I hear this all the time. Clients will tell me "I work out 3 or 4 days per week, but the scales stay the same "! They are frustrated and not sure why they aren't dropping fat. Knowing what I put them through, I know they are working hard which means the problem lies in their diet.

Diet - it's such a nasty word. It implies starving, giving up things and generally suffering to drop weight. It is no wonder people don't stick with them long. They all promise results, and some do work - for a little while, but inevitably people fall off the diet and wind up re-gaining the weight and many times putting more on. Then they move to the next diet and go through it all again.

My clients are smart enough to not get on the fad diet routine but they still need to follow good nutritional guidelines. Your goal is behavior modification, changing the way you eat permanently, not for 6 weeks. You have to change your eating habits, eat when hungry, you don't have to clean your plate, don't eat when you are angry or upset, and pay attention to what you eat.

• Get rid of the crap foods in your house, if they are there you will eat them.
• Keep a food journal. 
• Determine your estimated base rate, then take 20% of that to determine your daily caloric intake
• Gradually, over 5 to 6 days decrease your intake to that of the prior step
• Weigh yourself once a month.
• Drink enough water (not too much, not too little - enough)
• Rotate your workouts between high intensity interval training (HIIT), heavy resistance days and body-weight days (Flow Fit, yoga, stretching) and a very light joint mobility day (and/or Tai Chi, meditation)
• Eat  4 to 6 times per day
• Watch the fat fall off

To get started, the first thing you need to do is get rid of ALL the crap food in your house! The crackers, the chips, the cookies & candy. The junk foods, the bread, ice cream,

Are you on a thyroid supplement? Have you been tested? Do you need to be tested?

Here are a few questions to assess a possible thyroid problem. Score a 0 for never to 3 for all the time. If you score above 12 you should have your doc run some tests. However the standard tests are not enough, the don't look at all of the hormones and actions of the thyroid so many conditions go unnoticed or are treated incorrectly.

Are you:

• Tired or sluggish 0-3
• Feel cold - hands, feet or all over 0-3
• Require an excessive amount of sleep to function properly 0-3
• Increase in weight even with low calorie diet 0-3
• Gain weight easily 0-3
• Difficult, infrequent bowel movements 0-3
• Depression, lack of motivation 0-3
• Morning headaches that wear off as day progresses 0-3
• Outer third of eyebrow thins 0-3
• Dryness of skin and/or scalp 0-3
• Mental sluggishness 0-3
• Thinning of hair on scalp, face or genitals, or excessive falling hair 0-3

Total your score. Up to 12 is ok, 12 to 24 is medium you might want to get tested, 24 and up - you need to see a doctor as soon as you can!

Low functioning thyroid or HYPOthyroidism is a very common issue but can go undetected or misdiagnosed. Just because you've had the standard tests and you fall in the "normal" range doesn't mean you don't have a thyroid problem. There may be some underlying issue that is affecting the thyroid but doesn't show up on the standard screen.

If you've been tested and are still having problems go back to your doc and have him/her run the following tests:

TSH, TT4, fT4, TT3, fT3,T3U and antibodies.

If your doc won't run these tests, find another doctor! Seriously it's your health and your doctor doesn't know it all! Also there are labs you can find that will do the work, you can find them online.

Your diet will have a profound affect on not only thyroid function but all other systems in your body. Modifying your diet too may alleviate some thyroid problems. In particular raw cabbage, kale, Brussels sprouts, broccoli or cauliflower have a compound that can decrease the functioning of the thyroid, but by cooking them, even just lightly steaming them,  will deactivate the compounds.

There are also foods that can help improve thyroid function such as seaweed, kelp powder, avocado, coconut, and radish. By maintaining a balanced diet you can naturally bring your thyroid function back to "normal". If modifying your diet doesn't seem to help then you need to see your doctor and have those tests I mentioned above run.

Another thing to look at is your magnesium and other trace minerals. If you aren't getting enough of these in your diet, and most people don't it will affect  the thyroid's ability to produce T3 and T4 and other factors properly. Taking a high quality mineral supplement should help.

You should still get checked by your doctor as there are some serious diseases, including cancer that can interfere with the thyroid. Some of these include Hasimoto's Thyroiditis which is an auto-immume disease, meaning you body is attacking itself, in this case the thyroid gland. This causes lowered functioning and therefore lowered production of the thyroid hormones and antibodies. In this case taking calcium and magnesium in a 3:1 ratio (Ca:Mg) may be beneficial.

Eating a wide variety of good foods, preferably organic is always the best bet since your food isalways the preferred way of getting the vitamins and minerals your body needs to function correctly.

(note these are suggestions for things you can try, please see your doctor if you think you might have any symptoms of thyroidism,)

The questionnaire is part of an assesment form from Dr. Bryan Walsh's Fat is Not Your Fault   ebook

Other links:

 http://www.krispin.com/thyroid.html

http://thyroid.about.com/cs/hypothyroidism/a/hashivshypo_2.htm

This week has been an interesting one in the health and fitness world. As everyone knows, we are in the middle of watching the government try to decide what is best for us for health insurance coverage. Endless debates about what should be covered, who will pay, whether there will be private plans and public plans, whether the government will get to dictate health care to us all. It's mind boggling.

Then there was the Time Magazine article which looked at a study that examined the impact of the amount of time spent per week exercising. The study used post-menopausal women and was looking at the relationship between expected weight loss and actual weight loss based on how many minutes per week they trained. They did not control for diet and the women were asked to not change their dietary habits.

Their conclusion was that exercising about 194mins per week (a little over 3 hours) gave worse than expected results and that those who exercised about 136 mins per week met expectations. All groups showed weight loss. The finding lead the researchers to decide that the body compensates for the extra work-load by making you hungry, eating more. 

Of course that's true. I'm ravenous after a good hard strength session. You need to eat more to fuel muscle growth and strength. However just because you are hungrier or had a hard workout doesn't mean you can scarf down a pizza afterward, yet many people do just that. "Oh I just exercised hard for an hour, I think I'll go to Starbucks and have a Venti Frappachino and a big muffin". If that is you you just totally wasted an hour of exercise. That drink and muffin have way more calories and worse, sugar and no protein that you could ever burn in an hour workout. So make you post workout meal something nutritious, like a chicken breast with a salad a fruit and maybe a small baked potato with some butter (no margarine).

The author of the Time Magazine article basically tries to make it sound as though exercise is a waste of time, because it doesn't really burn much fat. That is true and I tell my clients that all the time. Changing your eating habits is a much better way to lose fat. But eating right plus exercise is the best way to lose fat and keep it off.

In addition, the body needs exercise. It helps maintain muscles and bones, promotes joint health and heart health too. So don't be fooled into thinking that you are wasting time and energy by training, you aren't. You will  feel much better, have more energy and sleep better if you get in 3 hours per week of moderately intense weight training with kettlebells and some more time doing things like hiking, gardening or playing a sport.

And yesterday, MSNBC.com had an article on weightlifting and breast cancer survivors . Doctors used to tell women to not lift weights, pick up their kids or do anything else strenuous because they thought it would cause painful inflammation in the arms of those who have had radiation to the armpit, or lymph nodes removed to check for cancer. New studies have revealed that those women who strength train actually have fewer problems after chemo and radiation than those who did nothing.

This is along the same track as doctors who told people with back injuries to stay in bed to let the back heal, or people who had had heart attacks to never do anything strenuous. Weightlifting is GOOD for you, if you are strong you can handle illness much better, recover better and stay healthy longer.

Regardless of your current health you should always:

• Seek out a competent trainer and learn proper mechanics
• Start gradually and build slowly - getting strong and remaining injury free takes time
• If you have had breast cancer experience the swelling mentioned about get fitted for a compression garmet
• Lift! Whether it's barbell work, kettlebell work, sandbags or whatever, go hard, lift heavy and get healthy!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31719136/ns/health-more_health_news/

It looks like the big food companies are at it again, lobbying to have foods labeled as organic even though may have synthetic substances in them or were grown using pesticides or for meat and poultry fed non-organic feed.

Thanks to big food lobbyists and certain employees of the FDA things that you & I would consider to be bad, synthetic, pesticides etc are getting exemptions. This allows the big companies like Kraft to have a bigger piece of the organics market. It also means they can charge less for their "organic" foods than what the small producers, who raise, grow and sell real organic foods, So once again the little guy is getting squeezed out of the market by the big companies who only care about the bottom line.

What can we do? Contact your representative and raise hell. Try to buy locally grown fruits, vegetables and meat wherever possible and read the labels!

Here are some excerpts:

".....The original law's mandate for annual pesticide testing was also never implemented — the agency left that optional.

From the beginning, farmers and consumer advocates were concerned about safeguarding the organic label. In 2003, Arthur Harvey, who grows organic blueberries in Maine, successfully sued the USDA, arguing that the fledgling National Organic Program had violated federal law by allowing synthetic additives.

"The big boys like Kraft realized they could really cash in by filling the shelves with products with the organics seal," Harvey said. "But they were sort of inhibited by the original law that said no synthetic ingredients."

His victory was short-lived. The Organic Trade Association, which represents corporations such as Kraft, Dole and Dean Foods, lobbied for and received language in a 2006 appropriations bill allowing certain synthetic food substances in the preparation, processing and packaging of organic foods, creating conditions for a flood of processed organic foods."

"..... broadening the law has helped meet demand by multiplying the number of organic products and greatly expanded the amount of agricultural land that is being managed organically.

".We don't want to eliminate anyone who wants to be a part of the organic community," Harding said. "The growth we've seen has helped the entire organic food chain.""

".....Robinson determined that farmers could feed organic livestock non-organic fish meal, which can contain mercury and PCBs. The law requires that animals that produce organic meat be raised entirely on organic feed.

After sharp protests from Leahy, Consumers Union and other groups, Ann Veneman, then agriculture secretary, rescinded these and two other directives issued by Robinson."

 

 

Bottom Line - Big Food and Big Pharma and most government officials don't give a sh*t about what you want, only what they can do to line their pockets.