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(HealthNewsDigest.com) – Winter is over and it is time to peel off all those warm clothes. As you begin to show more skin you vow to drop some weight before you put on your bathing suit. You are not alone. Thirty-three percent on all adults claim they would happily shave a year off their lives if they could just be thinner for the rest of their days.
Here is some weight loss wisdom that won’t let you down.
Weight loss is easy because all diets work. Most people can lose weight but few maintain their loss. Keeping the weight off requires a lifetime of diligent attention. Focusing on a good diet after you lose some weight is the key to weight maintenance.
Counting calories counts. If a serving of food equals:
- 40 calories – it is a low calorie food
- 100 calories – it is a moderate calorie food
- 400 or more calories – it is a high calorie food
This shortcut can help you make a quick decision about which food to pick.
Couch potatoes beware. For every hour you spend in front of the TV each day you increase your risk of dying by 11%. Start moving.
Being overweight is worse than smoking. When researchers calculate someone’s Quality-Adjusted Life Years, more years are lost to obesity than those lost from a lifetime of smoking. Moderate obesity can reduce your life by 3 years and severe obesity can shorten your life by a decade.
Weigh too much and your teeth suffer. Carrying too much weight increases your risk for gum (periodontal) disease, bad breath and tooth loss.
Don’t clear the table. When leftover chicken wing bones were visible, people watching a football game ate 27% less than those without a visual cue to signal how much they had eaten.
Fat cells are angry cells. Gaining weight causes fat cells to become bloated and inflamed because they receive too many nutrients. These over nourished, inflamed cells increase the risk for heart disease and create insulin resistance which leads to higher blood sugar and an increased risk for diabetes. Slimming down reverses the problem.
Sleep less, weigh more — Researchers have found that lack of sleep stimulates the part of the brain involved with appetite. Those who get too little sleep are hungrier.
Too many calories muddles the mind. The Mayo Clinic Study on Aging showed that eating too many calories each day raises the risk for memory loss and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) in people 70 and older. MCI is the stage between normal memory loss in aging and early Alzheimer’s disease. Staying slim can protect your brain.
Every step counts. — Taking an escalator up 3 flights of stairs burns 3 calories, walking 3 flights burns more than 20 calories.
Don’t follow fads. Fad weight loss diets are very enticing to try and they do work. The problem with fad diets is that they are like a patch on a leaking tire. The patch lasts for a while and then gives way. Fad diets also last for a while until you go back to the way you usually eat and you wind up back where you started or maybe even worse.
Find a good weight loss diet plan.
- The diet should be based on actual weight loss research, not just one study on a limited amount of people. Check out the National Weight Control Registry (http://www.nwcr.ws/) to find out what really works for real people.
- It should include physical activity. You don’t have to run a marathon or be slumped over an elliptical machine after a workout. Just get off your seat and on your feet. Wear a pedometer and count your steps. Approximately 2,500 steps equal a mile.
- No foods should be forbidden. It is not the food, but how often and how much you eat.
- The diet doesn’t use extreme measures – fasting, cleansing, special formulas or pills.
- The eating plan will not harm your health now or in the future.
- The diet has a plan you can live with for the rest of your life. The biggest flaw with most diets is that they end and the person goes back to their old eating and lifestyle habits. A lifelong diet gives you tools to rely on that will keep you slimmer and more active.
© NRH Nutrition Consultants, Inc.
Jo-Ann Heslin, MA, RD, CDN is a registered dietitian and the author of the nutrition counter series for Pocket Books with sales of more than 8.5 million books.
Look for:
The Diabetes Counter, 5th Ed., 2014
The Fat and Cholesterol Counter, 2014
The Most Complete Food Counter, 3rd ed., 2013
The Calorie Counter, 6th Ed., 2013
The Complete Food Counter, 4th ed., 2012
The Protein Counter, 3rd Ed., 2011
The Ultimate Carbohydrate Counter, 3rd Ed., 2010
The Healthy Wholefoods Counter, 2008
Your Complete Food Counter App: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/your-complete-food-counter/id444558777?mt=8
For more information on Jo-Ann and her books, go to: www.TheNutritionExperts.com.
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