PostHeaderIcon Psycho Diets

Dane Fletcher asked:


Hey buddy! So you want to lose weight, eh? Its summertime and you want to look all nice and hot for those babes at the beach. Ok, here’s what you have to do if you want this to happen quickly; eat lots of cabbage and drink a gallon of prune juice twice daily at noon . . . no wait. Hmm, try this; eat nothing but ice cream and lard for the next three weeks or until the next full moon . . .no that’s not it either. Aha! Here we go: eat six hotdogs per day (with syrup), while cutting out all meat products and carbs . . . . . what? Why are you giving me that look?? Ok, so maybe that wasn’t quite your cup of tea . . . Did I mention tea? Try this magic herbal-essence tea, with the special fat melting ingredient, Babaganoosh. Of course to ensure its potency, the only additional foods you can eat is two loaves of rye bread with pickles and mayonnaise . . . STOP THE MADNESS ALREADY!!!

 

You know, one thing that I fail to grasp is why people only worry about looking good during the summer? Sure, looking good in a swimsuit or bikini is nice, but is it not also important to look fit when wearing slacks? And as far-fetched as some of these “diets” may sound, the things people are actually trying nowadays are just as perplexing. The problem is 99% of the weight lost on these diets will be water weight, which the body will quickly regain. What’s worse is that all of these diets promote starvation, which in turn causes the metabolism to slow down. Once you come off a particular diet, you are apt to gain back all the weight you lost and then some! The human body does not take kindly to severe deprivation, and it will do whatever it takes to store energy i.e. slowing down the metabolism.

 

To get a better idea of what kind of madness people are willing to subject themselves to, let’s take a closer look at some of these diets and their claims to fame.

 

The 3-Day Hotdog and Egg Diet

 

Synopsis: Here’s one if you just can’t seem to get enough hot dogs and eggs! It’s easy to remember, and easy to shop for! Day 1) seven hot dogs, no bun, and mustard only. Day 2) eggs any style. Day 3) eggs any style. The Claim: Lose between 8 and 10 pounds in three days. Hey, that’s a lot of weight to be losing in three days, where do I sign up?? Ok, reality check people! For starters, there is nothing denoting the amount of eggs you should be eating, nor does it specify adding stuff like ham and cheese to your eggs, etc. Not only that, but just the thought of eating seven hotdogs in one-day makes most people want to gag. Heck, a hot dog vendor in Brooklyn who owns stock in egg manufacturing would find this diet hard to swallow!

 

The Cabbage Soup Diet

 

Synopsis: Every day you can have as much cabbage soup as you desire. In addition to this, you are allotted the following foods on certain days.

 

Day 1) any fruit, except bananas. Day 2) vegetables plus baked potato for dinner. Day 3) up to eight bananas plus fat free milk. Day 4) brown rice, fruit juice and vegetables. The Claim: Lose up to 10 pounds in seven days. The trouble with this diet is that it seriously lacks in providing for vitamins and minerals. Plus the sheer volume of cabbage would turn a bunny rabbit into a carnivore within a week! Not to mention the irregular bowel movements, as well as a constant case of cabbage-fueled gas. Very potent! Sleep alone, FYI.

 

The Bread and Butter Diet

 

Synopsis: This diet seems to focus on the joys of getting bread and butter with every meal. Like most of the other diets listed, this one also claims that you can lose 10 pounds in a week. Here is a sample from their menu:

 

Breakfast:

1 slice cracked wheat bread

1 teaspoon butter or margarine

Lunch:

1 ounce Muenster cheese

1/2 cup stewed tomatoes

1 cup steamed summer squash

1 slice Italian Bread

1 Teaspoon butter or margarine

Dinner:

4 ounces dark meat turkey

1/2 cup corn

green salad

1 slice pumpernickel

1 teaspoon butter or margarine

 

As much as I like bread, it is not enough of an incentive for me to starve myself. On average, when following this diet you only get approximately 850 calories per day. Sure, you’ll lose weight, probably even the 10 pounds promised. However, by following a starvation diet of this nature, one will lose more muscle weight than fat. Once the average person drops bellow 1,000 calories consumed per day, the metabolism shuts down, and the muscles will start to atrophy because the body is burning the muscle tissue for energy. In other words, your body starts consuming itself!

 

Two-Day Liquid Diet

 

Synopsis: Buy a bottle of magic diet concentrate, mix with water and consume for two days. Did I mention you are not allowed to consume anything else besides water with this? But hey, it claims that you can lose up to 10 pounds in two days! These also claim to detoxify and energize you! Reality: looks like concentrated juice mix, which is really what it is. Plus, I’ve never paid $20 for OJ concentrate! And, I’ve never been “energized” when my tummy was screaming profanities at me for neglecting it. As for detoxification . . . I think a couple of laxatives would do the trick just as well. Bottom line; it is impossible to lose any amount of body fat in only two days. Any weight lost will be nothing but water, which will be regained immediately upon completion of the diet. In reality, diets like this are nothing more than fasting. And if fasting is something you actually enjoy doing, there are plenty of religions out there that offer meditation and some pretty cool chants to focus on, that will take the mind off of the hunger pangs.

 

The so-called “American Heart Association Diet”

 

Here’s a doozy of a diet that fools people into thinking that it is actually endorsed by the American Heart Association. Here’s just a sample from one day:

 

Breakfast:

Black Coffee or Tea

1/2 Grapefruit

1 slice toast

2 tbs. peanut butter

Lunch:

1/2 cup of tuna (no mayo)

1 slice toast

Coffee or Tea

Dinner:

2 slices of any meat

1 cup of string beans

1 cup of beets

1 apple

1 cup of vanilla ice cream

 

The Claim: Lose 3 pounds in 3 days, up to 30 pounds in 40 days

 

Needless to say, the American Heart Association does NOT sanction this diet. The following is an except from the AHA website:

 

A weight-loss diet claimed to be from the American Heart Association has been cited several times across the United States and other countries. Many people believe that the three-day or seven-day, hot dog and cabbage soup diets are from the American Heart Association. However, this is not true.

 

The true AHA diet gives recommended servings per day of various food categories, not specific foods. Most of the diets that are incorrectly labeled as the AHA diet give specific menus or suggest that the diet should be followed for a specific length of time.

 

One phony diet describes a three-day or seven-day menu, supposedly prescribed by the AHA or by the “Heart Association.” It includes vanilla ice cream, hot dogs, eggs and cheddar cheese. The diet promises a 10-pound weight loss in three days. These bogus diets have been cited as the Spokane Heart Diet, the Cleveland Clinic Diet, Sacred Heart Memorial Hospital Diet and the Miami Heart Institute Diet. The poorly typed and photocopied phony diet has also been offered by mail for $2 per copy.

 

From time to time other fad diets emphasizing other foods will also incorrectly attribute the AHA.

 

Bottom line; be extremely cautious about anything that is supposedly endorsed by a national institution such as the American Heart Association. When in doubt, go to the organization’s official website and verify this information. If it sounds like it came out of left field, it probably did.

 

The Answer

Every psycho diet out there promises a loss of weight, which is fine, however what they don’t tell you is that you’ll be losing water weight, and will gain it all back once you complete the diet. And if you are feeling bloated and are actually looking to dump excess water weight, there are a lot less expensive methods for doing this. Try using water pills, for starters. And if you are looking to shed all that excess flab in time for summer . . . well what can I say, except that you’re too late for this year. Instead of torturing yourself with psycho diets that will only make you suffer and make you fatter in the long run, get a jump-start on next year. Start a long-term eating plan that you can live with every day. Do NOT starve yourself, and be sure that you do not limit yourself to one type of food. Also drink plenty of water, especially when exercising. With proper diet and exercise, the average person can reasonably expect to lose between two and five pounds of actual body fat per month. Remember, results cannot be had over night, and nothing worth having comes easy. But the end result is well worth the effort!

Source: http://www.bodybuildingtoday.com/index.php/nutrition/psycho-diets.html



The Fat Burning Furnace

PostHeaderIcon How Relaxation Techniques Play An Important Role In Treating Anxiety Disorders?

Jason Archer asked:


Anxiety attacks had always been common among working population, but with changing lifestyle and personal expectations of people anxiety is today a disorder found among every other person. With medicine being a prominent solution for every other disorder people often tend to spend large amount of bucks on their hospital bills, but not many know that it is always possible to treat such strokes of fear, tension or worries by following simple and safe relaxation techniques.

Relaxation with anxiety disorders plays a vital role, a role as important as any other medication, all because of the safe and beneficial principles of various relaxation techniques.

Before understanding how the equation of relaxation with anxiety disorders works, it is important to have an idea about the benefits and purpose of following various relaxation techniques. Relaxation is more or less a spiritual as well as non spiritual way to control the internal disturbance of a body and mind. Most of these relaxation techniques are designed to control the stressful and unstable mind as well as to heel the weary outlook of a body. Anxiety being a condition where a body is nervous and mind is under panic or excessive tensed situation, thus by simply controlling a disturbed mind with relaxation one can always treat those anxiety disorders or attacks.

Relaxation in itself is of various types, but each of these different relaxation techniques are based on one common purpose to benefit mind and body with peace, strength, stamina and calmness.

Relaxation with anxiety disorders is the best way to come over those panic strokes and attacks of angst. One such example of relaxation techniques heeling anxiety is, the fact that deep relaxation involves physiological changes in a person causing a decrease in respiration rate, heart rate, skeletal muscle tension, metabolic rate and analytic thinking.

Relaxation with anxiety disorders helps in overcoming its symptoms like nausea, headaches, irritation, shortness of breath, increased heartbeat, sweating and palpitation, suffocation, chest pain, dizziness, fear, tremors and nervousness.

Since anxiety is more of a mental and physiological disorder, therefore some of the most common relaxation techniques that are well designed to relieve a body of its anxiety disorders are meditation, yoga, ample sleep and good diet. When you experience attacks of anxiety with any of the symptoms mentioned the first thing to do is control your breathing, which can be done by either meditation or yoga. When you feel too much tension and inability to feel or think anything, it is always better to rest the over burdened brain.

Another quick relaxation technique is breathing exercise, when feeling stressed and anxious while working the best thing to do is take a break and then work on your breathing. Out of many big relaxation techniques, this breathing exercise is the easiest and works the best, as all you need to do is your eyes (you can lie down or can sit somewhere comfortably) and breathe slow and deep. By simply following this technique of relaxation with anxiety disorders for 15-20 minutes (or 10 minutes if you do not have that much time to spend), you tend to control your mind and calm it down. Breathing exercise is one those instant techniques that work with sudden attacks of anxiety, another thing to be done when feeling such sudden symptoms is to drink water, possible cold water.

No doubt, today there are dozens of good medicines and drugs available out in the market claiming to treat and some actually treating the hyper and anxiety disorders, but in many cases anxiety is all about the emotional state of the mind and thus can be best treated with relaxation techniques. Relaxation with anxiety disorders is not just capable of overcoming physical weakness, but also has the power to control or balance the emotions experienced by the body.

Some of the other relaxation techniques synchronizing relaxation with anxiety disorders for its treatment aroma therapy, aromatherapy, progressive muscle relaxation and visualization. Right diet and right amount of sleep are two important relaxation factors that act as both the precaution and the treatment. If you are sleeping for a comfortable 7 to 8 hours and eating the nutritious, balanced, healthy and fried less diet chances are you will not become a victim of any of the anxiety symptoms. Also, if you experience or have an anxiety disorder make sure that you eat food that is less oily, with more of vegetables and is not processed. Try not to have tea or coffee, as they are possible triggers of mood change and many other anxiety symptoms.

Relaxation techniques are simple methods to calm down an unbalanced mind and to refresh or rejuvenate an exhausted body, its no magic simple science. Thus, if you are someone being troubled with anxiety disorders three things you need to do is consult a doctor, take the medication (if prescribed) and follow relaxation techniques like yoga, meditation, sleep well and eat good.



Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle

PostHeaderIcon How to Eat Right and Have Healthy Food Delivery

Terry Schierer asked:


What’s the number one stress buster for time challenged professionals and families alike? Healthy food delivery!

After a chaotic and stressful day what better treat than not to have to cook? Not too much! Long workdays leave very little time for anything else, especially cooking.

In the United States today, the workday has increased from an eight hour day to often ten or twelve hours. In the workforce, stress is prevalent above everything else.

Lets face it, daily chores are time consuming. By the time you do your house work, go to work, drive the kids around and run errands you are to tired to cook a healthy meal let alone consume it. Can’t wait to go to sleep so you can wake up and do the same thing tomorrow.

This is when healthy food delivery can be a real godsend. When you order from menus that are healthy and nutritious, you do not have to worry if your family is getting the proper nutritional value from their meal.

You and your family will get to order exactly what they want to eat from the massive menu options. The good thing about healthy home delivery is that each one of your family members gets to choose the food that he or she prefers, avoiding the headaches of preparing multiple dinners.

When you order healthy food for delivery, you will always receive the perfect portion plate that a professional chef has prepared. Each menu item is carefully prepared to your order specifications and delivered to your door in a short amount of time.

For someone who doesn’t like to cook, or doesn’t have the time this service is right up their alley. Let’s face it! There is probably nothing more time capturing than cooking healthy meals, so we give in to fast food or junk food to get us through the meal.

Bad Idea! When you don’t have the time to eat right, eating junk or fast food only complicates the problem. You know! That situation they talk about on the national news every night, obesity.

With healthy food delivery having no time or can’t cook is no problem. Just go and get one of those delicious healthy dinners you picked, heat and enjoy. The best part about it, after the taste sensations have died down, is the fact that your body will love you for feeding it healthy food.

When you stop and think about it, your day is hectic enough without having to worry about what to cook for dinner. When you use a healthy food delivery service, you will be able to spend more quality time with your family and friends.



The Fat Burning Furnace

PostHeaderIcon The Amazing Biggest Loser Diet

Jeff Behar asked:


The Biggest Loser Diet is a calorie-controlled, carbohydrate modified, fat reduced, weight loss diet geared to help you burn pure fat from the body. It also help to do so without deprivation or loss of energy.

How The Biggest Loser Diet Works

The Biggest Loser Diet guides you to choose foods that are closer to their natural source, particularly fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, because your body processes and uses them much more efficiently to build health. Whole foods are those that have not been modified from their natural state, or have been modified only a little bit, for example, through cooking. Foods that have been substantially modified are classified as processed foods. For example, blueberries are a whole food but blueberries toaster pastries are not.

Whole foods are higher in fiber, which aids in weight loss, both because it is filling and because it helps reduce the number of calories that your body absorbs after a meal. Further, whole foods are much less fattening than processed foods because they do not contain added sugar or other sweeteners. Nor do they contain added fats or oils.

This is a low calorie diet based on the Biggest Loser pyramid of 4-3-2-1 (four servings of fruits and veggies; three of lean protein; two of whole grains; and one “extra”), along with good old-fashioned exercise. Eat a diet based largely on fruits, vegetables and lean protein, add a heavy dose of physical activity and you will lose weight, lower cholesterol, decrease blood pressure, and become stronger and more energized.

The Biggest Loser Diet is based on a diet is high in lean protein. Protein has a hunger controlling effect on the body, which is why higher protein diets are so effective for weight loss and fat-burning.

What Food is Allowed in The Biggest Loser Diet

The Biggest Loser Diet gives you the freedom to eat a wide variety of foods, as long as you stick to mostly whole, natural foods. Over the course of the 12-week program, you can expect to eat small, frequent meals containing plenty of fiber and protein, for fullness without too many calories.

The Sample Meal Plan for The Biggest Loser Diet

The Biggest Loser Diet plan includes one week sample meal plans for 1,200, 1,500 and 1,800-calorie diets, along with some recipes. Forty-five percent of the total calories come from carbohydrates, 30% from protein, and 25% from fat.

The 4-3-2-1 Biggest Loser Pyramid sets the stage for number of servings from each of the food groups:



4 servings of fruits and vegetables

3 servings of protein — lean, vegetarian, or low-fat dairy

2 servings of whole grains

1 extra of fats, oils, sweets, alcohol, or your choice, equivalent to 200 calories



What Foods are Not Allowed in The Biggest Loser Diet

The Biggest Loser Die doesn’t allow eating any appetite stimulating white foods like bread, pasta, or potatoes.  You have to keep daily food logs, watching portion sizes, and drinking 48-64 ounces of water each day round out the basic plan.

Dieters are urged to choose foods that are not processed and contain no added fats, sugar, or salt.

How to Benefit from The Biggest Loser Diet

There is a simple formula for you, put together by the Biggest Loser doctors and nutritionists.  

Your present weight X 7 = Your daily caloric needs for weight loss.

Your calorie count should never be static; in fact, it’s a moving target. As you lose weight, you’ll need to readjust your daily calories downward in order to keep losing at a good pace and break through plateaus, should your weight loss ever seem stalled. Your Biggest Loser online program will make this adjustment for you, and change your meal plans as necessary.

Note: Everyone is different, and we all burn different amounts of calories at different rates. So if you and a partner, friend, or buddy follow The Biggest Loser Diet, one of you might lose weight at a different rate, faster or slower, than the other from week to week.

Additional Suggested Health Benefits of The Biggest Loser Diet

The biggest loser diet program contains a detailed cardio and strength-training program that increases in intensity for a fat-busting boost.

It works because you burn more calories than you eat, and if you follow the prescription for eating healthy, whole foods every few hours, you shouldn’t have to deal with hunger.

Potential Risks of The Biggest Loser Diet

Sounds simple enough, but when you don’t have a personal trainer pushing you, as the TV contestants have, it is difficult to stay motivated. If you’re motivated by the television program, you have to struggle hard at home with this sensible and straightforward approach.

Whilst The Biggest Loser Diet doesn’t provide viewers with a realistic format for exercise, it does motivate them to get started and that is a good thing.

What the Experts Say about The Biggest Loser Diet

The Biggest Loser Diet has certain advantages. When you eliminate refined starches and sugars or the appetite stimulating foods, hunger and appetite go way down because blood glucose and insulin spikes are minimized.

The diet is endorsed by the American Dietetic Association.  According to American Dietetic Association spokesperson Amy Jamieson-Petonic, MEd, RD, the Biggest Loser Diet is a worthwhile diet– as long as you consume at least 1,200 calories daily. “It is not recommended to consume fewer than 1,200 calories a day because it is difficult to obtain the necessary vitamins, minerals and nutrients needed for daily activities,” she says.

Susan Bowerman, MS, RD, assistant director of the Center for Human Nutrition at the University of California at Los Angeles also endorses the diet. According to Bowman, “The Biggest loser Diet is very similar to the plan we use at our clinics, using very low-fat and lean protein, lots of fruits and vegetables (with an emphasis on vegetables), and avoiding refined grains — which has proven to be successful because the diet is very satiating,” she says. Bowerman also recommends that dieters get plenty of omega-3 fatty acids, either in a supplement or by eating low-mercury types of fish twice weekly.

American Dietetic Association spokesperson Amy Jamieson-Petonic, MEd, RD, endorses the Biggest Loser Diet — as long as you consume at least 1,200 calories daily. “It is not recommended to consume fewer than 1,200 calories a day because it is difficult to obtain the necessary vitamins, minerals and nutrients needed for daily activities,” she says.

Bottom Line Evaluation of the Biggest Loser Diet

Only four components of food supply calories: protein and carbohydrates (4 calories per gram), alcohol (7 calories per gram), and fat (9 calories per gram).  Vitamins, minerals, phytochemicals, fiber, and water do not supply calories.

Diet-wise, no matter what you’ve heard, calories really do count, and they count big-time. If you don’t eat fewer calories than you burn off, there will be no weight loss.



Fat Loss For Idiots

PostHeaderIcon Relax in Ten Minutes

Mark Boardman asked:


Use this simple self-hypnosis process to quickly and easily relax in just ten minutes. Practice and soon you will be able to relax at will! A great way to help you fall asleep.

Some people find it easy to relax, others find it very difficult. This article is aimed at those who find it difficult. This process is excellent to use if you are having trouble falling asleep at night or just find it hard to switch off from the stresses of life!

Sit yourself down somewhere comfortable and relaxed where you are unlikely to be disturbed for a few minutes.

Step 1. Take a deep breath and hold it for a couple of seconds, then release it as slowly and steadily as you can. Then repeat this just one more time and as you let out the breath very gently allow your eyes to close.

Step 2. For the next couple of minutes focus on nothing but your eyelids. Allow them to relax as fully as they can. Imagine them becoming heavier and heavier over your eyes, picture them becoming relaxed. The eyelids have some of the smallest muscles in the human body and are the easiest to relax.

Step 3. After a couple of minutes picture, and feel, the relaxation in your eyelids spreading down your entire body from the top of your head to the tips of your toes in a flowing wave of relaxation and comfort. Then feel that relaxation double.

Step 4. Next, on each outward breath, say inwardly to yourself, while keeping your lips perfectly still, the word ‘relax’. Your breathing should stay completely unaltered. On every outward breath just think to yourself ‘relax’ and feel the stress and tension leaving your body.

Step 5. Now, as you continue to think ‘relax’ on each outward breath allow your body to slowly relax one section at a time. Start at the head and face, move down through the neck and shoulders and into the arms, hands and fingers. Let all the tension flow away from your body. Then move on to the back and spine, the chest, stomach, waist and hips. Finally feel the relaxation flow through your legs and on into your feet and toes. Each step of the way let your body relax deeper and continue to think ‘relax’ on each outward breath.

Step 6. When you feel fully relaxed enjoy the sensation for as long as you like, then when you are ready slowly open your eyes, take a short while to stretch and revive yourself and then move on with the rest of your day, feeling relaxed and energised!



End Anxiety And Panic Attacks
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