Yo-Yo Dieting? -- You Need High Quality Protein

Here is a great article from Isagenix Health.

You know how it is with regular dieting—your long-lost skinny jeans make a temporary reappearance only to be retired to the back of your closet six months later. This frustrating scenario of weight cycling is all too familiar for most people.

Although decreased motivation and will-power greatly contribute to “falling off the wagon”, weight regain is also influenced by biological changes in the body in response to decreased intake of energy or calories. The main biological reason for weight regain is a slowing metabolism. A reduction in calorie intake can make the body become very efficient and work to conserve energy. Unfortunately, this means you are burning fewer calories. Loss of lean tissue (such as muscle) rather than fat mass during weight loss is also to blame for a lower metabolic rate (more on this below).

In a world where yo-yo dieting has become the norm, how does one keep lost pounds off for good?
New research carried out by a group of scientists from the Netherlands reveals that a diet higher than normal in protein may be the key to sustaining permanent weight loss (1). Seventy-two overweight and obese men and women took part in the study, which compared the effects of two reduced-calorie diets after weight was previously lost, the only difference between the diets being that one counted as high protein intake (1.2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day) and the other as normal protein intake (0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day). After six months, the group eating more protein was found to retain greater muscle mass and a higher rate of metabolism, helping to better keep that lost weight from returning.

Previous studies investigating the effect of energy-restricted, high protein diets on weight maintenance have reached similar conclusions (2). The fat-fighting power of protein lies in its ability to keep energy expenditure elevated as well as curb hunger despite reduced calorie intake.

Rev Up Your Metabolism with Protein

Energy expenditure, or the number of calories burned by the body, is greatly influenced by basal metabolic rate (BMR), which is the amount of energy, or rate of metabolism, required to support basic body functions when your body is at rest.

The greatest contributor to BMR is fat-free mass. Fat-free mass is largely made up of muscle, which is very energy demanding. Even when no work is being performed (such as when you are sleeping), muscle requires energy just to exist. Muscle cells and their components are constantly using calories to rebuild what is broken down during normal protein turnover. A higher protein diet not only increases energy-demanding protein synthesis and turnover, but has also shown to better preserve muscle during caloric restriction (1, 2). Keeping muscle mass and turnover rates high results in a higher BMR, faster metabolism, and greater energy expenditure.

The thermic effect of food (TEF) is another factor that affects energy expenditure and refers to the amount of energy needed to break down, absorb, and digest food. The TEF differs between nutrients, with protein requiring more calories for digestion and metabolism than both fat and carbohydrate combined. Specifically, 0 to 3 percent of the calories obtained from fat are used for fat digestion, 5 to 10 percent of calories from carbohydrate are used for carbohydrate digestion, and 20 to30 percent of calories from protein are used for protein digestion (2). This means that protein requires a substantial amount of calories for the body to metabolize and use it compared to the other macronutrients. Simply by eating more protein in place of carbohydrate or fat, a person will burn more calories.

Feel Fuller, Longer with Protein

Successfully committing to a reduced calorie diet can be difficult when you are bombarded by cravings and hunger pangs. Ravenous hunger will only encourage overeating and weight regain. Research has shown higher protein diets to be superior to low or standard protein diets in causing a feeling of fullness, thereby leading to lower calorie intake (2). A reduced calorie diet will lead to greater use of existing fat stores, as a person quickly burns through the energy provided by the food they consume, as well as the carbohydrate stored in the body (glycogen). This increased reliance on fat for fuel has been suggested to reduce appetite.

Protein may also boost satiety by sending hormonal messages to the brain signaling fullness. When protein is eaten, sensors located in the gut are activated. Hormones such as glucagon are released, sending a message to the brain saying, “I’m full!” (3).

Isagenix: Making the higher protein lifestyle easy

Sustaining weight loss over the long term is challenging but not impossible. A higher protein diet offers numerous metabolic advantages that will not only help a person lose weight, but may also prevent regaining pounds, or worse, surpassing your starting weight.
Isagenix offers a variety of convenient and delicious higher protein meals and snacks that can aid weight maintenance efforts. Incorporating these Isagenix snacks and meal replacements in your reduced calorie diet will not only help you get into those skinny jeans, but stay in them, too.

For more information about Isagenix, contact me at newtraditions99@yahoo.com or go to my website The Healthy Helms.

References:
1) Soenen S, et al. Normal Protein Intake Is Required for Body Weight Loss and Weight Maintenance, and Elevated Protein Intake for Additional Preservation of Resting Energy Expenditure and Fat Free Mass. J Nutr. 2013 Feb 27. [Epub ahead of print]
2) Westerterp-Plantenga MS, et al. Dietary protein – its role in satiety, energetics, weight loss and health. Br J Nutr. 2012 Aug;108 Suppl 2:S105-12. doi: 10.1017/S0007114512002589.
3) Belza A, et al. Contribution of gastroenteropancreatic appetite hormones to protein-induced satiety. Am J Clin Nutr. 2013 Mar 6. [Epub ahead of print]

Exercising but Not Losing Fat? Maybe This is the Problem by Dr. Michael Colgan

Dr Michael Colgan -- 14 March 2013
from Isagenix Nutritional Sciences

Image from compareweightlossprogram.com

One of my fat loss clients, has been steadily losing about one pound of fat per week on our nutrition and exercise program, 32 lbs overall. Eager to make a Size 4 for the summer, she thought she wasn’t losing enough. So she joined another gym and hired a trainer.

First week he had her jogging on the treadmill, a hard puff-and-pant exercise for an overweight girl who never jogged. He told her she had to keep going for 30 minutes or she would not lose any fat. Then she had to do an aerobics class for 30 minutes. But she was allowed an oatmeal muffin and some nice organic fruit juices to keep her going. She did both bouts of exercise for five days for one week, then came back to me exhausted, pleading that she had gained weight, and that perhaps ours was the best way.

As often occurs, there were several things wrong with the gym exercise she was given. First, the treadmill jogging was anaerobic for her. That is, she was puffing and panting, indicating a shortage of oxygen. Bodyfat is calorie dense. At 9 calories per gram it needs plentiful oxygen to enable the body to burn it. All endurance athletes know this well. Their VO2 max is the maximum aerobic effort they can make and still burn fat. Any greater intensity and they will turn anaerobic, stop burning fat, quickly burn up all their sugar, and hit the dreaded “wall”.

Second thing wrong; the trainer didn’t give her a diet beyond telling her some healthy things to eat, and he encouraged her to take fruit juice during exercise to keep her going. She told me she also had an oatmeal muffin and juice at the gym beforehand, “or I just couldn’t face it”. We estimated that she had at least 400 calories before starting and another 200-400 during the exercise, about 600-800 extra calories per day, a total of 3,000 – 4,000 extra calories for the five workouts. Bottom line. Any calories you put in your stomach before or during exercise to lose fat, will be preferentially used first by the body. So she was setting herself up to grow plump as a goose.

How much fat did she burn? If you could burn fat perfectly, (remember, no calories in the stomach and no panting) aerobic treadmill work or aerobics classes can use up to 200 calories of fat in an hour. So, if everything was perfect, she could burn a total of 1000 calories (about 4 ounces of fat) over the 5 workouts. Because of the mistakes in her program, likely she burned half that, probably only 500 calories (only 2 ounces of fat loss) over the whole 5 workouts. Meanwhile she ate an extra 3,000 – 4,000 calories, at least half of which would be turned to fat (6-8 ounces of fat gain) just to be able to do the workouts.

For comparison, steady housework uses about 130 fat calories per hour. It’s a good level of effort for burning fat, and costs nothing. Because you are in proximity to food, however, you have to resist eating anything, or you switch to burning mainly sugar. Two hours housework a day will burn far more fat than most gym workouts. Let’s consider perfect fat burning again: 2 hours housekeeping per day x 6 days a week = 12 hours. Twelve hours at 130 calories = 1,560 calories (6 ounces of fat loss) per week. Beats her gym workouts – no contest.

Whenever I see nonsensical gym programs for fat loss I turn back to the rigorous meta-analysis of 25 years of controlled research on exercise and fat loss published in The International Journal of Obesity. These were all medium intense gym programs for fat loss, supervised and motivated by university trainers. They counted only people who attended regularly for 4-6 hours per week. Average weight loss over all the studies was 6.4 lbs in 15 weeks. That’s an average loss of only 7 ounces a week.(1)

The researchers also examined studies that added a reasonable nutrition program to the exercise. Results got much rosier. The same meta-analysis examined the best of the exercise-plus-diet studies over 25 years. In 15 weeks, on a good diet plus 4-6 hours per week in the gym, subjects lost an average of 24.2 lbs. That’s a loss of 1.6 lbs per week.(1)

So, if we compare the exercise alone groups (loss of 6.4 lbs) with the exercise-plus-diet groups (loss of 24.2 lbs), adding the nutrition resulted in a loss of 17.8 lbs of fat. Now you know, no matter what anyone tells you, fat loss is mostly dependent on what and when you eat.

My client is back on her diet track now. After torturing herself very expensively in the gym for 5 hours, our body composition machine showed a gain of 4 lbs, about 3 lbs of water because her body was swollen from the effort, and about 1 lbs of fat. By working out until (in her own words), “my legs turned to Jello”, she had wiped out a week of the fat loss she was getting from a simple diet of two shakes and one meal a day. As I have written many times before, the usual exercise program is excellent at removing fat – but only from your wallet.

If you want to learn more secrets of weight loss go to The Healthy Helms Website.

 1. Miller WC, Koceja DM Hamilton EJ. A meta-analysis of the past 25 years of weight loss research using diet, exercise or diet plus exercise intervention. Int J Obesity, 1997;21:941-947.

How to Reduce Your Body Fat Percentage

Image from LiveStrong.com

Wonder how to reduce your body fat percentage?  Here is a great presentation from the LiveStrong  blog.

Click HERE for presentation.

EFT (tapping) To Raise Your Metabolism - Try It, You'll Like It

I have recently started using EFT ("tapping") techniques and have had amazing results (more about that later in this post!!) I found this tapping sequence on "raising your metabolism" on YouTube. I decided to give it a shot and I could feel the difference immediately.  This was not just in my head.  My husband did this sequence with me and he had the same sensation after we completed the rounds!!

At first you don't really have to understand "why" this works ... just follow along with the tapper ... be sure to note how you feel before and after you do the "rounds."

Here is the video:

I know this is going to look and feel stupid (at least that is what I thought at first), but do it anyway ... here is my testimony after my first tapping experience.

Due to my diabetes I have had nerve damage to my toes.  It had become so severe that I couldn't sleep at night due to the "pins & needles" sensations.  I would have to take a scalding hot bath each night to overwhelm those nerves so I could sleep.  My husband talked me into trying EFT for the problem with my toes ... skeptically I agreed.  I did 3 rounds of tapping where the beginning pain was at a "10" and when I finished it was at a "1."  (This process took less than 5 minutes).  That was the first night I went to sleep without pain.  The next night the pain was back, but just in my big toe.  I did one more round of tapping and the pain went away and has not returned, even though it has been over three weeks.

I am not really sure why it worked ... but it did!!!  I hope you have this kind of success with your tapping experience.

Dr. John Gray's Bounce, Shake & Flex Technique

Excerpt from:  The Mars and Venus Diet and Exercise Solution, pg. 195-200, St. Martin’s Press, 2003

The Method:

1. Stand with your knees slightly bent, feet comfortably apart, bounce up and down easily without lifting your feels off the ground.

2.  As you bounce, let your arms hang in a relaxed and floppy manner by your side.  Shake your hands by your side as you bounce.

3.  While you gently bounce and shake, slowly nod your head up and down in a comfortable range of no more than two to four inches.

4.  As you nod back and look up, breath in through your nose to the count of five seconds, and then exhale to the count of five seconds as you lower your head.

5.  During the first minute, breathe in and out through your nose.  During the next minute, breathe in and out though your nose while making a noise originating at the base of your throat.  This sound comes from the air flowing through your throat and not your vocal cords.  You will sound like you are quietly snoring.  During the remaining one to three minutes, breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth.  When you exhale through your mouth, pucker your lips and blow out as if you were trying to put out a candle two feet in from of you.

6.  Stop bouncing and shaking.  While standing in a relaxed position, take a quiet minute simply to feel the tingling in your body.  This is best felt while standing straight with arms relaxed by your side and knees slightly bent.  Besides the important aspect of activating your lymphatic system, this vibration is the activation of billions of cells to make you healthy.

Tips from Dr. Gray:

·         Do this technique before and after doing a light to moderate exercise program.

·         Start your exercise session with John Gray’s energized water – One ounce of cold process, undiluted, pure, whole leaf Aloe Vera.

·         Don’t over exercise because it interferes with the brains ability to create balanced brain chemistry.

·         If you are overweight, avoid intense exercise until you are closer to your goal weight.

·         After doing the Bounce and Shake routine, do about 20 minutes of low-intensity exercise with stretching and flexing your body and spine.

Benefits of the Bounce, Shake and Flex Routine:

·         Burns fat, tones muscles, increases lean body mass due to increased cellular vibrations.

·         The rhythmic flexing of the spine increases vitality and stimulates healthy production of brain chemistry.

·         Increased oxygen to your body and stimulates metabolism to burn more fat throughout the day.

·         The gentle whole body movement stimulates the lymphatic system to purify and cleanse the body.

Read more about this great technique and Dr. Gray’s other important solutions for diet and exercise whether you are from Venus or from Mars in his book, “The Mars & Venus Diet & Exercise Solution.”