Standard American Diet Attributed to Obesity and Poor Health

Standard American Diet

The Standard American Diet is one that focuses on food for pleasure and convenience, rather than being a diet that encourages good health. The daily caloric content of this diet is high, generally around 2500 calories for the average

Read More Standard American Diet Attributed to Obesity and Poor Health

Weight Loss and Pregnancy Do Not Mix

I find there are two key similarities between weight loss and pregnancy - a healthy diet and regular exercise are extremely important. Here is a picture of my little one at 11 weeks, 5 days.

Needless to say, I am thrilled beyond belief, but I am also scared about how pregnancy will make me gain weight. I have been thinking about this a lot and have come to the conclusion that weight loss and pregnancy do not mix. The bottom line is that I have to stop being so concerned about my weight as it appears as a number on a scale and just focus on eating a healthy diet and getting regular

Read More Weight Loss and Pregnancy Do Not Mix

Eating After Exercise

Eating after exercise is an important part of providing your body with the nutrients needed to repair muscle and restore glycogen.

Eating after exercise is meant to help your body to recover from exercise and be ready to perform optimally the next day. After all, using your muscles to a certain degree does indeed damage them and providing them with the nutrients they need to repair is a natural process that helps them

Read More Eating After Exercise

Healthy Weight Loss Diet May Prevent Cancer

Losing weight is one good way of reducing your risk of cancer and so is eating a healthy diet that contains fruits, vegetables and less red meat.

Following a healthy weight loss diet does not guarantee you will not at some time develop cancer, however you will be taking steps to minimize this chance. If anything, following a healthy and nutritionally-balanced weight loss diet with regular exercise will help you rid your body of extra weight and improve overall

Read More Healthy Weight Loss Diet May Prevent Cancer

Best Anti-Aging Diet Foods

Eating foods that are high in antioxidants, such as berries, will not only help you to lose weight, but will make you feel and look younger.

Most of us know that a healthy and balanced diet plays a big part in weight loss, but one of the other big benefits of a healthier diet is its anti-aging effects on your body. Try adding these best anti-aging diet foods to your diet – they will not only help you shed pounds, but they will make you feel and look

Read More Best Anti-Aging Diet Foods

Diet Changes that Lower Cholesterol

Adding more fish to your diet is one of the diet changes you can make to lower cholesterol levels.

It’s actually very interesting that many of the principles for losing weight are the same for lowering cholesterol levels. From what I can tell, many cases of high cholesterol can be improved just by making changes in your

Read More Diet Changes that Lower Cholesterol

Dieting Causes Hair Loss

Oh, now is that not just the icing on the cake that you can’t eat because you’re on a bloody diet – dieting can cause hair loss.

I was so distraught when I read that if you are losing significant weight you may lose hair. I ran to the bathroom right away. All squinty-eyed in the mirror, I went over my hairline over and over again, looking for any sign of weakness, thinness, recession. OK, none found…yet.

The American Hair Loss Council states on its website:

“Hair loss may also occur due to dieting. Franchised diet programs which are designed or administered under the direction of a physician with prescribed meals, dietary supplements and vitamin ingestion have become popular. Sometimes the client is told that vitamins are a necessary part of the program to prevent hair loss associated with dieting. From a dermatologists’s standpoint, however, the vitamins cannot prevent hair loss associated with rapid, significant weight loss. Furthermore, many of these supplements are high in vitamin A which can magnify the hair loss.”

I am assuming that losing hair while losing weight doesn’t happen to everyone (every model would be bald). Perhaps the key to keeping your locks is to eat a balanced diet. If you are worried about hair loss while dieting, maybe try to limit foods that are high in Vitamin A. These foods include cantaloupe, carrots, spinach, kale, apricots, papaya, mango, beef liver.

On the other side of the coin however, Vitamin A is really good for your body. Vitamin A plays an important role in vision, bone growth, reproduction, cell division, and cell differentiation (in which a cell becomes part of the brain, muscle, lungs, blood, or other specialized tissue.). Vitamin A also helps regulate the immune system, which helps prevent or fight off infections by making white blood cells that

Read More Dieting Causes Hair Loss

McDonald’s Diet helps Chris Colsen lose over 85 pounds

It has only been a few days after my proclamation that I will be abstaining from my favorite fast-food chain, McDonald’s, when a news story was released about Chris Colsen, who claims to have lost over 85 pounds by eating McDonald’s for every

Read More McDonald’s Diet helps Chris Colsen lose over 85 pounds