Extreme Diets and Eating Behavior
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admin 12 October, 2008
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Because extreme diets are so difficult to follow, they require maintaining a very high level of dietary restraint. In a study that looked specifically at dietary restraint, researchers found that high levels of dietary restraint and rigid control of eating were associated with higher scores of disinhibition and more frequent, severe episodes of overeating. Dietary restriction for fast weight loss can create a rebound effect and lead to a total loss of control over eating.
Here’s an example of how this works. Let’s say you decide to stop eating your usual breakfast as a way to lose weight quickly. Cutting out a meal a day does save a lot of calories. Numerous studies, though, have shown that skipping meals is neither healthy nor an effective weight-loss method. Breakfast supplies important nutrients, so skipping this meal robs the body of the nutrients it needs for the morning and the rest of the day. Not surprisingly, the body often rebels with extreme hunger later in the morning. By lunchtime, excess hunger leads to overeating. Or, worse yet, the morning’s hunger gets satisfied with a midmorning pastry. The body is still trying to make up the lost calories at dinnertime, and overeating continues.
Extreme weight-loss methods are difficult if not impossible to sustain for a long enough period of time to lose a significant amount of weight because they do not mesh with the realities of most people’s lives. When people go back to their regular routines, all of their underlying issues related to weight management come back and create the same combustible mix that caused weight gain in the first place. It is far better to adopt a strategy of multiple steps that can be incorporated into the routines of daily life rather than choose a course of dramatic sacrifice and restriction that is likely to lead to rebound.
The opposite is also true. Flexible control—adjusting eating from meal to meal—is associated with a greater chance of losing weight successfully. Learning to regulate eating in a flexible way in sync with daily life probably helps explain why the establishment of a normal diet is a success factor for long-term weight loss.
Participants in the Weight Watchers LTM Database and the National Weight Control Registry (NWCR) report that they pay ongoing attention to what they eat and are conscious of their eating patterns without turning their lives upside down. They have found the balance among sensible eating, structure, and flexibility, with just enough structure to create consistency and enough flexibility to allow for choices from a wide variety of foods and in all kinds of social situations. Making conscious choices and being aware of what you are eating is the foundation for making wise food choices long term.
Fast Weight Loss Equals Muscle Loss
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admin 12 October, 2008
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One problem with extreme diets is that they often lead to muscle loss. The faster the weight loss, the more likely it is that a significant portion will be lean muscle. Muscle loss works directly against sustained weight loss.
Drastically reducing calories forces the body to rely more and more on lean tissue—muscle—to meet its energy needs. As calories are restricted, the body starts turning to any energy source it can find to fuel its daily energy needs.The body literally starts to cannibalize itself. In many extreme weight-loss methods, as much as 40% of the weight lost may be from lean muscle! Muscle tissue, like glycogen, is about 80% water. So when the body breaks down muscle tissue, weight loss is quicker because of the water that is released.
Why is this problematic? Think of your body as an automobile, with muscle as the engine and fat as the trunk that stores energy. If you cut down on the size of the engine, then the amount of energy that your body burns decreases.This is exactly what happens when you lose lean muscle mass. What a pity it would be to go through all the sacrifice and struggle to reach a lower weight and then end up with a smaller engine that burns fewer calories.
There are two strategies for maintaining lean muscle during weight loss. The first is to pace your weight loss.You can help maintain the size of your engine and lessen the likelihood of regaining pounds if you lose weight at the recommended pace of 1 to 2 pounds per week. Pacing your weight loss means that your diet is supplying enough calories to allow fat burning but prevent muscle loss. Second, regular exercise is important, particularly during weight loss, to preserve lean muscle tissue. Although exercise helps preserve lean tissue, it cannot undo the damage done by too-fast weight loss. An extreme diet that supplies too few calories causes the body to break down muscle even if the person is exercising. In a study that compared a very low-calorie diet with resistance exercise and the same 800-calorie diet without resistance training, the loss of fat-free mass was the same.
Other Problems with Extreme Methods
Any method that produces fast weight loss by definition needs to be extreme. Severely limiting calories creates nutritional imbalances. Single-food diets (for example, the cabbage soup diet), eliminating foods with particular macronutrients like carbohydrates or fats, and skipping meals are examples of the extreme methods often used to attain fast weight loss.
Rapid weight loss is associated with a host of health problems including hair loss, dry skin, irritability, and commonly gallstone formation. Extreme methods are a setup for weight-loss failure.They provide fast weight loss for only as long as they are followed. But very few people can stay with them for more than a few days or weeks. Once the method is abandoned, old habits return and so does the weight. Several studies that have evaluated weight regain after completion of a very low-calorie diet have found that unless the lifestyle changes that support long-term weight loss are made, the pounds are quickly regained.
Categories : Dieting, Tips and Advices
A few extra pounds don’t matter
Posted by
admin 30 September, 2008
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A few extra pounds hardly seem worth worrying about. Gaining a little is better than gaining a lot. Being a little overweight but not obese may be a cosmetic issue, but it is not a health issue.
Weight gain is just part of getting older. In fact, it is a natural part of the aging process. The body’s metabolism slows over time, so it burns fewer calories. We’re not as active as we were in our younger years. Who has the time or energy to play and run around the way we did when we were children?
As the body ages, it doesn’t function as efficiently. It is very common for blood pressure to go up and for blood cholesterol to rise. People who are prone to getting diabetes have problems with high blood sugar. Cars often don’t work as well when they get older. It’s no surprise that the human body doesn’t work as well either.
For most of us, fighting off weight gain is not worth the time or effort it takes. Given the health risks of yo-yo dieting, it is smarter to live with a few extra pounds than lose and gain over and over again.
Categories : Dieting, Tips and Advices
Tips to be Successful on your Weight Loss Method
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admin 30 September, 2008
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The path to sustainable weight loss needs a beginning. As you put your new knowledge to work and embark on a comprehensive weight-loss method, there are several things you can do. The goal is to maximize your knowledge so that you are prepared to make informed decisions for your best approach.
- Consult with your doctor before starting any weight management program. It is a good idea to get a complete physical before beginning a diet and/or exercise program to rule out medical limitations.
- Ask your doctor or pharmacist if any of the medications that you’re taking might affect your weight-loss success by increasing your appetite or slowing your metabolism. The good news is that in almost all cases other drugs are available that treat the same condition but do not affect weight. It is worth finding out whether a simple change in your medication can remove this potential obstacle.
- Think about weight-loss methods that you have used in the past. How many of the factors that predict successful weight loss and sustained weight loss were part of these methods? Are there things that you could have done differently to include more factors?
- What do you see as your “happy” weight and when do you see yourself achieving it? If your answer is a weight that is less than 90% of your current body weight and your time frame for reaching that weight is in less than six months, rethink your expectations. A reasonable goal is a loss of 10% of your current weight over six months. Start with that goal—you may very well surprise yourself by exceeding it!
- Identify at least three people you know who have successfully lost weight and are keeping it off. Find out about their experience what method they used, what strategies and approaches they took to make it work for them, and what they are doing to sustain the weight loss. Compare what they tell you about the factors of successful weight loss, the factors for sustained weight loss, and the basic components of a weight-loss program.
- Remind yourself often and with confidence that sustained weight loss is possible.Your body will not undermine your achievements by slowing metabolism so that you gain the weight back.
Categories : Dieting, Tips and Advices
Make Wise Food Choices
Posted by
admin 30 September, 2008
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Our food world is complicated.We are surrounded by tasty, affordable food choices.We are constantly reminded of food by the media, much benefit from regular physical activity that they wouldn’t dream of a day without it.
Regular physical activity has three important elements. The first is that the activity has to fit into your life, whether in a set block of time or in little nooks and crannies throughout the day.You can squeeze in a bit of activity by taking the stairs at work, parking farther away from the store on errands, taking a ten-minute walk at lunchtime, or walking the dog at the end of the day.
These activities may sound too small to make a difference. But if you take a daily ten-minute walk at lunchtime for a year and change nothing else about your eating or activity, you can lose more than five pounds! Imagine the result if you incorporated a number of these simple activities into your daily routine.
The second element of regular physical activity may seem obvious. Find physical activities that you enjoy. If you like an activity, you’re more likely to stick with it. What is right for you might be different from what works for your family members or friends.That is okay.The key is to find something that you look forward to and enjoy such as walking outdoors or doing more structured activities like swimming, bicycling, or aerobics with a favorite exercise tape. Don’t turn your life upside down—your chances of success are greater if you create a plan that is livable for you.
The third element is to look for activities that you can do almost every day. Consistent exercisers get the most benefit, and once you incorporate exercise into your daily life, it becomes second nature.
Categories : Dieting, Tips and Advices
