If you are on a diet and yet struggling to lose weight, it is pretty clear that you need to get rid of your poor food choices. Most importantly, you need to bid goodbye to your junk food buddies and embrace the organic and REAL foods in their place.

Nevertheless, no matter how much we monitor our food consumption habits, one or two bad foods almost always manage to sneak past our sharp eyes. One such food is the innocuous rice cake.

Yep, rice cake is one food which is usually eaten by wannabe weight loss strugglers, especially those who are dieting. They believe rice cakes are low on calories. Funny enough, they seem to be ignorant of the fact that this “low-calorie” food is preventing them from losing weight fast. Read the rest of this entry »

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: energy, food, food consumption habits, food habits, food intake, junk food buddies, less food, poor food choices

Perhaps you are already aware of the fact that you need to reduce your overall calorie intake in order to acquire the sexy and slim body you desire. However, if you thought that cutting down on your calorie intake means counting the calorie of every little item of food that you partake of, you couldn’t be further from the truth. There is a BIG difference between calorie reduction and calorie counting.

Many people don’t take the calorie counting method of dieting in a favorable light since it is tedious and time consuming. The problem gets worse if you are in the habit of eating out at restaurants too frequently. Most decent restaurants would offer you tasty foods but few would take the trouble to list the respective calorie contents of each food served.

Good news is that you can reduce your calorie intake without actually having to count each and every calorie. If you are wondering how that could be possible, that is exactly what I will tell you in this article. Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: drastic food reduction, food, food habits, food journal, less food, mathematician

It is said that America tops the obese adult population in the world, which is of course true. However, one seems to overlook the fact that America is also home to the highest population of obese children. If WHO (World Health Organization) is to be believed, our world contains more than twenty million obese kids, most of whom are in the age group of five-eight.

WHO also says that childhood obesity has reached the level of an epidemic in America, so much so that in the past three decades the number of obese American kids has more than tripled. Isn’t your child one of them too? It is time to take control of your kid’s life and help him lead the kind of comfortable and healthy life we would want him to lead. And this is only possible by helping him get rid of the extra pounds.

In fact, if America tops the number of obese kids, even third world countries are not far behind. You would think that an economically backward continent like Africa would have skinny kids because most of their parents are too poor to feed them properly, let alone overfeed them. However, very often our beliefs don’t coincide with reality. Just recently a special task force sent to Africa to gauge the health stats of the people living there encountered more obese kids than malnourished children.

You maybe thinking: why all this hullabaloo about childhood obesity? What is wrong if the belly of your kid if a tad fatter than his peers? The answer is: just like overweight adults, fat kids are also likely to suffer from harmful diseases such as high blood pressure, type 1 diabetes, hypertension, fatigue, heart diseases, and in some cases, even early death.

Believe it or not, the root cause of childhood obesity has little to do with genetics and more with poor lifestyle habits. Often people add two and two and jump to the conclusion that the kid is fat because of his parents. But that is not true at all. Kids emulate the unhealthy habits of their parents and naturally become fat like them. If you and your kids follow healthy lifestyle habits, both of you would be able to get rid of fat very quickly.

Truth to be told, the onus of the rising levels of childhood obesity lies on parents to a great extent. We parents prefer our kids to have junk foods since they can be easily procured from outside and help save the time we would have spent on cooking. A diet rich in fat and sugar could only make your child fatter and fatter. There is really nothing new to be said about it. Unless you are willing to spend a little time and energy in cooking healthy foods at home, don’t expect your kids to become any slimmer.

Apart from making them eat healthy foods such as whole grains, fruits and vegetables, it is also important that you try to reduce their intake of soda and fizzy drinks.

Controlling the food habits of your kids is only half the battle won, the other half being that of encouraging them to become more active. If you are concerned about your child’s future and wish to offer him a healthy life, you would need to take him away from Xbox and PSPs to outdoor sports such as cricket, basketball, tennis, etc. Encouraging them to indulge in cardiovascular activities such as swimming, dancing, rope jumping, etc., would also help them burn fat and lose weight.

Tags: Africa, America, basketball, cricket, diabetes, energy, fatigue, food habits, heart diseases, high blood pressure, hypertension, obesity, outdoor sports, Swimming, Tennis, World Health Organization

Dieting is not about following a fad diet for a few months, getting rid of a few pounds, and returning to your normal eating mode (which is nothing but gorging on more junk and fatty foods). Rather, dieting is about healthy eating, and if you want to gain the maximum mileage possible from your diet, you need to make it an essential part of your life just as you have done with those junk foods.

Of course there is a big difference between theory and practice. If you have been eating only junk foods all your life, it would be difficult if not impossible for you change your food habits for the better. However, I have a few tricks up in my sleeve which would help you with that.

Get rid of allergic foods: For the purpose of successful weight loss, you should not only get rid of junk foods but also those foods which make you allergic. Crabs are a good example; many people are allergic to crabs even though they have been touted by several experts as an ideal food for weight loss. Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: dehydration, fatigue, food, food allergies, food habits, nausea, waiter, wheat-based food

While it is true that it takes time and patience to lose weight, and that you have to work hard for it, that ‘hard work’ doesn’t mean starving yourself for days on end in the hope of losing a few pounds quick. You may or may not believe it, but it is possible to get rid of fat using healthy and natural means. In this article I will tell you about two such means.

Contrary to what you may be thinking, you won’t have to workout at the gym for hours like crazy; it has nothing to do with your workouts and everything with your food habits. Do you know that your food habits can make or break your health? By following a few simple food management tips, you would ensure that you get rid of annoying pounds easily and quickly. Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: food, food habits, food management tips, junk food buddies

If you want your kids to lose weight fast, the best option is to go the ‘dieting’ route. Of course I am not hinting at any of the popular fad diets; instead, I am talking about healthy eating. Healthy eating obviously means eating organic fruits and vegetables. However, making kids eat raw foods is a Herculean task.

Even if they are accustomed to eating organic foods as an infant, your kids’ food habits are bound to change as soon as they grow older and get in touch with the outside world. When kids see their peers sipping packaged fruit juices, would they eat the raw fruits anymore? The answer is “no”.

This is the reason why kids are consuming more soda and soft drinks than ever before, and their intake of organic foods is getting reduced in almost equal degree. When kids make junk foods their friends, their parents almost stop offering them the organic foods, thinking that buying loads of organic foods is just a waste of money if the kids don’t eat them. However, this is a wrong thinking on their part. You may or may not believe it, but through the use of perseverance and patience, it is possible to mould the food habits of your kids. Read on to find out how.

I ask you NOT to stop their junk food intake right away; if you stop them from having their favorite foods, they would secretly consume even more of them. The key is to make them eat organic foods such as fruits and vegetables in small amounts everyday, as often as possible. Remember that eating a small amount of healthy foods is better than eating none of them at all.

Even if they discard the healthy foods at first, be persistent and keep offering them the same foods everyday. Remember that most organic foods are rich in fiber and would help keep your kids full for a long time. Consequently, they’d be less inclined to eat junk foods.

I have often come across parents who complain that their kids don’t eat raw fruits, even though they themselves are enjoying a can full of soda. Remember that kids imitate adults, and if you want them to inculcate good habits, you need to get rid of your bad habits first and replace them with good habits. When your kids see how much you enjoy eating raw fruits and vegetables, they would start taking interest in those healthy foods as well. This would not only help them lose weight but also keep them healthy.

You can also try cooking some of your kids’ ‘favorite foods’ at home. Remember that homemade popcorn is any day better than the ones available from the local store.

Tags: food habits, junk food intake

While a lot has been written and said about the so called ‘calorie-shifting diet’, I am sure that the common man, including you, is interested in knowing only about how it would them lose weight and how fast, rather than its nuts and bolts.

However, I believe that in order to understand any new diet program, it is important to know about its functionalities and structure. With that view in mind, I will offer you a short introduction to the calorie shifting as well as how it can help you with weight loss.

If you have tried and failed with some of the most popular low-calorie diet programs out there, you would agree that while almost all of them helped you lose a few pounds, the ‘weight loss’ lasted only for a short while. Here is actually what happens with those fad diets: since weight loss occurs with a reduction in calorie intake, they restrict your daily calorie intake to an awfully low level. Now, as a matter of fact, your body adjusts your metabolic rate based on your average calorie consumption.

Thus, if your average calorie intake is high, your metabolic rate would also be high; similarly, your body would lower your metabolic rate with a reduction in your average calorie intake level. To what level your metabolic rate would be reduced/increased depends on by what amount you have reduced/increased your calorie intake, but keep in mind that the higher your metabolic rate is, the faster you would lose weight.

Now, suppose that normally you consume an average of about 2,500 calories per day. Since you are on a low-calorie diet now, you are consuming only 2,000 calories, which means that you have reduced your daily calorie intake by 500 calories. Thus, you would reach a deficit of about 3,500 calories by the end of 1 week. Since 3,500 calories equal to 1 pound of fat, you can also say that you would be losing a pound per week.

However, your joyride would last only for a short while. Soon your body would get accustomed to your new food habits and would lower your metabolic rate to fit your new calorie intake level. When that happens, you would stop burning fat like before. After a while, you would probably give up on dieting out of frustration and take to normal eating, thereby increasing your daily calorie intake level by 500 calories.
Since your body’s metabolic rate is set to burn only 2,000 calories, the extra 500 calories would get deposited as fat and in due time, you gain back all the pounds you lost, plus some more as bonus.

The calorie shifting diet works differently. It doesn’t actually reduce your average calorie intake level. With calorie shifting, the level of your calorie consumption varies on a daily-basis. For example, if on one day you have a high-calorie meal, the next day you must consume a low-calorie meal. It is also important that you eat at different times on different days. Rather than having your lunch at 12:30 pm everyday, you may have it at 12:00 PM on one day, 12:30 on another day, then 1.00 PM on yet another day, etc.

When you consume different amounts of calories on different days, your body becomes confused as to whether to keep your metabolic rate at a high level or low-level. Consequently, it would always keep your metabolic rate at a high level just to be on the safe side.

This way, you keep burning fat fast everyday notwithstanding your calorie consumption level. A good diet plan which follows the calorie shifting method of dieting is fat loss 4 idiots. Lots of people have found success with it so I recommend that you too try it.

Tags: food habits

Obesity has always been there, especially among people belonging to the upper middle class and of course, the rich people too. More often than not, obesity is the result of overeating and unhealthy eating. It is no wonder that obesity usually thrives in families which are financially well off; these families can afford to eat expensive junk foods and junk foods are what primarily make a person overweight.

In recent times however, it is noticed that obesity is not just limited to adults. As more and more children fall into the trap of obesity, one wonders whether it is taking the form of an epidemic.

How do children become obese? Well, usually they gain weight as a result of following poor eating habits. But who teaches those poor eating habits to them? As we know, a child’s mind is like a blank, white paper and whatever you write on it would become his future. In other words, a child’s mind is very influential; he cannot differentiate between good and bad and consequently, takes whatever is taught to him as gospel truth.

Parents have a big role to play in the health of their children. No matter how much they deny it, they are primarily responsible for teenage obesity. Have you ever noticed that obese kids usually have obese parents? It is not just a coincidence. It might be true that the child has inherited obesity from his parents, but it is equally true that the kid became obese because of following the poor eating habits of his parents.

The kid’s parents have probably become obese because of poor, unhealthy eating habits and leading a sedentary lifestyle; so it is likely they would pass on their bad habits to their kids since they don’t know any better.

So rather than trying to make your teenage kids lose weight when it is too late, it is better to teach healthy eating habits to them right from an early stage so that they never gain weight in the first place. Here are some ways you can do it:

1. First of all, you need to change your poor eating habits. By following an unhealthy lifestyle, you are not only harming yourself but also your kids. Since kids take their parents as role models, they would follow your eating habits and become obese just like you.

2. Second, it is time to put your parental love on the backburner and become stricter with regards to your kid’s food habits. Children naturally love to eat sweets, candies, cakes, cookies, etc. No matter how much you feed them with healthy foods, they would still pester you for these items.

However, these foods are high on calorie and would make your kids fat. Many parents like to condone the poor eating habits of their kids out of parental love, but in my opinion, such parental love is misdirected for it makes kids obese. It is time you start admonishing your kids for eating junk foods. Remember, your kids’ health is at stake.

3. Thirdly, you should stock your home with organic fruits and vegetables and cook them regularly for yourself and your kids. Far too many parents, either out of laziness or lack of time, don’t cook meals at home; instead, they ask their kids to eat junk foods from outside. If you really believe that your family’s health is your first priority, you would need to cook meals regularly.

Unlike junk and fatty foods, organic foods are rich in vitamins, protein, fats, zinc, calcium, etc., as well as low on calorie. More importantly, they are rich in fiber, which would help keep your kids full for a long time. Remember that when kids are not hungry, they are less likely to gorge on junk foods.

4. Fourth, it is time that you not only stop buying junk foods but also throw away your existing stock of junk foods from your kitchen and refrigerator. Kids are more likely to eat chips and cookies if they are easily available at home.

5. Lastly, encourage your kids to become more active in life, and of course, you should do the same too. Instead of watching video games, PSP or TV, they should go outside and play sports such as basketball, tennis, cricket, etc. These sports would help them burn fat and stay fit. Additionally, if your kids are interested in swimming, dancing, etc., they would be encouraged to indulge in them as well.

Obesity is bad enough, but keep in mind that if you are proactive about it, it is never too late to begin. Also keep in mind that preventing weight gain is much better than struggling to lose weight.

Tags: basketball, cricket, food habits, obesity, play sports, Swimming, Tennis

Teenage obesity is harder to control than childhood obesity. This is because children are more receptive to advice and suggestions than teens. Also, you cannot chide a teenager in the same way as a pre-teen. As we grow into adolescence, we grow physically as well as mentally. We become much more sensitive and stubborn than before. We think of ourselves as more intelligent than our parents. As you can see, handling a teenage kid is a real pain in the butt.

Now, why teenagers gain weight? Teenagers gain weight because:

1) They hardly know the difference between healthy and unhealthy foods since they were taught about it during their childhood. If they were eating junk and fatty foods as little kids, the same unhealthy eating habit follows them into their adolescence and they start eating them in larger quantities.

Parents often ask their kids to buy junk foods from outside instead of taking the time or trouble to cook healthy meals at home. If your child never tastes healthy and organic foods, he would naturally hate them in the latter years of his life.

Plus, if your child lives in school hostel, things could get only worse. These days, schools prefer to buy junk foods from outside since it is the cheaper option to cooking meals in-house. Also, the exercise classes they have are pretty basic. They would only work for a certain period, after which your kid would be left on his own.

As you can see, there is just no way your teen kid can have a choice to eat healthy foods.

2) They are much more tempted to try out restaurant foods than their pre-teen counterparts. You see, almost all teenagers today have their pockets full of cash. There are usually two sources of this cash: either their parents offer them pocket money or they make money by dong part time jobs. So, when they have money to spend, they usually spend it on junk foods because they are tasty and yummy.

A lot of their food habits are also influenced by their peers at school and college. I still remember how every time my friend had soft drinks at the college canteen, I would inevitably buy one for myself, even though I had no intention of buying it when I ventured out of home.

3) They hardly exercise. Again, their parents have got a big role to play here. If a kid is not taught the benefits of exercises, or if parents allow them to watch video games for hours instead of encouraging them to participate in outdoor sports, the situation could only get worse as they grow into adolescence.

There are indeed very few schools which make outdoors sports and other such activities a mandatory part of their curriculum. As such, our present school system is also to be blamed for teenage obesity.

It would have been good if the present American lifestyle and education system could be completely revolutionized; however, I don’t see it happening within the next few years. Hence, as a parent, it is high time that you start taking control of your kid’s health. As to what you should do to keep your teenage kid healthy, I think that what I said above is more than enough.

Tags: food habits, obesity, outdoor sports, pain

Teenage obesity is fast becoming a ‘growing’ menace (pun intended). One reason behind it is that it is very difficult to handle and control the lifestyle habits of teenagers. Teenagers always try to live life on their own terms since they believe that they are mature enough to take all important decisions of their lives. Still, there are a number of ways you can make sure that your teenage kid is always fit and slim.

Have you ever taught the difference of healthy and unhealthy foods to your kids? Have you ever taught your kids how to identity those two types of foods? Have you ever offered him home cooked meals? Have you ever prevented him from eating junk foods from outside, or watching television for hours?

If your answer to all these questions is “no”, I regret to say that you have not really been a good parent. But you are not the only one of a kind. Most parents make their kids eat junk foods because they are not only a cheaper alternative to home cooked meals but also save them time. Most parents would prefer watching television or gossiping rather than cooking meals at home.

If a kid is not made to taste healthy foods right from the beginning, if he is never taught to identify good and bad foods, it is only natural that he would continue with the unhealthy habits of his childhood right into adolescence and beyond. If one has never eaten anything except junk foods as a child, it is not unnatural that he would develop a certain kind of distaste towards organic foods as he grows older. These unhealthy eating habits are one of the primary reasons behind teenage obesity.

Changing is a teenager’s eating habit is a lot more harder than changing the food habits of a little kid. The only way you can change your kid’s eating habit is by changing your food choices first. When you become proactive at weight loss and fitness, your teenage kids would follow suit. What you should be eating is something I would discuss at the end of this article.

Another reason behind obesity is the influence of television. Television not only makes a teenager idle but also influences his mind with those attractive ads on junk and fatty foods. As a parent, it is your responsibility to make sure that your kids don’t watch television for a long time period.
You should encourage them to indulge in outdoor sports or at least take a walk outside.

As a parent, you should neither allow your kids to buy junk foods nor bring them yourself at home. When junk foods are available just right at the corner, neither you nor your kids would be able to resist the temptation. For goodness’ sake, it is best to throw junk foods out of your home.

Your kitchen and refrigerator should be stocked only with organic foods; that way, you can make sure the whole family eats them more often than junk foods. Eating organic foods is one of the best ways to keep your calorie consumption low. This, coupled with a little physical activity, would do good both to you and your adolescent kids.

As for a diet program, you really don’t need one, but if you want to follow a good diet, take a look at the “Strip That Fat” program. This is a new kind of diet devoid of the stupid food restrictions of the fad diets. When you start following it, you won’t feel like you are dieting.

With Strip That Fat program, you are not forced to eat only one or other food; you can make your own meal plans based on your food choices. Strip That Fat comes with a diet generator tool as well that would build customized meal plans for you on the go.

Remember that as parents, we have the choice to teach healthy or unhealthy lifestyle habits to our kids. However, you need to teach your kids, especially teenagers, through action instead of mere words of wisdom. When you start losing weight as a result of following a healthy lifestyle, your kids would do the same. This is really a great way to fight teenage obesity.

Tags: diet generator tool, food, food choices, food habits, obesity, outdoor sports, stupid food restrictions