Weight Loss

1. Everyone gains weight as they age. While this seems to be the norm it does not have to be and it is not a healthy thing. The contributing factors are; a decrease in metabolic rate (about 2% per year after the age of about 22-23), a significant decrease in physical activity (very common when people enter secondary education), and poor diet (again, very common when people leave home and go to university-pizza & chicken wing nights). A decrease in muscle mass, caused by the less physical activity, resulting in lower metabolic rate. However, this does not need to be the case. If someone is careful with their diet and keeps physically active fat gain will not occur.
2. If you're not thin then you are not healthy. Ok, we all need to realize that we come in different shapes and sizes and this is very hard to change (even for some people who want to gain weight). Even if you have difficulty in losing excess fat keep up the exercise program. The internal benefits, that you can not see in the mirror, are more important than the external benefits. E.g. lower blood pressure, increased cardiovascular capacity, lower cholesterol, lower chance of diabetes, etc.
3. Missing meals will result in weight loss. How many of haven't tried this one? And we all know the result, but somehow we are tempted to try over and over again, swearing that 'this time it will be different.' The end result is over eating at the next meal or at the end of the day. And that 'over eating' usually consists of many more calories by the end of the day. The reason, your body needs nutrients. When you try to fight the body it will win. So, eat healthy, eat several small means, and don't try and trick the body, it doesn't work.
4. High protein & low fat, high fat & low carb, high carb & low protein, etc. We've heard them all! bottom line, weight loss occurs when the overall calories you consume, is less than the calories you burn. All diets, no matter what they are called, work because of this concept. Problem is, you can't keep it up. Who can live on plain chicken and lettuce?! Best way is to reduce portion sizes, in order to reduce calories consumed.
5. Herbs, teas, pills, etc, will help one lose weight. More magic:) If only it were that simple. Fact is, there is no simple cure for weight loss. In fact, taking pills, powders, or anything else along that line can do serious harm. E.g. taking pills to increase your metabolism will soon result in a 'tolerance' affect. Meaning, even with the pills your metabolism will return to normal and you will need even more pills to keep it up. And once you stop the pills, and eventually you will, your metabolism will drop to even lower levels than before you started the pills.
6. Certain foods burn more calories than they contain. Nobody knows for sure, but let's suppose that lettuce has 20 calories and it takes your body 30 to digest it. How many sticks of lettuce are you going to eat to really induce any weight loss?
7. Eating tons of fruits will result in weight loss. Totally not true. While your diet should consist of a few fruits per day, they still contain calories. And an excess in calories, regardless of the source, will result in fat storage, which is weight gain. And again, how long can you live on one food source?
8. Eating late at night will result in weight gain. Simply not true. Again, it is a total calories consumed compared to total calories used. However, the tendency is that what we eat late at night is usually unhealthy. E.g. pizza, chicken wings, chips, etc.
9. Bananas are fattening. This one makes me laugh, and I've heard it many times. The calories in a fruit doesn't come near the calories in a pop, or a chocolate bar, or a bag of chips. Fact is, bananas are healthy, and no one ever got fat on eating bananas. If caloric intake is of concern, there are many other foods to look at first before worrying about bananas.
10. Being a vegetarian will result in weight loss. This is only true if the vegetarian is more health conscious of what they put in their body. Simply avoiding meat or animal products will not result in weight loss. Chips, pop, thick salad dressings, etc., can still be part of a vegetarian diet, but are still quite fattening. And keep in mind that going vegetarian, without proper knowledge and meal planning can result in vitamin and mineral malnourishment.

Cabbage Soup Diet

The cabbage soup diet is exactly as the name implies. You eat cabbage soup - only. The claim is that you will lose up to 10 pounds in one week. However, it is made clear that is should not be continued for more than 7 days, and that this diet is only designed as a kick start to a more healthy way of eating.

Body image is defined as to how believe we appear to the rest of the world. It is our perception of our physical characteristics. The amazing thing is that it is almost always false, and this inaccurate perception can lead to many emotional issues. For the longest time this used to be an issue that concerned mostly women, but with the growth of the beauty industry, and the ability of the media to reach us all whether we want to be reached or not, this problem now also affects men, especially young men.

Some important facts you should know about losing weight:

Be aware of gimmicks. I'm sure you've seen ads that say something like, "Lose 10 pounds in 5 days without dieting and without exercise!" Well, mathematically this is impossible, unless you will be losing a lot of muscle, fiber, and water, and probably very little fat. Look, 10 pounds is 35,000 calories. If you only use about 2,000 calories per day you would need at least 17.5 days to lose 10 pounds. This is assuming that you don't eat or drink anything at all during those days, which is of course impossible.

Just a bit of humor in the area of dieting. If nothing else, perhaps it'll bring a smile to your face.

Funny pictures about dieting.

First, let's change this term. Weight loss is not specific enough and it is misleading. I know this is the term the industry uses, but a more accurate term is fat loss. You see, it's very, very easy to lose weight, but much harder to lose fat.

Many people often wonder if they are the ideal weight for their height. And when we use the word 'ideal' we are referring to maintain optimal health. Below we will try and explain about weight, BMI, obesity, etc. And finding out if you're the right weight for your height may not be as easy as you may have thought.

Weight-loss generally involves shedding pounds of fat. And so it makes sense that dieters would want to know what their fat level is. However, athletes and those not dieting should be interested as this measure provides some insight in to your overall health.

Metabolism is the involvement of reactions conducted by all living organisms. These reactions are chemical in nature, and involve two main aspects; anabolism and catabolism. Anabolism is the process of assembling, or creating things. This process requires energy derived from food. Examples include the growth of hair, nails, new skin, bone tissue, muscle repair after a hard workout, etc. Catabolism is the opposite. It is the process of disassembling, or breaking things down, such as in digestion. Other examples include the constant breakdown of bone tissue, and the breakdown of fat and protein molecules to provide energy to the body. Both, anabolism and catabolism require energy.

There seems to be a great demand on losing weight. A lot of weight, and quickly. Before I tell you how to do it you must understand that this is not healthy, there is a high chance of not succeeding because your body (cravings, appetite, lack of will power) will eventually cause you to fail, there is a high chance it will be temporary (again, because of cravings, etc).

The Atkins diet is much different than all other diets, which are focussed on limiting fats in the diet. The Atkins diet is the opposite, it instructs you to eat all the fats you want but limit the carbohydrates. It is so strict in fact, at least for the first couple of weeks, that intake of carbohydrates should be almost zero.

I'm willing to bet that if you're reading this you've been on a diet at least once. But chances are, if you're like most North Americans, you've tried more diets than you can remember. And chances are they've worked, for the 2-3 weeks you were on them. Then you've probably gained more weight than what you were before.