Diet & Life Style Info

There are literally thousands of studies available about dieting and which one is best. Low fat, low carb, low this and low that. With so many diet plans available and most of them if not all of them waiting to take your money how is the average person to know which one is best for them. Most of these diet plans are looking to make money from you and it will cost you whether you buy a book, join a club, join a web site. It does not matter.

This post you can read for free and it is probably the only thing you can do for free so enjoy it while you can. First we will start off with an exerpt from WEBMD which follows, then after that we will add some comments of our own. At the end of the day you need to make your own decision regarding what you want to do about your weight. After all it is your body and your life, you need to decide how much you are going to spend and how it will be spent to lose weight.

Here are the study results for one study that looked at Low Fat Diets!

Study Shows People on Low-Fat Diet More Likely to Keep Weight Off

By Jennifer Warner, WebMD Health News

Reviewed by Laura J. Martin, MD

March 1, 2010 — A low-carb diet may offer quick results, but a new study suggests that a low-fat diet may be best for long-term weight loss and maintaining a healthy weight.

Researchers found obese people who followed a low-fat diet may be more likely to keep the weight off three years later after starting the diet than those who followed a low-carbohydrate diet.

“Although participants in the low-carbohydrate group lost more weight at 12 months, they regained more weight during the next 24 months,” write researcher Marion L. Vetter, MD, RD of the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and colleagues in the Annals of Internal Medicine. “In contrast, participants in the low-fat group maintained their weight loss.”

In the study, researchers started with a group of 132 obese people who weighed an average of 289 pounds before starting either a low-fat diet, a calorie- restricted diet with less than 30% of daily calories from fat, or a low-carb diet with fewer than 30 grams of fat per day for 12 months.

After six months on the diets, the group on the low-carb diet experienced the greatest weight loss, but by 12 months there was no significant difference in weight loss between the two groups.

Three years after the study began and two years after the diets ended, researchers followed up with 40 people in the low-carb diet group and 48 in the low-fat diet group.

They found people in the low-carb diet group weighed an average of 4.9 pounds less than before they started dieting while those in the low-fat diet group weighed an average of 9.5 pounds less than they did at the start of the study.

Researchers say while both diets appear to offer weight loss benefits, the pattern of weight change was different between the low-carb and low-fat diet groups.

“The differences in weight regain between the two groups probably reflects initial weight loss,” write the researchers. “Participants who lost more weight during the first 12 months tended to regain more weight by month 36.”

End of article from WEBMD

So what do we think about this particular study. All they are saying is that one diet was slightly better than another diet! That’s it and these people appeared to not lose very much weight either.

So what should you do? Should you chose one diet over another? Should you buy the book on low fat diets or low carb diets?

The sad result in our opinion is neither! Get hold of your life and seriously limit your portion size, decrease your salt intake, eat well balanced meals  and start exercising!  There is no easy way to lose weight, it takes hard work and it takes discipline.  Forget the deserts, the second helpings, the buffets and whatever else you indulge in. Go for walks, go to the gym, reduce your intake and lose weight!

The equation is simple. Energy into your body less energy burned for the day = plus or minus weight gain. Nothing else. Forget all of these fancy weight loss programs. Eat sensibly and eat carefully, in restaurants share meals – it will cost you less, dring water instead of soft drinks and forget the deserts.

As you can see we are not fans of these diet plans.  If you have comments or would like to add to the comments please feel free to do so.

Have you ever gone to one of the buffets offered by many of the casinos around the country? They are really great deals for the price and the food is usually excellent. The problem with these buffets, well not really the casino buffet, it is more with the people who go to them, myself included, is that we all tend to over eat. It is human nature and of course we want to get our money’s worth , don’t we?

If you are on a diet and you go to one of these buffets with a group it can be very difficult to maintain your diet while everyone around you is filling up on the foods available at the buffet. Some of the larger buffets will have over 100 items on display for you to chose from and let’s face it , all of the food is excellent. The selection is so great that even if you only took one table spoon of each item, your plate would be over flowing by the time you got to the end.

Some buffets at some of the smaller casinos cost around $10.00, while the buffets at the larger casinos in Vegas can go as high as $25 per person. The food is all good, no, great and the selection is fantastic. The difference between a $10 and a $25 buffet will be a combination of  decor, presentation and at the higher end buffets, sometimes there will be more exotic foods. Either way you can fill up your plate very quickly and blow your diet plan without any trouble at all. So what is a person supposed to do when asked to go to one of these casino buffets?

Alternatives to Buffets

You could of course refuse to go to the buffet with the group or family, however for most people this is a non starter. Everyone wants to fit in and besides the family or group you are with want to enjoy the buffet as well as your company.

You already know that once you get in there, chances are you will probably over eat, but there are a few things you can do to control your over eating at a buffet and minimize the damage to your diet plan.

Discipline is one thing. You need this every day of your life while on a diet, so it is no different here, just a little more difficult to stick to it. Before you walk in, you need to tell yourself that you need to be extra strong to avoid all of the temptations.

Next, avoid looking at the desert area. This is a major source of calories, so just do not look at it. If you cannot see it and don’t know what they are offering then you will not be tempted.

We all know that it takes a while for the stomach to tell us that it is full and that is why we often feel so uncomfortable. We have over eaten and did not stop when we knew that we would be full.

So, eat slowly. Enjoy every bite and let your stomach tell you when you are full. By eating slowly your stomach will have the time to realize that it is full and communicate to your brain that it does not need any more food.

Next, the casino buffets often provide small plates and very large plates. These large plates really do hold a lot of food, more than most people can eat at one sitting. When I am trying to control how much I eat, I grab one of the small plates and use this as a natural way to limit the amount of food I put on my plate. Combined with eating slowly and having to get up for another plate naturally limits the amount of food I eat.

Lastly watch what you drink. At a casino buffet, you can have just about anything you want to drink and as many drinks as you want. Some casinos will even offer free beer and wine with their meals. You can drink chocolate milk, soft drinks or coffee or juice and as much of it as you want. If you are trying to manage your diet, stick to water. It is better for your digestion  and there are no calories when you drink water.

To summarize:

Avoid the desert area

Eat slowly

Use a small plate

Drink water with your meal

Enjoy your time with your family and friends

Casino buffets can be very tempting, however if you follow these few simple rules, you can still manage to stay within your diet plan and enjoy your time as well.

The buffets offered by the casinos have a full selection of salads and low calorie foods as well as all of the high calorie foods. Stick to the salads and low calorie foods while at the buffet. All of the food with the gravies and sauces, while they taste good, are high calorie and also are full of salt which is another health issue for many people.

Following these few simple rules and guidelines can help us all to maintain our diets and also avoid gaining weight while we are on vacation.

If you have other tips or ideas, please leave a comment on our blog.

There are so many weight loss diets out there it is hard to choose between them. One thing for sure is they are all trying to make money by selling their products and their services. So how does a person choose between one or another? Which one will work best for you over the long term? Which one will harm your body the least? There are thousands of people selling diets, doctors, exercise guru’s, dietitians and more. Who do you believe.

What I have come to conclude in life about just about everything is that if it sounds too good to be true then it is too good to be true. Many people get duped by the fast paced flashy advertisements. They want to lose weight so badly they are willing to try anything. I have also learned in life that if you don’t have to work for it and put some effort in, then you will not appreciate it and will just go back to your normal ways. So all of these weight loss diets that promise weight loss in a matter of weeks are promising more than can be achieved.

We are going to list some of the weight loss diets and a short description of each. We are in no way supporting these diets. We do think that everyone must make their own decision and do their own homework to determine which one is going to be best for them. We are trying to gather some unbiased information about diets to help people who read our posts. Please add your own comments if they are helpful to other people.

Atkins Diet
Metabolism Diet
Rice Diet
Cabbage soup diet
Sonoma diet
Soup diet
Low fat diet
Calorie diet
High protein diet
Mediterranean diet
Cleansing diet
Weight Watchers diet
Crash diet
Natural diet
Raw food diet
Mayo clinic Diet
Lemonade diet

Just looking at the names of the above diets gives me the shakes. I cannot imagine following a cleansing diet for example or a raw food diet. They just seem so counter intuitive. If you have ever watched the biggest loser, they talk about portion control, managing your total calorie  intake, eating a balanced diet to make sure you get all of the essential minerals and vitamins. The biggest loser also talks about getting enough exercise to allow you to create an energy deficit and as soon as you have an energy deficit you are going to lose weight!

Your body is a highly complex organism that requires many different foods in order to maintain the chemical balance it needs to be healthy. Why would you ever limit your food intake that essentially robs your body of key foods and vitamins it needs to maintain your health? In fact what you are potentially doing is making yourself ill while losing weight! Now that is a scary thought.

Eating in moderation is just another way of saying manage your portion control. You really have to wrap your mind around that so that you do not over eat. All of these diet plans are aimed really at making money and not your well being. Most have no scientific support and in fact many are just plain bad for you.

Following a weight loss diet on any of the above diets does not really deal with the reason you are overweight in the first place. Obviously you have eaten too much. Can’t argue with that. But why have you gotten into the habit of eating so much? Is it boredom? Are you trying to hide from something? Are you looking for comfort when you cannot get it from anything else or anyone else? It may be one or all of these reasons.

In my case, my family always had desert for supper and often a snack just before we went to bed. Can you imagine if I did that today! Never the less, I still have a craving to eat something, anything, just before I go to bed. Now that is a long term habit. The worst time to eat is just before you go to bed  and yet that is what my family did for years. They were very active and had an outlet to burn the calories off.

However when you get older, this just will not work. First of all you are not nearly as active , your metabolism slows down and you tend to eat more as well. On go the pounds and boy are they tough to get off. So far I have found that a little bit of exercise has helped along with eating sugarless gum just before I go to bed.

The exercise increases my metabolism, and burns some calories as well which helps to create an energy deficit. The sugarless gum gives me that fix I need just before I go to bed, which is really just feeding my habit with something that is very low in calories. This is a win win solution for me.

I have been able to lose 10 pounds over the past month using this approach. If you want to call it a weight loss diet you can, while I prefer to call it limiting my intake while managing my habits in a manner that lets me remain satisfied and lose weight.

This is by far a better approach to weight loss diet programs. I continue to eat a balanced diet to get all of the vitamins and minerals I need and I am not missing any of my favorite foods, just limiting the amount I eat at each meal.

Works for me . Maybe it will work for you too.

Many people are looking for the quick fix to their weight and diet problems. They see the advertisements on TV with young in shape good looking men and women who are pushing whatever product they have. It may be some sort of exercise equipment or diet or medical treatment or some sort of concoction that they should take to improve their weight problems. For the majority of people these gimmick just do not work because they do not deal with the underlying problems or the real work it takes to reduce weight and improve your overall life style.

The main message of this post is as follows : Develop a common sense plan around the food you eat, the nutrition you get from these foods and the amount of exercise that is right for you. Without a plan that you can focus on, most people will just not be able to  lose weight or improve their situation

Common Sense Diet

So what does it mean to follow a common sense diet? Without getting into how many calories you are eating or how many calories you are burning off, the common sense diet really means that you need to limit your intake of food and focus on good nutritional food.

More and more we are seeing that when we go to restaurants, that we are not satisfied unless there is a huge plate of food in front of us. Part of this satisfaction is getting value for money spent. We seem to equate the more food that we have in front of us vs. the amount we are spending is a good thing. Consumers love going to buffets were they can eat as much as they can put into their mouth or going to a restaurant where the restaurant offers large sides of vegetables, pasta’s or other high carb food.

Of course once we have this immense quantity of food in front of us, there is the feeling that we must consume all of this food. We ordered it and we have been taught since we were young to always finish our plate. So we order or receive large amounts of food and we consume all of it. Before we know it we are gaining weight at a rapid pace.

The message is to practice some self control and cut down on the quantity you are eating. Use whatever trick you need, but reduce the quantity of food that you take in every day. Use a smaller plate, stop snacking, snack on low calorie foods, split portions with a partner and avoid those places were you just cannot maintain your self control. It is the old adage, you cannot take a kid to a candy store and expect him or her to not ask for some of the candy in that store.

Split Portions

One common sense diet approach is to split portions between you and a partner when you go out to a restaurant. We have found that most restaurants support this request and will gladly give you another plate so that you and your partner can separate the portions any way you like.

Some restaurants have a minimum order requirement. If you really like this restaurant, then just order a salad for one person and have the other person order the main course. You can split the meal after the meal is delivered and reduce the number of calories that you are taking in.

A big advantage of this approach is that you also reduce the cost of eating out!

Foods You Eat

Anything that is deep fried, regardless of what it is should be avoided. The fat content from the oil that it was cooked in will contribute to many more calories that you can believe. Focus on foods that are not deep fried such as vegetables that are steamed, meat that is not breaded and fried and stay away from desert. If you really must have desert keep your portion small and split it with your partner. That way you will both benefit from less calories, save money and reduce your weight.

Common sense diet – Snacking

Snacking is one of the most difficult things to get control of and yet in some cases is the single biggest contributor of weight gain.

There are two problems with snacking that cause weight gain. The first one is that we lose control of how much we snack and how many calories that we actually consume. A bowl of peanuts, chips etc taste great, satisfy some inner urge and before we know it the entire bowl is gone. Repeated daily or several times a week will definitely contribute to weight gain. It really does not matter what you snack on, unless it is just fruits and vegetables with no salad dressing, everyone loses control of how much they eat and will gain weight.

The second problem with snacking is what we snack on. Many of us like salted peanuts, chips or sweet deserts. These kinds of snacks will contribute to weight gain as well as possibly high blood pressure from all of the salt intake. If you must snack, then cut these types of high calorie foods out of your diet and switch to other low calories types of foods. Fruits and vegetables are good examples.

Another common sense diet snack reducer is to chew low calories gum. Benefits to chewing low calorie gum include the lack of calories, the sensation of chewing you get which will contribute to the satisfaction of chewing on something and it gives you something to do instead of snacking.

In summary, reduce the amount of food you intake, split portions, avoid snack foods and desert and use common sense diet approach to everything you do. Use tricks such as smaller plates,  splitting portions, avoiding fried food and eating steamed vegetables with spice flavoring instead of salt.

We would appreciate your comments and positive contributions to this subject.