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Weight Loss What diet is best? There are many diets. We've listed some of the more popular ones on our Weight Loss Diets page. You can judge for yourself which you think would be best for you. However, you might notice that some diets work really well for one person and don't work for another. Why? Because each person has a different reason as the cause for their overweight. It can't be that the overweight person eats too much. Have you ever known someone who eats ten times what someone else eats and never gains weight. His metabolism is different. So, what do you do, do you try every diet and see what happens? Well, there are certain basics. First, a very low calorie - starvation diet - may burn fat, but it you will also burn muscle. Since muscle is needed to burn fat it is a losing proposition. Less muscle, less ability to burn fat. A starvation diet can also create deficiencies which will injure your health. In addition, when you starve your body, the body takes precautions. It must conserve energy in case of another "famine" (you might start dieting again), and lowers its metabolism rate. The result, the body burns calories more slowly, and that means faster weight gain. And thirdly, the body fights back by escalating food cravings until these cravings are strong enough to overwhelm the will to diet. It is insuring that it gets enough to eat. To the body, it is a survival point, to you, you can't stop the cravings and you gain weight. An important reason is dehydration. When the body doesn't have enough water, it doesn't have all the tools it needs to have proper digestion, elimination, and metabolism slows down. When a person is dehydrated, they will often mistake it for hunger and eat. Try drinking water when you feel you still want to eat. Do you drink a lot of water and find yourself in the bathroom a lot? That is not what you want, you want you body to get the water. A good idea is to put a pinch of mineralized sea salt in you water bottle. The body needs this to be able to use it in the body. This can increase your hydration. For more information about dehydration go to our article on Dehydration. What is a healthy weight? How do I obtain it? You have your individual reason for being overweight There is lots of different reasons here - read through them. Exercise - this is a prevalent reason for overweight. Your body just isn't metabolizing the food. Your muscles burn fat, your muscles shrink unless you use them. Result slower metabolism, weight gain and an lessening ability to burn fat. What to do? Exercise Why are you overweight? One way - Proper Food Intake (lower calories but not starvation) - you need to determine exactly how many calories you need to consume each day to achieve your goals. You must consume fewer calories than you expend. When your calories are decreased, an imbalance is created. The body's job is to restore the balance, and this is accomplished by either reducing energy expenditure (ie. losing muscle) or forcing you into non-compliance through hunger and cravings. You need to find the right amount of calories that will not create an imbalance but will cause a slight deficit so you lose weight. Cardiorespiratoy activities - The next step is to stimulate the body with an activity that helps maintain the deficit of calories. The ultimate goal is to have as many large muscles as possible working continuously to burn the greatest number of calories during and after exercise. Food supplementation - This allows you to give the body nutrition without any calories. It is virtually impossible to consume all the nutrition your body needs and still support fat loss. Resistance Training - use it or lose it - Resistance training exercise increases nervous system and muscle protein activity. This provides the body with an after-burn which continues for days after exercising. Other reasons: Maybe you are allergic to some foods. I've heard of someone who lost 16 lbs just by eliminating corn and wheat from her diet. Maybe it is the fact that your body cannot tolerate certain kinds of foods. Then, of course, there are those cravings that you get. That might be the result of many things, not only starvation diets, and that needs to be addressed.
Then there is that slow metabolism. What is the cause?
Thyroid? Another really good book is Body for Life. It goes over the myths regarding weight loss and exercise and gives you a program to work with. There are lots of before and after pictures to give you some idea of the results that you can get in 12 weeks. It is not for the lazy who want a "miracle cure" by which they can transform themselves from couch potato to swimsuit model, but gives you a step by step program to achieve it. And another great method, one which you don't have to go to the gym but one which gives you a good exercise routine with gradients of exercise at a very nice pace, there is a great program at Beach Body called Power 90. They have other great exercise and diet plans there as well and diet advice, a message board, a buddy system and VIDEOS so you can do the routines in the comfort of your home. This again in not for those who want a "miracle cure" but for those who do want shape up and lose weight. When it comes to just not being able to lose weight - A good book is The 7 Principles of Fat Burning by Dr. Eric Berg. This book educates you into how the body works and may prevent you from losing weight. It goes over the purpose of food & the four different body shapes which enable you to figure out what needs to be fixed. There is a multiple choice questionnaire which will to figure out which one you fall under and what can be done to heal the glands and hormones. He talks about Fat burning and fat storing hormones and how incorrect exercise can prevent fat burning. And that is Chapter 1. Its got lots of really good information. You can read more about it here Dr. Berg's 7 Principles of Fat Burning We would also like to hear from you if you have another successful method. Email us at diet@mcvitamins.com. Here are some more suggestions: Water Important for dieting and good health. See our article Anything you'd like to add, please email us at diet@mcvitamins.com. For counting Calories & Fat content Here is an article about Diets written by a Nutritionist and Chiropractor. The Problem with Diets
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