Weight loss means different things to different people. For some, it is just a matter of popping a few diet pills, starving for weekends, and losing all the extra weight. For others, it is a matter of complete lifestyle change. If you ask me, I would go for the latter option. If you are wondering why, this article is just the right thing for you.

You see, if you have ever used fad diets and diet pills for weight loss, you would agree with me on one thing: weight loss achieved solely with their help is anything but permanent. You stop the intake of diet pills, you stop dieting, and the weight comes back.

Weight loss needs permanent solutions

This is not what I would call ‘weight loss’. For me, weight loss is all about losing weight permanently, so that the ‘lost’ weight never comes back again. As a matter of fact, permanent weight loss cannot be achieved with diet pills or fad diets; it can only be achieved by making a major change to your existing lifestyle, the change from unhealthy to healthy lifestyle.

No matter what other weight loss experts tell you, the fact remains that if you supply enough nutrition to your body regularly, it would always be fit and healthy, keeping you free not only from weight gain but also other harmful diseases.

Foods need to energize you

The foods you are currently consuming are anything but nutritious. Sure, they fill up your belly quickly but all they provide your body is empty calories that don’t provide the necessary nutrition; to make matters worse for you, these empty calories get deposited in your body as fat and make you obese.

Basically, if you follow the laws of nature, it would be impossible for you to gain weight, ever. This means that you should eat natural foods instead of processed junk, use your hands instead of machines to perform most of your routine tasks, don’t be a couch potato or a slave to your computer, don’t eat before bedtime, and get to bed as well as get up at right times.

Are you doing all these now? If your answer is “no”, then obesity is the natural outcome of your lifestyle habits because you are basically violating nature’s laws.

Obesity and Health issues if you do not change now

Forget about obesity, if you continue with your present lifestyle, you would soon find yourself burdened with more harmful diseases such as coronary diseases, kidney problems, hypertension, high blood pressure, diabetes, and even premature death.

The choice is now yours: do you want to lead a healthy and long life by obeying nature, or lead an unhealthy lifestyle and die an early death?

Looking to make a change and lose some weight? I have reviewed the top diet on the internet and you can go and read over 200 comments people have made about why this diet has worked well for them, as well as some of the problems.

Tags: coronary diseases, diabetes, high blood pressure, hypertension, obesity

A teenage life is not an easy one to lead, as I can tell from my experience. If you are a normal teenager, you have the stress of studies, peer pressure, and all that. You have to keep up with the latest gadgets and gizmos, excel at studies, and bear the rules and restrictions of your parents as if you are still a baby. And if you are an overweight teenager, then all hell breaks loose.

People not only laugh and joke about your fat belly behind your back, but also insult and taunt you openly. This in turn lowers your self-esteem and makes you depressed. If you are a teenager suffering from weight gain problems, this article is for you.

Who to blame for child obesity

So far as your obesity issue is concerned, the blame has to be shared equally by you and your parents. Your parents are probably too busy to cook healthy meals for you, and even if they are not busy, they don’t like to cook. Left without choice, you have to eat junk foods from outside. In this case the onus for your obesity lies with your parents, because they failed to offer you with healthy food choices.

But on top of that, if you also eat junk foods when you don’t need to, for example, at a friend’s party, or with your classmates at a school canteen, etc., then you are equally to blame for your present predicament. This additional junk food intake (over and above your regular junk food consumption) makes matters worse for you. Just in case you don’t know, junk foods are one of the primary causes of obesity.

Junk food and teen obesity

Another thing to note is that some of the effects of your junk food consumption would have worn off if you had taken the time to workout a little instead of being a couch potato or a slave to computers and video games. Unhealthy food habits, coupled with sedentary lifestyle, became your undoing. Here again you have no one but yourself to blame.

So now that you have gained weight, you need to lose it anyhow. Consider the following options:

Visit a doctor to make sure that you are really overweight. If you are overweight, then ask about your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate), for it would determine how much you need to workout and by what percentage should you reduce your food intake on a daily basis.

Try to convince your parents to start cooking healthy meals. Tell them how bad obesity is, how it can burden a person with diabetes, high blood pressure, coronary diseases, etc. If you fail to convince them, then learn to cook yourself. Once you start eating healthy meals, half of your extra weight would be gone even before you know it.

Did I tell you that you need to bid goodbye to your junk food buddies.

Stop being a couch potato. Get rid of your addiction to PSPs, TVs and PCs. Instead, do some exercises everyday; it can be in the form of walking, running, jogging, or working out in the gym, whatever you feel most comfortable with.

Just pick up a suitable exercise for yourself and DO it daily. If you lead an active lifestyle, the other half of your ‘extra weight’ would be gone too and you would become the slim and sexy teen you used to be.

Tags: coronary diseases, diabetes, food intake, healthy food choices, high blood pressure, junk food, junk food buddies, junk food consumption, junk food intake, obesity, regular junk food consumption, unhealthy food habits

First of all, let me tell you that not all fats are bad, and conversely, not all fats are good either. There are two types of fats found in today’s foods: omega-3 and omega-6. Now you maybe are wondering what these fats have got to do with weight loss. Hmm, well that is what this article is all about.

The omega-3 fat is usually found in fishes, flax seeds, a few types of nuts (the ubiquitous groundnut is a good example), and hemp seeds. On the other hand, omega-6 fats are found in fast foods, processed fruit juices, sugary foods, soft drinks, etc.

Most people today have forgotten all about the healthier omega-3 fats and focus on eating only foods that are rich in omega-6 fats. I don’t mean to say that in order to lose weight, you should be eating only those foods that are rich in omega-3 fats. The key here is not to prefer one type of fat over another, as it creates an imbalance.

Here are some facts about omega-6 fats:

1. Omega-6 fats make your body unhealthy: Studies have pointed out that people who consume a high amount of omega-6 fats and low amount of omega-3 fats are likely to suffer from coronary diseases, high blood pressure, kidney and liver troubles, diabetes, high blood pressure, etc. Premature death is also not a remote possibility.

2. Omega-6 fats make you stressed and hungry: A little known fact about junk foods is that they make stressed and depressed. A recent study on rats showed that when these rats were given junk and fatty foods to eat, they became stressed and tended to eat more and more junk foods.

However, when those same rats were served with foods rich in omega-3 fats, they were very little stressed didn’t eat more than what they were served because the omega-3 fats made them full just with the initial serving size.

Keep in mind that the foods served in both instances contained the same amount of calories. This study on rats debunked the myth that a calorie is a calorie, and proved that when it comes to weight gain/weight loss, the amount of calorie intake matters as much as the source of those calories.

3. Omega-6 fats make you overweight: Omega-6 fats are also responsible for obesity. This was the final conclusion drawn from the study on rats I mentioned above. As you know, at one time the rats were given junk foods to eat while at another time, they were served with foods rich in omega-3 fats; the foods served on both occasions contained the same amount of calories.

However, it was found out that when the rats ate the junk foods rich in omega-6 fats, they gained a lot of weight. It is only natural; as I told you earlier, omega-6 fats make the rats stressed out and increase their appetite.

In the end, I would suggest that you eat more of omega-3 fats and less of omega-6 fats. However, please don’t focus on eating only omega-3 or only omega-6 fats. Both need to be eaten in balance and as such, you should be eating a high amount of foods rich in omega-3 fats and a low amount of omega-6-rich junk foods.

While fishes are rich in omega-3 fats, you shouldn’t eat too much fish because apart from omega-3 fat oils, they also contain the poisonous mercury and PCB. If you wish to purchase a fish oil supplement, carefully check the package label to make sure that it has been completely detoxified of all these toxins and poisonous ingredients before being packed.

Tags: coronary diseases, diabetes, fish oil supplement, high blood pressure, obesity

In good old times, when there was no video game, PSP, IPOD or computer, one needn’t worry about telling their kids to engage themselves in outdoor sports and exercises. Children would do it on their own, having no other (read better) choice. However, in this age of gizmos and gadgets, kids have become so much addicted to video games, TV and computers that rarely, if ever, do they venture out of home except for school classes, forget about exercising or playing sports.

As times change, parents need to change too. Now that kids no longer have any inclination for exercise, you, as a parent, need to be proactive about it, IF you want to ensure a healthy future for your kids, that is.

How would exercise benefit my kids, you may ask. Well, for starters, exercises would keep your kids fit, not only now but also forever, provided that they continue with the exercises. When kids are accustomed to leading an active life, there is little chance that they would become inactive as they grow into adulthood.

In fact, several studies have pointed out that people who lead active lives as kids usually continue with the same active lifestyle as adults; such people are much less likely to suffer from obesity, or obesity-related diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes, coronary diseases, sleep apnea, etc., than those who lead a sedentary lifestyle right from childhood.

Apart from making him physically strong and immune to diseases, exercises also make your child mentally healthy. A kid who exercises regularly is more likely to get good grades in exams, have more self-confidence, and be in a better position to socialize, than one who doesn’t exercise at all or exercises rarely. Again, these are not all lame speculations but rather proven scientific facts.

Now, here are some exercise tips for Kids:

a) Kids, being impatient by nature, won’t stick to anything, especially hard work, which lasts for more than half-an-hour. This is why kids shouldn’t be made to exercise for more than half-an-hour per day, unless they want to. If they exercise for too long, they are likely to become either bored or frustrated with their exercise routine, and that is something that you won’t want to happen.

b) Kids are least likely to be motivated to exercise if they have to go to a gym and do boring workouts. A much better alternative is to buy them a treadmill. Keep the treadmill at home and let your kids have fun with it.

c) Kids become bored very quickly, so make sure that you don’t force them to engage in the same workout day after day. For example, if your kids do the treadmill workout on the first day, have them do some hula hooping on the next day. Then send them on a scavenger hunt on the third day, tell them to play a sport like cricket or baseball on the fourth day, and engage them in relay race, swimming, skiing, or dancing on the fifth day.

With a variety of exercise activites for Kids to be done throughout the week, you can be rest assured that your kids would never become bored of exercises. Don’t forget to engage your kids in domestic chores too, as this would also help them stay fit.

Tags: baseball, coronary diseases, cricket, diabetes, high blood pressure, ipod, obesity, outdoor sports, skiing, sleep apnea, Swimming

Not too long ago, America was looked upon as the country of ‘obese population’. Today, this is no longer true. As western influences, particularly western lifestyle habits, continue to make headway into the rest of the world very swiftly, obesity is slowly becoming a worldwide problem. As waistlines continue to become wider and buttocks larger in size, we wonder whether obesity is soon going to turn into an epidemic worldwide.

Fortunately, unlike several other harmful diseases, obesity is preventable as well as curable. In my opinion though, prevention is better than cure. An obese teenager not only suffers physically but also mentally. In fact, when it comes to teens, obesity begets obesity.

When obese teens are ridiculed at by their peers, they become depressed. Consequently, they try to find solace and comfort in junk foods and eat more and more of them. This in turn worsens their health. This is why it is a good to prevent weight gain by monitoring the health of your teenage kids right from an early stage.

In any case, it is never too late to begin, so let’s get started. First, let me tell you how obesity could harm a teen:

1. Obese teenagers often suffer from depression for the reasons I mentioned above. They also suffer from low-self esteem, inferiority complex and irritability.

2. Just like their adult counterparts, obese teens also suffer from physical diseases such as sleep apnea, coronary diseases, kidney problems, high blood pressure, diabetes, etc. Additionally, recent studies point that that obese teens are more likely to die prematurely than teens of normal body weight.

3. Obesity can affect your child’s education and career in a big way. Obese teens are more likely to have their education and job applications rejected. They are less likely to get a cushy job as most companies consider the health of a prospect in a big way before employing him.

4. Obese teens are more likely to have marital troubles than others. It is no secret than obese people usually snore in sleep. Believe it or not, snoring is one of the leading causes behind the growing number of broken marriages and divorces.

5. An obese teen is very likely to live in social denial. Being used to mistreatment of the society since his childhood, he would eventually accept it as part of life and continue to allow others to mistreat him. As time goes by, he would become more and more depressed and might even want to end his life when the torture becomes too much to bear.

I am not exaggerating anything; I have seen so many obese teenagers grow and I can say that not many of them are leading happy lives as adults. If you wish to offer your kid a healthy, happy and long life, there are a few things you should do.

Teens take their parents as role models and follow their lifestyle habits. Therefore, you, as a responsible parent, can influence your kid’s lifestyle habits by following healthy habits yourself. Kids usually get attracted to junk foods after watching their parents enjoying them. By getting rid of your junk food habits and switching to healthy and organic foods, you would not only ensure a healthy and happy life for yourself but also your child.

Unless prescribed by a qualified doctor or nutritionist, a teenager shouldn’t be given any kind of diet pill or weight loss supplement. Many of these pills and supplements have harmful side effects which may do more harm than good to your teen kid.

Encouraging him to indulge in performance activities is another good way to overcome teenage obesity. These days, teenagers indulge more in video games and the like instead of playing sports which make them sweat, such as tennis, volleyball, baseball, etc. However you can reverse it by actively participating in these sports. As your teenage kid sees that you are enjoying a certain sport, he would soon emulate you and play it.

Remember that as a parent you are fully capable of influencing your kid’s lifestyle. Use that power now to insure a healthy and positive life for your teenage kid. Remember that it is never too late to begin.

Tags: America, baseball, coronary diseases, depression, diabetes, high blood pressure, job applications, junk food habits, nutritionist, obesity, sleep apnea, Tennis, volleyball