Wellness Dietitian

How many times have you heard that you need to drink 8 glasses of water per day? What exactly is eight glasses? Is that perhaps a child’s glass? Or tumbler? And how does bottled water figure in?
Water makes up about 60 percent of your body. Your body needs water for every single organ and most functions. Water carries toxins out of your body and carries nutrition into your body through the bloodstream. Lack of water can lead to dehydration, not to mention impacts such as acne and weight gain.
But, the exact amount of water that your body needs is often an elusive number. It often depends on the specific reasons that you’re ingesting an increased amount of water in the first place. The figures can vary depending on weight and activity level, too.
Water and Weight Loss
Water is a part of most weight loss diets.
Water helps your metabolism because it helps your kidneys. When your kidneys are functioning at their best, your liver can concentrate solely on metabolism, meaning that your weight is better under control. How simple is that?
In addition, those who drink the requisite eight glasses know that doing so helps control hunger. In fact, thirst is often mistaken for hunger, causing dieters to overeat. Keeping yourself hydrated will aid in calorie control.
Exercise
Take a look around a gym and you’ll notice that most people realize that they need to drink water during exercise. But, hydrating yourself before and after exercise is just as important. Be aware of the heat and humidity you experience when you exercise, in addition to the amount of sweat you lose, and adjust your water intake appropriately. A standard recommendation is to consume about 2 cups of water for every pound lost during your workout.
Beauty and Skin
Well hydrated cells are perkier and more likely to bulk up saggy skin. Wrinkles will appear less noticeable in well hydrated skin. In addition, hydrated skin is less likely to experience breakouts and acne issues.
There are other beauty benefits, too. Water helps to hydrate the eyes, decreasing redness. Adequate water decreases bloating in the abdominal area, helping your middle to appear flat and sleek.
Health Issues
Of course, if your increased water intake is due to certain health issue, you’ll need to follow a healthcare provider’s directions thoroughly. Increased intake of water is indicated for many health issues, such as kidney stones and pregnancy.
What About the Rest of Us?
Consuming about two quarts of water per day is recommended for most humans. Add another 8 ounces for every extra 25 pounds if you are overweight. Other drinks do count, but you should be careful of caffeine, which is a diuretic. In addition, you may consider getting additional hydration from fruits and vegetables.
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=784085

Mike Geary’s Truth About Six Pack Abs is currently the most sold fitness ebook on the Internet. Is it the ultimate program to finally get rock-hard six pack abs or just another scammy “miracle” flat abs system?
Mike is certified personal trainer and nutrition specialist. So he’s expert in his field and I found some articles from Mike in reputable magazines. By the way Mike is a very helpful guy! I asked him some questions by email and he responded instantly.
In my opinion it’s the fact that Mike combines diet and meal suggestions with highly effective workouts �” no not crunches and sit ups �” and the right doses of cardio training. I’m a busy guy and can’t spend 60 minutes a day with exercises. Truth About Six Pack Abs does not require this. 30-45 minutes workouts 2-3 times a week should do the trick.
The Truth About Six Pack Abs program starts with an introduction of the various sections of the belly. I thought how boring is this. But once I read more I understood how important it is and that this will help reducing the risk of train the wrong muscles.
The main section covers over 20 highly effective abs exercises. Each exercise is illustrated with easy to follow photos. There are some abs workout I’ve never seen before. The great thing is that there are a lot of workouts can be performed at home. My favourite workout is the one with a fitness ball. After a busy day I can do some exercise at home without going to the gym.
A real surprise was the nutrition section. It’s not the same crap about low carb diets you can read in most books. It’s actually a very balanced food plan. I like it and don’t miss anything. Of course I can eat once a week a burger or something heavy without bad feelings.
Another important part in Mike Geary’s fitness book is the cardio training. I found out that I did this wrong for the last two years. He exactly illustrates what cardio you need to do and the most important part is when.
Truth About Six Pack Abs is for everybody and anyone who needs to lose weight and flatten their tummy. It’s ideally suited for men who want a ripped six pack or just a flatter stomach but ladies will benefit from the program as well �” my wife is doing the program as well �” mothers and even grandmas who want to tone their middle.
You just need to make the commitment to read the ebook once or better twice and then take action. And there’s no need to perform workouts daily, 2-3 times a week for 30-45 minutes will show very good results. But it requires the discipline to do the abs exercises, cardios and apply the nutrition program regularly �” over a few weeks and months.
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=784155

Do you want to get rid of your not-so-lovely ‘love handles’? Are you embarassed of your big pear-shaped body? Do you dream of having an hour-glass figure? It is possible, highly possible in fact if you are ready to commit yourself to do the following.
We all know for a fact that weight loss equals dieting. It’s not new. It’s not rocket science. So what are these little steps towards achieving your goal?
1) Eat a sensible balanced healthy diet consisting of higher protein, lower carbohydrate, enough minerals and vitamins. Do not eliminate your carbohydrate totally for your body requires energy to perform.
2) Eat just the amount your body needs to function well. Excessive eating will undoubtedly lead to excess fat.
3) Eat only healthy food. Avoid food that has high fat content. Cakes, pies, pizzas, pastries,cookies should be eaten sparingly and just occasionally.
4) If you have the habit of snacking when watching tv , try nuts, fresh fruits, or dried fruits like apricots, cranberries, dates but make sure they are not sugared.
5) Drink plenty of water at least 8 glasses a day. This helps to flush away the free radicals in your body so it is excellent for your general health as well as giving you a clearer skin complexion. Green tea helps to cut oil so it is good to add that to your regime.
Dieting is always accompanied with exercises. This is quintessential because it helps to tone your muscles besides burning away your body fat. You do not have to do a marathon. Just do it in moderation. Some suggestions of what you can do
1) Take your dog for a walk or even better for a jog for about 45 minutes each day. Now both owner and pet can get trim and fit.
2) Go to the gym at least 3 times a week.
3) Do yoga, pilate exercises, aerobics or just running up and down your staircase when no one is looking!
Whatever you choose to do, as long as you are burning away calories, you will be on your way to achieving that slim figure you have always wanted.
Do you find those tips on healthy weight loss useful? You can learn a lot more about other efficient weight loss programs/methods including doing just 15 minutes of ‘burst’ exercise at
http://www.slimyummymummy.com
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=784802

We are all aware of the pressure society places on people to meet or to strive for perceived physical “perfection.” Although it’s common to read about women working on their figures or features, many men feel the same need to diet and to workout. A bulked-up physique has become a standard criteria for male attractiveness leading some men to take steroids and even to seek body-building cosmetic implants in their chests and arms. According to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, pectoral implant surgery was performed 409 times in 2006, an increase of 99 percent from the previous year.
Beginning in the 1980s societal perceptions of what makes the male physique attractive changed from the ideal of the trim, suave Hollywood stars of the 1940s to the ripped action heroes of the modern cinema. A sculpted, rugged chest is now seen as conveying strength, good health, power and virility. Most men, through hard work in the gym, can build that kind of chest. Others can’t and for them, pectoral implants are a rapidly attractive option at a cost of anywhere from $7,000 to $12,000 for the procedure.
The silicone implants themselves are made by Allied Biomedicals and cost approximately $1,600 per pair. There are two basic shape configurations and a range of five sizes. Unlike breast implants for women, pectoral devices have a semi-solid feel meant to mimic well-developed muscle. The implants have been on the market for approximately 20 years and similar prosthetics are available to shape and enlarge the biceps and triceps. (Although usually chosen as a personal augmentation, the implants are also routinely used to correct chest deformities and as such perform a reconstructive medical purpose as well as a cosmetic one.)
To place the pectoral implants, the surgeon makes an incision in the armpit that will subsequently be disguised by the underarm hair. Typically the cut is two to three inches in length, allowing the surgeon access to an area under the muscle that is free of both nerves and blood vessels. The implant is folded in half before being inserted and positioned between the pectoral muscles. After the incision is closed, recovery takes approximately two weeks with tolerable discomfort. Most patients report a heavy, stiff sensation that lasts a few days. Exercise and sports should be avoided for two to six weeks after the surgery and patients may need to get used to actually feeling the edge of the implants at the extreme edge of their range of motion.
Potential post-surgical complications include infection, which effects approximately 1 percent of patients. This may result in a need to remove the effected implant with a subsequent wait of six months before another implant can be positioned. If noticeable migration or displacement of an implant occurs, a second surgery will be required to reposition the device. A degree of chest bruising is to be expected and should disappear after two to three weeks. In about 1 percent of patients numbness may occur in the upper arm and it is possible to lose sensation in one or both nipples. This may be temporary or permanent. In some cases pockets of fluid may also form. If unabsorbed by the body, the fluid may need to be drained away.
Pectoral implants still represent a specialized niche in the field of cosmetic surgery and heretofore have been heavily associated with the gay community. Of the 11.5 million cosmetic procedures performed in 2006, 1 million were on men, with eyelid surgery, liposuction, and the removal of excess breast tissue leading the surgical list. Chest implants are, however, growing in popularity across the male population as a viable means of gaining the chiseled chest definition that society seems to demand of “manly” men today.
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=785642

The groundbreaking study on fertility and diet, done by the Harvard School of Public Health, revealed five critical lifestyle and diet behaviors that impact both fertility and aging. The data comes from the Nurses’ Health Study. With the help of more than 18,000 women, this long-term project is designed to look at the effects of diet and lifestyle on overall health and wellness.
Over the last 30 years the dynamics of American life have changed. It used to be common for young couples to marry early and start families in their 20s. Today, job and career goals have taken greater precedence, so marriage and families are starting at a later stage in life. Combined with certain lifestyle and dietary changes over the last 30 years, fertility challenges are at an all time high. Less than 10 percent of women in their early 20s have infertility issues; unfortunately, 30 percent of women in their early 40s experience infertility issues.
The Nurses’ Health Study compared the diets, exercise habits and lifestyle choices of the participants. Their choices made a significant difference in their health and wellness. As I’ve pointed out in several of my articles:
Your choices have more to do with how you age than any other factor!
The beauty of the Nurses’ Health Study is that it also confirms this statement. You and your choices are the single biggest factor in determining your biological age, health and wellness. Let’s see what the researchers found and then apply this to your goal to slow down the aging process.
Five Critical Lifestyle and Diet Behaviors
The Harvard School researchers found that fertility problems affect one in six couples. Ovulation disorders have been identified in up to 30 percent of infertility issues. The women who followed these five critical lifestyle and diet behaviors were approximately 80 percent less likely to have infertility from ovulation disorders than women who followed none of the behaviors.
According to Jorge Chavarro, one of the lead authors of this study:
We analyzed what happens if you follow one, two, three, four, or more different factors. What we found was that, as women started following more of these recommendations, their risk of infertility dropped substantially for every one of the dietary and lifestyle strategies undertaken. In fact, we found a sixfold difference in ovulatory infertility risk between women following five or more low-risk dietary and lifestyle habits and those following none.
Here are the five critical lifestyle and diet behaviors that had the greatest impact on fertility issues.
Carbohydrates – Slow verses Fast!
Twenty years ago the U.S. government’s food pyramid was built on carbohydrates. With the advent of the Atkins and South Beach diets, carbohydrates were thrown out the window and replaced by protein. At least by the general public! This focus on carbohydrates verses protein triggered new research into the role carbohydrates play in a healthy diet.
The new research shows that carbohydrates have a major impact on heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and digestive health. The Nurses’ Health Study shows that the type of carbohydrate impacts fertility. Eating easily digested carbohydrates (simple carbohydrates or what is now referred to as fast carbs) increases the chance of ovulatory infertility. Choosing slowly digested carbohydrates (complex carbohydrates or what is now referred to as slow carbs) that are rich in fiber can improve fertility.
Additional research has shown that a diet rich in slow carbs and fiber prior to pregnancy helps to prevent gestational diabetes; a common problem for pregnant women and their babies. Why? Because carbohydrates are the main nutrient that determines your blood sugar and insulin levels! When they rise too high they disrupt the finely tuned balance of hormones necessary for reproduction.
The absorption speed of carbohydrates has given rise to the Glycemic Index. This index is a measurement of how quickly carbohydrates are turned into blood sugar. The higher the index the faster they’re turned into blood sugar. Combine this with your total carbohydrate intake and you have the Glycemic Load. The researchers found that women with the highest glycemic load were 92 percent more likely to have ovulatory infertility. This means that eating more slow carbs with fiber improves fertility.
KEY OBSERVATION – Since fast carbs disrupt the finely tuned balanced of hormones needed for reproduction, just think how they may affect other hormonal issues!
Fats – Natural verses Artificial!
It has long been know by midwives, doctors, and fertility researchers that body fat and energy stores affect reproduction. Women who don’t have enough stored energy (code word for fat) have trouble ovulating or may even stop menstruating altogether. Women with too much stored fat also have difficulty conceiving. What the researchers wanted to find out was whether dietary fats had an influence on ovulation and reproduction.
Two important pieces of information emerged from the Nurses’ Health Study. The intake of saturated fat, monounsaturated fat, polyunsaturated fat, and cholesterol wasn’t connected with ovulatory infertility. The study suggested fat intake may actually improve the menstrual cycle. However, trans fats were a completely different story.
Trans fats were shown to be a powerful deterrent to both ovulation and conception. Trans fats are artificial fats. The study clearly showed that the greater the trans fat intake, the greater the likelihood of developing ovulatory infertility. The effect showed up even when the trans fat intake was as low as four grams per day. Four grams of trans fat would be the equivalent of two tablespoons of stick margarine, one medium order of french fries or one doughnut.
KEY OBSERVATION – There has been a big push to eliminate trans fats from both processed and fast foods. Your elimination of trans fats from your diet and replacing them with natural fats will go a long way to improving your overall health and wellness!
Protein – Animal or Plant!
Americans like their protein. Beef is still the first choice followed by chicken, pork and then fish. Beans are a distant fifth. Too bad! Beans are an excellent source of protein, fiber, vitamins and minerals. According to the Nurses’ Health Study, the women who got their protein from plant sources rather then from animals took a big step toward improved fertility. The following will show you how significant this was:
* Adding one serving a day of red meat, chicken or turkey correlated with a 33 percent increase in ovulatory infertility.
* Adding one serving a day of fish or eggs didn’t influence ovulatory infertility.
* Adding one serving a day of beans, peas, tofu or soybeans predicted a modest protection against ovulatory infertility.
* Swapping 25 grams of animal protein with 25 grams of plant protein resulted in a 50 percent improvement in ovulatory fertility.
KEY OBSERVATION – Animal protein doesn’t just adversely affect fertility. Current research shows that it has a direct influence on cancer!
Body Weight – Your BMI!Like it or not your weight has an impact on fertility. Weighing too little or weighing too much can interfere with ovulation. Additionally, the dangers of being overweight or underweight can also extend to the woman’s baby. The Nurses’ Health Study showed a strong connection between weight and fertility. To help quantify this, the researchers used Body Mass Indexes (BMI) to help provide some guidelines.
Women with BMIs that ranged from 20 to 24 improved their chances for fertility. In fact, the authors of this study call this range the Fertility Zone. If you are not in the Fertility Zone don’t fret. For those who are too lean, then gaining 5 to 10 pounds can help improve your fertility. For those overweight, losing 5 to 10 percent of your weight can also improve your fertility.
KEY OBSERVATION – Weight doesn’t just affect women. Overweight men aren’t as fertile as normal weight men. Excess weight lowers testosterone levels and hinders sperm production!
Exercise – Is It Important?
The answer is YES! Inactivity saps the body of its ability to respond to insulin and makes you less efficient in absorbing blood sugar. Physical activity and exercise work to improve the body’s use of insulin. It also helps you become more efficient in absorbing blood sugar and then utilizing it rather than storing it as fat. The Nurses’ Health Study showed that exercise can be a boon for fertility.
It’s always important to check with your physician or health care provider before you start an exercise program. Once you have the OK, then it’s important to get at least 30 minutes per day. Your exercise program should include aerobic activities, strength training and stretching. If at all possible try to incorporate your exercise into daily living such as:
* Park the car at the far end of the lot and walk the distance to the front door.
* If you need to go to the 2nd or 3rd floor take the stairs instead of the elevator.
* Carry your grocery bags to the car instead of using the shopping cart.
* Wash and wipe down your own car. Save your car wash fee and tip so you can invest in a home gym or treadmill.
KEY OBSERVATION – Exercise not only improves fertility but also improves how you look and feel about yourself. This translates to improved health and wellness and will reduce your biological age!
Summary
Walter Willett, the senior author of the Harvard School of Public Health study had this to say:
The key message of this paper is that making the right dietary choices and including the right amount of physical activity in your daily life may make a large difference in your probability of becoming fertile if you are experiencing problems with ovulation.
The same could also be said if you are experiencing health and wellness problems. Taking the information gleaned from the Nurses’ Health Study and applying them to the aging process, you have the following key points:
1. Eating more slow carbs or complex carbohydrates with fiber will improve your health and wellness. A positive improvement in the following health issues could be seen: better blood sugar control for diabetics, better hormonal balance in women, and improved testosterone levels in men.
2. Eliminate trans fats from your diet. Replacing them with heart healthy fats like omega-3s will go a long way to improving your cardiovascular system.
3. Animal protein increases your risk for disease. Replacing animal protein with chicken is a good step. Replacing animal protein with fish is a better step. Replacing animal protein with plant protein is your best step for reducing disease, especially cancer and Alzheimer’s.
4. Get a handle on your body weight. Find out your BMI. Work towards a healthy BMI if you’re not already there.
5. Exercise can help you see improvements in weight management, cardiovascular health, greater energy and improved stamina.
Bottom line! The recommendations of The Fertility Diet will improve a women’s fertility and positively impact a person’s overall health and wellness. The enjoyable side benefit is that they also improve the sexual health of men and women. Until next time, may we both age youthfully!
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=786838

I think you will be surprised to know the answer is not sit-ups, crunches, or any of the other traditional ab exercises we have all been taught work. These ab workouts just do not raise your metabolism enough to create any real fat loss.
As an athlete and trainer I am often asked what are the best exercises and/or workouts for shedding stomach fat and getting true six pack abs. The brutal truth of the matter is that most people, who have a fat stomach, are looking for that miracle exercise that will strip the fat off quickly and easily, and I am sorry to say, that magical miracle exercise just does not exist, and yes, it does take a lot of effort.
Bottom line is if you want to lose your fat stomach, you are probably going about it the wrong way. You will not lose your gut by doing traditional ab workouts.
You must stop wasting your time focusing on traditional ab exercises to lose fat from your stomach.
The name of the game for abdominal fat loss is to concentrate on full body workouts that will set your metabolism fire. Focus on exercises like squats, lunges, deadlifts, clean and presses, snatches, presses and pulls, mountain climbers, sprinting, etc.
Please keep in mind, I do recommend core and ab exercises as a part of any workout routine, I just do not focus the workout on ab exercises, particularly for fat loss.
The next aspect of abdominal fat loss is the most important aspect, and that is nutrition. Yes, eating right is critical. When it comes to fat loss, it has been said that only 20% of the formula is the exercise part, 80% is eating right.
To clear the air about how to lose stomach fat
Stop wasting time on traditional ab exercises and all those absolutely worthless abdominal machines you see advertised on TV. Instead get to the gym and go to work doing high intensity full body exercises in combination with a healthy diet.
Go to http://www.quickrippedabs.com and pick up a free fat loss report and metabolic rate calculator.
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=789412

Parenthood is an exciting time to play with your kids, take them places, and teach them all your knowledge, as long as you don’t teach them to be overweight. It is also a difficult time to balance schedules, push your career forward and get a good night’s sleep. We spend less time on ourselves which makes the weight creep up. Moms have a battle with weight gain soon after giving birth but Dads also feel the pressure to stay busy with work while still providing quality time with their families.
How did life get so complicated and why does it interfere with weight loss efforts? A short list would include:
Lack of time to exercise
Childcare issues interfering with exercise
Lack of financial resources to purchase gym memberships or home equipment
Resuming exercise after a long time off can be painful and discouraging
Time spent shuffling kids back and forth from school and activities
Less time to shop and prepare healthy meals while more time is spent in the drive thru
Kids are picky eaters and nutrition information is confusing
Work schedules are more demanding
Stress prevents weight loss due to hormonal and immune system disruptions
More errands, yard work, and fix it jobs
Lack of energy when all of the day’s chores are finally finished
Busy parents often feel depressed when they think about their poor health yet feel guilty thinking they might neglect their children if they take time for themselves.
If these situations sound familiar, it is very common to feel overwhelmed enough to push weight loss goals on to the back burner. The usual grocery store gossip doesn’t help either. How often do parents hear their peers tell them their age is a factor and it is so much harder to lose weight after children come along? Because parents want to be good examples for their children the internet becomes great problem solver.
Busy parents need a weight loss tool that is not complicated and takes very little time to organize. The internet can be a great help by immediately taking away some of the financial and time constraints listed above. Health education available online is a time saver compared to driving to classes or doctors’ offices which takes time away from family. Anonymous support on internet discussion boards can prevent embarrassment for those who are shy about their weight loss struggles. Real people can share their real experiences a few minutes each day encouraging participants to stay focused.
The rewards will benefit the entire family giving children healthier, energized and enthusiastic parents. A few searches on the internet with the right keywords will guide busy parents to the type of website that meets their needs. The Numbers Don’t Lie Diet is one program from a mother’s point of view who experienced a weight problem when her first child was born. With a common sense approach tracking progress on the internet puts weight loss success at your fingertips making any busy parent an EZLoser.
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=789838

Your initial answer to why you should exercise would probably be because you want to lose weight, look good, and feel better about yourself. While this is a common goal, there are far more benefits from exercising which go beyond looking good.
The human body is a mechanism that is constructed for exercise. The fact is that your body is constructed for rigorous exercise. Your body will continue to adapt over periods of time to the stresses that exercising will place on it. This will result in you getting stronger and fitter beyond what you may even think possible at the present time.
Weight loss is a great side effect of a good exercise programme. Other major benefits will include:
An increase in life expectancy due to the numerous health benefits that exercise will provide.
Exercising will reduce the risks of various cancers, heart diseases, and osteoporosis.
Exercise will increase your metabolic rate, allowing you to burn calories more effectively.
Exercise lowers the risk of high blood pressure and diabetes.
Exercising increases your energy levels and your ability to do things for longer without getting tired.
Exercising strengthens your heart so it doesn’t have to work as hard to pump blood through your body.
Exercising increases your lung capacity leading to greater oxygen intake. The more oxygen you can get into your body the more energetic you will feel.
Exercising increases your confidence and gives you a much better self image.
Exercising gives you the ability to be able to cope better with stress, anxiety, or depression.
Regular exercise helps you to sleep better.
As you can see there are many benefits to be gained from exercise apart from weight loss. Now if you put all these benefits together what have you got?
You have a stronger, fitter, healthier, and more energetic person who not only looks good but feels good. This is how most people want to be but very few people actually achieve this goal.
The hardest part of any exercise programme is taking the first step. People that have become used to a lifestyle based on little or no exercise and a diet of poor nutrition have become comfortable with that lifestyle.
They probably know that it is not a healthy lifestyle and a part of them wants to make changes. The problem is because people have been living in a certain way for a certain period of time, that lifestyle has become a habit. A habit that is often very difficult to change.
Often when people try to make changes they want and expect to see results very quickly. Your body is not constructed to change very quickly, so when people don’t see the results that they want, they usually tend to give up. Mentally and physically it just isn’t possible to treat your body in a certain way for a long period of time, and then expect it to adapt to something new in just a few weeks or months.
If you change your diet by making a large reduction in calories and start working out in the gym four or five times a week, you are setting yourself up for failure. You are trying to make your body do something which is alien to it and something it is not used to.
The results that such a change would bring would include sore muscles that would ache every time you moved, cravings for the foods that you are trying to give up, and your mind constantly screaming at you telling you that it is too hard. This will eventually result in you giving up with the thought that you are not capable of doing it.
You must remember that if you have not exercised in a long time, you must ease yourself into it slowly. You must allow your body the time it will need to adapt to the changes that you are trying to make.
You must also think about your perceptions of society. Forget all the images you see in magazines and television adverts of fit men and women showing of their 6 packs and lean bodies. Most of these people have great genetics, and have been exercising for a long time to get their bodies into the shape that they are in.
Then there are the celebrities who some people aspire to mimic. These celebrities have the money to hire personal trainers, they have the money to equip their homes with top class gym equipment, and they have the opportunity to feed themselves with the best food money can buy. If all this fails they then have the money to pay to have the fat sucked out of them through medical procedures.
You and these people have nothing in common. These people live in a different world to the rest of us, a world that you cannot hope to compete in. your focus should be on what you can do about yourself, and what you can do to improve yourself. Don’t feel bad because you can’t do 50 push ups and a 100 sit ups.
It’s obvious that you are not going to manage that if your lifestyle been one of little or no activity for a number of years. It doesn’t matter what you can do today. The point is that once you start doing something you will begin to improve and continue doing so on a weekly basis. It will only be a matter of time before you can manage to do 50 push ups and a 100 sit ups.
The thing is not to give up. Keep doing your exercises and keep adding a bit more over periods of time and the improvements will come. The improvements cannot fail to come, simply because your body is an entity that is made to adapt. This is a biological fact which cannot be denied.
Many people think that they are too old to begin exercising. This idea is one of the biggest myths that you will ever hear. Age is no barrier to exercise, no matter how old you are you are capable of making improvements.
The only difference between a 25 year old an a 50 year old will be the types of exercises that each can do. A 50 year olds body may have had more wear and tear than a 25 year old. There may be joint problems or certain aches and pains that will not allow the 50 year old to perform the same exercises that a 25 year old can do.
However this doesn’t need to be an obstacle because all that a 50 year old can do is to pick exercises that will avoid putting excessive strain on weaker areas. There are hundreds and hundreds of ways to get fitter; it is just a question of finding what is going to suit you.
When you are young you can get away with putting your body through an unhealthy lifestyle to a certain degree. Your body will be able to cope with almost anything that you throw at it because your muscles and your organs are still young and strong.
When you start getting older you naturally begin to lose muscle as each year goes by. Your muscles and tissues became less pliable, your metabolism slows down, and you are more prone to putting on weight. However there are ways to combat this deterioration through diet and exercise.
When many people reach their forties they often think that physically their best years are behind them, and begin to wind down. Thoughts of ‘I’m too old to exercise now’ or ‘I can’t do the things that I used to’ begin to fester. So they begin to take things easy, begin to gain weight, become weaker, lose flexibility and lose their fitness in general.
The fact is that it’s even more important to exercise when you are older. Naturally your body begins to slow down and you stop doing anything that may help you to reverse the situation. Exercising and having a good diet can slow down this deterioration to a large degree. Today there are people in their sixties and seventies who are still running marathons and keeping themselves alert, active, and fit.
It doesn’t make any difference as to who you are or how old you are, the fact remains that eating well and exercising can substantially improve the quality of your life.
At the end of the day you have two choices:
The first choice is to begin exercising and become more active. Don’t worry about what you are capable of at this moment. It doesn’t matter, the real point is to make a start and that if you keep going you will get better and better. The longer you continue exercising the fitter you will get and the more weight you will lose. That will be the consequences of choice number one.
The second choice is to do nothing and stay as you are. The only problem with this choice is that you will not stay as you are for long. You will gradually get worse, you will continue to put on weight, and you will continue to lose your health. The heavier and unhealthier you get, the harder your heart will have to work to keep you alive. On top of all this your self image and confidence will continue to erode. There is more than a strong possibility that you will be forced to take all sorts of medication when you are in your forties or fifties. Medication for high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, cholesterol levels and various other ailments.
Your skeletal frame will have been weakened because of all the weight you have had to carry for all those years. Your joints would have worn away resulting in constant pain. All these problems will restrict you in what you can or cannot do.
This may come across as a shock tactic as to what may happen if you don’t lose weight. Make no mistake; many of the problems that have been mentioned will be unavoidable if lifestyle changes are not made.
If you think that this situation sounds bad, think again, it can be worse. There will be many people who will not even reach their fifties. Cancer and heart diseases are rife in people with weight related problems. If by chance people survive cancers and heart attacks, many are left weak and often have to live on permanent medication. The quality of life that people in these situations will have is blatantly obvious. These are the consequences of choice number two.
These are the two choices open to you and ultimately the decision as to which choice you make will be yours. It will all depend on what you want for yourself; also think of what the impact of your choice will be on the people that are close to you.
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=790489

We’ve all been there, it’s a few months till you leave for that holiday on the beach you’ve got planned when you notice you’re looking a bit plump in places, far from the rugged, “chiselled from stone” look that everyone seems so desperate for. It’s about this time that most people sign up for a gym membership, set themselves a gruelling regime of weekly exercise or just start on a new diet programme. The trouble with these seemingly “fail proof” plans can usually be summed up in one of these two points;
1. Exercise takes up a large portion of your already busy day – A 5k run every morning may very well be extremely beneficial, but let’s be honest, who has the time or energy to get up 2 hours early, run to the point of exhaustion, have a quick shower and a bite to eat and then start a full days work? Not many is the simple answer.
2. Most diet plans do more damage than good – What most people don’t know about the vast majority of todays diet plans is that they quite often put the user’s body under extreme stress, greatly increasing the risk of diabetes, heart disease and in extreme cases certain types of cancer. Not only that, but when you force your body into “survival mode” by eating minimal amounts, you slow your metabolism down to a crawl. So while you may lose weight quite rapidly, the moment you even think about eating again you’ll put all that weight back on, and even a bit more for your troubles. Not exactly a practical solution by any means.
I myself have personally struggled to get my head around these two ideas for many years now, constantly changing from one diet to the next, trying all but the most extreme starvation diets. Like everyone else who’s tricked into thinking these “loose 30lb in just 3 days!” diets are a great idea, I found myself making no more progress than being hungry for 3 days, then putting on weight when I finally did actually eat something. I also had a great deal of trouble working out exercise regimes. As I’ve said, doing a back breaking, 3 hour full body workout every 2 days would probably give even the most unfit person a body to rival David Hasselhoff’s, but I found that even an hour a day can be very hard to fit into a busy schedule.
My salvation came when a friend recommended me The Fat Burning Furnace, I will admit I was sceptical at first as let’s face it, there are plenty of so called “wonder diets” out there, but what with the eight week money back guarantee I thought I might as well give it a try. The level of success this guide brought about still shocks me to this day, I managed to lose 4.5 inches off my waist in only a week and 2 months down the line am happily 28 pounds lighter. It’s a great read that shows not only exercises that anyone can manage (I think we can all squeeze in 15 minutes 3 times a week!), but also how to prepare quick meals that will actually provide your body the nutrients it needs to help lose weight, rather than starve yourself of anything vaguely healthy. Its completely risk free with an eight week money back guarantee, so if you’re like me and feeling sceptical, give it a try, there really is nothing to lose and so much to gain!
http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=899352

Do slim people annoy you when you watch them eat loads of high calorie food and not put on a pound? Wonder how they manage it? They simply burn calories quicker than the rest of us. But how do they do this; is there a secret to being constantly slim? The answer is that people like this have found the key to getting slim and staying slim without paying a cent. They are life’s energetic people. I’ll give you an example:
You could have two siblings. One cannot keep still. They are constantly running about and burning loads of calories in the process. They cannot even sit and watch TV for long. They have to be doing something. Just watch them. Their feet will be jiggling, they will constantly shift their position, and they will probably jump up at the earliest opportunity to get on with something new.
At the TV interval, it will be this sibling who asks if anyone wants a coffee and will rush off to make it, always in a hurry to get things done.
This person will be slim. They will most likely also be healthy, and well toned. They are using hundreds of extra calories a day and exercising their muscles without even realising it.
The other sibling has to watch their weight and is constantly on a diet to lose the extra pounds they seem to have put on for no apparent reason. This person loves to read. They will curl up for hours on the couch with a good book. If someone (usually the slim sibling) offers to make them a drink they will say thank you… and get on with their reading. If you watch the second sibling, you will notice that they sit real still. They never fidget. They hardly move a muscle. This sibling will tell you they eat a healthy diet. They may tell you they go to the gym once a week and do aerobics exercise three times a week, but what they will not tell you is that for the rest of their time they are almost sedentary. They are not burning enough calories to maintain a slim figure. They are also probably not that healthy, despite the nutritious diet and the carefully planned (and often paid for) exercise. Their life is a constant struggle to get slim and stay slim and they are losing the battle.
Which sibling are you?
If you resemble the first sibling, then you are most likely slim and healthy already and the free exercise tips I am going to post below will be nothing new to you. You will be doing all these things already and probably more besides.
If, however, like many of us, you resemble the second sibling; the one who always struggles to lose weight and keep it off, then these exercise tips may help. They are part of my weight loss program and they are all for free.
First of all, you need to be a fidget. Don’t just sit there at the pc, or watching TV, move! Get up and walk around, stretch a little, change your position quite often. Not only will it prevent you getting stiff joints long before your time, it will get your circulation going and burn up a few extra calories in the process.
Is it the advert break on TV? Get up and make the coffee (in fact, jump up and make it). Be the first to rush to answer the phone, even if you think it might be a salesman. Someone’s got to answer the damn thing. Same as the front doorbell, make sure you are the one to answer it. Who cares if it is someone offering pamphlets, you can always say no thanks. Again, someone has to do it and that someone may as well be you.
The benefits? I don’t think I have to spell it out. You will be using up extra calories, getting your circulation going, exercising your muscles, and keeping slim.
Here are a couple more tricks you can try to lose weight for free:
If you have a kitchen which is organised so that everything is in easy reach, move a few things about. Make it so that you have to walk from the dishwasher to the cupboard to put things away. Store things at a low level so that you have to squat down to reach them. You are burning a few more calories and exercising your legs just from doing everyday things.
If you have stairs, use them. Put things away in cupboards upstairs so that you have to climb the stairs to fetch them. You have your own free stepping exercise right at hand.
Be the one who takes the dog for a walk and run with it when you let it off the lead. The dog will have fun and just think of all those calories you are using up chasing it.
It’s been said many times that driving your car when you could walk is bad for your health and fitness. I don’t think I need to spell out the advantages to having a slimmer more toned figure in walking, but I’ve added this anyway, just in case you forget.
There are many more things you can do to set up a free weight loss program like this. Of course, cutting down on calories and eating sensibly is essential if you want to lose weight, but wouldn’t it be nice to find a way to remain slim after you have achieved your weight loss goal? This free weight loss program will work.
And if you are reading this and saying “I’m much too busy to do these extra things.” Just stop and think for a moment. Would any of these things really use up much more of your time? And if you do them quickly, like all the slim people do, will they really take up any more time at all?
The benefits of being a fidget and moving quickly and making yourself move are really effective as a means of burning up calories and keeping slim and toned. And who knows? Once you get into a program like this you may never have to spend money on gym membership again.
That thought is worth a moment of your time at least.
And if you like this article and want to follow my progress as I lose weight and get toned up, you can check me out at My Free Weight Loss Program, where I will be posting more diet and exercise tips on a regular basis.
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