Natural Weightloss

Researchers have recently reported that waist circumference is associated with higher risk of mortality among all women—but interestingly, mortality rates were especially high in those women who had a normal body mass index, or BMI (and therefore, were not considered overweight or obese). 

BMI is not always a clear indicator of whether or not your weight is in the healthy range. For instance, many athletes who have a great deal of muscle mass (and therefore weigh more because of that muscle mass) would be considered overweight by BMI standards. Therefore, I do believe that BMI is only one tool to assess health risk. Waist circumference is a great indicator of health because women with thicker waistlines (usually more than 35 inches around) have a higher risk of metabolic syndrome, diabetes, heart disease, and many other conditions.

Eating a healthy diet (which includes natural appetite control measures) and exercising regularly are the best ways to whittle down your waistline and achieve natural weightloss. Try walking, cycling, jogging, tennis, yoga, dancing, or any other exercise that appeals to you and keeps you motivated. In time, your waistline—and your weight overall—will decrease and you’ll be in much better health.

For more great tips on achieving your weight loss goals, visit my Web site.

• Add more fiber. Begin each meal with a high-nutrient, high-fiber foodósuch as a salad or an appetizer like 1/3 cup of hummus with baby carrots. This will give you a feeling of fullness before you begin your main course.
• Breakfast like a king.  Eat your heavier meals during the day (breakfast and lunch) and a lighter meal for dinner. This gives your body time to digest the heavier meals long before bed.
• Calm down when you eat. Research shows it takes at least 20 minutes from the time food hits your stomach until your brain receives signals of fullness. If you eat too fast, you’ll eat past your “full” point, taking in too much food.
• Don’t quit. If you do eat something that you know you shouldn’t, or that isn’t right for your type, don’t beat yourself up or feel guilty. This is not a short-term program, but a lifetime approach. Work to make these recommendations the norm in your life, with foods like refined sugar, white flour, alcohol, and red meats the exception.
• Eat a wide variety of foods. Otherwise, you may begin to feel bored and deprived. Plus, you need a wide variety of nutrients for good health.
• Fifteen-minute meal preparation. You’ll be less likely to give in to temptation and hit the fast-food chains if you know you can throw a healthy dinner together in 15 minutes.
• Go with small portions first. We seem to be programmed from childhood to leave a clean plate. It’s much better to take a little more if you’re still hungry than to feel stuffed because you felt compelled to finish everything on your plate.
• Honor mealtimes. Light candles, play soft music, and consider mealtimes an opportunity for reflection, planning, and community, whether you’re eating alone or with others.

• Hot peppers. Capsaicin is the “hot” ingredient in hot peppers. Studies show that, in spite of being fed a high-fat diet, laboratory rats given supplemental capsaicin actually lost body fat and 8 percent of their starting body weight, while the rats not given capsaicin gained both weight and fat. I recommend Nature’s Way Cayenne 40,000 H.U. Take 450 mg three times daily with food.
• Turmeric. A well-known antioxidant and anti-cancer agent, turmeric is also a traditional Ayurvedic weight-loss agent. Its active ingredient is curcumin, which studies show suppresses fat deposition in mice fed a high-fat diet. I recommend a turmeric extract standardized to 95 percent curcuminoids, which you can find at any health food store or vitamin retailer. Take 500 mg three times daily. Or, simply add this wonderful spice to your recipes! You can find many recipes that include turmeric online.

In my most recent newsletter issue, I shared some exciting new discoveries in the world of natural weightloss. I'd like to share some of them with you this week. Let's start with a vitamin I have discussed many times in conjunction with bone health, immunity, and even female hormone balance, that now also has been shown to play a critical role in maintaining a healthy weight--vitamin D!

In one very recent study, overweight or obese individuals in a diet and exercise weight-loss program, who concomitantly took supplemental vitamin D, lost significantly more weight than those who were not taking vitamin D. Here’s the twist: Those who had ample blood levels of vitamin D at the start of the weight-loss program did not benefit weight-loss wise from those ample levels. It was when vitamin D levels in the blood increased over the first six months of the two-year study that their weight-loss success blossomed.

I recommend taking 1,000 to 4,000 IU vitamin D3 daily (D3 is more effective than D2). This dose will get your serum levels increasing towards that target level and give your natural weight loss plan a boost. 

For more tips on improving your natural weigtloss efforts, visit my Web site.

• 4 oz. fish/poultry—a deck of cards
• 1 cup—a softball
• ½ cup—a handful
• 1/4 cup—a golf ball

• Plan for your indulgence and be extra vigilant the day before.
• Limit the number of indulgences you take in any given month.
• Exercise for 60 minutes rather than 30 minutes the day after.
• Always remember, indulgences are the exception, not the rule.
• Substitute a shake for breakfast and another for lunch the day after.
• Enjoy! You’ve worked hard and deserve an occasional treat!

• eliminating toxins from your body;
• cleansing and invigorating your cells and tissues;
• improving your ability to lose weight and gain appetite control;
• promoting radiant skin and lustrous hair;
• protecting your nervous system and brain from unmetabolized toxins;
• reducing your risk of heart disease, PMS, fibroid tumors, endometriosis, and breast cancer;
• enhancing libido;
• fighting fatigue; and
• balancing estrogen levels by supporting estrogen metabolism.

The final step in controlling emotional eating and kick-starting your natural weightloss is to take the following supplements, which have been proven to help curb the cravings associated with emotional eating:

• Saffron has long been used as a seasoning and coloring agent by gourmet cooks. But saffron also has amazing medicinal value that is beginning to turn heads, including benefits that can help free you from the clutches of emotional eating. Scientists have identified at least two of its active ingredients: safranal, which has been found to promote levels of the well-being neurotransmitter serotonin, and crocin-1, which inhibits the neurotransmitters dopamine (believed to condition you to expect “rewards” from comfort food), and the acute stress hormone norepinephrine. Saffron’s effects on these brain chemicals is believed to be one mechanism by which it combats mild to moderate depression; increases a sense of fullness and satisfaction; helps blunt the triggers of emotional eating; and promotes not just weight loss, but reduction of fat mass. A new, patent-pending, clinically proven optimized saffron extract, developed in France from Mediterranean saffron and used in the study above, is available as a supplement called Satiereal. I recommend one capsule, twice daily.
• Sublingual 5-HTP. Your brain is a major source for the production of the appetite control neurotransmitter called serotonin, and 5-HTP (5-hydroxy-L-tryptophan) is serotonin’s main ingredient. In a placebo-controlled study of overweight women, eight weeks of treatment with an under-the-tongue form of 5-HTP resulted in a significantly greater sense of fullness and satisfaction, and reduced body mass index, skinfold thickness, and hip measurement. I recommend Life Link’s 5 HTP lozenges .

To  learn more about appetite control techniques and ways to aid in your natural weight loss plan, visit my Web site.
 

The fourth step in controlling emotional eating and kick-starting your natural weightloss is to curb your cravings by avoiding dieting and focusing on eating sensibly. 

Any diet that restrains and deprives is doomed to fail. Instead, I recommend the luxury of a Mediterranean-type diet, which is rich in fresh fruits and vegetables, fish, chicken, and whole grains.

If you become hungry between meals, do not deprive yourself. Allow yourself to have a sensible treat, like a gluten-free cookie or soy-based ice cream. Or better yet, eat a whole piece of ripe fresh fruit, such as an apple or a pear. When researchers in a recent study compared the length of satisfaction from eating an apple, versus a cup of applesauce, versus drinking a cup of apple juice, they found that the juice and the sauce did very little to reduce hunger. But the whole fruit significantly satisfied, and held hunger at bay for up to three full hours.

To learn more about natural weightloss techniques, appetite control measures, and ways to curb emotional eating, visit my Web site.

• turkey;
• seafood;
• whole grains such as quinoa;
• brown rice;
• legumes;
• eggs;
• almonds; and
• sesame, sunflower, and pumpkin seeds.

The second step in controlling emotional eating and kick-starting your natural weightloss is to learn to control your response to, rather than deny, your negative emotions.

While many women experience emotional distresses, not every one of them is an emotional eater. The difference between those who are and those who are not has to do with how they deal with their feelings. Studies show that when a woman responds to negative emotions by suppressing them, her negative energy merely goes underground, significantly increasing her risk of becoming an emotional eater. If, instead, she uses what’s known as emotion regulation strategies, she has a chance to gain control over her emotional eating.

One emotional regulation strategy in particular is called emotional reappraisal. This technique intervenes early, before the behavioral response (eating) to the negative emotion has kicked in.

Tfirst step is awareness of the emotional trigger: Step back and witness your emotions as an impartial third party. For example, rather than saying, “I am lonely,” say, “She is lonely.” Then, look from several angles at what triggered that feeling of loneliness, and find a perspective that acknowledges the aloneness but has a more constructive take on it, such as: “The loneliness is a chance for solitude, peace, inner growth, to read a good book, exercise, meditate, and/or start a creative project.” Instead of building pressure, the energy from the negative emotion gets recognized, redirected, and depressurized in a positive way.

For one-on-one expert help in adopting emotional reappraisal for emotional eating, ask your health care provider for a referral to a licensed psychologist or counselor who has experience in the technique.
 
To learn more about natural weightloss and appetite control methods, visit my Web site.

One of the biggest obstacles in any woman's natural weight loss plan is emotional eating.  Emotional eating—craving then consuming foods you are addicted to—occurs when you cannot or will not allow yourself to feel, express, or deal with your negative feelings. 
If you cannot deal with them as they arise, a common protective mechanism is to avoid experiencing them on an emotional level and instead shut them away or bury them in your body. Emotional eating is a common way of doing this. Instead of feeling sad, worthless, angry, or resentful, you anesthetize yourself by bingeing on foods like potato chips, pizza, or ice cream. In other words, you eat instead of feel.

Today and over the next several days, I will give you techniques and supplements that have been scientifically proven to curb emotional eating, provide appetite control, and help aid in natural weightloss. The first step is in this journey is to use a method called relaxation training.

Anxiety causes cortisol elevations that can quickly sabotage any natural weight loss plan. Relaxation training can help you deal with anxiety and reduce emotional eating that can sabotage your weight and health. In a recent study, three months after completing 12 weekly relaxation training sessions, obese women had fewer depression and anxiety symptoms, fewer episodes of emotional eating, and significant weight loss.
 
A great way to start is to use brain wave entrainment, which uses a preprogrammed session of flickering lights and/or rhythmic sounds that pulsate at the alpha brainwave frequency (the brainwave associated with deep relaxation and a meditative state). The therapy coaxes brainwaves into that target alpha frequency to bring about a relaxed state. My favorite BWE device is the MindSpa. 

Other relaxation techniques that I use and recommend include yoga, deep breathing, T’ai Chi, Qigong, grounding, and aerobic exercise like walking or hiking. Whatever method(s) you choose, please commit to having at least a 15-minute relaxation session every day to ease your mind.

To learn more about natural weightloss and appetite control methods, visit my Web site.