Sabtu, 30 September 2017

3 Reasons to Go on a Healthy Weight Loss Diet, Even If You're Satisfied With How You Look

Why do you think most people want to lose weight?

Honestly, most want to lose weight because of how they look. But what if you're overweight and are happy with how you look anyway? Is being fat acceptable?

Healthy Weight Loss Diet Reason #1: Cardiovascular disease

In addition to putting more stress on your knees and hips, being overweight puts a tremendous amount of strain on your heart. For one, it has to pump much more blood around your body, which can definitely cause it to be fatigued.

Also, the blood vessels in your body become stretched and thinner. Speaking of blood vessels, overweight people have higher bad cholesterol than thinner people, which means plaque builds up on their vessel walls.

This means more work on the heart, and can cause heart attack and stroke. Stroke is especially possible if you have high blood pressure, another result of being overweight.

A stroke occurs when your brain does not receive enough oxygen. This is because some plaque on the artery walls has broken loose and lodged in an artery that leads to the brain. This means reduced blood flow to the brain; hence, less oxygen.

Healthy Weight Loss Diet Reason #2: Pregnancy issues

Overweight women who want to get pregnant face a lot of issues that their thinner counterparts don't. For example, being overweight alters your hormone balance. This means you might not be able to ovulate and, if you do get pregnant, there's a higher chance of having a miscarriage.

Several other complications are possible if you're overweight and pregnant. Being overweight means you might have a baby that's larger than normal. This means you'll almost certainly have to have a cesarean section, rather than a natural, vaginal birth.

Healthy Weight Loss Diet Reason #3: Everyday life issues

OK, we all know that being overweight is hazardous to your health, but what about other areas of life? Is being overweight just a nuisance, or are there more serious considerations?

Well, as of this writing, a famous Hollywood director was asked to get off an airplane because he was too fat to fit in a seat. Public transportation just does not cater to obese people.

Also, what about the seats in movie theaters? Those are so small that I've seen people who were just a little overweight having trouble fitting.

Ironically, I went to dinner with a couple fairly recently who were both obese, but the man was severely obese. The restaurant had to bring out a special bench just for him. Can you say embarrassing?

What about clothing? Lots of times clothes for heavier people are more expensive and harder to find than regular size clothing. I've known people who had to have their clothes specially made.


Minggu, 10 September 2017

Weight Loss Diets for Men - Important Facts You Need to Know

Diets were never a man's thing. The word "diet" almost has a feminine claim to it that men don't like to consider themselves as being "on a diet", even if they are trying to cut their portions so they can lose the extra pounds. They were better off using exercise to lose those extra pounds. Lifting weights, running, bicycling-- all these were more masculine and hence had more appeal. If you closely looked at weight loss programs, you'd notice that a lot of them use female models, utilize female facts and paraded female success stories.

You could perhaps blame it on man's physiological makeup. By nature, men could burn off fat easily because their metabolisms work faster. They also lead more active lifestyles, especially where sports are concerned. And because of this, they need more calories. Hence, they can never live on the tightly controlled, thinly-sliced portions on women's weight loss diets.

But times are changing. Whether you have Hollywood to thank for that by showing extremely ripped bodies of Brad Pitt in Troy or the growing vanity brought about by the steady commercialization of the multibillion dollar fitness industry, the truth of the matter is that men are now, hold on to your seats, dieting! Even if they don't like to admit that what they're doing is dieting, they are now very conscious about buying smaller plates, eating smaller meals and weighing themselves on the bathroom every now and then.

You can't blame them. After all, men are not spared the bulging midsections brought about by sedentary lifestyles and overeating. Hypertension, diabetes and other cardiovascular considerations are also enough reasons to get them to be concerned about what they eat. But do weight loss diets for men really exist?

It's really a difficult question to answer. The most common diets practiced today (Atkins, South Beach, GI Diets) weren't specifically tailored for men. South Beach was originally developed by Dr. Agatston for his heart patients. GI Diets are based on the glycemic value of foods rather than on gender considerations. And while Atkins seem like the ideal diet for men because it allows lots of room for mayo, red meat and butter creams, the high-protein low fat content of the diet still poses a lot of unresolved health issues.

Losing weight, whether for health or aesthetic reasons, is always a worthy goal. Thus, the more important issue is whether there is a particular weight loss diet for men. For men, any diet that focuses on eating a well-balanced meal from a variety of food sources, drinking lots of water and spreading out the meals taken everyday, is the weight loss diet. It does not mean severely limiting portions to the point of hunger, but it means cutting down a bit. If the voracious eater in you used to eat one big slab of steak at dinner, dieting means halving it down gradually until you get used to only one the size of a deck of cards. If you were used to eating 3 main meals a day all with huge portions, dieting means spreading out your meals 6 times with smaller servings. If you usually snacked on a box of donuts, dieting means snacking on half the box, then a fourth, until you get used to only one donut or none at all. While you do have to quit on the soda if you really want to lose weight, dieting means consuming smaller portions while replacing it with healthier alternatives (like fruit smoothies) until you don't crave for it anymore.