Weighing in...

Sunday is the weigh-in day for the Healthy Again group at Lumpkin Road Baptist Church (the rest of you reading along who do not attend our church will just have to skip over the church-specific stuff).  Here's a couple of weigh-in tips that apply to anyone.

 

1. There is a lot of debate over whether or not you should weigh every day. Some weight loss experts discourage it, because your weight can fluctuate from day to day (women are particularly susceptible to this problem). Some encourage it to keep you on track. Personally, I do weigh every morning - not to be obsessive about it, but because I can make mid-week adjustments to my diet if I sense a slow-down in my loss. If it slows, I eliminate some of the starches from my diet, or work a little harder on exercise, or make some other change. As part of the Augusta's Biggest Loser competition, our official weigh-in is once a week, but our nutrition center weighs us two other times a week. They only see their regular clients once a week, but because we are in a competition, they don't want to wait a week to see about changing our food plan. If there's a problem, it shows up in a couple of days instead of a couple of weeks.

 

2. To get an accurate weight each time on the scale, the following may be helpful:

 

    - Wear the same (or similar) clothing each time you weigh. If you are weighing in at the church on Sunday, this may be difficult. Just do the best you can.

 

    - Weigh at the same time each time you weigh in. There can be as much as a four-pound difference between what you weigh in the morning and what you weigh in the evening.

 

    - If you began by weighing without shoes, make sure you weigh without shoes each time.

 

    - When you step on the scale, stand up straight, look forward, and exhale. It's best to have someone else look at the dial / display for you, because when you lean forward to see your numbers, you are most likely going to put too much pressure on the front of the scale, which can distort your number either up or down. Swallow your pride and let someone else record your weight loss.

 

    - Tempting as it may be, don't try any "tricks" to artificially get your number down before you face the scale. Boxers and wrestlers know all the tricks to get their weight just exactly what it needs to be for the moment they have to weigh in. As far as I know, there are no boxers or wrestlers in our group. Don't delay more than one meal to face the scale (for example, if you weigh on Sunday night, postponing dinner until after the weigh-in is fine), but don't starve yourself on Sunday to get a good number. You could slow your metabolism down and make it more difficult for the pounds to come off later.

 

Eat right, drink right, exercise right, and let the scale worry about itself!

 

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com
Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

 

The Motivation to Keep Going...

What motivates you? This is an important question, because most people do not have it within themselves to simply will themselves to succeed in weight loss. You need to find what motivates you, incorporate it into your life, and use it to propel you forward. Here are just a couple of suggestions:

 

Media - there are movies out there with inspirational speeches, scenes of people giving their all, etc. Go to youtube.com and do a search for inspiration or motivation. You will find movie scenes, speeches, etc., that will put just a little more hunger in you (no pun intended) to achieve your best. I throw in a Rocky movie every now and then to watch Stallone exercise, and to see the results. I listen to the speeches the coach makes from "Facing the Giants".

 

Pictures - for those of you who have just a little bit of weight you want to lose, pictures are probably not going to be very motivational. But if you are wanting to make a change in your appearance, there's a couple of ways you can use photos to your advantage. If you have a picture of you at, or near, the weight you want to be, pull it out and put it somewhere where you will see it often. Another way to use the camera to your advantage is to keep a picture record of where you start at, and take a new picture at significant points during your weight loss. I had my starting pictures, and then one at 50 pounds down, and my most recent one is at 80 pounds down. Keep the new pictures side by side with your old picture, and you will be astounded at the difference. There's something about looking at yourself in a photo that is significantly different from looking at yourself in a mirror.

 

Your health status - many people who are trying to lose weight are doing so to improve their blood pressure, cholesterol, or some other indicator of quality of health. Have your numbers checked regularly, and watch them come down as you live a more healthy lifestyle.

 

There are other ways to motivate yourself, such as posting relevant scripture verses or motivational sayings around your environment. But there is one type of motivation that we do not want you to do, and that is to reward yourself with food. Many people, after they have had a good weigh-in, will go and "treat themselves" to some off-limits food that they are wanting. Not only do you have the potential of wrecking your diet with a cheat (even a little one), but you are reinforcing the behavior that assigned an emotional attachment to food, and that emotional attachment is what got many of us into this place to start with. Food should neither be a reward nor a punishment; food is the fuel your body needs to burn off excess fat, and to continue functioning day-to-day. Until you change your mind about your food, you are not likely to make permanent changes in your lifestyle.

 

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com
Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

 

 

Salt Re-visited...

Too much salt in your diet will cause you to retain water and sidetrack your numbers on the scale; however, there are several other harmful effects of excessive salt / sodium on your body. Please read the following carefully:

 

Excessive sodium will:

 

- Raise the pressure of the blood, causing stress on the arteries

 

- Increase the mass of the left ventricle of the heart

 

- Thicken, stiffen, and narrow major arteries, including the coronary and renal arteries

 

- Increase the number of strokes

 

- Increase the severity of cardiac failure

 

- Cause the blood platelets to clump together

 

- Accelerate the rate of kidney deterioration

 

- Affect calcium and bone metabolism, affecting bone density in women

 

- Increase the incidence of cancer of the stomach

 

- Increase the severity of asthma in male asthmatic subjects

 

On the plus side, however, excessive sodium will:

 

- Make your food taste good.

 

That's it. Is good taste really worth wrecking your heart, arteries, and kidneys?

 

Here's your guideline for salt: DON'T cook with it. DON'T add it to your food at the table. DON'T eat anything for which you don't know the sodium content. You should not get more than 2000 mg of sodium per day, at most. 1500-1700 is probably more like it.

 

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com
Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

 

 

 

Fast Food, or "Fat Food"?

In today's "hurry-up" world, we want everything to be fast, including our meals. It's so convenient to swing by McDonald's or Burger King and pick up a meal, but what will it means in terms of your healthy lifestyle? How many calories are there in that #2 meal, with large fries and a large Coke? All the fast food restaurants are trying to pitch themselves as having "healthy" alternatives - KFC has a big sign over their menu featuring a grilled chicken meal with only 370 calories (but the sodium content - nearly 1800 mg - is in fine print).

 

How do we know what we're eating? Years ago, we had to rely on little calorie-counting books that gave us their best guess on very general categories of food. But with the proliferation of information available on the internet, you're only a few clicks away from looking under the hood of your favorite restaurant's menu. Here are a couple of sites that can help you:

 

http://www.foodfacts.info - Fast Food Facts has comprehensive information on 21 of the most popular fast-food and specialty restaurants (like Krispy Kreme). You can search by restaurant, or sort the results based on calories, sodium, carbs, and other content.

 

http://www.calorieking.com/foods/ - Calorie King has their own membership plan, but you don't have to join to look up foods in their database. You can search not only the entire menu of hundreds of restaurants and fast food chains, but you can look up specific foods in every category imaginable, from beverages to desserts and everything in between.

 

Confession time: My old breakfast favorite from Sonic - two sausage, egg, and cheese burritos - has a whopping 940 calories, 60 grams of fat, 650 mg of cholesterol (more than double the recommended cholesterol for an entire DAY!), and 2280 mg of sodium. And back in those days, I thought I was making a healthier choice because it was a burrito instead of a biscuit! Throw in a lunch at McDonalds, and I was already over 2500 calories, 127 grams of fat, and nearly 4000 milligrams of sodium, with dinner still awaiting me.

 

No wonder I feel so much better after being off of that stuff for just 3 months!

 

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com
Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

 

 

10 Steps to Getting Started...

This is not original with me - it's from the book, "The Biggest Loser Success Secrets". Maybe you have already started on your weight-loss journey, but no matter where you are, these items can help you focus your efforts:

 

1. Admit you have a weight problem. Denial can prevent you from taking action, and pounds will keep piling on.

 

2. Don't make excuses for delay. There's never a "good" time to start a weight-loss program. The best time to start living healthfully is NOW.

 

3. Learn from your past. If you are trying to lose weight now, you have probably tried before. Maybe you failed in the past, but use those failures as an opportunity to learn. What worked before? What didn't work before? Figure out what worked for you, and incorporate the successful behaviors into your new diet plan.

 

4. Make a clean sweep of all junk food. You can't eat it if it's not there, and it cannot tempt you if it's not there. Rid your environment - home, office, car - of foods that will cause you to stumble.

 

5. Build your team. Research shows that people who lose weight and keep it off have good support systems to help them along. This could be your family, your coworkers, an exercise partner, or a weight-loss group.

 

6. Set realistic goals. If your goals aren't realistic and attainable, you'll get frustrated and most likely quit. Set small goals that you can meet in order to maintain your enthusiasm.

 

7. Make daily resolutions toward reaching your goals. Early in a program to change your lifestyle, it's helpful to make daily resolutions that are manageable rather than focusing on far-off end goals. (I can attest to this - throughout my Biggest Loser experience, I have looked for benchmarks that I strive to reach that can be attained in no more than three to four weeks. 25 pounds, then the 300 pound barrier, then 50 pounds, then 75 pounds, etc., are the markers that have kept me going. I don't think about the 140 lbs. I need to lose - if I hit my markers, the 140 will take care of itself. Currently I am working to hit the 250 lb. mark, which is only about 12 pounds away as of this writing.)

 

8. Set your calorie budget. Without a dietician or a specific plan, you may not know how many calories you should eat in a day. A simple guideline to use is this: decide what you want your goal weight to be; multiply that number by 10, and that will tell you roughly the number of calories you should eat in a day. Generally, you should try not to eat less than 1000 calories in a given day. Doing so will actually slow your weight loss as your body goes into starvation mode.

 

9. Plan to be active for at least 60 minutes a day. This may be walking, exercising with free weights, playing a game, or any number of activities. The key is to keep moving.

 

10. Expect to have setbacks. They will come - you may as well brace yourself for them. Some weeks you will lose little - some weeks you may even gain. Don't view these setbacks as "failure" - you will be tempted to give up. As quickly as possible, identify the reason for the setback. You may have to decrease carbohydrates, increase your protein, and exercise a little more to get things moving again. But they will get moving again - be patient!

 

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com
Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

 

You Have to Eat to Lose...

When losing weight, you will hit those weeks where the losses will not be as good as they may have been in week one. This is natural - don't get discouraged. One common reaction by people is to assume, "I'm not losing as fast - I need to eat less." Don't give into the temptation to do that, and here's why. If you reduce the amount of food your body is used to eating, you will cross a line where your body will stop losing weight, and it will go into preservation mode. It assumes no more food is coming any time soon, and your hypothalamus will shut your metabolism down. You will begin feeling weak, and maybe even light-headed. You will convince yourself that this is the cost of dieting that you must endure, but your weight loss will be better if you eat more, and keep your metabolism going.

 

Most diet plans are well-defined into breakfast, lunch, supper, and maybe a snack or two. But instead of eating at those three or four times, try spreading your calories out throughout the day. Try eating something about every two and a half hours - this will keep your metabolism burning all day long, instead of the stopping and starting that occurs when you eat at 7 AM, noon, and 6 PM.

 

There is no secret formula, because everyone is different. But just be aware that the times you eat are just as important as what you eat, and it may take some careful experimenting on your part to find your optimal eating pattern for weight loss.

 

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com
Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

 

 

What About My Sweet Tooth?

Many of us are in the boat we are in with our weight because of our "sweet tooth" - whether it be chocolate, hard candy, or sweet, doughy treats, candies and desserts can pack on the pounds quickly. For many people, getting a handle on this area of diet can mean the difference between failure and success. My vote is for "success".

 

I will not try to convince you that sugar-free, fat-free alternatives are going to be just as tasty as their "real" counterparts. But there are some things you can do, and some things you can eat, that will help with that craving.

 

First, understand that it is easier to go from "no sweets" to "sugar-free sweets" than it is to go from "real sweets" to "sugar-free sweets". For some people, the best strategy is to go for a period of time with no sweets at all, and then to re-introduce their sugar-free counterparts. When we began the Augusta's Biggest Loser program, they put us through a four-day period of "detox", where all we ate was fruit, vegetables, chicken, and brown rice. Not only did this help cleanse our digestive system and wean it off of the junk food that most of us ate, but it also re-aligned our tastes. When we were finally allowed to have some other food items, they tasted MUCH better!

 

Second, there are some products out there that will help with your sweet tooth when the urge strikes. Jello makes sugar-free, fat-free puddings that are very good. Make sure you get the ones that say they are both sugar- and fat-free, because they make some that are just sugar-free, but loaded with fat, and vice-versa. They also make very good sugar-free jello - you can either make it yourself from the box, or you can pick them up in individual servings in the cold foods area (usually by the cheese products in the grocery store). These servings of jello only have 10 calories each, and you can eat them to your heart's content. For a little variety, you can add a little fat-free whipped cream (I don't particularly care for the taste, but some people do).

 

Yogurt is another good alternative, but you have to be careful, because the major brands (Dannon, Yoplait) tend to be very high in sugar and in total carbohydrates. The yogurt that our nutritionists recommend to us is only found at Kroger stores, because it is a Kroger brand called "Carbmaster". It has far less carbs than the main brands, and is a much better choice. If you absolutely have to have the big-name yogurts, go for the simpler varieties like plain fruit. Don't get the ones with Oreo crumbs or M&Ms that you stir in and think you are eating healthy!

 

There is a wide assortment of snack bars out there that can be used to satisfy the desire for sweets. Use these sparingly, and compare different brands by reading the labels. Many of them are labeled as diet aids, but in fact, many of them contain large amounts of sugar and carbohydrates. So be careful.

 

Finally, you have to make some changes in your thinking to deal effectively with your sweet tooth. One of my teammates has a slogan that she has come to use whenever she is confronted with a temptation: "It's not worth the sweat!" Eat it if you want, but understand that you are going to have to do some serious work to burn those calories. A chocolate creme-filled donut from Krispy Kreme is 350 calories, and most of us would not stop at just one. Let's assume you eat three (because everyone knows you ate one of them in the car on the way home, and you tell yourself those calories don't count!). Three of those donuts is a typical Saturday morning breakfast for those of us here in the south. That is a total of 1050 calories, 117 carbohydrates, and 69 grams of sugar. To work off those 3 donuts, you would have to walk at a brisk pace (4 miles per hour) for 12 miles! And you would have to do it immediately after eating them, because certain types of carbohydrates are turned into stored fat almost instantaneously.

 

Do not ever forget that there is a spiritual component to the discipline of weight management, as well. Ask God for help in overcoming the temptations that come your way every day.

 

 

Two Things...

I forgot to follow up on something I promised a couple of days ago. When I gave you the link to the calorie burn calculator, I told you that I would show you how to calculate how many calories your body actually needs - but I never followed up. Here's the link: http://www.caloriesperhour.com/index_burn.php. Enter your gender, age, height, and current weight, and it will calculate your BMR (basal metabolic rate). This will show you how many calories your body needs to maintain your current weight. If you are a 40 year-old female who stands 5'3", and you weigh 210, your body requires 1674 calories to maintain its current weight.

 

I also wanted to pass on a resource for you - it is impossible to pick up a fitness magazine without being bombarded with images and ads that are not appropriate for a Christian to spend their time with. I found a publisher that puts out a magazine (6 or 7 issues a year) that you can access online called "Fit Christian". It appears to be about all-around fitness, with interviews with Christian athletes, recipes, workout ideas, etc., but without all the garbage of the world. You might want to check it out.

 

http://www.fitchristian.com/

 

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com
Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

How Much Sodium?

I wanted to re-visit the issue of sodium, because that is the most common question we have received so far about the tips I offered Sunday night.

 

Q. Why is sodium bad for you?

 

A. Sodium is not bad for you - your body needs sodium, just like it needs many other minerals and nutrients. However, the body only needs about 500 mg of sodium to function properly. Most Americans eat way more than that. A healthy diet restricts sodium to around 1200-1500 mg per day; anything over 2400 is considered excessive. A typical fast-food meal of a burger and fries contains around 1300 mg.

 

Q. What will too much sodium do to me?

 

A.  Excessive sodium has been conclusively linked to high blood pressure, which causes problems for all body systems. The probability of heart attack, stroke, liver disease, kidney disease, and other catastrophic illnesses goes up with increased blood pressure. An added side effect is that too much sodium causes the body to retain water, which affects your number on the scale each week.

 

Q. How can I reduce sodium in my diet?

 

A. Read labels and make good food choices, for one. Green beans, for example, are packed with a large amount of sodium. A regular can of green beans has about 330 mg of sodium per 1/2 cup serving. A "no salt added" can of the same product has 50 mg of sodium. When you consider that you only should be eating 400-500 mg of sodium per meal, that regular can of green beans doesn't look so healthy anymore. Be especially wary of products labeled "diet", "sugar-free", and "fat-free" - they will frequently use high levels of sodium to compensate for the ingredients they leave out.

 

The foods in a well-balanced diet contain more than enough sodium for your body - take the salt shaker off the table, and don't add salt to anything while you are cooking with it. Be careful of things like seasoning salt, etc., which contain large amounts of salt. If you find your food too bland without salt, sometimes you can mimic the salty taste with a buttery spray such as "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter".

 

Even some traditional diet foods can derail your diet - cottage cheese and pineapple were a staple of many diets when I was growing up. However, cottage cheese can, in some people, make you retain water; pineapple is the second-worst fruit you can eat if you are trying to lose weight because of the sugar levels (only watermelon is worse).

 

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com
Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

 

 

How Much Exercise Do I Need?

Exercise. Ugh. No one likes to hear about exercise, particularly if you aren't used to doing any. Exercise usually conjures up images of sweating over a treadmill or a bike, but exercise can be much more than that, and it can be fun. Granted, the exercise that I am involved in as a participant in Augusta's Biggest Loser is not necessarily fun, but sometimes it is. Strenuous exercise does more than just burn calories; it builds muscle, which can burn fat long after the exercise is over with.

So how much exercise do I really need? It depends on how many calories you want to burn. There are some great tools online for figuring out how many calories you can burn doing a specific activity. A very good calorie burn calculator can be found at http://www.healthstatus.com/calculate/cbc. You type in your current weight, select an activity, and type in the number of minutes you did (or anticipate doing) that particular activity. The calculator will show you how many calories you will burn. For example, if you weigh 200 pounds and you bowl for one hour, you will burn 276 calories. If you weigh 200 pounds and you walk for one hour, you will burn either 252, 396, or 468 calories, depending on how fast you walk. Remembering that you need to create a deficit of 3500 calories in order to lose one pound, a brisk walk every day for one hour is almost exactly enough work to lose 1 lb. per week, assuming you take in no more calories than your body needs to maintain its current weight. We will learn how to figure that number of calories next time.

Email: healthyagain@lumpkinroad.com

Healthy Again Blog: http://healthyagain2010.blogspot.com

How to Lose One Pound

What Does It Take to Lose One Pound?

 

To lose weight, you have to eat fewer calories than your body uses. Calories are the amount of energy in the food you eat. Some foods have more calories than others. For example, foods that are high in fat and sugar are also high in calories. If you eat more calories than your body uses, the extra calories will be stored as excess body fat.

 

A pound of fat is about 3,500 calories. To lose 1 pound of fat in a week, you have to eat 3,500 fewer calories (that is 500 fewer calories a day), or you have to "burn off" an extra 3,500 calories. You can burn off calories by exercising or just by being more active.

 

The best way to lose weight and keep it off is to eat fewer calories and be active. If you cut 250 calories from your diet each day and exercise enough to burn off 250 calories, that adds up to 500 fewer calories in one day. If you do this for 7 days, you can lose 1 pound of fat in a week.

 

"Then why can't I just quit eating for a while and lose weight?" Two things happen when you stop eating: 1) Your metabolism shuts down because your body thinks no food is coming, and it will do everything it can to conserve energy, thus, it will shut down your weight loss; and 2) when your body does have to burn something, it will indiscriminately consume good muscle tissue along with stored fat. This is why people with eating disorders such as anorexia never reach a phase where they look healthy - a body in deprivation burns muscle along with fat, so that the end result looks like skin draped over bones.

 

Muscle tissue burns fat; water flushes fat out of your body. This is why you must eat right, you must get some exercise, and you must drink water in order to properly lose weight.

 

What Foods Should I Eliminate From My Diet Immediately?

 

- Desserts (even limited quantities will wreck your diet; try sugar-free jello instead)

 

- Sugar (even in your tea - sorry!)

 

- Salt

 

- Soft drinks (use diet sodas sparingly - no more than 1 a day, because of the sodium)

 

- Beef, particularly ground beef (beef is the hardest meat to digest, and contains too much fat for weight loss. Lean cuts of beef should be limited to no more than one time per week, and eat it on the day after you weigh in. It will take days for you to get rid of it.)

 

- Pork (same reasons as ground beef)

 

- Ketchup (contains too much sugar for weight loss)

 

- White bread (when buying bread, look for bread that is 40-50 calories per slice)

 

Be healthy!

 

 

Getting Started

Good morning – after discussing a little bit with Jo Anna last night, we decided it might be beneficial for me to pass along some tips I have learned.

First off, there was a great response last night at our initial meeting – thank you for participating in this weight loss challenge. What we are doing is not easy – but nothing worth having is easy!
I am not a weight loss expert, but the people I am working with on Augusta’s Biggest Loser are experts, and I am passing along what I have learned from them to you. I wanted to put down, in written form, some of the things I covered in the meeting last night so that you will have them. There were four basic tips I gave last night to help you get started:

1) You are going to have to get some exercise. I suggested walking, and mentioned that I walk 5 miles a day outside of anything I do at the gym. Not all of you can do that – you may have to start with a much smaller goal, and work your way up. People who only diet are more successful at weight loss than people who only exercise, but the people who do both are the most successful. Go to Wal-Mart, pick up a pedometer (as little as $5), and wear it all the time. The steps you take during the normal course of your day count towards that 10,000 steps (5 miles). Whatever you have leftover at the end of the day to walk, go find a comfortable place for you to walk and finish it out.

2) You are going to have to drink water. Water is what the liver uses to process fat and flush it out of the body. How much water? Take your weight, divide it by 2, and that is approximately how many ounces of water you need to drink in a day. If you weigh 200 pounds, you should be drinking approximately 100 ounces of water. If you weight 300, you should drink around 150 ounces of water. Don’t drink it all at once – spread it out throughout the day. I usually do a quart at a time, and I allot myself 2 hours to drink that quart. And don’t drink a lot of it right before you weigh in. I stop drinking about 6 hours before weigh-in time. Your body will get rid of any water it doesn’t need, so don’t worry about over-doing it.

3) You are going to have to reduce your carbohydrates. White bread, biscuits, pasta – any food which has as its first ingredient “enriched flour” – needs to go, as well as anything that has sugar, corn syrup, fructose, or any form of sugar. Be very careful with foods that advertise themselves as fat free or sugar free, because when they take out fat, they usually make up for it with sugar. When they take out sugar, they make up for it with fat. Sometimes they make up for both with sodium, which leads me to my fourth point.

4) NO SALT! Don’t cook with it, don’t add it to your food, and don’t eat anything that you can’t verify the sodium content in. Sodium (salt) will make you retain water, increase your weight, drive your blood pressure up, and make you feel bad. A person should only get about 1200 milligrams of sodium in a day – a Big Mac and a large order of fries is about 1340 milligrams of sodium.

Tomorrow I will send out a more comprehensive list of things that you should not eat, or that you should eat sparingly, if you really want to lose weight.
Be healthy!