John Howard asked:


A lot of people nowadays are looking for ways to lose weight. Reasons for losing weight vary – some people simply want to become healthier, some people want to look good, and some people need to do it to reduce risks of other health issues. There are a lot of ways available for weight loss, advertisements for weight loss products have become abundant, so with ads for weight loss exercise programs and routines. Another popular way to lose weight is to participate change one’s ordinary diet to a weight loss diet.

There are numerous weight loss diet plans available – and you can choose a plan to suit your specific nutritional needs. Before choosing one of the available weight loss diet plans, you may want to consult your physician and gather as much information as you can to make an informed decision.

Some of the more common and popular weight loss diet programs are those that involve cleansing and calorie reduction. Another popular weight loss diet plan involves the so called five factor diet.

Cleansing diets are essentially detoxification techniques. This diet involves eating combinations of fresh fruits and vegetables and drinking plenty of liquids. Some advantages to this diet are: it provides you with a fresher feeling and increases your energy; it also helps to increase metabolism as a cleaner liver metabolizes food better; and it is an inexpensive diet. The disadvantages of this diet are that it can be a little hard to adhere to and it may leave you feeling hungry.

The Five Factor diet involves eating five meals in a single day, doing exercises of five days a week (exercises have five phases that are five minutes in length), and includes the following in every meal: lean protein, low GI carbs, adequate fiber, good fats, and sugar free beverages.

Calorie Restriction diets are about as simple as any weight loss diet can get. This diet is based on reducing your daily caloric intake and helps in reducing stress on the immune and digestive systems. Going on this type of diet entails counting the calories you take in and eating less of everything. This diet generally includes the consumption of fruits, vegetables, and low calorie proteins. There are no restrictions on the type of food you can eat as long as you pay attention to the amount of calories.

Prior to starting on your diet, you may want to ask yourself a few questions to determine if the diet can also address your lifestyle needs. Here are a few guideline questions you can use:

- What are your eating habits? Do you eat while on the go or do you eat at home? What do you eat most of the time? Will the new foods in your weight loss diet plan be suitable for this kind of environment?

- Will you be able to eat a different type of food from majority of those present at social gatherings? When eating in groups, how do your companions eat? Do they typically eat food that may not be compatible with your new diet plan?

- Will your current home environment work with your new diet plan? If it does not, are you prepared to change it?

- Do your current leisure activities fit into your weight loss diet plan? Do you consume a lot of junk food in your spare time? If your new diet plan does not allow for the consumption of junk foods, will you be able to give up junk foods altogether?

- Do you eat out a lot? If you do, do the restaurants you go to serve food that fits into your new diet plan?

- Is your kitchen set up properly to handle the type of food preparation required in your new diet plan? Do you have freezer space? Do you have enough time to prepare your food?



Precious

Anne Dixon asked:


just learned you have diabetes and your doctor recommends you lose weight? Finding an easy diabetic weight loss diet may seem difficult.

Trying to find a good weight loss program is hard enough. It may also seem an impossible task to find a good diabetic weight loss diet. This is where we may help out, by explaining 5 different diabetic weight loss diet options.

5 Diabetic Weight Loss Options:

Diabetic Food Exchange Diet: This diabetic diet plan is one of the main eating plans that doctors prescribe to people with diabetes. It may be confusing at first, yet once you understand its concept, you will find that it has two positive outcomes. It will help you lose weight and maintain your blood sugar.

The diabetic food exchange diet groups similar foods together. Each group lists certain foods that may be eaten and the exact portion that may be eaten. Measuring the food portions exactly is very important on this diabetic weight loss diet. It is also important to eat on a very regular schedule.

Diabetic Food Pyramid: This diabetic food plan is easier to understand and implement than the diabetic food exchange diet. With this plan the foods are separated into different groups. The food group that allows the most servings is the base of the food pyramid. The next set of groups of foods follow up the pyramid, with the top of the pyramid representing the food group allowed the list.

You can lose weight on this diet and be satisfied, if you stay within the servings allowed each group and choose healthy, low calorie foods.

Atkins Diabetic Diet: This is a well known diet found in the Atkins diet books series. The book, Atkins Diabetes Revolution, offers diabetic meal plans allowing three different levels of carbohydrate consumption. This diet plan begins with the person having only 20 grams of carbohydrates a day. Gradually, 40 grams of carbs are allowed, and finally, 60 grams of carbs are allowed per day. This diabetic weight loss diet may be a bit extreme for many people because it almost eliminates breads, rice and potatoes. Many people have been able to manage their diabetes and lose weight with this diet.

Nutrisystem Diabetic Diet Plan: The diabetic weight loss diet plan offered by Nutrisystem may be considered one of the most convenient diabetic weight loss options. The diabetic meals are specifically made for people with diabetes Type II. They are low calorie pre-packaged and pre-portioned, and require no refrigeration. Fresh vegetables, fruits and dairy products will need to be added to fully balance the diet. If you are “on the go” and have a hard time with meal planning, this diabetic weight loss plan should be considered.

Medifast Diabetic Diet Plan: This diabetic diet weight loss plan claims to help you lose 20 pounds in 30 days. Medifast has a simple, yet powerful diet plan called “5 in 1.” This means, you choose 5 items to eat a day from Medifast’s prepackaged meals, and make your own one “lean and green” meal a day. The “lean and green” meal should consist of a lean meat and green vegetable. Many people with diabetes and weight issues have been help greatly with Medifast’s diabetic diet plan.

Any one of the above diabetic diet weight loss plans can help you manage your diabetes and weight loss goals.



Olivia

Dr John Anne asked:


Obesity is a truly complex health hazards that may affect any individuals irrespective of age or gender. It can be a serious health problem that may in time prove itself a life-threatening disorder and put an individual suffering from obesity in a high risk for developing cardiac problems, cholesterol or diabetics. If you are overweight or you just wish to maintain your figure, weight loss diet certainly works best for you, if you can follow rigorously.

Analyze your emotional state

If you are really serious about your overeating problem and make a good control on it, you should first start taking a diary on your food habits. The diary can include three columns initially. In the first column, you write the name of the food you are taking. In the second column, you write the temptation that you have experienced before attaining the food and in the third column, you should write about the emotional satisfaction that you have derived after having the food. Now it is the time to compare between your short-term gratifications that you acquire immediately after having (or rather during having) and the long term impact that you actually gain in your health system. It will certainly help you to switch to weight loss diet.

Provide little extra time to control your impulse

If you feel like eating now, provide some extra little time to get a hold on your impulse. Say, for example, you feel that you need to feed now and hunger is hitting you up badly, try to give yourself at least 10 minutes time before you actually turn yourself into any action. It helps.

Have plenty of water

Drink a minimum of 6-8litres water daily. Especially, you try not to forget drinking water before your meal. It will reduce your hunger and provide you a ‘full feeling’. Not only that, pure drinking water has the ability to purify your system. It helps maintaining the homeostasis of the system with appropriate water retention while increasing the discharge of body wastages through urination.

Quick ‘n’ effective weight loss diet program

There are few quick but effective weight loss diet programs available in the market. In 1985, General Motors Inc in cooperation with John Hopkins Research Centre formulated a wonderful weight loss diet program for their employees and family members. According to the research, this program is effective and almost flawless. It is structured in a fashion that the followers of the program will be able to loose their weight to a remarkable extent, say, 10-17lb per week, without loosing their energy or stamina.

This is a seven day program; however, research has shown that there is no apparent harm related with it and this weight loss diet program can be repeated several times to get the desired result. If you are willing to follow this program, the first thing you have to do is to refrain from alcohol or any kind of alcoholic beverages. Additionally, you have to drink ten glasses of water every day.

On the first day of the program, you need to feed yourself with a variety of fruits except banana. The program suggests having lots of watermelon and a loupe to have good result. The second day comprises with vegetables. You may have raw or cooked one depending your own personal preference. To fulfill the requirement of carbohydrate, you may start with potatoes with little butter on it. Third day is a day of mixing. You have the combination of fruits and vegetables. But you are not allowed to have banana.

Third day of the weight loss diet program is not allowing you to have potato as well. In the fourth day, you may have a combination of banana and milk. But you are limited with 8 bananas and 3 glasses of milk. On the fifth day, you may relax a bit because it offers you to feed your appetite with beef and tomatoes.

Have 10 oz of lean beef with 6 tomatoes. But do not forget to increase your water intake by 1qrt. Sixth day is really lovely for you because you may have as many beef and vegetables as you want. In the seventh day, you may enjoy your weight loss diet by having brown rice, vegetables and fruit juice. Now measure your weight, and please do not forget to write a review of this weight loss diet program.



Campbell

Alice Loh asked:


The effectiveness of whatever weight loss diet lies ultimately on calorie reduction.

Diet plans generally impose rules on what you can eat and what you cannot, thus limiting you to a certain number of calories you can consume per day. So, by following these weight loss diets, you’ll naturally eat less than when you normally eat freely.

Sure, there are other nutrients like fat content that you must watch out for when you eat, but that’s a topic for discussion another day. For now, suffice to know how many calories you consume on a daily basis and that will give you a good indication if you’re overeating or not.

There’s really no general guideline about how many calories you should consume due to many factors based your current physical condition, age, sex but from U.S. National Weight Control Registry’s findings, individuals who were successful in weight loss consume around 1,700 kcal for men and around 1,300 kcal for women.

Counting calories may seem to be tedious and unnatural but nevertheless helps you to be aware of how much food intake you’re actually consuming. Even if you don’t count, by knowing the calories of common foods will help you make an informed and better decision for your diet.

Here’s an example of a fictitious female who eats an extremely healthy diet for the sake of discussion:

1) Breakfast Croissant (medium) bread and Low-fat milk (1%) – 333 kcal

2) Morning snack Regular ice cream (1/2 cup) – 145 kcal

3) Lunch Fried fish (3 oz) and Regular cheddar cheese (1 oz) – 309 kcal

4) Morning snack Frozen yogurt, low-fat (1/2 cup) – 110 kcal

5) Dinner Ground Beef – Regular (25% fat) – 236 kcal

This works out to a total of 1133 kcal. With a cup of coffee, a fruit helping here and there, this lady’s food intake will hover around 1,250 to 1,300 which is pretty ideal.

Note: The above calories are based on US Food & Drug Administration (FDA)’s Consumer Magazine, May – Jun 2005 issue.

You can easily search for listings of all the common foods and their calories but here’s my list I compiled for you so you’re more conscious of the common foods and calories when you choose your foods:

1) Hamburger 120 g – 300 kcal

2) Fish and chips 250 g – 800 kcal

3) Soft drink (Coke) can (285 ml) – 120 kcal

4) Fries 200 g – 600 kcal

5) Coffee/tea with sugar cup (200 ml) – 40 to 50 kcal

6) Coffee/tea with milk cup (200 ml) – 70 to 120 kcal

7) Beer can (350 ml) – 150 kcal

Fried fish 200 g – 450 kcal

9) Broiled fish 200 g – 300 to 400 kcal

10) Steak 200 g – 500 kcal

11) Fried rice 400 g – 500 kcal

12) Noodles, dry or soup 300 to 500 g – 400 to 500 kcal

13) Noodles, fried 300 to 500 g – 500 to 800 kcal

14) Cookies 5 to 10 small pieces – 200 to 300 kcal

The above list is NOT a recommended list of foods to eat. Rather, you now know that eating a packet of fries at a fast food restaurant will give you 600 calories and you can now decide if you want to eat all of that, half of that or don’t touch that at all.



Ahmad

Melanie Thomassian asked:


Do you find weight loss challenging?

You lose weight, you gain weight, you lose again, and the cycle continues!

If you want to break out of that cycle once and for all, you need to start focusing on a way of eating that you can continue for life, rather than opting for a short term fix.

Lets face it youll get short term results from short term diets!

So, to save you the hassle, well take a look at 3 weight loss diets that simply don’t work, and why:

#1 Low carb diets

Low carb plan focus is on reducing, or removing, carbohydrate from the diet, and increasing protein intake. A few examples include the South Beach diet, the Zone diet, and the Atkins plan.

Problems:



Difficult to stick with long term

Initial rapid weight loss is rarely maintained.

Reduced intake of carbohydrate eventually leads to protein being used for energy.

Lack of fibre can lead to constipation.

Can be high in saturated fat, which is proven to be bad for heart health.



#2 Meal replacement plans

These diets advocate substituting real food with shakes or soups. A few examples include the Slim Fast plan, Celebrity Slim, and the Tony Ferguson diet.

Problems:



Difficult to stick with long term

This is a quick fix solution, and not a good option if you want to change eating habits for life.

It won’t teach you anything about healthy food, or portion control.

Weight is normally gained back again when the diet is stopped.



#3 Very low calorie diets

These diets are extremely restrictive, often focusing on a single food or food group. Examples include the Grapefruit Diet, the Cabbage Soup Diet, and the Chicken Soup Diet.

Problems:



Difficult to stick with long term

Excluding whole food groups is extremely dangerous and unhealthy.

If followed for an extended period could lead to malnutrition.

Very low cal diets do the opposite of what you want – they store up energy, and begin breaking down protein (muscle). Weight is gained quickly when you stop the diet because the body tries to replenish its energy stores.

Anne