Attention to all nurses!!!

Need a job now?

Access to local or foreign nursing jobs available here:

NursesGetJobs.blogspot.com

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Cutting calories is pretty simple. If your trying to cut calories your either trying to get into great shape or maybe even just trying to have a healthier diet. Most of the time the objective is to take in less calories and burn more calories. Here you will learn how to cut calories.

The first basic step starts when you go shopping. You want to look at the food labels to see the amount of calories in each food you buy.Try to find foods with fewer calories. It is important to compare the calories to the serving size. If a food says 200 calories and it comes in a pack of 4, most likely the serving size will be 1 of the 4. Sometimes they seem to try to trick you into buying their unhealthy food. Eat a lot of vegetables because they contain less calories and are packed with nutrients.

Stay away from foods with lots of sugar. Sugar has a lot of calories. The reason I say this is because you have to watch what you drink also. Soda contains lots of calories which making it harder for you to get into great shape. It would be ideal to just quit soda all together. If you don't want to quit soda then I would suggest drinking diet soda such as diet rite.

The next step is on how you cook your food. If your going to cook your food in a frying pan with a whole bunch of grease, that is going to pack the calories. It's actually healthier to cook your food on a grill rather then frying it if you can. This is because the grease drips down into the grill. It won't contain as much fat and will contain less calories.

The final step is that you must watch your food portions. By this I mean if your going to eat something healthy trying to cut calories you must watch how much you eat. If your eating plates and plates full it really isn't going to cut calories. It is always better to eat more small meals rather then a couple big ones. Cutting calories is pretty simple and I know that you can do it.

Hi, I'm Jamie Krause and if you would like more information about cutting calories I invite you to visit my website. You can find my website by clicking HERE.

Cutting calories is pretty simple. If your trying to cut calories your either trying to get into great shape or maybe even just trying to have a healthier diet. Most of the time the objective is to take in less calories and burn more calories. Here you will learn how to cut calories.

The first basic step starts when you go shopping. You want to look at the food labels to see the amount of calories in each food you buy.Try to find foods with fewer calories. It is important to compare the calories to the serving size. If a food says 200 calories and it comes in a pack of 4, most likely the serving size will be 1 of the 4. Sometimes they seem to try to trick you into buying their unhealthy food. Eat a lot of vegetables because they contain less calories and are packed with nutrients.

Stay away from foods with lots of sugar. Sugar has a lot of calories. The reason I say this is because you have to watch what you drink also. Soda contains lots of calories which making it harder for you to get into great shape. It would be ideal to just quit soda all together. If you don't want to quit soda then I would suggest drinking diet soda such as diet rite.

The next step is on how you cook your food. If your going to cook your food in a frying pan with a whole bunch of grease, that is going to pack the calories. It's actually healthier to cook your food on a grill rather then frying it if you can. This is because the grease drips down into the grill. It won't contain as much fat and will contain less calories.

The final step is that you must watch your food portions. By this I mean if your going to eat something healthy trying to cut calories you must watch how much you eat. If your eating plates and plates full it really isn't going to cut calories. It is always better to eat more small meals rather then a couple big ones. Cutting calories is pretty simple and I know that you can do it.

Hi, I'm Jamie Krause and if you would like more information about cutting calories I invite you to visit my website. You can find my website by clicking HERE.

Want to feel full longer? It's all in the numbers.

Actually, one rule will do: Lower each meal's overall score on the glycemic index (GI) -- an indication of how quickly a meal drives up your blood sugar -- and you'll feel full longer. The index ranks foods against glucose, a sugar that scores 100. Under 50 is considered low; 50 to 70 is medium; over 70 is high. The foods' scores are in parentheses below; for an expanded list, see The Glucose Revolution Pocket Guide to Losing Weight, written by leading GI researchers.

Be Wary of White
Such as white bread (73), bagels (72), Cream of Wheat (70), doughnuts (76) -- just about anything made with white refined flour. Ditto for high-sugar products such as Pop Tarts (70), colas (65), and sweet cereals (85). Also troublesome are white veggies and grains such as instant rice (72), baguettes (95), french fries (75), baked potatoes (85). Try new potatoes (57) instead.
  • There are exceptions to the white rule, including dairy products (40 or less), and most pasta (40 to 50).
Eat Healthy Fat
Cook with olive and canola oil, snack on nuts, and make sandwiches with cheese, peanut butter or avocados. Also good is lean protein such as beans, fish, chicken, lean cuts of beef, and some luncheon meats. (All of these score low.)

Eat Fiber
That means whole-grain breads (53), long-grain or brown rice (55), vegetables (most score low), fruit (unsweetened and unjuiced, it's fine).

Snack Smarter
Skip jellybeans (80), Skittles (69), Lifesavers (70) in favor of Peanut M&M's (33), Snickers (55), Twix bars (44) or milk chocolate (34). For salty snacks, pass on the corn chips (72), pretzels (81) and rice cakes (77) in favor of a handful of nuts, another low scorer.

Think Balance
Having a baked potato on the side won't hurt if it's served with a salad and salmon. It's the overall score of your meal that counts.


Alternative Ways to Burn Calories and Build Strength

Easy Ways to Lose Weight: 50+ Ideas

Ways to Control Your Cravings

Cutting Back on "Bad" Carbs
5 Simple Rules to Beat Hunger

16 ways to make low-carb healthy.


Thanks to the popularity of low-carb diets, nearly half of Americans say they are watching the amount of carbohydrates they eat. If you're among them, we're providing these 16 tips so your carb control is stealthy, healthy, and wise!

Bear in mind that there is a huge difference between Cheese Doodles and oatmeal. Both might be categorized as carbs, but their benefits are on opposite ends of the health spectrum. What is a "bad carb"?. Here's the simplest answer: white flour, refined sugar, and white rice. More broadly, any food made primarily of a carb that has been processed in such a way as to strip out ingredients that hinder quick and easy cooking. Why are refined carbs a problem? Easy: They digest so quickly that they cause blood sugar surges that lead to weight gain and other health troubles.

Here we'll give you ways to avoid troublesome carbs while still getting the fuel you need for good health. Carb-counting meets common sense, right this way...

1. Tell the waiter to hold the bread. At almost every restaurant, your meal starts with a basket of rolls, breads, and crackers made from white flour. If it's not put on the table, you won't eat any. Or, if you really need something to nibble on, ask if they have whole wheat varieties.

2. At Chinese restaurants, ask for brown rice, and limit how much you eat to one cup. In fact, some Chinese restaurants have started offering to swap a vegetable for the rice in their combo dinners, knowing that many people are on low-carb diets. At home, always cook brown rice instead of white. Brown rice hasn't been processed and still has its high-fiber nutrients.

3. Instead of bread, use eggplant slices to make a delicious sandwich. Broil two thick slices of eggplant until brown, then add mozzarella and tomato, olive oil and basil to one slice, suggests Nicole Glassman, owner of Mindful Health in New York City. Top with the other slice of eggplant and broil again until the cheese melts.

4. Wrap your food in lettuce leaves. Yes, skip the bun, tortillas, and bread slices and instead make a sandwich inside lettuce leaves. Glassman suggests going Mexican with a sprinkle of cheddar cheese, salsa, and chicken; Asian with sesame seeds, peanuts, bean sprouts, cut up green beans, and shrimp with a touch of soy sauce; or deli style with turkey, cheese, and mustard.

5. Buy old-fashioned snacks in kid-size bags. Truth is, pretzels, tortilla chips, potato chips, and cookies are mostly bad carbs, made primarily of refined flour, sugar, salt, and/or oil. You want to remove as many of these foods from your daily eating as you can. But if you can't live without them, buy them in small bags -- 1 ounce is a typical "lunch box" size -- and limit yourself to just one bag a day.

6. Break yourself of your old spaghetti habits. Almost everyone loves a big bowl of pasta, topped with a rich tomato sauce. The tomato sauce couldn't be better for you; the spaghetti, however, is pure carbohydrate. While spaghetti is fine to eat every now and then, for those sensitive to carbs or wishing to cut back on their noodle intake, here are some alternatives to the usual spaghetti dinner:
  • Here's the easiest choice: Switch to whole wheat pasta. It is denser than traditional pasta, with a firm, al dente texture similar to what you'd get in Italy.

  • Grill vegetables such as eggplant, zucchini, bell peppers, and onion and slice them into long, thin pieces. Mix up and pour your spaghetti sauce over the vegetables for a delicious and immensely healthy meal.

  • Substitute spaghetti squash for the pasta. Boil or microwave the squash until soft, then scoop out the seeds and pull the strands of squash from the shell with a fork. Top with your favorite sauce and a grating of real Parmesan.

  • Try healthy whole grains as a replacement for pasta. Spaghetti sauce goes better than you'd expect on brown rice, barley, chickpeas, and such.


7. Cut up 1-ounce portions of cheese and divvy up 1-ounce portions of nuts into tiny snack bags. Now you have a handy snack at the ready.

8. Eat potatoes boiled with the skin on. The effect of potatoes on blood sugar depends on how the potatoes are prepared. No need to unspud yourself completely! Also, new potatoes tend to have fewer simple carbs than other types of potatoes.

9. Eat lightly of the new low-carb products. More than 1,000 low-carb products were introduced in 2003, but the FDA has yet to publish any guidelines as to what "low carb" really means. Instead, many new "low carb" foods are to carb-cutting what "low fat" cookies were to fat-cutting: just a new way of pitching foods high in calories and low in nutrient value. In fact, Consumer Reports found that many packaged low-carb foods are actually higher in calories than their regular counterparts. For instance, a serving of Keto's low-carb Rocky Road ice cream has 270 calories, almost double the calories found in many regular ice creams and twice as much fat.

10. Think lightly of the new net-carb measurements. Many of the low-carb weight-loss programs are trying to get their followers to use "net carbs" as the measurement of choice for the appropriateness of a carb food in their diet. This is a measurement of the "bad carbs" left in a food after you adjust for those carb ingredients that don't immediately affect blood sugar. The folks at Atkins Nutritionals say the proper way to measure net carbs is to subtract fiber (as well as sugar alcohols and glycerin, when applicable) from the total carbs listed on the nutrition facts panel of a product. But that's just their version, and that's the problem. "Net carbs" is not a regulated or standardized measurement -- manufacturers can define it how they want, and say what they want on product packaging. And there is no science to say that tracking net carbs offers any unique weight-loss benefit.

11. Never let yourself get too hungry. Eat every three to five waking hours, and eat only until you're satisfied but not stuffed. You should never reach the point where you feel ravenous. Not only is that a recipe for overeating, but your body will want sugary, quick-to-digest "bad carbs" to quickly satiate your need for fuel.

12. Instead of eggs and bacon, try low-carb versions of cereals. For example, the Nature's Path cereal line offers all the benefits of whole grains without the "problem" carbs found in added sugar. Another option is low-carb, high-fiber muffins and breads (spread with no-sugar-added jams or nut butter).

13. At the movies, skip the popcorn. Popcorn isn't a bad food, but it does happen to be a simple carb with little other nutritional value and, when bought at the theater, is often drowning in salt and fat as well. Better movie snacks are small bags of nuts or seeds and fresh or dried fruit. Just sneak them into the theater in your purse or a backpack.

14. Mix up a sweet dessert. Combine nonfat cream, unsweetened cocoa, sugar substitute, and ice in a blender. Or mix mascarpone and sugar substitute with whipped cream and a hint of lemon zest.

15. Make your own quickie low-carb pizza. Lightly toast a whole grain, low-carb tortilla and top with chopped tomatoes and shredded, part-skim, mozzarella cheese. Season with salt and pepper and return to the toaster oven until cheese is melted and bubbling.

16. Make french fries with turnips. Missing those fries with that bun-less burger? Heimowitz suggests cutting turnips into sticks and tossing with olive oil and salt. Bake at 425°F for 30 minutes, turning frequently. Voilà! A crisp side dish with none of the fat of frying and far fewer carbs than from potatoes.

Alternative Ways to Burn Calories and Build Strength

Easy Ways to Lose Weight: 50+ Ideas

Ways to Control Your Cravings

Cutting Back on "Bad" Carbs
5 Simple Rules to Beat Hunger

You can lose weight by overcoming your cravings now. Here are the latest tricks of the trade from researchers and experts:

Avoid your triggers. "You crave what you eat, so if you switch what you're eating, you can weaken your old cravings and strengthen new ones," says Marcia Pelchat, PhD, of the Monell Center. This can happen pretty fast. For five days, her study volunteers drank bland dietary-supplement beverages. During that time, they craved fewer of their trigger foods. By the end of the study, the volunteers actually wanted the supplements instead. The first few days are always the hardest, and you probably can't completely eliminate your old cravings. But the longer you avoid your trigger foods, the less likely you may be to want them. In fact, you'll probably begin to crave the foods you eat, a real bonus if you've switched to fresh fruit.

Destroy temptation. If you've succumbed to a craving and bought a box of cookies or some other trigger food and start to feel bad while eating it, destroy it. "Don't just throw it away; run water over it, ruin it. You'll feel a sense of accomplishment that you've licked your binge," says Caroline Apovian, MD, director, Nutrition and Weight Management Center at Boston Medical Center. Don't think about the money you're wasting. If the cookies don't go into the garbage, they're going straight to your hips.

Go nuts. Drink two glasses of water and eat an ounce of nuts (6 walnuts, 12 almonds or 20 peanuts). Within 20 minutes, this can extinguish your craving and dampen your appetite by changing your body chemistry, says Michael F. Roizen, MD.

Jolt yourself with java. Try sipping a skim latte instead of reaching for a candy bar. The caffeine it contains won't necessarily satisfy your cravings, but it can save you the calories by quenching your appetite, says Dr. Roizen. And the warm richness and ritual can distract you.

Let it go. Since stress is a huge trigger for cravings, learning to deal with it could potentially save you hundreds of calories a day. This will take some practice. You can try deep breathing or visualizing a serene scene on your own, or you can speed things up by buying one of the many CDs that teach progressive muscle relaxation. A good one is Relaxation/Affirmation Techniques, by Nancy Hopps.

Take a power nap. Cravings sneak up when we're tired. Focus on the fatigue: Shut the door, close your eyes, re-energize.

Get minty fresh. Brush your teeth; gargle with mouthwash. "When you have a fresh, clean mouth, you don't want to mess it up," says Molly Gee, RD, of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.

Distract yourself. If only ice cream will do, it's a craving, not hunger. "Cravings typically last ten minutes," says John Foreyt, PhD, of Baylor College of Medicine. Recognize that and divert your mind: Call someone, listen to music, run an errand, meditate or exercise.

Indulge yourself -- within limits. Once in a while, it's OK to go ahead and have that ice cream. But buy a small cone, not a pint. Try 100-calorie CocoaVia chocolate bars and 100-calorie snack packs of cookies, peanuts or pretzel sticks. The trick is to buy only one pack at a time so you won't be tempted to reach for more. And since even 100 extra calories can sabotage weight loss if you indulge daily, strike a bargain with yourself to work off the excess calories. A brisk 15-minute walk will burn 100 calories or so.

Plan or avoid. Vary your usual routine to avoid passing the bakery or pizzeria. If you know you'll be face-to-face with irresistible birthday cake, allocate enough calories to fit it into your diet.


Alternative Ways to Burn Calories and Build Strength

Easy Ways to Lose Weight: 50+ Ideas

Ways to Control Your Cravings

Cutting Back on "Bad" Carbs
5 Simple Rules to Beat Hunger

Simple Slimming

Spring is right around the corner and retailers have already begun stocking their floors with warm-weather goods -- including swimsuits. Besides looking great on the beach, commonsense tells us that one of the best things you can do for your overall health is to drop a few pounds. Or maybe more than a few pounds.

Being overweight significantly increases your risk of heart disease, diabetes, stroke, high blood pressure, cancer ... the list seems almost endless. Plus, if you do get sick or need surgery, being overweight can make any treatments riskier.

You know the drill when it comes to losing weight -- take in fewer calories, burn more calories. But you also know that most diets and quick weight-loss plans have about as much substance as a politician's campaign pledges. You're better off finding several simple things you can do on a daily basis -- along with following the cardinal rules of eating more vegetables and less fat and getting more physical activity. Together, they should send the scale numbers in the right direction: down.

1. Once a week, indulge in a high-calorie-tasting, but low-calorie, treat. This should help keep you from feeling deprived and binging on higher-calorie foods. For instance:
  • Lobster. Just 83 calories in 3 ounces.

  • Shrimp. Just 60 calories in 12 large.

  • Smoked salmon. Just 66 calories in two ounces. Sprinkle with capers for an even more elegant treat.

  • Whipped cream. Just 8 calories in one tablespoon. Drop a dollop over a bowl of fresh fruit for dessert.

    2. Treat high-calorie foods as jewels in the crown. Make a spoonful of ice cream the jewel and a bowl of fruit the crown. Cut down on the chips by pairing each bite with lots of chunky, filling fresh salsa, suggests Jeff Novick, director of nutrition at the Pritikin Longevity Center & Spa in Florida. Balance a little cheese with a lot of salad.

    3. After breakfast, make water your primary drink. At breakfast, go ahead and drink orange juice. But throughout the rest of the day, focus on water instead of juice or soda. The average American consumes an extra 245 calories a day from soft drinks. That's nearly 90,000 calories a year -- or 25 pounds! And research shows that despite the calories, sugary drinks don't trigger a sense of fullness the way that food does.

    4. Carry a palm-size notebook everywhere you go for one week. Write down every single morsel that enters your lips -- even water. Studies have found that people who maintain food diaries wind up eating about 15 percent less food than those who don't.

    5. Buy a pedometer, clip it to your belt, and aim for an extra 1,000 steps a day. On average, sedentary people take only 2,000 to 3,000 steps a day. Adding 2,000 steps will help you maintain your current weight and stop gaining weight; adding more than that will help you lose weight.

    6. Add 10 percent to the amount of daily calories you think you're eating, then adjust your eating habits accordingly. If you think you're consuming 1,700 calories a day and don't understand why you're not losing weight, add another 170 calories to your guesstimate. Chances are, the new number is more accurate.

    7. Eat five or six small meals or snacks a day instead of three large meals. A 1999 South African study found that when men ate parts of their morning meal at intervals over five hours, they consumed almost 30 percent fewer calories at lunch than when they ate a single breakfast. Other studies show that even if you eat the same number of calories distributed this way, your body releases less insulin, which keeps blood sugar steady and helps control hunger.

    8. Walk for 45 minutes a day. The reason we're suggesting 45 minutes instead of the typical 30 is that a Duke University study found that while 30 minutes of daily walking is enough to prevent weight gain in most relatively sedentary people, exercise beyond 30 minutes results in weight and fat loss. Burning an additional 300 calories a day with three miles of brisk walking (45 minutes should do it) could help you lose 30 pounds in a year without even changing how much you're eating.

    9. Find an online weight-loss buddy. A University of Vermont study found that online weight-loss buddies help you keep the weight off. The researchers followed volunteers for 18 months. Those assigned to an Internet-based weight maintenance program sustained their weight loss better than those who met face-to-face in a support group.

    10. Bring the color blue into your life more often. There's a good reason you won't see many fast-food restaurants decorated in blue: Believe it or not, the color blue functions as an appetite suppressant. So serve up dinner on blue plates, dress in blue while you eat, and cover your table with a blue tablecloth. Conversely, avoid red, yellow, and orange in your dining areas. Studies find they encourage eating.

    11. Clean your closet of the "fat" clothes. Once you've reached your target weight, throw out or give away every piece of clothing that doesn't fit. The idea of having to buy a whole new wardrobe if you gain the weight back will serve as a strong incentive to maintain your new figure.

    12. Downsize your dinner plates. Studies find that the less food put in front of you, the less food you'll eat. Conversely, the more food in front of you, the more you'll eat -- regardless of how hungry you are. So instead of using regular dinner plates that range these days from 10-14 inches (making them look forlornly empty if they're not heaped with food), serve your main course on salad plates (about 7-9 inches wide). The same goes for liquids. Instead of 16-ounce glasses and oversized coffee mugs, return to the old days of 8-ounce glasses and 6-ounce coffee cups.
13. Serve your dinner restaurant style (food on the plates) rather than family style (food served in bowls and on platters on the table). When your plate is empty, you're finished; there's no reaching for seconds.

14. Hang a mirror opposite your seat at the table. One study found that eating in front of mirrors slashed the amount people ate by nearly one-third. Seems having to look yourself in the eye reflects back some of your own inner standards and goals, and reminds you of why you're trying to lose weight in the first place.

15. Put out a vegetable platter. A body of research out of Pennsylvania State University finds that eating water-rich foods such as zucchini, tomatoes, and cucumbers during meals reduces your overall calorie consumption. Other water-rich foods include soups and salads. You won't get the same benefits by just drinking your water, though. Because the body processes hunger and thirst through different mechanisms, it simply doesn't register a sense of fullness with water (or soda, tea, coffee, or juice).

16. Use vegetables to bulk up meals. You can eat twice as much pasta salad loaded with veggies like broccoli, carrots, and tomatoes for the same calories as a pasta salad sporting just mayonnaise. Same goes for stir-fries. And add vegetables to make a fluffier, more satisfying omelet without having to up the number of eggs.

17. Eat one less cookie a day. Or consume one less can of regular soda, or one less glass of orange juice, or three fewer bites of a fast-food hamburger. Doing any of these saves you about 100 calories a day, according to weight-loss researcher James O. Hill, Ph.D., of the University of Colorado. And that alone is enough to prevent you from gaining the 1.8 to 2 pounds most people pack on each year.

18. Avoid white foods. There is some scientific legitimacy to today's lower-carb diets: Large amounts of simple carbohydrates from white flour and added sugar can wreak havoc on your blood sugar and lead to weight gain. But you shouldn't toss out the baby with the bathwater. While avoiding sugar, white rice, and white flour, you should eat plenty of whole grain breads and brown rice. One Harvard study of 74,000 women found that those who ate more than two daily servings of whole grains were 49 percent less likely to be overweight than those who ate the white stuff.

19. Switch to ordinary coffee. Fancy coffee drinks from trendy coffee joints often pack several hundred calories, thanks to whole milk, whipped cream, sugar, and sugary syrups. A cup of regular coffee with skim milk has just a small fraction of those calories. And when brewed with good beans, it tastes just as great.

20. Use nonfat powdered milk in coffee. You get the nutritional benefits of skim milk, which is high in calcium and low in calories. And, because the water has been removed, powdered milk doesn't dilute the coffee the way skim milk does.

21. Eat cereal for breakfast five days a week. Studies find that people who eat cereal for breakfast every day are significantly less likely to be obese and have diabetes than those who don't. They also consume more fiber and calcium -- and less fat -- than those who eat other breakfast foods. Of course, that doesn't mean reaching for the Cap'n Crunch. Instead, pour out a high-fiber, low-sugar cereal like Total or Grape Nuts.

22. Pare your portions. Whether you eat at home or in a restaurant, immediately remove one-third of the food on your plate. Arguably the worst food trend of the past few decades has been the explosion in portion sizes on America's dinner plates (and breakfast and lunch plates). We eat far, far more today than our bodies need. Studies find that if you serve people more food, they'll eat more food, regardless of their hunger level. The converse is also true: Serve yourself less and you'll eat less.

23. Eat 90 percent of your meals at home. You're more likely to eat more -- and eat more high-fat, high-calorie foods -- when you eat out than when you eat at home. Restaurants today serve such large portions that many have switched to larger plates and tables to accommodate them!

24. Avoid any prepared food that lists sugar, fructose, or corn syrup among the first four ingredients on the label. You should be able to find a lower-sugar version of the same type of food. If you can't, grab a piece of fruit instead! Look for sugar-free varieties of foods such as ketchup, mayonnaise, and salad dressing.

25. Eat slowly and calmly. Put your fork or spoon down between every bite. Sip water frequently. Intersperse your eating with stories for your dining partner of the amusing things that happened during your day. Your brain lags your stomach by about 20 minutes when it comes to satiety (fullness) signals. If you eat slowly enough, your brain will catch up to tell you that you are no longer in need of food.

26. Eat only when you hear your stomach growling. It's stunning how often we eat out of boredom, nervousness, habit, or frustration -- so often, in fact, that many of us have actually forgotten what physical hunger feels like. Next time, wait until your stomach is growling before you reach for food. If you're hankering for a specific food, it's probably a craving, not hunger. If you'd eat anything you could get your hands on, chances are you're truly hungry.

Discover New Motivations

27. Find ways other than eating to express love, tame stress, and relieve boredom. For instance, you might make your family a photo album of special events instead of a rich dessert, sign up for a stress-management course at the local hospital or take up an active hobby, like bowling.

28. State the positive. You've heard of a self-fulfilling prophecy? Well, if you keep focusing on things you can't do, like resisting junk food or getting out the door for a daily walk, chances are you won't do them. Instead (whether you believe it or not) repeat positive thoughts to yourself. "I can lose weight." "I will get out for my walk today." "I know I can resist the pastry cart after dinner." Repeat these phrases like a mantra all day long. Before too long, they will become their own self-fulfilling prophecy.

29. Discover your dietary point of preference. If you work hard to control your weight, you may get pleasure from your appearance, but you may also feel sorry for yourself each time you forgo a favorite food. There is a balance to be struck between the immediate gratification of indulgent foods and the long-term pleasure of maintaining a desirable weight and good health. When you have that balance worked out, you have identified your own personal dietary pleasure "point of preference." This is where you want to stay.

30. Use flavorings such as hot sauce, salsa, and Cajun seasonings instead of relying on butter and creamy or sugary sauces. Besides providing lots of flavor with no fat and few calories, many of these seasonings -- the spicy ones -- turn up your digestive fires, causing your body to temporarily burn more calories.

31. Eat fruit instead of drinking fruit juice. For the calories in one kid-size box of apple juice, you can enjoy an apple, orange, and a slice of watermelon. These whole foods will keep you satisfied much longer than that box of apple juice, so you'll eat less overall.

32. Spend 10 minutes a day walking up and down stairs. The Centers for Disease Control says that's all it takes to help you shed as much as 10 pounds a year (assuming you don't start eating more).

33. Eat equal portions of vegetables and grains at dinner. A cup of cooked rice or pasta has about 200 calories, whereas a cup of cooked veggies doles out a mere 50 calories, on average, says Joan Salge Blake, R.D., clinical assistant professor of nutrition at Boston University's Sargent College. To avoid a grain calorie overload, eat a 1:1 ratio of grains to veggies. The high-fiber veggies will help satisfy your hunger before you overeat the grains.

34. Get up and walk around the office or your home for five minutes at least every two hours. Stuck at a desk all day? A brisk five-minute walk every two hours will parlay into an extra 20-minute walk by the end of the day. And getting a break will make you less likely to reach for snacks out of antsiness.

35. Wash something thoroughly once a week -- a floor, a couple of windows, the shower stall, bathroom tile, or your car. A 150-pound person who dons rubber gloves and exerts some elbow grease will burn about four calories for every minute spent cleaning, says Blake. Scrub for 30 minutes and you could work off approximately 120 calories, the same number in a half-cup of vanilla frozen yogurt. And your surroundings will sparkle!

36. Make one social outing this week an active one. Pass on the movie tickets and screen the views of a local park instead. Not only will you sit less, but you'll be saving calories because you won't chow down on that bucket of popcorn. Other active date ideas: Plan a tennis match, sign up for a guided nature or city walk (check your local newspaper), go cycling on a bike path, or join a volleyball league or bowling team.

37. Order the smallest portion of everything. If you're ordering a sub, get the 6-inch sandwich. Buy a small popcorn, a small salad, a small hamburger. Studies find we tend to eat what's in front of us, even though we'd feel just as full on less.

38. Switch from regular milk to 2%. If you already drink 2%, go down another notch to 1% or skim milk. Each step downward cuts the calories by about 20 percent. Once you train your taste buds to enjoy skim milk, you'll have cut the calories in the whole milk by about half and trimmed the fat by more than 95 percent.

39. Take a walk before dinner. You'll do more than burn calories -- you'll cut your appetite. In a study of 10 obese women conducted at the University of Glasgow in Scotland, 20 minutes of walking reduced appetite and increased sensations of fullness as effectively as a light meal.

40. Substitute a handful of almonds in place of a sugary snack. A study from the City of Hope National Medical Center found that overweight people who ate a moderate-fat diet containing almonds lost more weight than a control group that didn't eat nuts. Really, any nut will do.

41. Eat a frozen dinner. Not just any frozen dinner, but one designed for weight loss. Most of us tend to eat an average of 150 percent more calories in the evening than in the morning. An easy way to keep dinner calories under control is to buy a pre-portioned meal. Just make sure that it contains only one serving. If it contains two, make sure you share.

42. Don't eat with a large group. A study published in the Journal of Physiological Behavior found that we tend to eat more when we eat with other people, most likely because we spend more time at the table. But eating with your significant other or your family, and using table time for talking in between chewing, can help cut down on calories -- and help with bonding in the bargain.

43. Watch one less hour of TV. A study of 76 undergraduate students found the more they watched television, the more often they ate and the more they ate overall. Sacrifice one program (there's probably one you don't really want to watch anyway) and go for a walk instead. You'll have time left over to finish a chore or gaze at the stars.

44. Get most of your calories before noon. Studies find that the more you eat in the morning, the less you'll eat in the evening. And you have more opportunities to burn off those early-day calories than you do to burn off dinner calories.

45. Close out the kitchen after dinner. Wash all the dishes, wipe down the counters, turn out the light, and, if necessary, tape closed the cabinets and refrigerator. Late-evening eating significantly increases the overall number of calories you eat, a University of Texas study found. Stopping late-night snacking can save 300 or more calories a day, or 31 pounds a year.

46. Sniff a banana, an apple, or a peppermint when you feel hungry. You might feel silly, but it works. When Alan R. Hirsch, M.D., neurological director of the Smell & Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago, tried this with 3,000 volunteers, he found that the more frequently people sniffed, the less hungry they were and the more weight they lost -- an average of 30 pounds each. One theory is that sniffing the food tricks the brain into thinking you're actually eating it.

47. Order wine by the glass, not the bottle. That way you'll be more aware of how much alcohol you're downing. Moderate drinking can be good for your health, but alcohol is high in calories. And because drinking turns off our inhibitions, it can drown our best intentions to keep portions in check.

48. Watch every morsel you put in your mouth on weekends. A University of North Carolina study found people tend to consume an extra 115 calories per weekend day, primarily from alcohol and fat.

49. Stock your refrigerator with low-fat yogurt. A University of Tennessee study found that people who cut 500 calories a day and ate yogurt three times a day for 12 weeks lost more weight and body fat than a group that only cut the calories. The researchers concluded that the calcium in low-fat dairy foods triggers a hormonal response that inhibits the body's production of fat cells and boosts the breakdown of fat.

50. Order your dressing on the side and then stick a fork in it -- not your salad. The small amount of dressing that clings to the tines of the fork are plenty for the forkful of salad you then pick up.

51. Brush your teeth after every meal, especially after dinner. That clean, minty freshness will serve as a cue to your body and brain that mealtime is over.

52. Serve individual courses rather than piling everything on one plate. Make the first two courses soup or vegetables (such as a green salad). By the time you get to the more calorie-dense foods, like meat and dessert, you'll be eating less or may already be full (leftovers are a good thing).

53. Passionately kiss your partner 10 times a day. According to the 1991 Kinsey Institute New Report on Sex, a passionate kiss burns 6.4 calories per minute. Ten minutes a day of kissing equates to about 23,000 calories -- or eight pounds -- a year!

54. Add hot peppers to your pasta sauce. Capsaicin, the ingredient in hot peppers that makes them hot, also helps reduce your appetite.

55. Pack nutritious snacks. Snacking once or twice a day helps stave off hunger and keeps your metabolism stoked, but healthy snacks can be pretty darn hard to come by when you're on the go. Pack up baby carrots or your own trail mix made with nuts, raisins, seeds, and dried fruit.

56. When you shop, choose nutritious foods based on these four simple rules:
  • Avoid partially hydrogenated oil.

  • Avoid high-fructose corn syrup.

  • Choose a short ingredient list over long; there will be fewer flavor enhancers and empty calories.

  • Look for two or more grams of fiber per 100 calories in all grain products (cereal, bread, crackers, and chips).
57. Weed out calories you've been overlooking: spreads, dressings, sauces, condiments, drinks, and snacks. These calories count, whether or not you've been counting them, and could make the difference between weight gain and loss.

58. When you're eating out with friends or family, dress up in your most flattering outfit. You'll get loads of compliments, says Susie Galvez, author of Weight Loss Wisdom, which will be a great reminder to watch what you eat.


Alternative Ways to Burn Calories and Build Strength

Easy Ways to Lose Weight: 50+ Ideas

Ways to Control Your Cravings

Cutting Back on "Bad" Carbs
5 Simple Rules to Beat Hunger

Try these options when you're bored with your walking and strength-training routine.

Spice Up Your Workout

Variety is the spice of life, and exercise comes in as many varieties as you could want. Whether it's walking, tai chi, tennis, gardening, or swimming, the key is to find something you enjoy and keep doing it. (Having a few options to choose from so you can vary your routine helps.)

Here are a few fun, inexpensive ideas to try:

Exercise Balls
One of the hottest exercise trends to hit the country in recent years involves nothing more than a brightly colored, oversized plastic ball. Physical therapists have been using these giant balls for years; finally they're available to the rest of us. The balls are used in a variety of exercise moves and routines to improve your balance, coordination, strength, flexibility, and posture, primarily by helping you strengthen your body's core muscles: the abdomen, back, and sides.

The balls trump other exercise routines for numerous reasons, says Liz Applegate, Ph.D., author of Bounce Your Body Beautiful: Six Weeks to a Sexier, Firmer Body. They're portable -- you can even deflate one and bring it with you when you travel; they are attractive, so you don't have to "hide" it in the basement; and they're efficient. For every exercise you do, the rest of your body also gets a workout. They're also inexpensive, starting at around $25. You can buy your ball from sporting goods stores, shop online at sites such as www.balldynamics.com, or call 800-752-2255.

Pilates
If you're looking to simultaneously strengthen your muscles, become more flexible, and improve your posture, look to Pilates. One of the latest fitness trends, Pilates is embraced by movie stars and professional dancers, who value its integration of mind and body and its ability to help them maintain a lean shape. It was developed by a German man named Joseph Pilates in the early 20th century as a way to regain his strength after he spent much of his childhood as an invalid. It focuses on using the body's core muscles to support you as you move through large ranges of motion.

Many Pilates exercises require only an exercise mat, although some utilize large pieces of equipment involving pulleys. (For access to these, you'll need to sign up for a class. Look for a certified Pilates instructor -- many are not certified -- by logging onto www.pilates-studio.com.) The "mind" portion of Pilates comes with the intense concentration on the quality of the highly controlled movements. For a Pilates workout you can do at home, check out these videos:
  • Pilates for Dummies, with Michelle Dozios. A good, basic workout for beginners.

  • The Method, with Jennifer Kries. This is a series of videos, both for beginners and those who have done Pilates before.

  • Stott Pilates -- Advanced Matwork, with Moira Stott-Merrithew, one of the gurus of the Pilates movement. This is for a more advanced participant, although Stott-Merrithew also makes a video for beginners.

Resistance Bands
Remember as a kid how you would stretch a rubber band against your index finger and fling it across the room at your brother? Well, the same concept is at work with exercise resistance bands, only there's no flinging involved, and it's not your index finger that gets the workout but nearly every other muscle in your body. Resistance bands use your own body weight instead of dumbbells to provide resistance.

Generally, you slip a band around your foot or arm and lift or extend the limb, working against the band's resistance. You can also secure the band to a door or bar. The bands are not only portable, they're cheap: You can find them in sporting goods stores for under $15. They come in different lengths and degrees of resistance. The shorter bands are used to strengthen hips, ankles, wrists, and hands, while longer bands are best for legs and arms. Both are usually color coded: Yellow provides the least resistance, followed by green, red, blue, and black. For a good video introduction to using the resistance bands, check out Denise Austin -- Pilates for Every Body. (The makers of the video call it a Pilates workout, but true Pilates does not involve resistance bands.) A number of other toning and strengthening videos incorporate resistance band exercises into their routine.

Moving Without Exercising

Exercise doesn't have to involve equipment or even a special time set aside in your day. Any kind of movement that increases your heart rate provides benefits. That includes everything from house cleaning to dancing to gardening. Here is a list of activities that can replace 30 minutes of walking:
  • Washing and waxing a car for 45-60 minutes.

  • Washing windows or floors for 45-60 minutes.

  • Playing volleyball for 45 minutes.

  • Gardening for 30-45 minutes.

  • Wheeling self in wheelchair for 30-40 minutes.

  • Bicycling 5 miles in 30 minutes.

  • Dancing fast (social) for 30 minutes.

  • Raking leaves for 30 minutes.

  • Water aerobics for 30 minutes.

  • Swimming laps for 20 minutes.

  • Basketball (a game) for 15-20 minutes.

  • Bicycling 4 miles in 15 minutes.

  • Jumping rope for 15 minutes.

  • Shoveling snow for 15 minutes.

  • Stair-walking for 15 minutes.
Source: Surgeon General's report on Physical Activity and Health, 1996

If your hobby involves being physically active, perfect! Just consider the workout you get from gardening. Between edging and raking the lawn, walking back and forth to the mulch pile, pulling weeds, digging holes, and planting seeds, gardening uses all of the major muscle groups. And half an hour of general gardening burns about 202 calories in a 185-pound person. One study even found that gardening could reduce insulin resistance, a condition that could lead to metabolic syndrome or diabetes, both of which significantly increase your risk of heart disease. It's even been suggested that urban gardens be used to improve public health, not only by providing fresh produce, but also by providing exercise. To get the most out of gardening, nix the gadgets that make it easier, such as electric weed-whackers.

In addition to gardening, simply eschewing convenience devices like remote controls and garage-door openers can make a big difference in terms of the calories you burn and your overall amount of physical activity.

Monday, November 9, 2009

How to get rid of stomach fat: Understanding the problem

Stomach fat is just like any other fat in your body. It accumulates as a result of the lifestyle choices that you make that lead to consuming more calories than you burn off with exercise. Your body converts any access energy or calories that you eat into fat as a way of storing the energy for later.

This is your bodies way of helping you to survive when you're never quite sure when the next meal is coming from. It's a mechanism that's more suited to the lifestyle that your ancestors might have lead several thousand years ago when they had to hunt for food. If you regularly consume more calories than you need then you will create more and more stomach fat and fat in other places and you'll carry it around with you forever. Not a pleasant thought.

How to lose the fat on lower stomach

The lower stomach is one of the first places that you will notice excess fat storage. It's a very convenient place for your body to put it but it isn't so different from the fat anywhere else on your body. The steps to lose fat around the stomach are the same as losing it from other parts of your body.

Exercise to lose stomach fat

Exercise is important in any weight loss program especially if you want to lose the weight permanently. Weight loss exercise programs work by increasing the rate at which you burn off calories and if you burn more calories than you consume then your body will start converting fat into energy to make up for the shortfall. Fat will be converted into energy from all over your body including your stomach but exercise will not burn fat from any specific area of your body.

If you want to accentuate your abs and even start yourself a six-pack where your stomach muscles can be clearly seen then you need to use an exercise program targeted to that area of your body. You will need to reduce stomach fat if you want your six-pack to be seen because it will be underneath the fat otherwise. More about this in a free ebook and course from Lose Weight and Stay Lean

Best way to lose stomach fat

  • Reduce your daily calorie intake a little but not too much.
  • Replace a small amount of fat and carbohydrate with lean protein in your meals.
  • Take up regular exercise several times a week to burn more fat.
  • Make this a lifestyle change and plan to keep it up for the rest of your life.

It's important to have a target weight loss of no more than 1-2 pounds per week. Any more than this and you will start to lose muscle and other lean parts of your body. Your metabolism will slow and your appetite will increase making it very easy for you to put the weight back on as soon as you start to relax a little. Get rid of stomach fat slowly but surely and you are far more likely to keep the weight off permanently.

1. Mike, what is the number one component to getting a six pack?

MG: Your training style, nutrition, and mindset are all extremely important if you want to stand a chance at getting a six pack... However, if I had to choose 1 component that is most important, it would probably have to be nutrition. Maybe you've heard the saying before that "abs are made in the kitchen".

It really is true, and that's where the majority of people go wrong in the goal to get super lean. Of course, this also ties into mindset, because you really have to get your mind in the right place in order to have the discipline to be able to eat consistently clean enough to get six pack abs.

There's a lot of confusion out there these days about calories, fat, protein, and carbohydrates... every "expert" disagrees with one another on proper ratios and types of diets. I think people make this way too complicated... If you are just to focus on a good balance between fats, carbs, and proteins, and make sure to eat only natural unprocessed organic foods (as close to their natural state as possible) instead of packaged, processed foods, a lot of the problems that most people have with cravings, sweet tooth, overeating, blood sugar swings, etc all take care of themselves.

We still can't lose sight of the fact that you can overeat on healthy foods and gain fat even while eating healthy. Therefore, your caloric intake needs to be controlled to a level that will promote fat loss if that's the goal.


2. Excellent Mike! Next question... What is one thing I might be doing, unknowningly, steering my quest for a six pack in the wrong direction?

MG: I'll give 2 things that may be steering you in the wrong direction...

a. Too much cardio

Some people, in their efforts to try to get lean, focus way too much on hours and hours of cardio exercise. The problem is that this can backfire on you by making you lose lean muscle mass over time, which decreases your resting metabolic rate. Once this happens, it becomes easier to pack on body fat than ever before. I've even seen many people that do too much cardio and end up getting that "skinny fat" appearance, where they have very little muscle tone, yet they have excess stomach fat (even a "gut" possibly).

Instead of excess cardio, focus more on high intensity weight training (yes, even during a "cutting" cycle). This will help maintain your lean muscle mass throughout your body, so that you don't experience the metabolic rate decrease. Maintaining as much lean muscle mass on your body at all times is one of the most important things for staying super-lean for life.

b. Not eating enough healthy fats

This is another area where I see people go in the wrong direction. They are trying to lose body fat and they end up going WAY too low on their fat intake. When you decrease your fat intake too much, you are basically messing up your fat burning and muscle building hormones. It's not uncommon to see people decrease their fat intake too low and end up reducing their testosterone levels significantly.

Try to get some sources of healthy fats with every meal to make sure you don't go too low... This could be avocados, any and all nuts (almonds, walnuts, pecans, etc), seeds (pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds), nut butters (almond butter, natural peanut butter, etc), virgin coconut oil (good source of medium chain triglycerides), extra virgin olive oil, grass fed beef (good source of conjugated linoleic acid and omega-3s), whole eggs (yes, whole eggs...not egg whites), etc.



Alternative Ways to Burn Calories and Build Strength

Easy Ways to Lose Weight: 50+ Ideas

Ways to Control Your Cravings

Cutting Back on "Bad" Carbs
5 Simple Rules to Beat Hunger

Lose Body Fat and Get a Lean Stomach for Good!
Finest Blogger templates
Create polls here.
Learn about HTML. Click above.
Location, Prices, Reservations, PROMOS!, etc.
 
Copyright (c) 2010 Philippine Nurse Help. Design by WPThemes Expert

Themes By Buy My Themes and Direct Line Insurance.