember the emotion attached to the food what you could do also is add some hair to it so that your mind would think that you are eating the hair as well.

EFT (emotional free technique)

This involves acupuncture but without using needles what you do is tap various parts of your body in order to collapse the negative feelings associated with the food, here is a diagram so you can see which points you need to tap and also a link to a site which has videos on it that you can watch in order to try this method. It’s far easier to do it this way than explain it by typing.

EFT diagram EFT site and videos

pastel-EFT-300

Hopefully there will be something in this list that will be able to help you with your emotional eating.

If you have any other suggestions then please feel free to leave a comment so people can benefit from your experience.

Filed Under: Weight Loss Tagged With:

Ten Ways to Change your Metabolism Speed

March 6, 2008 By

feels like fire1. Metabolism jump start : If you are going anywhere whether it be for a walk, or intending to do some exercise, either running or whatever is you may be doing. You can apply the following technique.

To re-jump start your metabolism, walk or run in bursts of 30 seconds. When you do this, you will take in more oxygen into your body and this will cause the cells in your body to work harder in order to burn energy more efficiently.

If you’re walking or running at a steady pace of about 3 mph, what you need to do, for it to work is change your speed to roughly 4 mph for one minute. Then go back down to the lower speed for roughly 90 seconds and repeat the process over five times.


2. Eat fish: What are the reasons for eating more fish, that are rich in omega three oils ? Studies have been done on rats whom were given, large quantities of fish were found to lose weight. And the rats that didn’t showed no change.

Good sources of omega three oil fish are salmon and tuna, or you could take a cod liver oil supplement instead. Or if you don’t like eating fish try these other alternatives instead flaxseed oil, walnuts or eggs that are high in omega three oils.


3. Do resistance training : When you’re actually working against something, and you start to build muscle this alone will enable your body to burn calories, even when you’re resting up to a hundred more over a period of time. Muscle tissue tends to be active were as fat isn’t. If you work out for 30 minutes two times per week this will speed up your metabolism overtime.


4. Drink green tea : Green tea has long been known to have very good antioxidant properties which is good for overall health. However studies have been done on people, and the participants in the studies were found to lose weight, rather than those who didn’t drink green tea. You need to drink about 5 cups a day in order to lose roughly about 90 calories per day, A small investment to lose that amount of calories.


5. Don’t do crash dieting : When people are initially trying to lose weight, you tend to think that by cutting your calories down to the bare minimum you will lose weight faster. But that isn’t so.

What you need to do is eat five to six small meals a day, rather than having three large meals. This will stop your body going into starvation mode and holding onto fat stores. Work out your basic metabolic rate (BMR) so you know how much you need to eat in order to keep your body functioning.


6. Exercise in two parts : Rather than exercising intensively for one hour or two hours and having small breaks in between, exercise for half an hour. Then do your second session later on in the day studies have shown that, you burn more fat this way than you would do, if you exercise in just one session. You will get more of a after burn effect, your body will still be burning calories in between.


7. Eat Breakfast : With the way we tend to live these days, I dare say a lot of people do tend to skip it. A ongoing study that monitored people who didn’t,and those who did eat breakfast found that over a period. Of five years that the people whom ate breakfast, lost weight and kept it off rather than than those who didn’t eat breakfast.


8. Eat snacks : Sometimes this can be frowned upon in diet and weight loss circles, but the thing is your blood sugar levels will remain constant throughout the day. This will conquer any cravings and also keep your metabolism nicely ticking over. You’ll find also that you will need less food throughout the day.


9. Lower your intake of trans fats : We all know that these fats are bad for us, but the problem is due to their odd shape, they tend to bind to fat cells, which slow your metabolism down by clogging your liver up. Which is one of the major fat burning organs within your body.


10. Eat organic fruit and vegetables : Food that has been grown without the use of pesticides, will keep your metabolism running better rather than ones that have been treated with pesticides.
Food that has been treated with pesticides puts toxins into your body which interfere with your thyroid gland. So maybe it’s time to go organic.

If you have any feedback or comments about this please feel free to leave one.

Source : health magazine

Filed Under: Exercise Tagged With: ,

How I Lost Weight

March 3, 2008 By

Steps I took

It can be quite frustrating when you’re trying to lose weight and seem to get nowhere so for all those people I decided it would be a good idea to blog about the steps I took which helped me to lose my weight things that worked things that didn’t work.

One of the first things I tried was just making a few minor changes to what I ate but the problem with this was when I thought I was eating well I wasn’t, you tend to think you are when you necessarily aren’t eating well, things I were tending to do was drinking Lucozade when I wasn’t feeling too well all this is a recipe for disaster without a doubt, drinking that is more or less like drinking pure sugar so that is one thing that had to go no more fizzy drinks full of sugar as most of them are as you’re probably aware

One particular habit I got into was eating more or less the same food every day this in itself becoming became quite boring, but also I was eating the wrong foods again as you read this you might probably see where it’s going but if not I’ll tell you anyway I used to eat jacket potatoes more or less every day now while these are quite healthy the problem is they can turn into glucose into your bloodstream quite quickly I never really knew this until I started to learn about how certain foods affected your body.

Sometimes I would eat a jacket potato with some spring onions and some pork pie now there is a big mistake straight away eating the porkpie, those things are full of fat you see what we tend to do is we still want to eat the foods we used to enjoy, now this isn’t a very good idea most most of us I would say don’t eat consciously.

We just tend to eat the things that we like and by cutting out some of the foods we like we may substitute them with other poor choices which isn’t a good thing to do and that is exactly what I was doing, it wasn’t until that I really started to look at what I was eating that things began to click into place as it were as I began do more research on food I started to realise that certain foods do and can suppress your appetite which is one of the keys to weight loss when you eat the wrong foods you can constantly feel hungry thus eating more food.

If it wasn’t for doing research for this blog I might not have known which food choices to make in order to effectively lose weight for instance one are things that I came across was that soup is an excellent way to lose weight one of the main reasons being is that it acts as they appetite suppressant and not cravings on the head.

Eggs coincidently have the same effect so there you have two simple choices that can make a difference to how you feel food wise. Another trick is having a drink of water about half an hour before your main meal this will full your stomach with water and you will tend to eat less.

So to summarise the first part of this the first thing to do to yourself is write down exactly what you are eating that means everything every crumb every single thing you eat that way you can actually see what you’re eating in the day otherwise all happen is you will tend to eat on autopilot which is what you don’t want I have lost count the amount of times I have seen people trying to lose weight and when asked what they have been eating they tend to say the healthy items and then tend not to talk about the bad things they had been eating even so though they were supposed to be taking notice of what they ate when you keep a food journal there is no excuse you can see exactly what you have eaten throughout the day and make the necessary adjustments to your eating habits.

I myself didn’t do this but it wasn’t long before I realised where I was going wrong I started to eat mostly calorie dense food things like salads beans on toast, porridge for breakfast, soup, eggs e.g. scrambled eggs ate more fruit in particular apples eat three of those a day before each meal and you will eat less.

Ialso followed something called the GI diet which is eating foods that supposedly release their sugar slower this will allow you to feel fuller longer and help you to lose weight another thing which you must do which is very important it is to look after your liver because this is the main fat burning organ within your body.Eat foods that are kind to your liver and you will find it can help a lot in helping you to lose weight.

Exercise

exercise is one of the other important keys to losing weight I’m sure you’ll agree this doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to join pay expensive gym or by expensive gym equipment I didn’t at all in fact all I did was was buy a machine called a twisted and shape what this is a stair stepper which goes up and down and side to side this as a double effect it works your stomach as well as your legs all I did was two 10 minute in intense workouts per day 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the evening four times a week for days on three days off. Studies have shown that doing exercises this particular way is far more effective and doing one batch of exercise.

Visualization

one of the things that I tend to do or use to which have neglected I must admit is meditation combined with this I used to what is known as creative visualisation which basically means seeing yourself a particular way or in a particular situation doing something or sing the person you want to be when I was trying to lose weight I is the practice this all the time what I used to do was see myself on the scales losing weight and also seeing myself as this that the person what this tends to do is actuate the part of your brain which is called RAS or known as reticular actuating system.

What this will do is implant into your subconscious mind what is needed in order to accomplish your goal that your, visualising so as an example of this you could see yourself as a thinner happier person eating all the right foods and gradually losing weight.

Keeping Score

When I was at the start of my weight loss journey I made a table in Word so that I could track my progress it was a very simple table, it had the date my waist size and weight I did this each week on every Friday sometimes I forgot to fill it in but mostly I did it was very satisfying to see progress being made over a period of time it has been proven that keeping records of where you are what you’re doing is overall more effective and not doing it this is a practice I would highly recommend to yourself.

Outcome

I would have to say that anybody who is trying to lose weight whether it’s you or me there is always something to learn as to where I am now I still have some weight to lose but it is nowhere near as bad as it was in order to get to my ideal weight I need to lose about a stone think the only thing that has prevented me from doing this is just a lack of exercise that is it nothing else that is something I tend to put right in the

Filed Under: Weight Loss Tagged With: ,

How I Lost Weight

March 2, 2008 By

Steps I took

It can be quite frustrating when you’re trying to lose weight and seem to get nowhere so for all those people I decided it would be a good idea to blog about the steps I took which helped me to lose my weight things that worked things that didn’t work.

One of the first things I tried was just making a few minor changes to what I ate but the problem with this was when I thought I was eating well I wasn’t, you tend to think you are when you necessarily aren’t eating well, things I were tending to do was drinking Lucozade when I wasn’t feeling too well all this is a recipe for disaster without a doubt, drinking that is more or less like drinking pure sugar so that is one thing that had to go no more fizzy drinks full of sugar as most of them are as you’re probably aware

One particular habit I got into was eating more or less the same food every day this in itself becoming became quite boring, but also I was eating the wrong foods again as you read this you might probably see where it’s going but if not I’ll tell you anyway I used to eat jacket potatoes more or less every day now while these are quite healthy the problem is they can turn into glucose into your bloodstream quite quickly I never really knew this until I started to learn about how certain foods affected your body.

Sometimes I would eat a jacket potato with some spring onions and some pork pie now there is a big mistake straight away eating the porkpie, those things are full of fat you see what we tend to do is we still want to eat the foods we used to enjoy, now this isn’t a very good idea most most of us I would say don’t eat consciously.

We just tend to eat the things that we like and by cutting out some of the foods we like we may substitute them with other poor choices which isn’t a good thing to do and that is exactly what I was doing, it wasn’t until that I really started to look at what I was eating that things began to click into place as it were as I began do more research on food I started to realise that certain foods do and can suppress your appetite which is one of the keys to weight loss when you eat the wrong foods you can constantly feel hungry thus eating more food.

If it wasn’t for doing research for this blog I might not have known which food choices to make in order to effectively lose weight for instance one are things that I came across was that soup is an excellent way to lose weight one of the main reasons being is that it acts as they appetite suppressant and not cravings on the head.

Eggs coincidently have the same effect so there you have two simple choices that can make a difference to how you feel food wise. Another trick is having a drink of water about half an hour before your main meal this will full your stomach with water and you will tend to eat less.

So to summarise the first part of this the first thing to do to yourself is write down exactly what you are eating that means everything every crumb every single thing you eat that way you can actually see what you’re eating in the day otherwise all happen is you will tend to eat on autopilot which is what you don’t want I have lost count the amount of times I have seen people trying to lose weight and when asked what they have been eating they tend to say the healthy items and then tend not to talk about the bad things they had been eating even so though they were supposed to be taking notice of what they ate when you keep a food journal there is no excuse you can see exactly what you have eaten throughout the day and make the necessary adjustments to your eating habits.

I myself didn’t do this but it wasn’t long before I realised where I was going wrong I started to eat mostly calorie dense food things like salads beans on toast, porridge for breakfast, soup, eggs e.g. scrambled eggs ate more fruit in particular apples eat three of those a day before each meal and you will eat less.

Ialso followed something called the GI diet which is eating foods that supposedly release their sugar slower this will allow you to feel fuller longer and help you to lose weight another thing which you must do which is very important it is to look after your liver because this is the main fat burning organ within your body.Eat foods that are kind to your liver and you will find it can help a lot in helping you to lose weight.

Exercise

exercise is one of the other important keys to losing weight I’m sure you’ll agree this doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to join pay expensive gym or by expensive gym equipment I didn’t at all in fact all I did was was buy a machine called a twisted and shape what this is a stair stepper which goes up and down and side to side this as a double effect it works your stomach as well as your legs all I did was two 10 minute in intense workouts per day 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the evening four times a week for days on three days off. Studies have shown that doing exercises this particular way is far more effective and doing one batch of exercise.

Visualization

one of the things that I tend to do or use to which have neglected I must admit is meditation combined with this I used to what is known as creative visualisation which basically means seeing yourself a particular way or in a particular situation doing something or sing the person you want to be when I was trying to lose weight I is the practice this all the time what I used to do was see myself on the scales losing weight and also seeing myself as this that the person what this tends to do is actuate the part of your brain which is called RAS or known as reticular actuating system.

What this will do is implant into your subconscious mind what is needed in order to accomplish your goal that your, visualising so as an example of this you could see yourself as a thinner happier person eating all the right foods and gradually losing weight.

Keeping Score

When I was at the start of my weight loss journey I made a table in Word so that I could track my progress it was a very simple table, it had the date my waist size and weight I did this each week on every Friday sometimes I forgot to fill it in but mostly I did it was very satisfying to see progress being made over a period of time it has been proven that keeping records of where you are what you’re doing is overall more effective and not doing it this is a practice I would highly recommend to yourself.

Outcome

I would have to say that anybody who is trying to lose weight whether it’s you or me there is always something to learn as to where I am now I still have some weight to lose but it is nowhere near as bad as it was in order to get to my ideal weight I need to lose about a stone think the only thing that has prevented me from doing this is just a lack of exercise that is it nothing else that is something I tend to put right in the

Filed Under: Weight Loss Tagged With: ,

Health Benefits of a High Fibre Diet

February 26, 2008 By

Why opt for a high fibre diet ?

Fibre is a very key component to any healthy eating plan and or diet, also known in language terms as “roughage” it is responsible for general overall health, without fibre in your diet you may end up with poor digestion, stomach problems, and other ailments.

Fibre is a carbohydrate which we are unable to break down quickly in our stomachs, this serves the purpose of pushing food more quickly through our digestive tract and eliminating waste far more effectively.

Otherwise undigested food can reside in your stomach and will just sit and rot inside your stomach releasing toxins into your body.

How it helps to lose weight

This type of food takes longer to chew in your mouth so you won’t eat as much, when fibre reaches your stomach it acts like a sponge soaking up water, also it takes longer to break down than most other foods, this will give you a feeling of satisfaction and fullness, for a longer period of time this will help conquer cravings. A lot of fibre contains very few calories.

What are the health benefits ?

Because of the very effective elimination characteristics of it, it can help prevent such diseases as bowel cancer, piles, stop constipation which quite a lot of people suffer with, improve overall digestion, in less civilised countries where their diets are high in fibre they tend to have less diseases than their western counterparts have.

Fibre tends to be very low in fat but can help prevent cardiovascular disease which is brought on by hardening of the arteries when fat consumption is high in your diet. Fibre tends to be a good source of vitamins and minerals which is essential for correct body functioning, and also helps prevent cravings.

The best sources of fibre are ?

Wholegrain foods such as wholegrain breads ones that tend to have about four to 5 g per slice is ideal, others include muesli, Weetabix, Shredded wheat, baked beans, wholemeal pasta, Brown rice, porridge or oatmeal as its otherwise known as, dried fruits, nuts.

Best vegetable sources are:

Asparagus

Broccoli

Turnips

Jacket potato with skin

Sweet potatoes

Greenpeas

Carrots

Cauliflower

And spinach

Best fruit sources are:

Apples

Bananas

Blueberries

Pears

Strawberries

Raisins

And oranges

How much am I supposed to eat ?

The recommended guidelines are that you’re supposed to eat between 10 to 25 g of fibre per day I dare say that most of us don’t come anywhere near this figure, just recently in a tabloid newspaper it was quoted that Britons still don’t eat enough fruit and vegetables in their diet.

Studies around fibre

Fibre can be very good for your heart several studies in various countries have shown that eating a high fibre diet is a significant player, in lowering bad cholesterol the sort of fibre known as the soluble type has cholesterol-lowering properties.

The particular countries where the studies were done, their rate of coronary heart disease was a lot lower than those countries who ate less fibre.

The two types of fibre

The two types of fibre are insoluble and soluble soluble fibre tends to bind itself to cholesterol molecules and flushes it out of your body if there is any present think of it as a sponge soaking up all the bad cholesterol in your body.

Insoluble fibre on the other hand serves a different purpose this is purely for pushing food through your body very quickly, and keeping your digestive system functioning correctly this will help and stop problems, such as stomach cancers, bowel cancers and also stop you from being constipated as well.

Are there any problems with a high fibre diet ?

Not really know although some people do say that when they changeover to a higher fibre diet it can cause them to suffer from flatulence, but based on mine and a lot of other people’s experiences, this tends to be a short-term thing rather than rather than a long-term thing. So as we can see there are more pros and hardly any cons to having a nutritious high fibre diet.

So get eating those high fibre fruit and vegetables.

Filed Under: Healthy Eating Tagged With: ,
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