"For a man is slave to that which has mastered him!"
Imagine. You wake up one morning after getting the best night's sleep you've had in too long of a time. You feel well rested and your face shows it. In fact, you are pretty sure that you have never looked better (at least not as far back as you can rummage to mind at these wee hours). You got a raise the day before, and a promotion to go along with it. As far as you are concerned, if the Grinche stole Christmas this year, you probably wouldn't even blink twice. Your bills are paid - a month in advance, your entire family adores you, and your friends are fighting over your free days, (o.k., I may be pushing it slightly!). You walk into the bathroom to brush your teeth, when your eyes catch a glimpse of the bathroom scale. Everything is going so great; you can not help but wonder if your luck will continue straight down into the depth of those tiny numbers. What the heck! You pounce onto the scale, this in itself being a major step. Usually your one-toe, followed by the next-toe, followed by the whole foot process takes a good ten minutes! You look down. Wait! Screech! Another screech! This cannot, this mustn't! After all, you hardly ate a thing yesterday. You step off the scale and run over to the toilet, empty your bladder, take off all clothing, even your rings and bracelet. You try it again. You hold your breath this time, thinking that the lack of oxygen will tip the scale in your favor, hopefully before you tip yourself onto the floor! But, it is the same! You step off of the scale, look in the mirror and suddenly your heart sinks, straight into the depths of your stomach. Where did those five extra pounds come from? And as you stand gazing at your naked body in the mirror, you wonder why your stomach looks flatter even though the scale says that you are heavier. That just can't be right! There has got to be something wrong with that stupid scale. After showering you begin trying on clothes for the promotional ceremony being held in your honor. You go through about half of the clothes in your closet, feeling certain that nothing fits right, before setting on something that won't draw too much attention to your body. Gone is the feeling that "you've never looked better;" it has been replaced by a feeling of "life can not get any worse than this!' You consider the option of a sick call, but you somehow muster the strength together and head for the car. You skip breakfast, telling yourself you'll starve your body into submission. By the time you get to work, your head hurts (the effects of a painstaking hunger), and you r mood has been set for the forthcoming day. You are bummed out, so to speak, and low and behold, the first person you see is the skinny little receptionist who smiles ever so sweetly to you from behind the desk, and asks, "Did you do something different to your hair?" You smile smugly, and tell her, "No," but you are certain of what she really meant to ask: "Did you gain weight?" Can you relate to this situation? Although it may not be identical in detail, the feelings described in the opening paragraphs are most likely ones that you have experienced. Why? Because they are commonly felt emotions and feelings! It is important to note that there are millions of people addicted to their scales. They can not let a single day pass without finding out what the little flat box has to tell them. You know you are addicted if you are unable to let a day pass without weighing yourself. Or, when visiting a doctor's office, you ask if you may remove your shoes before weighing in. Chances are, after weighing yourself, this little infamous device determines for you not only what you will or will not be eating for the continuation of the day, but also, how you will feel about yourself. Let me ask you a question. After weighing yourself, has the scale altered your mood, diminished your confidence, or affected your self-esteem? If it has, then GET RID OF IT! Would you stay around a person who made you feel this way about yourself? Hopefully, not for a long period of time. If you can not bring yourself to get rid of the scale, maybe you need to re-think its power over you. "For a man (woman) is slave to that which has mastered him." The scale is similar to a hungry piranha in that it is never satisfied. If it shows a "loss," then it is never a big enough loss. "Just one more pound, or ten more pounds!" On the same hand, if it shows a "gain," then it eats away at your self-esteem and confidence. My friend, how will you ever learn to be happy and content with who you are, if someone or something is always shoving you back down, never allowing you the satisfaction of being, well, satisfied! I've got good news! You do not have to be a slave to your scale any longer! If you feel the need to lose weight, or to get in shape, then great, good for you! Those are positive factors in one's life. And in addition, you have come to the right place, because we want to help you reach those goals. But you must first learn one thing. You must use your clothing, not scale, to gauge your losses. It is up to you to make the decision not to permit the scale to sit crowned as the reigning master over your life.
GET RID OF IT! AND GET FREE!
- You, Too, Shall Overcome
This article was published in FDA Consumer magazine several years ago. It is no longer being maintained and may contain information that is out of date. You may find more current information on this topic in more recent issues of FDA Consumer or elsewhere on the FDA Website, by checking the site index or home page, or by searching the site.
Not Only Sugar Is Sweet
by Alexandra Greeley
Plain table sugar and its numerous taste-alikes may be one of our most popular food commodities. People come by their love for sweetness naturally. According to the experts, humans are born generally preferring sweet over bitter or sour tastes.
Sweeteners make many foods taste better. And natural sugars have a host of other valuable culinary?and practical?uses, including adding bulk to baked goods, helping foods to brown, and facilitating fermentation. But despite their immense popularity, sweeteners, particularly table sugar, have generated their share of sour publicity because of health concerns.
What Is Sugar?
Traditionally for most consumers the generic term ?sugar? means simply the white sugar crystals, or table sugar, that are stirred into or sprinkled on foods.
These familiar crystals are technically known as sucrose. Sucrose is a disaccharide--that is, it's composed of two simple sugar units, in this case, glucose and fructose. White sugar comes from sugar cane or sugar beets that have undergone a rigorous refining process. White sugar crystals can be used as is, compressed into cubes, or further pulverized to superfine, then to confectioner?s, or powdered, sugar. Brown sugar results from mixing white sugar crystals with molasses. Other forms of sucrose are beet sugar, maple sugar, turbinado sugar, and raw sugar.
Sucrose, however, is only one of a subgroup of sugars (see accompanying chart), and all sugars are carbohydrates. Monosaccharides, or single sugar units, include glucose, fructose and galactose. Monosaccharides also are the digestive end product of polysaccharides, the complex carbohydrates (starches) in fruits, grains and vegetables. Other disaccharides besides sucrose include lactose (glucose and galactose), also called milk sugar, and maltose (two units of glucose), also called malt sugar.
For labeling use and for making comparative claims, the Food and Drug Administration defines sugars as all mono-, di-, tri-, and tetrasaccharides and their derivatives, such as sugar alcohol, says Youngme Park, Ph.D., a nutritionist with FDA's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. He says this includes all carbohydrate sweeteners with the same functional and physiological effect that can be used interchangeably in the food supply.
After complex carbohydrates are broken down to simple sugars (most sugars and carbohydrates are eventually broken down to glucose), the sugars are absorbed into the bloodstream and go to the liver. There they may be stored as glycogen or used immediately as glucose for energy by the body or brain.
"The body uses glucose as its simplest form of energy," says Judith Wurtman, Ph.D., research scientist in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "So for people who need calories, that is, those who are recovering from an operation or who are shipwrecked, sugar can keep them alive."
Thomas Jukes, Ph.D., professor of biophysics at the University of California at Berkeley, tells of his experiments feeding laboratory rats protein, vitamins, minerals, and sugar as the sole source of carbohydrates. The rats thrived, he says. "Fish is not a brain food," concludes Jukes. "Glucose is."
Sucrose occurs naturally in most green plants, says Sarah Setton, vice president for public affairs, The Sugar Association, Washington, D.C. It is produced by photosynthesis, which is the use of the sun's energy in the formation of food by plants. People would have to stop eating fruits and vegetables and any products incorporating them to cut sugar out of their diet. People seem to think that there is a difference between sugar in an apple and sugar in the sugar bowl," she adds. "But the way the body uses sugar is all the same. The body can?t tell where the sugar is from."
A Taste for Sweets
Americans have become conspicuous consumers of sugar and sweet-tasting foods and beverages. We have developed a relentless sweet tooth, "a severe addiction to sweetness," says Joan Gussow, Ed.D., professor of nutrition and education at Columbia Teachers College, Columbia University in New York City.
According to U.S. Department of Agriculture data on the amount of caloric sweeteners used in food, there has been an increase of more than 16 percent on a per person basis over the past two decades, and more than half of the increase has occurred in the past five years. Caloric sweeteners include sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, pure honey, and edible syrups.
Paul Lachance, chairman of the department of food science at Rutgers University in New Jersey states it another way. He estimates that, based on a 2,000-calorie-a-day diet, the average American consumes about 300 calories from sugars added to food. That comes to nearly 14 teaspoons of table sugar a day.
Gussow has her own theory about why sugar is so prominent in the American diet. It's for taste, she says. "I grow my own vegetables and fruit. And when I pick, cook and eat my parsnips, for example, they are as sweet as sugar," she says. "But food is shipped all over the place, and when food gets too old, much of the sugar turns to starch. The natural sweetness is gone, and people sugar food to give it flavor."
As yet, no scientist has established any limits for sugar consumption. In the typical American diet today (composed of about 45 percent carbohydrates, 20 percent protein, and 30 to 35 percent fat) all added and naturally occurring sugars account for about 21 percent of the total daily caloric intake. A 1986 FDA report estimated that sugars added to food accounted for 11 percent of calories consumed.
Yet if people eat increasingly larger quantities of caloric (nutritive)
sweeteners in general, these could compete with and crowd out other nutrients, warns Jane Hurley, associate nutritionist at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, Washington, D.C. People may consume many of their calories each day from a sugary soft drink or candy bar. "Those foods have few important nutrients we need," she says. "People are better off having an apple as a snack than a candy bar."
The Safety Issue
Over the last several decades, sugar has taken on the villain's role in the American diet. General sugar-bashing has led to "sugarphobia" as Jukes calls it and the unfounded fear that eating refined sugar causes many health problems, including heart disease, diabetes, anxiety, fatigue, depression, hyperactivity, and even criminal behavior.
But, in fact, added sugar at current levels is not detrimental to health. According to the landmark 1986 FDA Report of Sugars Task Force, sugar, when consumed normal or moderate quantities, cannot be linked to any disease, nor does it create a dependency.
Walter Glinsmann, M.D., FDA's associate director for clinical nutrition and senior author of the task force report, explains that members of the task force estimated the intake figures and trends of both added and naturally occurring sugars, based on USDA data. They also reviewed the scientific literature dealing with possible harmful effects of sugar consumption on numerous conditions, including tooth decay, glucose tolerance, diabetes mellitus, lipidemias (high blood fat), cardiovascular diseases, obesity, gallstones, and cancer. "Based on that work," says Glinsmann, "we decided that sugars are safe as they are now used in the food supply." If there is a significant change in the way Americans consume sugars, he adds, then scientists must reevaluate their role.
As Glinsmann observes, FDA does not say that eating unlimited amounts of sugars is safe. "There are not good or bad foods, only good or bad diets," he says. "If half your diet is pure sugar, that is not healthy. ... In a normal, varied diet, there are no adverse effects of sugar itself."
The task force did find that sugar can cause dental cavities, he says, but adds that so can other fermentable carbohydrates, such as dried fruit and honey, under the right conditions.
Despite the report, some consumers persist in linking sugar consumption with assorted ills, such as hyperactivity and aggressive behavior in children. This is often reported by parents who say that their children are uncontrollable after eating candy and other sugary sweets.
Glinsmann points out that sugar has not been shown to be a factor in hyperactivity. Studies of children and adolescents at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md., and elsewhere have looked at groups of individuals served sugar or a placebo (an inactive substance given as a control when testing another substance). Glinsmann points out that no researcher has found that sugar has had any discernible negative effect on children's behavior. To the contrary, sugar often has a soothing effect.
It also calms adults, says Wurtman, who has studied the relationship between carbohydrate consumption and mood. When people report having a sugar high or jitters, Wurtman asks them what was happening before they took a mouthful of something sweet. "When people feel the need to eat," she says, "They usually are jittery. But 20 minutes after eating, they are no longer jittery." In fact, the opposite happens: After eating sugar, people become calm or even sleepy, she says, an effect caused by sugar raising the level of a calming rain chemical called serotonin. Sugar in its pure form is the best
nonprescription antidepressant, she says.
Sugar by Other Names
Numerous nutritive and nonnutritive substitutes for sucrose vie for its place as a sweetener. All nutritive substitutes - such as honey, concentrated fruit juices, dextrose (also known as glucose), maple and corn syrups, fructose (levulose or fruit sugar), sugar alcohols, and high-fructose corn syrup contain and contribute calories.
Perhaps the most commonly used nutritive sweetener is high-fructose corn syrup, a sweet product manufactured from cornstarch and containing a high level of fructose, explains Kyd Brenner, director of public affairs for the Corn Refiners Association in Washington, D.C. High-fructose corn syrup is very close to the composition and calorie content of cane sugar, he says, and the syrup can be used as a direct and inexpensive substitute for cane sugar when liquid sweeteners are called for. It is used extensively in soft drinks, condiments, jams, jellies, and wine and is not available for home use.
Of the sugar alcohols, sorbitol (60 percent as sweet as sucrose with about the same number of calories per gram) is used in such products as hard and soft candies and chewing gums. Xylitol, another sugar alcohol, has limited FDA approval for special dietary uses. A third sugar alcohol, mannitol, has been removed from the GRAS (generally recognized as safe) list, and is regulated as an 'interim' food additive. This means that its current use is considered safe, but some questions have been raised that must be resolved to fully determine what limitations, if any, should be imposed. Mannitol is still being used in some products.
Both mannitol and sorbitol, when taken in large amounts, can cause diarrhea. Products whose reasonably foreseeable consumption may result in a daily ingestion of 50 grams of sorbitol or 20 grams mannitol must bear the labeling statement: "Excess consumption may have a laxative effect."
The sugar polymer polydextrose, because of its bulking properties, is used to replace a number of the technical effects of sucrose in various baked goods, salad dressings, frozen desserts, and candies. Because of its structure, polydextrose is not readily digested, so it is a low-calorie sucrose substitute. But it does not provide sweetness, so it is likely to be used with a nonnutritive sweetener. FDA is presently considering petitions for its use in other products such as in fruit and peanut butter spreads, sweet sauces, toppings, and syrups, and as a formulation aid in film coatings in vitamin and mineral supplement tablets.
Nonnutritive Sweeteners
Nonnutritive, or high-intensity, sweeteners satisfy America's sweet tooth without adding calories. Presently, manufacturers are using three such sweeteners to replace sugar in a variety of food and nonfood items such as mouthwashes and pill coatings.
One of these is saccharin, 300 times sweeter than table sugar and with zero calories. It is sold in liquid, tablets, packets, and in bulk. Saccharin has had a stormy past, with studies in the United States and Canada implicating it in the development of certain cancers. In the late 1970s, FDA contracted with the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) to study cancer-causing agents and toxic substances in foods, including saccharin. NAS reports showed that saccharin is a potential cancer-causing agent in humans. A congressional moratorium protecting saccharin's continued use has been renewed periodically
by Congress. The required label warning on saccharin states, "Use of this product may be hazardous to your health. This product contains saccharin which has been determined to cause cancer in laboratory animals."
Aspartame - about 200 times sweeter than table sugar and with the same number of calories per teaspoonful has been shown to be safe. However, some people have reported that they are sensitive to it, although such a sensitivity has not been confirmed by scientific studies. Certain individuals suffering from a rare genetic disease called phenylketonuria cannot tolerate the amino acid phenylalanine, one of the building blocks of aspartame as well as naturally occurring proteins. Therefore, products containing aspartame must bear on the label a statement that they contain phenylalanine. Aspartame is available in packets and is used in numerous foods, including cereals, beverage bases, and ready-to-drink iced tea, but because it is not generally heat stable, it is not used for cooking. Food technologists have been working on ways to overcome this instability.
Acesulfame K (K is the chemical symbol for potassium)-130 times sweeter than table sugar?was approved by FDA in July 1988 as a sugar substitute in packets or tablets and as an ingredient in such products as chewing gum, dry drink mixes, and gelatins. The body does not metabolize acesulfame K so itcontributes no calories. Soluble in water, it is stable at normal temperatures and does not break down during cooking.
FDA banned the use of the sweetener cyclamate in 1970 because of concerns over its safety, but cyclamate is again under consideration for use in specific products, such as tabletop sweeteners and nonalcoholic beverages.
Under Development
Scientists continue to develop new sugar substitutes. For example, among the nutritive sweeteners, petitions for the use of the sugar alcohols isomalt (in gelatins, hard and soft candies, and baked goods), maltitol (in candy and cough drops), lactitol (in candy, chewing gum, baked goods, and frozen dairy desserts), and hydrogenated starch hydrolisates (in candy, chewing gum, and confections) are under current FDA review, says Art Lipman, Ph.D., a supervisory consumer safety officer with FDA's direct additives branch.
FDA has also received numerous inquiries about the regulatory status of a naturally occurring high-intensity sweetener known as stevia (or stevioside), says Lipman. Extracted from a plant grown in South America, stevia is 300 times sweeter than table sugar and is used for sweetening in Japan and other countries. Lipman says no petition has been filed for its use in the United States.
Two nonnutritive sweeteners being studied, says George Pauli, Ph.D., chief of the novel ingredients and policy development branch. These are alitame (Pfizer), which is chemically similar to aspartame, and sucralose (McNeil Specialty Products Co.), a chlorinated sucrose that has been made indigestible. FDA is also considering petitions for additional uses of the sweetener acesulfame K in beverages and baked goods and of aspartame for bulk use and in breakfast cereals, malt beverages, candies, and cooked foods.
Eating foods sweetened with nonnutritive sweeteners rather than sugar is an individual choice, says Laura Tarantino, an FDA consumer safety officer. Our law says only that we [FDA] need to assess the safety of a new food additive and its technical effect," she says. "Nonnutritive sweeteners are safe to use. But we don't tell people to replace sugar with artificial sweeteners."
In the future, consumers wanting to know which sweeteners are present in their foods need only read the label. According to an FDA labeling proposal, all sweeteners will be listed together in the ingredient list, under the collective term 'sweetener,' when more than one sweetener is used in a product (following the collective term, each sweetener would be listed in parentheses in descending order of predominance by weight of the sweetener in the food). According to an FDA proposal published late in 1991, it would be mandatory for all complex carbohydrates and simple sugars to be listed on the nutrition label, says Lynn Larsen, Ph.D., director of the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition's Executive Operations Staff.
People may have an inherent preference for sweetness, and that may have helped our ancestors survive, since bitter-tasting plants are generally not fit to eat. But beyond survival, people seem to have discovered that sweet flavors really help make eating pleasurable.
Alexandra Greeley is a freelance writer in Reston, Va.
Type of Sweetener Regulatory Status
Common Sugars
Monosaccharides
Glucose (also called dextrose) GRAS
Fructose (also called levulose) GRAS
fruit sugar
Galactose none; cannot be directly added
to food
Sugar Alcohols
sorbitol GRAS
xylitol limited FDA approval for
special uses,
mannitol removed from GRAS; regulated as
"interim food additive"
Nonnutritive and High-Intensity Sweeteners
Aspartame approved
Acesulfame K approved
Cyclamate banned
Saccharin remains on market through
congressional moratorium
This was previously posted way, way back in Sept. 2000 and disappeared when they changed over the boards. Worth reading!
Facts on Water for Health
The life-saving element we usually take for granted has been found to possess many seemingly magical qualities.
Incredible as it may seem, water is quite possibly the single most important catalyst in losing weight and keeping it off. Although most of us take it for granted, water may be the only true "magic potion" for permanent weight loss.
Throw away your diuretics, toss out the laxatives, flush the appetite suppressants. Water does these jobs better, yet it's safe, natural, and healthy. Water works - if you learn how to use it. Here are some startling - yet scientific - facts about the benefits of water to weight loss:
Water can help your body metabolise fat.
Water can eliminate fluid retention.
Water can help you lose all the weight you want and keep it off for good.
The liquid of life
Life without water would last about seven days. Every form of life on earth depends on water. Adequate water is essential for the human body to perform at its peak. Like the earth, the human body is 70 per cent water. A loss of 10 per cent body water would be critical and any more than that might prove fatal.
Where does the body get the water it needs?
About half comes from beverages we drink - water, tea, coffee, soft drinks, milk, beer, wine and so on. A small portion is metabolic water - water we manufacture as we metabolise food. The rest comes from food. Meat, for instance, is 70 per cent water. Fruits can be up to 90 per cent water. Even bread is 20 per cent water.
How does the body use water?
All reactions in the body take place in water. It's the catalyst for enzymatic reactions. Blood plasma, which is 90 per cent water, can be called the body's main waterway. Food is transported to cells. Waste is carried away, passed through the kidneys and out in the urine. About half our fluid intake is expelled this way. Water makes breathing possible. It moistens the harsh, dry air. We exhale about 20 per cent of our water intake. The digestive system uses several litres of water daily to process food. Digestive enzymes are made almost entirely of water. The body uses water in its cooling system. When it gets to be 33 degrees Celsius outside, or when we exercise briskly, the body heats up. The heat must be dissipated, so in the process, the body pumps moisture through the muscles to the skin where it then evaporates and consequently, cools down the system.
Where does the body store water?
Water input must equal water output and water distribution throughout the body must be balanced. The body continually strives to maintain this balance. Half our water is stored in the cells (intracellular). The rest is stored outside the cells (extracellular), which includes fluid between cells and plasma inside blood vessels.
If body mass is 70 per cent water, what's the other 30 per cent?
Muscle, organ tissue, and fat. Only three per cent of this fat is essential. It is found in and around most vital organs such as the kidneys and gastrointestinal tract. The rest is excess weight. The bad news for women is - they store more fat than men do because of different hormone levels.
Water and weight loss
Water suppresses the appetite naturally and helps the body metabolise stored fat. Studies show that a decrease in water intake will cause fat deposits to increase, while an increase in water intake can actually reduce fat deposits. Here's why: The kidneys can't function properly without enough water. When they don't work to capacity, some of their load is dumped on to the liver. One of the liver's primary functions is to metabolise stored fat into useable energy for the body. But, if the liver has to do some of the kidney's work, it can't operate at full throttle. As a result, it metabolises less fat, more fat remains stored in the body and weight loss stops.
Water is the best treatment for fluid retention
Sounds crazy? It's the most sensible solution to water retention you'll ever find! When an otherwise healthy person has a problem with water retention, he usually does two things: he drinks less water and/or starts taking diuretics. These are the worst possible things to do. First, when the body gets less water, it perceives this as a threat to survival. To conserve what it has, it begins to hold on to every drop. Water is stored in extracellular spaces (outside the cells). This shows up as swollen feet, legs, hands, and so on. Diuretics are a temporary solution at best. They only mask the real problem. The diuretic forces out stored water along with some essential nutrients. Again, the body perceives a threat and will replace the lost water at the first opportunity. The best way to overcome the problem of water retention is to give your body what it needs - plenty of water. Only then will stored water be released. If you have a constant problem with water retention, excess salt may be to blame. Your body will tolerate sodium only in a certain concentration. The more salt you eat, the more water your system retains to dilute it. Salt intake makes you thirsty. This releases an antidiuretic hormone that causes water to be retained. The water is packed away in extracellular spaces that expand. This means swollen hands, feet, legs and so on. For your kidneys to expel the excess sodium, they need more water. If you don't drink enough, the water will automatically be siphoned from internal sources. It's the same old story - the body's way of coping with too little water is to store up what it already has.
How do you get rid of excess sodium?
Drink more water. It's that simple. Water is forced through the kidneys taking the excess sodium with it. In addition, the body has some natural checks and balances for dealing with sodium. Eat no salt, and the body secretes a hormone called aldosterone to hang on to the sodium it needs. Eat a little salt, and the aldosterone level drops. Eat too much salt, and extracellular spaces begin to expand with stored water. When this happens, another hormone is released to prompt the loss of both the excess sodium and the water. All these checks and balances work in concert to help maintain perfect water balance. But none of them will work without an ample supply of water.
How can one avoid eating too much sodium?
You don't have to go on a rigid salt-free diet. Instead, just be aware of the products that are high in salt; processed wheat and bran flakes, most canned foods, bacon, ham, salted fish, processed cheeses, most snack foods, and foods with additives such as monosodium glutamate. Read labels. Most manufacturers are required to list the amounts of sodium their products contain. Foods naturally low in salt are fruits, fruits juices, fresh vegetables, and anything you cook from scratch, because you can add little or none.
An overweight person needs more water than a thin person
The larger a person is, the larger his metabolic load. He needs more fuel to keep going. Since we know that water is the key to fat metabolism, it follows that the overweight person needs more water. This is why so many overweight people retain fluids. Their bodies get too little water, so their systems hang on to what they get. The only way to overcome this problem is to give the body what it needs to function - plenty of water. Only in this way will stored water be released.
Water helps to maintain proper muscle tone
It does this by giving muscles their natural ability to contract and by preventing dehydration. It also helps to prevent the sagging skin that usually follows weight loss - shrinking cells are buoyed by water, which plumps the skin and leaves it clear, healthy and resilient.
Water helps rid the body of waste
When the body gets too little water, it siphons water from internal sources. The colon is one primary source. Result? Constipation. The faeces become hard and dry. Constipation is too often treated with laxatives. Aside from leading to a dependency, this solution never addresses the root of the problem. The whole miserable cycle can be avoided. When a person drinks the correct amount of water, normal bowel function usually returns.
So far, we've discovered some remarkable truths about water and weight loss:
The body will not function properly without enough water and can't metabolise stored fat efficiently.
Retained water shows up as excess weight.
To get rid of excess water you must drink more water.
Drinking water is essential to weight loss.
How much water is enough? On the average, a person should drink eight 240ml glasses every day. That's about 2 litres. However, the overweight person needs one additional glass for every 11kg of excess weight. The amount you drink also should be increased if you exercise briskly or if the weather is hot and dry.
Water should preferably be cold - it's absorbed into the system more quickly than warm water. And some evidence suggests that drinking cold water can actually help burn kilojoules.
To utilise water most efficiently during weight loss, follow this schedule:
Morning: 1 litre consumed over a 30 minute period.
Noon: 1 litre consumed over a 30 minute period.
Evening: 1 litre consumed between five and six o'clock.
When the body gets the water it needs to function optimally, its fluids are perfectly balanced. When this happens, you have reached the "breakthrough point". What does this mean?
Endocrine-gland function improves.
Fluid retention is alleviated as stored water is lost.
More fat is used as fuel because the liver is free to metabolise stored fat.
Natural thirst returns.
There is a loss of hunger almost overnight.
If you stop drinking enough water, your body fluids will be thrown out of balance again, and you may experience fluid retention, unexplained weight gain and loss of thirst. To remedy the situation you'll have to go back and force another "breakthrough".
Is water the only liquid you can drink?
Coffee, tea, and diet soft drinks should be taken only in moderation. Have no more than two cups of coffee or tea a day. Limit soft drinks to two per day. These beverages have an adverse effect on weight loss. Eliminate them completely if you can, since caffeinated drinks (coffee, tea, diet colas) stimulate the appetite. However, if you now drink large amounts of caffeinated beverages, it might be wise to cut down slowly. Cold-turkey caffeine withdrawal can trigger severe headaches.
Are decaffeinated drinks all right?
In moderation. Most still contain a degree of caffeine. And decaffeinated soft drinks may also contain excessive amounts of sodium, so read the labels.
Diet drinks are not for dieters!
Most so-called diet drinks are loaded with sodium, which we know can cause fluid retention. The high levels of phosphates in diet drinks interfere with the body's absorption of calcium, which can be critical to the dieter.
What if tap water has an unpleasant taste? Buy bottled water. If that's not convenient, try chilling the tap water thoroughly, with a few thin slices of lemon added to the jug. One lemon slice to a glass of plain water gives it a nice fresh flavour.
This article was originally posted by DEBELLI on the Weekly Support Board on 5 October, 2001.
Glycemic Load, Diet, and Health
Until recently, there was little question that the best approach to healthy eating was to follow official guidelines — such as the USDA Food Guide Pyramid — which emphasize carbohydrates as a way to discourage fat consumption. But this view of carbohydrates and fats is too simplistic. It might even contribute to the very conditions that we hope to avoid by eating a good diet in the first place, such as obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.
For one, not all fats are bad. In fact, certain fats are heart-healthy. In addition, not all carbohydrates act the same. Some are quickly broken down in the intestine, causing the blood sugar level to rise rapidly. Such carbohydrates have a high glycemic index (GI).
Because rapidly rising blood sugar levels have various adverse effects, we advise eating plenty of fruits and non-starchy vegetables and few high-GI carbohydrates, such as refined grains and starches. We also favor a food pyramid where fruits and nonstarchy vegetables, not refined grains, occupy the bottom tier. The purpose of this advice is to reduce overall glycemic load (GL). GL is a relatively new way to assess the impact of carbohydrate consumption that takes GI into account but gives a fuller picture than does GI alone.
GL Reflects Actual Carbohydrate Burden
A GI value tells you only how rapidly a particular carbohydrate turns into sugar. It doesn’t tell you how much of that carbohydrate is in a serving of a particular food. You would need to know both things to understand a food’s effect on blood sugar. That is where GL comes in. The carbohydrate in a carrot, for example, has a high GI. But there isn’t a lot of it, so a carrot’s glycemic load is relatively low. Calculating GL allows researchers to better relate carbohydrate intake to its health effects.
Researchers at Harvard, including Harvard Women’s Health Watch advisory board member JoAnn E. Manson, M.D., have closely examined the relationships among carbohydrates and heart disease and diabetes in women. The Nurses’ Health Study, for example, found that women with the highest dietary GL have double the risk for heart disease when compared to those with the lowest GL.
Why It’s Not As Simple as GI
The glycemic index originated as a research tool. It assigns a numerical value to a food indicating how much and how rapidly 50 grams of its carbohydrate content will raise blood-sugar levels, compared to 50 grams of a reference food (glucose or white bread). The reference food is given an arbitrary value of 100, and the GI value of a particular food is expressed as a percentage of that value. Many things contribute to the GI of a given food, including its fat and fiber content and how much it’s been processed.
But carbohydrates differ in quantity, as well as in GI ranking, from one kind of food to another. The shortcoming of GI values is evident when you compare foods of different carbohydrate densities. For example, the GI of a baked potato is 121% (assuming white bread is the standard reference food). This has earned the potato, which is largely carbohydrate, a place on the “avoid” list in publications and on Web sites promoting the GI approach to food choices.
The GI of carrots, as noted earlier, is also high: 131%. But this unfavorable GI rating is based on the blood-sugar effect of eating 50 grams of carbohydrate from carrots — the amount contained in a pound and a half of them — which few people would consume in one sitting. A serving of carrots, therefore, just doesn’t have much carbohydrate, so its impact on blood sugar is much less than that of a serving of potato.
Avoiding carrots because of their GI ranking would be a big mistake, particularly given all the vitamins and minerals they contain and the low GL of each serving (see “How to Calculate GL,” below). The GI of potatoes, on the other hand, is not a misleading measure because potatoes are carbohydrate-dense. Their GL is also fairly high.
How to Calculate GL
GL is the amount of carbohydrate in a serving of food multiplied by that food’s GI. Thus, a 12 cup serving of carrots (which has 8 grams of carbohydrate) has a glycemic load of about 10 (8 * 131%, or 1.31 = 10.48).
As reported recently in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (March 2001), Nurses’ Health Study researchers — aided by blood samples and a food-frequency questionnaire — used GL measures to assess the impact of carbohydrate consumption on 280 postmenopausal women. They found that high-GL diets (and, by extension, high GI foods and greater total carbohydrate intake), correlated with lower HDL concentrations and higher triglyceride levels, a marker for heart disease. The strongest association was in overweight women, i.e., those whose body mass index (BMI) was over 25. Increased risk started, on average, at a daily GL of 161.
Calculating overall dietary GL is difficult outside a research setting. But knowing a food’s GL can help you make comparisons that can improve the quality of your carbohydrate choices. In general, it’s a good idea to replace processed and refined-grain carbohydrates, such as those found in many snacks and desserts, with fruits and non-starchy vegetables. These foods, as well as whole grains and beans, are rich in nutrients and contain fiber, which slows digestion and moderates blood sugar levels. Also, try substituting, for example, whole grain bread for white bread; wild rice for white rice; and beans or lentils for potatoes.
Dietary GL may not become an everyday calculation, but we wouldn’t be surprised to see labels that exclaim “Low Glycemic Load!” — like “Low Cholesterol!” — beckoning from grocery shelves in the near future.
Glycemic Index
The glycemic index (GI) number is a relative not an absolute number. In effect, it is the blood sugar response to ingestion of a given food compared with the blood sugar response to another standardized food. Researchers have used both glucose and bread as this standardized, or reference, food.
Sometimes test results have yielded a range of values, which we show with a plus or minus sign, ±. So, for example, the GI value for a croissant using bread as the reference number is 96± 6 means test results ranged from 90 to 102.
One way to think about the glycemic index number is to picture it as fraction. The blood sugar blood response to a food is the numerator. The blood sugar response of the reference food is the denominator. Therefore, index number for same food will vary depending on whether you put glucose or bread in the denominator.
Because glucose quickly becomes blood sugar, the GI numbers based on glucose result in a lower number than do the GI numbers that use bread. Again, if you envision the GI number for a food as a fraction, or ratio, the glucose-based index has a larger denominator: you’re dividing by a bigger number. But the numerator doesn’t change, so the GI number gets smaller.
A word of warning about applying the GI to your diet. It is a carbohydrate-to-carbohydrate comparison. It doesn’t say anything about how much carbohydrate a food contains. So, for example, while the carbohydrates contained in carrots may have a relative high GI index, carrots contain relatively few carbohydrates compared with corn chips. Therefore, the net effect of carrots on blood sugar levels is considerably less than corn chips, even though their GI index numbers are similar.
*****************
You can view the entire article at the link below:
Diets With A Low Glycemic Index: From Theory To Practice
by Janette Brand-Miller
The glycemic index (GI) of foods has important implications for the prevention and treatment of the major causes of morbidity and mortality in western countries, including non-insulin-dependent diabetes, coronary heart disease, and obesity. The recent United Nations FAO/WHO Consultation on Carbohydrates recommended that "the glycemic index of foods be used in conjunction with information about food composition, to guide food choices." Specifically, it recommended that "at least 55% of energy be derived from carbohydrate and that the bulk of carbohydrate foods be those rich in dietary fiber (non-starch polysaccharide and with a low glycemic index." Although these recommendations are designed for the general population, there is persuasive evidence that they are even more applicable to people with diabetes.
What exactly is the glycemic index (GI), and why has it become so important? In this article, we show how foods are classified according to their GI, summarize the health benefits and criticisms of the GI, and consider the practical aspects of putting GI into nutrition therapy for diabetes.
WHAT IS THE GI?
The GI is an established, physiologically based method used to classify foods according to their blood glucose-raising potential. It compares the level of glycemia after equal carbohydrate portions of foods and ranks them relative to a standard (usually glucose or white bread). Over the past two decades, the GI concept has been subjected to extensive research confirming its reproducibility, application to mixed meals, and clinical usefulness in the treatment of diabetes and hyperlipidemia. More than 600 individual foods have been tested for their GI. Concerns about using high-carbohydrate diets in diabetes (because of adverse effects on triglycerides [TG] and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol [HDL] levels) are overcome by recommending low-GI instead of high-GI carbohydrate foods.
The GI concept has been widely adopted in diabetes management in Australia,[6] New Zealand, Canada, the United Kingdom, and France. Dietitians at the International Diabetes Institute in Melbourne, Australia, headed by Professor Paul Zimmet, were among the first to take GI from theory to practice. The GI remains controversial in the United States, where it is perceived as too complex for health professionals as well as for ordinary people or simply not worth the trouble. Inexplicably, food exchanges and carbohydrate counting are regarded as less complicated. The average American diet has a high GI, and the adoption of a low-GI diet will entail some adjustments, but our experience suggests that this is not difficult and may be facilitated by simple "take home" messages.
Contrary to popular belief, low-GI foods are not the same as foods based on high complex carbohydrate and fiber, nor are high GI foods those based on simple sugars. The foods that produce the highest glycemic responses include many of the starchy foods consumed by people in industrialized countries, including bread, breakfast cereals, and potatoes, whether high or low in fiber. This is because the starch is fully gelatinized and can be rapidly digested and absorbed. The foods with the lowest GI values include pasta, relatively unprocessed cereal foods, baked beans, dairy products, and many types of fruit and vegetables. Sugary foods often cause lower levels of glycemia per gram of carbohydrate than the common starchy staples of western diets. This is because up to half of the weight of carbohydrate is fructose, a sugar that has little effect on glycemia. In fact, the overall GI of the diet has been shown to have an inverse correlation with total sugars (refined plus naturally occurring) expressed as a proportion of total carbohydrate.
The Glycemic Index (GI) of Foods That Make the Largest Contribution to Carbohydrate Intake(*)
High GI (>70) GI
Breads
White bread 70
Wholemeal bread 72
French bread 95
(*) Data from references 4 and 54. Reference food is as follows: glucose = 100.
THE HEALTH BENEFITS OF LOW-GI FOOD CHOICES
Many well-designed experimental and epidemiologic studies highlight the health benefits of slowly digested and absorbed carbohydrate. Short-term studies in lean healthy people, obese individuals, and people with diabetes show consistently higher day-long insulin levels with diets based on high-GI foods in comparison with low GI diets of similar nutrient composition. Because fasting hyperinsulinemia has been found to be an independent risk factor for coronary heart disease, differences in postprandial insulinemia caused by food can no longer be ignored. Even a small physiologic increase in insulinemia for as little as 3 to 5 days induces severe insulin resistance in healthy young subjects.
In people with diabetes, there are particularly important reasons to promote low-GI foods in dietary choices. One reason is that they show greater insulin resistance than nondiabetic individuals, and consumption of high-GI foods results in far more exaggerated glycemic and insulin responses, which may lead to worsening insulin resistance and eventually the need for drug or insulin therapy. Furthermore, higher day-long insulin levels promote carbohydrate oxidation at the expense of fatty acid oxidation, thereby encouraging synthesis of very-low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (VLDL) in the liver and fat storage in adipose tissue. A combination of high-GI carbohydrate and high fat (of any type) in a meal therefore may be synergistic in promoting weight gain.
Long-term studies in animal models show that high-GI starch increases fasting insulin levels and promotes insulin resistance, in comparison with identical diets based on low-GI starch. In rats, high-GI diets promote faster weight gain, higher body fat levels, higher adipocyte volume, and hypertriglyceridemia--that is, all of the components of the insulin resistance or "metabolic" syndrome.
In subjects with type 1 and type 2 diabetes, low-GI diets, in comparison with high-GI diets of similar nutrient composition, lead to improvements in glucose and lipid metabolism. In eight well-designed long-term studies using a cross-over design, the low-GI diet reduced glycosylated proteins by an average of almost 14% over periods ranging from 2 to 12 weeks. Although these results have been criticized as only modest, they are higher in magnitude than improvements induced by oral hypoglycemic drugs. The improvement in glycosylated proteins with low-GI diets contrasts with the lack of change seen with high-MUFA diets in diabetes.
Recent epidemiologic studies indicate that the GI of the diet may be the most important dietary factor in preventing type 2 diabetes. Two large-scale prospective studies, one in female nurses and one in male health professionals, showed that diets with a high glycemic load (GI x carbohydrate content) increase the risk of developing type 2 diabetes after controlling for known risk factors such as age and body mass index. The only other dietary factor that increased risk was lack of cereal fiber. Importantly, the total carbohydrate and refined sugar content, and the amount and type of fat, were not found to be independent risk factors in these studies. A similar picture has emerged with acute coronary heart disease in the Nurses' study. The underlying mechanism postulated by these authors is the demand for insulin generated by high-GI foods. Because hyperinsulinemia is linked with all of the facets of the "metabolic syndrome" (insulin resistance, hyperlipidemia, hypertension, and visceral obesity), the GI of foods eventually may be linked with all so-called diseases of affluence.
In healthy people as well as those with type 2 diabetes, high-carbohydrate diets ([is greater than] 50% energy) have been shown to worsen aspects of the blood lipid profile, including the TG, VLDL, HDL, and lipoprotein a. Individuals with insulin resistance are more susceptible to these adverse effects. However, this effect of high-carbohydrate diets is almost certainly linked to the rate of absorption of the carbohydrate, because strategies that slow down digestion and absorption (high soluble fiber, low GI, [Alpha]-glucosidase therapy) improve these parameters. The concerns with usual (ie, high-GI) high-carbohydrate diets have led some experts to recommend high intake of monounsaturated and polyunsaturated oils in place of carbohydrate, but high-fat, energy-dense diets of any sort are prone to overconsumption. High-carbohydrate foods (even energy-dense versions) can only ever have half the energy density of high-fat foods.
The GI has implications for weight control in people with diabetes because slowly digested carbohydrate is associated with higher satiety. The prolonged presence of food in the gut may stimulate chemical and pressure receptors that signal satiety. Low-insulinemic diets have been shown to increase the rate of weight loss on energy-restricted diets through the mechanism of lower insulin levels. Thus, low-GI diets may promote weight control by both enhancing satiety and reducing insulinemia.
CRITICISMS OF THE GI
The GI approach has been dismissed by some in the mistaken belief that it does not work in "mixed meal" situations or when there is added fat or protein. In fact, at least a dozen studies show that the GI of single foods predicts the response to mixed meals. In our own study, the correlation coefficient (r) for the observed glycemic response versus the predicted response was 0.88. One of the studies showing lack of effect in mixed meals can be faulted on methodologic grounds.
Unfortunately, some foods have been rated as "good" or "bad" simply on the basis of their GI. It is certainly not appropriate to substitute boiled potatoes (high GI) with potato crisps (lower GI). Large amounts of fat in a food reduce glycemia by slowing down gastric emptying, but glucose tolerance to the subsequent meal is impaired. Thus, high-fat foods may be seen in a "falsely favorable" light if the GI is the only criterion for selection. The total amount of carbohydrate, the amount and type of fat, and the fiber, micronutrient, and salt contents of a food are also important considerations. The proper use of the GI is to compare foods within categories of similar nutrient profile.
The use of 50-g carbohydrate portion sizes in GI testing has been criticized because it does not reflect a normal serving size. However, it has been shown that the glucose response to 1000-kJ portions (a reasonable serving size) of a range of foods is highly correlated with the published G144. Other criticisms of GI, including "too complex," "too many variables," a "burden" on people with diabetes, "restriction of food variety," and "too many foods with unknown GI values," stem from inexperience with this relatively new concept. In Australia, where the approach has now been used for over a decade, dietitians have produced simplified educational material that is useful for the layperson and professional alike.
Another concern about the GI is that the insulin response to a food may be more relevant than the glycemic response. Our laboratory is one of the few that has measured both glucose and insulin levels concurrently in all GI testing. In general, insulin responses in healthy people have followed the rank order of the glycemic responses. High-protein and high-fat foods, however, stimulate greater insulin responses than predicted by the level of glycemia. More exaggerated insulin responses are seen when people with underlying insulin resistance consume high-GI foods. In our study of insulin responses to 1000-kJ portions of common foods, ordinary soft breads (white or wholemeal) showed scores that were among the highest of any of the foods tested. An insulin index of foods may eventually be needed to supplement tables of GI.
THE GI IN PRACTICE
Considering the evidence that has accumulated supporting the benefits of low-GI foods, it is difficult to understand how nutrition advice can be given today without incorporating it. The GI is the fundamental principle underlying the relationship between carbohydrate intake and the consequent glycemic response, yet some dietary recommendations for people with diabetes still ignore it. The American Diabetes Association guidelines state that first priority should be given to the total amount of carbohydrate consumed rather than its source, and detailed carbohydrate counters exist to equip people with diabetes in doing this. This advice ignores twofold to threefold differences in glycemia for the same quantity of carbohydrate in common foods: potato versus pasta, yogurt versus ice cream, cornflakes versus All Bran. Although the amount of carbohydrate consumed may be a consideration in refining glycemic control, the question of "what to eat" is one that naturally precedes the question of "how much to eat." Guidance on appropriate food choices should, at least initially, be a primary goal of nutrition education for people with diabetes.
The information contained in the GI is the basis on which recommendations about carbohydrate intake should be made. First, the GI dispels the myth that foods containing refined sugars have a greater glycemic impact than starchy staples such as bread. This has forced us to reassess the range of carbohydrate choices recommended to the person with diabetes, in effect expanding, rather than limiting, food choices. Foods such as sweetened breakfast cereals, low-fat flavored dairy foods, and Sweetened baked goods are some examples of nutritious foods now appearing on diet sheets that were once forbidden to people with diabetes. From our own experience, allowing sugar as a carbohydrate improves dietary compliance by making fairly bland cereal grains, such as oatmeal, more palatable.
A sequela of moving the focus from sugar is that greater consideration can be given to other, more significant nutritional aspects of foods. The fiber content of breakfast cereals and fat content of baked goods, for example, were often overlooked by people with diabetes in their quest for low-sugar products. No longer need low sugar content be a criterion of suitability. A moderate intake of refined sugars (10% to 12% energy) is not associated with obesity, micronutrient deficiency, or undesirable effects on blood lipids or insulin sensitivity. Conversely, there is good evidence that low sugar intakes are associated with higher intakes of saturated fat, higher body weight, and a diet with a higher GI. Unfortunately, some dietitians have found the liberalization of sugar that goes hand in hand with GI advice can be one of the major stumbling blocks to general acceptance of the GI. The "pure, white, and deadly" image of sugar is well entrenched.
The GI identifies those sources of carbohydrate that have the lowest glucose-raising potential. The concept that slowly digested and absorbed carbohydrate has the least impact on blood sugar levels is readily understood. A useful approach to convey the concept is to represent all high-carbohydrate-low-fat foods as "good," but some as "better" and others as "best," making the distinction on the basis of GI and fiber content. All high-carbohydrate-low-fat foods may be regarded as useful or "good" because carbohydrate is quantitatively the most limiting nutrient in western diets (we eat only 40% to 45% of our energy as carbohydrate instead of the recommended 55%), but some of them may be "better" or "best," depending on the context. Kellogg Australia have produced a colored pyramid-style food guide in which the largest component (ie, "eat most") is divided into two parts, the bigger segment being low-GI, high carbohydrate-low fat foods, and the smaller segment being the high-GI counterparts. The message is simple and effective.
The "Good-Better-Best" System of Choosing High
Carbohydrate Foods
Good Better (more fiber Best (high fiber
or low GI) or low GI)
White bread Wholemeal bread Grainy breads (high kibbled
grain: flour ratio)
Soft drink Fruit juice Piece of fruit
Potatoes Pasta Baked beans
In practice, therefore, applying the GI is then simply a matter of substitution. A system of "this for that," as shown in Table 3, makes reducing the GI of the diet easy. To examine the effect of making such changes on the GI of the diet without drastically altering its nature, we have constructed dietary models of high- and low-GI diets. Both diets contain the same amounts of energy and macronutrients and derive 50% of energy from carbohydrate, and 30% from fat. In each diet, carbohydrate choices have been made that maximized the difference in GI between the two diets. In practice, however, it is unnecessary to choose only low-GI carbohydrate, because exchanging only half of the carbohydrate from high to low GI will lower the GI of the whole diet by about 15 units, sufficient to bring about clinical improvements in glucose metabolism in people with diabetes.
Substituting Low GI Foods for High GI Foods(*)
High GI Food Low GI Alternative
Bread, wholemeal or white Bread containing a high proportion
of whole grains
High GI rices (low amylose), Low GI rices (high amylose), eg,
eg, sticky rice, waxy rice Basmati, parboiled rices
Processed breakfast cereal Unrefined cereal such as oats
(muesli or porridge) or check
the GI list for processed
cereals with a low GI factor,
eg, Kelloggs All Bran
Potato Substitute with pasta or legumes
Plain biscuits and crackers Biscuits made with dried fruit
and whole grains, such as oats
Cakes and muffins Look for those made with fruit,
oats, whole grains
Tropical fruits, such as Temperate climate fruits, such as
bananas apples and stone fruit
(*) Changes in the type of bread and breakfast cereal have the biggest impact in the western diet. Changes in the type of rice are more important in Asian diets.
Model High and Low GI Diets That Contain the Same Amounts of Energy and Macronutrients and Derive 50% of Energy From Carbohydrate (CHO) and 30% From Fat(*)
Snack
1 crumpet 20 6.40
1 tsp margarine
Lunch
2 slices wholemeal bread 23.5 7.60
2 tsp margarine
25 g cheese
1 cup diced canteloupe 8 2.50
Snack
4 plain sweet biscuits 28 10.40
Dinner
120 g lean steak
1 cup of mashed potato 32 12.10
1/2 cup of carrot 4 1.70
1/2 cup green beans 2 0.60
50 g broccoli
Snack
290 g watermelon 15 5.10
1 cup of reduced fat 14 1.90
milk throughout day
Total 212 69.80
Low GI Diet
CHO Contribution
(g) to Total GI
Breakfast
30 g All Bran 24 4.70
1 diced peach 8 1.10
1 slice grain bread 14 2.20
1 tsp margarine
1 tsp jelly 4 1.20
Snack
1 slice grain fruit loaf 20 4.10
1 tsp margarine
Lunch
2 slices grain bread 28 4.50
2 tsp margarine
25 g cheese
1 apple 20 3.60
Snack
200 g low fat fruit yogurt 26 4.10
Dinner
120 g lean minced beef
1 cup boiled pasta 34 6.40
1 cup tomato and onion sauce 8 2.50
Green salad with vinaigrette 1 0.60
Snack
1 orange 10 2.10
1 cup of reduced fat milk 14 1.90
throughout day
Total 212 39.00
(*) In each diet, carbohydrate choices have been made which maximize the difference in GI between the two diets.
Breads and breakfast cereals make a large contribution to the glycemic load of a western diet, and therefore a change to low-GI alternatives is especially useful. In the model diets, these two food groups supply 50% of the total starch, and choosing low-GI varieties reduces the total GI by 13 units. In Australia, many breads and breakfast cereals have been identified as having a low GI, so this type of change is often one of the first and simplest to make. Alternatively, altering the main meal starch and one snack choice (raisin toast instead of a bagel) will lower the GI by a similar amount. In the diet of someone who eats more fruit, a focus on low-GI types will reduce the GI significantly.
Some people mistakenly believe that they should avoid foods with a high GI altogether. However, the aim is not to eat low-GI carbohydrate at the exclusion of all other. We suggest that people try to include at least one low-GI carbohydrate choice per meal or to base at least two of their meals each day on low-GI choices. In the high-GI diet model, even a food with a very high GI, such as carrots (GI = 92), in a normal serving, contributes less than 2 units to the total GI of the diet. If potato and carrots were substituted for pasta in the low-GI diet model, the total GI of the day would be increased by only 7 units. Against the background of low-GI choices, the diet retains a low GI.
One other aspect of the GI research that is of practical significance, particularly to people with diabetes, is the challenge that arises to the concept of carbohydrate exchanges. The theory that equal amounts of different carbohydrate foods produce similar glycemic effects is refuted by the GI. Fifteen-gram carbohydrate loads of a range of common foods have been shown to produce glycemic responses that vary threefold (authors' unpublished data). Researchers are now seeking to determine the size of food exchanges that are truly "glycemic equivalents." In reality, two slices of grainy, low-GI bread produces an equivalent glycemic response to one slice of regular bread. Practically speaking, these findings question the value of carbohydrate counting--low-GI carbohydrate foods can be eaten more freely without overt risk of hyperglycemia, thereby helping to reduce fat intake.
In our nutrition recommendations, we need to emphasize that all carbohydrate foods (even those containing refined sugars) are good choices, that coarsely ground flours are preferable to fine flours (whether white or wholemeal), and that the consumption of slowly digested carbohydrate foods such as pasta, oats, barley, baked beans, Basmati rice, low-GI breakfast cereals, and grainy breads is particularly beneficial. Fruits that have a low GI and are more acidic will help to lower the overall GI. The use of salad dressings containing vinegar and lemon juice also could be encouraged, because this results in further reductions in glycemic and insulin responses.
The challenge to the food industry is to produce new and palatable low-GI foods, because no doubt many people see some low-GI foods (beans and "birdseed" breads) as less than acceptable. We therefore should encourage the development of low-GI foods for specific applications in diabetes, appetite control, weight reduction, and exercise. Specially formulated breads, breakfast cereals, and other low-GI products will give astute food manufacturers a new marketing edge, with long-term benefits to public health.
CONCLUSIONS
The rewriting of nutrition recommendations with GI in mind will be painful for some. The dilemma for most dietitians is that adopting the GI approach will appear to contradict previous dietary advice. Bread and potatoes have been the "staff of life" for many people for a long time. But we would do well to remember that finely milled flours and domesticated varieties of fruits and vegetables are produces of the agricultural and industrial revolutions. In evolutionary terms, these are recent developments, not of sufficient duration to produce human genetic adaptations. For most of human evolution--for over two million years--cereal foods were absent, and, when introduced 10,000 years ago, they were in a coarsely ground, low-GI physical form. Hence, foods producing high glycemic and insulin responses were not available in large amounts until recently. It should not be surprising, therefore, to find that the glucose homeostatic mechanisms of many individuals will be exceeded by a lifetime intake of high-GI carbohydrate foods.
Many popular books such as Sugar Busters and The Zone give you a list of foods based on Glycemic index, and they recommend avoiding all foods that have a high glycemic index.
When you eat a food, your blood sugar level rises. The food that raises blood sugar the highest is pure table sugar. So glycemic index is a ratio of how high that food raises blood sugar in comparison to how high table sugar raises blood sugar levels. Foods whose carbohydrates break down slowly release glucose into the bloodstream slowly, so blood sugar levels do not rise high and therefore these foods have low glycemic index scores. Those that break down quickly cause a high rise in blood sugar and have a high glycemic index.
Most beans, whole grains and non-starchy vegetables have low glycemic index; while sugars, refined grains made from flour, fruits and root vegetables have a high glycemic index.
If you look at tables of glycemic index, you will see things that should bother an intelligent person. A carrot has almost the same glycemic index as sugar does. That is ridiculous. You know that a carrot is far safer for diabetics than table sugar. So scientists developed a new measure to rank foods called glycemic load. It tells you how much sugar is in the food, rather than just how high it raises blood sugar levels. To calculate glycemic load, you multiply the grams of carbohydrate in a serving of food by that food's glycemic index.
Carrots and potatoes both have a high glycemic index, but using the new glycemic load (GL), carrots dropped from high GI of 131 to a GL of 10. Potatoes fall from a GI of 121 to a GL of 45. Air-popped popcorn, with a glycemic index of 79, has a GL of 4.
Foods that are mostly water or air will not cause a steep rise in your blood sugar even if their glycemic index is high. That's why the new measure, Glycemic Load, is more useful. However, all of these tools should be used for research and not for your daily selection of foods. Use your own common sense and eat plenty of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans and other seeds. If you are diabetic, you can eat root vegetables and fruits with other foods to slow the rise in blood sugar they may cause.
Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy: The Harvard Medical School Guide to Healthy Eating (Simon & Schuster, June 2001), by Harvard School of Public Health professor and researcher Walter Willett, M.D.
It's annoying but true: As we chalk up additional years, we find ourselves adding unwanted pounds in the process. People who had no weight problem in their 30s and 40s watch in dismay as the needle on the scale creeps upward during their 50s and 60s, even though their diet hasn't changed. And therein lies the problem.
As the years go by, the body's metabolism rate slows down and we need fewer calories than we did when we were younger. The same diet that kept us trim at 40 may plaster on the pounds at 50. Yet we still need the same amount--or more--of the vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients we've been getting all along. This poses a dilemma: How to find a diet that meets no more than our basic caloric needs while supplying more nutritional value than ever.
One way around the problem is exercise. The more calories you burn, the more you can eat. And you don't have to enter a marathon or "feel the burn" of a Jane Fonda workout for exercise to make a difference. Taking a walk every day is ideal (see chapter 4). You can burn off three pounds a month by walking at a moderate rate for an hour per day. For many, however, this won't be enough.
Whether the solution is diet, exercise, or both, the problem is more than aesthetic--especially as we grow older. Studies by life insurance companies show that slim people live longer, healthier lives than those who are overweight. And the reasons for this are legion.
The Health Consequences of Excess Weight
Carrying too many pounds has a hair-raising array of potential consequences. Excess weight increases the chances of developing heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, gallstones, certain cancers, varicose veins, pressure ulcers, and a variety of other diseases.
For example, high blood pressure is twice as common among overweight people aged 45 to 74. Overweight people are also three times more likely to develop diabetes. In fact, the Nurses Health Study, one of the largest disease-risk studies ever undertaken, showed that women who gain 15 excess pounds increase their risk of diabetes by 50 percent.
For men, the consequences of being overweight can be even more pronounced. A recently completed 27-year study of more than 19,000 middle-aged men found that those at their ideal weights lived significantly longer than those just 2 to 6 percent above the ideal. The heavier the men in the study, the shorter their life expectancy. Those who were 20 percent overweight had a risk of death from heart disease that was two-and-a-half times that of their slimmer counterparts.
Cancer and More
Obesity has also been linked with gallstones, back pain, sleep apnea (a condition characterized by brief periods when breathing stops during sleep), heartburn, stroke, gout, varicose veins, and even some types of cancer, including colon and prostate cancer in men, and uterine, endometrial, and breast cancer in women.
What seems clear is that the biochemical disruptions caused by being overweight are more complex and more prevalent than we thought. In just the last year or two, medical researchers have discovered links between excess weight and an astonishing variety of health problems, ranging from osteoarthritis of the hands and knees to carpal tunnel syndrome (a nerve conduction problem in the hand). All of these discoveries underscore the wisdom and benefits of weight control.
It Happens
Why do so many Americans tend to be overweight? The answer is simple: Many of us are taking in more fuel than our bodies need. Indeed, Americans now consume 34 percent of their calories in the form of dietary fat, the food most easily converted to body fat. (For every 100 unused calories taken in as fat, 97 are stored as fat. For every 100 unused calories taken in as carbohydrates, only 77 are stored as fat; the rest fuel the process of converting those carbohydrates to fat.)
Other factors that have contributed to the epidemic of overweight include highly processed foods laced with excessive amounts of fat, sugar, and sodium; lack of exercise in an age of labor-saving devices, computers, and tv; stress that prompts us to overeat or routinely snack on junk food; drinking (and nibbling high-fat snacks at the same time); and the decline in smoking (individuals who quit smoking often experience a 4- to 6-pound weight gain).
Sex Matters
Where weight is concerned, men can count themselves lucky. Women gain weight more easily than men do; and women have to work harder to get it off. It's all a matter of biochemistry.
A fat cell is designed to store calories (lipogenesis) when you don't need them and release fat (lipolysis) when you do. The enzymes that help store fat are called lipogenic enzymes; the ones that help release fat are lipolytic enzymes.
Women tend to have more lipogenic enzymes for fat storage; and the more you can store, the bigger the fat cell. Men have more lipolytic enzymes for fat release and, therefore, smaller fat cells.
Testosterone, the male sex hormone, activates the lipolytic enzymes for speedy release of fat. Estrogen, the female sex hormone, activates and multiplies the lipogenic enzymes. Estrogen not only stimulates the storage of fat, but also directs where most of it will be stored, concentrating it in the hips, buttocks, and thighs.
Throughout their lives, women have more body fat than men. The bodies of young girls contain a higher percentage of fat than those of young boys. And at certain milestones in the female life cycle--puberty, pregnancy, and menopause--women tend to put on even more fat. That means that the older a woman gets, the more likely she is to face the health-destroying problem of excess weight.
In technologically advanced countries, most men keep gaining weight until they reach their mid-50s, when they start shedding pounds. In women, however, body weight keeps increasing until the late 60s. After that it declines, but at a rate slower than that of men. While the metabolic changes of maturity could be a factor, reduced physical activity may be the real culprit.
Overweight or Over-Fat?
Don't trust only your scale or your mirror; they tell just half the story. It is body fat, rather than weight, that may be the best indicator of whether or not you need to trim down.
Fat comprises about 15 to 18 percent of the total body weight of a healthy, physically fit man. For a woman, the ratio is slightly higher: from 20 to 25 percent. It's quite possible to exceed these ratios without weighing in above your ideal; and the reverse holds true as well. Remember: You can be overweight without being over-fat and over-fat without being overweight.
This is one of the reasons a tape measure can be a better tool than a scale for measuring the success of a weight loss program. Since muscle weighs more than fat, your weight may seem to stabilize or even increase as you build muscle mass. Don't be discouraged. If you're wearing smaller-sized clothes or you've lost inches from your hips, waist, or neck, you are actually leaner and healthier than when you started.
Apple vs. Pear
At least as important as total weight is where the fat tends to settle on your body. While fat in the hips, thighs, and buttocks is mainly stored just under the skin, fat in the midsection is stored deeper in the body.
As we grow older, fat tends to collect around the abdomen, and many people develop an "apple shape." This can be more dangerous than having a "pear shape," in which excess fat gravitates to the hips and thighs.
Experts theorize that abdominal fat releases more fatty acids, leading to a rise in blood cholesterol and triglyceride levels. While this can be a serious health problem in and of itself, it also may interfere with the action of insulin in the body, thus increasing the risk of diabetes. Some researchers also believe that "apple shape" obesity may increase the availability and activity of estrogen, leading to an elevated risk of breast cancer. The good news is that, to some degree, you can modify your shape, whether apple or pear, through exercise and diet modification.
What Weight Is Right for You?
Recent research suggests that if you repeatedly have trouble reaching--and maintaining--your ideal weight, you may be better off surrendering that elusive goal altogether and focusing on what your body really wants to weigh: your natural weight.
Natural weight is the weight your body goes to and maintains when you're eating reasonably and not drastically cutting calories, exercising vigorously, or otherwise trying to shed pounds. It will never be a fixed number, but, rather, a range of 5 to 8 pounds (since weight normally varies slightly with changes in general health, activity, hormone levels, and the time of day).
Of course, that doesn't mean that any weight is healthy. If your weight is 20 percent or more over the top of the ideal range for your height and frame (see the nearby table), you should consider trimming down to stay healthy.
Gauging Your Natural Weight
To determine your current natural weight range, consider the following factors.
Your personal weight history. Try to remember the lowest weight range you have successfully maintained as an adult, without dieting, for a period of a year or more. That is your baseline natural weight range.
Your family. Make a mental picture of family members when they were about the age you are now. Because genetics is a powerful variable in terms of size and shape, family resemblance can help define your natural weight. (Remember, however, that even if you come from a long line of very heavy people, if your weight seems dangerously high, it's wise to check with your doctor about the need to shed some pounds.)
Your exercise habits. Think back to that period when you maintained your lowest-ever weight. If you exercised regularly then and don't do it now, you may need to add several pounds to your baseline weight range--or start exercising again.
Strategies for Successful Weight Loss
Once you have determined your natural weight range, what do you do with the information? If your weight is excessive for your height, you should try to lose weight gradually by adopting a low-fat, moderate-calorie, healthful diet and boosting your exercise level. Remember that crash diets and furious bouts of exercise don't work and can, indeed, be dangerous. Moderation and consistency are the keys to success.
From a weight-loss standpoint, a low-fat diet is ideal because it minimizes the amount of fat readily available for your body to store. But how low is low? The American Heart Association, the National Academy of Science, the American Cancer Society, and many other groups recommend that we get a maximum of 30 percent of our calories from fat (with no more than 10 percent of total calories from saturated fats). Another body of nutrition experts, including Nathan Pritikin and Dr. Dean Ornish, suggest that even lower levels of fat (10 to 20 percent of total calories) are much better than 30%, and can, among other things, actually reverse existing heart disease.
Calories Still Count
Your body needs a certain number of calories per day to maintain bodily functions--referred to as your Basal Metabolic Rate (bmr). You can estimate your bmr by multiplying your current weight (in pounds) by 10 for women, 11 for men. For example, a woman who weighs 120 pounds would require about 1,200 calories per day just to maintain her bodily functions. You'll also need some percentage of calories above your bmr to provide energy for your daily activities; the percentage will vary widely based on your metabolism and activity level. A moderately fit and active person might need 30 to 50 percent more calories than the bmr to maintain current weight. Example: A 120-pound woman would need approximately 1,680 calories per day [1,200 + (1,200 x 40%) = 1,680]. A person who is very fit and exercises frequently might burn as much as 100 to 200 percent more than his or her bmr.
If your goal is to lose weight, you'll need to take in fewer calories than you use up, or burn off extra calories through exercise, or both. If you choose to decrease calories, aim for the amount needed daily to maintain your target weight, not your current weight. Most experts recommend that women take in a minimum of 1,200 calories and men a minimum of 1,600 per day. Lower calorie levels are unlikely to supply all the essential nutrients you need, and may slow down your metabolism, making weight loss even more difficult. For gradual weight loss, some professionals recommend a daily calorie target of 10 times your weight. At this level, they say, you can expect to lose half a pound per week.
Good (And Bad) News about Sugar
The "empty calories" of sugar have gained a bad reputation. Yet sugar by itself isn't a problem. It's the high levels of fat in sugary foods such as ice cream and pastries that really put on the pounds. In terms of weight loss or maintenance, sugar becomes objectionable only when you fail to keep your intake down to moderate levels. Sugar is a carbohydrate, thus it is normally burned by the body immediately, and is converted to fat only if it's present in quantities too large to be used at once.
Nevertheless, some people find that even moderate amounts of sugar stimulate cravings for yet more sweets, often of the high-fat variety. If you are one of these people, you may find it helpful to eliminate processed sugars from your diet, relying instead on the natural sweetness of fruits, vegetables, and grains. Artificial sweeteners can be an effective aid if you have occasional cravings for sweets, but probably won't work for those of us with an active sweet tooth. The taste of artificial sweeteners can trigger sugar cravings about as easily as the real thing can.
Tempting Techniques for Boosting Fiber
Fiber has many benefits, but one stands out when you're losing weight: it fills out the stomach and intestinal cavity, producing a feeling of fullness. Fiber is found chiefly in nonprocessed foods such as whole grains, beans, peas, fruits, and vegetables. Fiber may be added to processed foods in the form of bran, which is the outer coating from a grain such as wheat or oats.
The typical American diet is high in processed foods, most of which contain little or no fiber. Most people get only about 10 to 12 grams of fiber per day, while 25 to 30 grams are needed to get real health benefits. If your current diet is low in fiber, it's important to increase your intake gradually over a period of weeks or months (a sudden jump can cause bloating, cramping, and gas). Try having a small serving of a high-fiber, low-fat cereal with your breakfast; as your system becomes used to the higher fiber levels, start substituting whole-grain breads, cereals, and pastas for refined (white flour, low fiber) varieties. Increase your consumption of fresh fruits and vegetables, and eat edible peels and skins (apples, potatoes) instead of trimming them.
How to Put Your Diet into Action
Once you've decided it's time to shed a few extra pounds, the big question is How? The basic principles--less fat, fewer calories, more fiber--are enshrined in hundreds of dieting schemes. At any given time, you have a choice of over 300 diet books, plus all of the commercial diet centers in your area (there were over 8,000 of them recently in operation across the country). The first decision to make is whether you prefer to go it alone or seek the help of a structured program.
Tips for Do-It-Yourselfers
If you're the go-it-alone type, keep these tactics in mind. You'll need to make up for the support that comes automatically with enrollment in a program.
* Find a good time to start. "I'm going on a diet tomorrow," is a sentence that often heralds failure because it's sparked by a momentary impulse (or guilt after a triple-decker ice cream cone) rather than a well-thought-out plan. Weight loss is tough, and you should give it the same careful consideration you would give to changing your career or buying a house. Find a starting date during a relatively quiet time in your life, not while you're also moving to another state or dealing with a crisis at work.
* Create a diet "campaign." Some people prefer to start with an exercise program, and add nutritional changes later on. For others, the reverse strategy works best. And for "all or nothing" types, starting both programs on a particular day can increase motivation.
* Choose a good book for companionship. Some people prefer a diet plan book, while others do best with a low-fat, low-calorie cookbook.
* Check with your doctor if you have any medical problems. You need to make sure that the eating and exercise strategies you've chosen are suitable and safe.
* Decide whether you need a "quick start." Quick-start programs, in which you change your eating habits drastically for a few weeks, are likely to deliver the most dramatic changes on the scale. But they require a good deal of concentration during the initial phase and may not be suitable if you're pressed for time. For many people, however, this approach serves as a great motivator. After you've lost those first exciting five pounds, you can modulate the plan into one you can continue life long.
* Consider "gradualism." This strategy works best for people who don't have too much weight to lose, and those who can accept the idea of slow--but steady and permanent-- change. One approach is to modify one daily meal at a time. For example, during the first week, you can concentrate on low-fat, low-calorie dinners, assembling menus and creating tasty meals. In the second week, you can turn to lunch, and so on. Or, you can tackle one food group at a time. A switch to low-fat dairy products is a good start. The second week, pay attention to lower-fat meats and fish, and to learning how to create one or two vegetarian dinners a week. (Be careful, though: Some vegetarian recipes are amazingly high in fat.)
* Don't forget fluids. Drinking eight glasses of water a day can fill you up, prevent the shakiness and fatigue of dehydration, and give you something to put in your mouth when you're trying to forget about eating.
* Eat slowly and savor your food. Give your internal "portion control" monitor a chance to get through to you. Fill up on lots of veggies prepared without added fat. Eat pastas, potatoes, and other filling foods, too, but only within reason. Use cheeses, meat, and sweets to give an extra zing to meals, but keep them to a minimum.
* Keep track of your progress. Weigh yourself daily, keep a food diary or try on a once too-tight skirt or pair of jeans each morning. Tracking progress reminds you that you've started a change, and rewards you with a hint of the final results.
* Don't punish yourself. If you "fall off the wagon," don't despair. Learning to climb back on is a key to long-term success.
* Survive the "plateaus." While the first pounds often come off quickly, many dieters hit plateaus where their weight remains steady for weeks even though their fat and calorie counts are low. Your metabolism is making noble efforts to keep up your fat levels, in the mistaken belief that starvation is near. Don't give up; weight loss will start again once this plateau is passed.
* Reward yourself. Small treats and large pleasures will help you celebrate everything from sticking with your plan on Day One to reaching your target weight, along with whatever small markers you create in between.
Checking Out the Enrollment Programs
If you want the extra motivation and support that come from a structured weight-loss program, you'll be faced with some additional choices. How best to judge a commercial program? Make your decision based on cost, comfort, and common sense. These plans generally attract women who have a moderate weight problem and men who are moderately to seriously overweight. All the top four commercial weight-loss programs--Diet Center, Jenny Craig, Nutri-system, and Weight Watchers--include a low-calorie diet of about 1,000 to 1,500 calories a day and some kind of supportive counseling.
None of the top four emerges as better at helping individuals to lose weight and keep it off, according to a 1994 Consumer Reports survey of 95,000 readers who had attempted to lose weight in the past 3 years. Overall, however, Weight Watchers tended to be the clear favorite among those polled. It costs less than the others, emphasizes healthful dietary habits, encourages relatively slow weight loss, and generally appears to provide the most satisfying support. In contrast, Nutri-system and Jenny Craig cost more and are more likely to use high-pressure sales tactics. But as Deralee Scanlon, rd, points out in Diets That Work: The monetary aspect does not in itself lessen the potential effectiveness of a program--in fact, some people take these programs more seriously precisely because of the financial investment.
How to Keep the Lost Pounds Off
Once you've lost the weight and have come to accept your new appearance, you have to develop new skills to hold onto your hard won gains. While there is no simple formula for keeping weight off, there are skills you can develop that will help you maintain your desired weight and make maintaining it more automatic.
The "C" Word
Long-term weight management requires a conscious commitment--one just as strong as, or stronger than the one you made in deciding to lose weight. As with any large project, it's a good idea to break the task down into smaller, doable segments. Many people find it easier to make a commitment to maintain their current weight for one year.
The commitment should be specific--something like: "I will continue to go to exercise class 3 times a week and I will continue to use vegetables for my snacks." Remember that keeping this commitment is something no one can do for you.
Once the commitment is made, keep visualizing your success. Imagine yourself a year from today, still able to get into your current sized jeans. Imagine yourself relaxed and happy, eating foods you like that are also good for you.
Create New Habits
Weight maintenance becomes a much easier proposition once you've established good nutritional habits. Simplification and preparation are key to getting new habits in place. For example, if you don't habitually eat breakfast but have decided to do so to boost your morning energy and prevent overeating at lunch, start with a simple approach: Eat the same breakfast every day until the habit is firmly embedded. Prepare by keeping the things you want for breakfast always on hand.
To avoid falling back into old habits, you need to trigger your new habits on a daily basis. For example, put a note on the mirror reminding yourself to eat breakfast, and set out dishes and some ingredients the night before.
Simplifying your approach to food makes it easier to form new habits. Choose a nutritional plan that feels comfortable and doable. If possible, reduce your plan to a simple-to-remember formula. For example, plan to eat a fruit or vegetable with each meal or snack, or set a fixed number of portions from each food group to eat every day. Keep your plan in your wallet and look at it before you buy your lunch. And remember to drink plenty of fluids to prevent dehydration.
Connect with Hunger
People who have never had a weight problem tend to eat when their body says "I'm hungry." But hunger signals may be badly scrambled for those who have been through various deprivation diets. Judith Matz, co-director of the Chicago Center for Overcoming Overeating, suggests it's possible to relearn to identify and respond to hunger signals and to eat only when they occur. "With practice you can reconnect your eating with internal cues," she says. "Doing so helps you distinguish between a bodily urge for nourishment and the desire for emotional comfort from food." This doesn't mean you should never reach for food out of emotional hunger, but that you should know it when you do and perhaps choose another way to fill your needs instead.
If you often feel hungry between meals, consider adjusting your food choices. Some foods have "staying power," notes Sybil Ferguson of The Diet Center Program. They stay longer in your system, helping you feel more satisfied and energetic. Many foods low in calories, such as prepackaged convenience diet foods, are also low in "staying power" because they're digested quickly. Natural foods with lots of fiber, such as oatmeal, vegetables, and fruits--are helpful for maintenance because they take longer to chew and to digest, and they create a full feeling in your stomach.
Skipping meals, either because of time crunches or out of guilt from previous overeating, interferes with the steady state of satisfaction that makes maintenance easier. When the body has been deprived of food for many hours, your blood sugar level drops, leading to cravings for immediate energy boosts. Eating a balanced selection of foods on a consistent schedule helps stabilize your blood sugar level and hunger sensations, so you can continue to make intelligent decisions about eating.
Avoid Deprivation
A sense of deprivation ("oh, I wish I could eat that," "you're lucky, you can eat anything," "I used to be able to finish a whole cake at one sitting") is a prime enemy of long-term weight maintenance. Tyrannical diet programs do work well for short-term weight loss, but over the long haul, we all need to eat for pleasure as well as nourishment. Meals are among the most pleasurable social events in life, and it pays to learn to take pleasure in the foods that are good for you.
Keep a list of foods or dishes you particularly like that also fit in with weight maintenance. When you find yourself missing your old bacon, eggs, and steak diet, treat yourself to all of your favorite nutritious foods in the same day. It keeps your spirits up without expanding your waistline.
Whenever you feel hungry, there's always something you can eat that will be satisfying without threatening your weight stability. Try keeping the refrigerator stocked with fresh fruits and vegetables. Treat yourself to exotic and out of season fruits and vegetables when they look inviting in the market. Nibble on red peppers, fresh young carrots, and cucumbers dipped in a low-fat sauce (no-fat salad dressing makes a quickie dip).
Monitor Your Weight Daily
If you find you've put on a pound or three, try to ease yourself back on track quickly. This may involve relaxation efforts, visualizing more nutritional eating, or being extra careful for a few days. But once a 5-pound gain has occurred--you should consider it a "weight emergency" and construct a relapse recovery plan.
Return from Relapse
Everyone should expect to have slips from their weight maintenance program," says James Hill, PhD, associate professor of psychology at the University of Colorado in Denver. "The most important thing is to recover as soon as possible."
The first step in recovery is to identify the problem(s). List all possible reasons to finish the sentence, "I've started gaining weight again because ...."
Then adopt an optimistic stance about your ability to bounce back from hard times. Remembering previous accomplishments, and setting realistic goals for the future can soon have you back on the maintenance track.
Assume responsibility for your actions and beliefs--this puts you firmly in control of your future. Come up with some solutions for each of the stresses that undercut your program. For example, a new low-fat cookbook or cooking class can help you combat food boredom.
When you've patched together a recovery plan to meet your needs, gather strength for the new change by tapping into your support network. Talk to someone who is positive and reinforces your decisions. If you were part of a formal weight loss program, check in with the support group whenever you need to recover from a lapse.
Feed Your Emotional Needs
The trick to avoiding relapses--and coping with those that occur--is to remember that you're a capable, lovable human being who can accomplish your goals. Nurturing your own self-esteem can help you cope with the stress and burnout that so often lead to overeating. When you feel tired, bored, quick to anger, withdrawn, rigid and ineffective, you're most apt to abandon your nutritional program. It helps to remember the positive side of your weight loss experience: feelings of being in control, reaching goals, making peace with your appetite, taking care of yourself. It's easy to believe in yourself when things are going well. It's when the going gets tough that you need to reinforce your self-confidence.
Making positive life changes that improve your body and mind are a good way to foster self- esteem. Consider taking a stimulating class or workshop, or try a new exercise program. Developing a relaxation ritual, which may involve breathing exercises, chanting, or muscle tension and relaxation, is another excellent technique for caring for yourself.
The Maintenance Mantra
Why do you want to maintain your weight loss? What's the most important factor for you? The reasons vary from person to person. For some, lowering blood pressure or a high cholesterol level is most important. For others, cosmetic concerns loom largest. Naming your motivation proudly and loudly, at least to yourself, can help you stay on track. "Usually people go out and lose as much weight as they can, then see how much they can keep off," notes Professor Hill. "Maybe we should do the reverse: first, make the right nutritional changes, then, based on our ability to stick with them, accept the resulting weight."
Weight Loss Plateau: Thou Shalt Not Overeat
by Tanya Zilberter
Fighting stalled weight loss, or a weight-loss plateau, is not an easy business; nor is it easy to advise on troubleshooting because there are many reasons for this plateau. The rule of the thumb, however, is universal...
Fighting stalled weight loss, or a weight-loss plateau, is not an easy business; nor is it easy to advise on troubleshooting because there are many reasons for this plateau. The rule of the thumb, however, is universal:
Thou Shalt Not Overeat
What is overeating? It depends. For one person, overeating means that she eats in excess of her energy expenditure, which may be due to the sedentary needs. For another person, it's because of sluggish metabolism. For yet another, it can be a plain old cheating on his diet.
In this article, I'll talk about the weight-loss plateau and one of its aspects that is rarely discussed: taste and calories.
There are two issues in the weight-loss plateau problem that concerns low-carb dieters. First, what is this plateau - ; is it anything real or all in our heads? Second, is low-carb stalled weight loss different from any other diet stalling?
A Look at the General Problem of Plateaus
A weight-loss plateau is when you were losing weight and then stopped losing, without changing your diet, exercise or other lifestyle factors. You eat the same diet and exercise as much as before, but your bathroom scales are frozen at some mysterious point, sometimes referred to as the body-weight set point.(Just think of your refrigerator: it's the point you set to maintain the temperature you want. Though different in details, basically the same parts make up the human body's "thermostat" or "fatostat," for that matter.)
Body-weight set point is nature's idea of what amount of fat you need. If we deviate from nature's, it forces us to eat more - ; even when our fat stores are huge. Luckily, a low-carb diet allows your body to recognise your stored fat as legitimate fuel and uses it instead of storing it (as it does on any other diet.) However, there is another danger that is often overlooked by low-carb dieters:
The Sweeter, the Heavier
It seems that our body-weight set points are not carved in stone. Clinical studies revealed links between taste and the amount of food we eat.
Tastier foods make the set point of body weight shift up proportionally, that is: the tastier the food, the greater the set point. Researchers even showed that foods with negative taste qualities, (in the study, researchers added quinine) do the opposite: the more bitter the food, the lower the set point.
Artificial Sweetners Are Not the Answer
Sweet taste - ; even from artificial sweeteners - ; causes an increase in calories coming from fat and protein. Why does this happening?
Sweet taste, even coming with artificial sweetener, raises glucose concentration in the blood before the food has a chance to be digested. Your body knows that eventually, it will have all the carbs you've swallowed and it doesn't wait until it that happens. Instead, it releases some glucose from the carbohydrate depots and hopes to get it all back. When the sweet food is real, the carbohydrates eventually get into the blood. If they're not? Well, nature never counted on us inventing artificial sweeteners. Being fooled, your body reacts rather vindictively: it forces you to want more sweet food plus eat more next time, no matter what food you agree to have.
So, you'd be better off without artificial sweeteners. There are other tasty foods you can have on a low-carb diet.
Some Clinical Data on Fats:
* Preference for high-fat foods appears to be a universal human trait.
* How much fat we eat appears to be determined simply by the amount of fat available.
* Fats are especially provocative in the obese, who tend to overeat fatty foods more than the lean.
Clinical Data on Other Tasty Foods:
* Good tasting foods increased so-called diet-induced thermogenesis (heat production after meals) and reduced food efficiency (how many calories are used and how many pass through the intestines).
* Good tasting foods increase energy expenditure. It seems like a paradox, but when you eat what you really enjoy, you body gets less of this particular food's calories.
America Rubs Its Stomach, and Says Bring It On
By GREG WINTER
ORTY pounds of white bread, 32 gallons of soft drinks, 41 pounds of potatoes and a couple of gallons of vegetable oil in which to fry them. No, it's not a roster of provisions for the troops on the Fourth of July. It's a sample of what the average American eats in a year.
Bear in mind, that's only what consumers admit to eating. If there is one thing researchers have learned while surveying the nation's gastronomic habits, it is that, whether from modesty or sheer denial, Americans are prodigious liars about how much they really eat.
The fact is, Americans are not only eating more healthy foods like fruits and vegetables, but more of almost everything else. Per capita consumption of food increased about 8 percent from 1990 to 2000, according to the Department of Agriculture. That translates to something like 140 extra pounds of food a year. Yes, per person.
Given that exercise rates have hardly changed, is there any wonder that obesity rates increased 61 percent during that time? A more difficult question may be: Why, despite our better judgment, do we keep eating more and more?
The main answer, according to many in the public health community, comes down to an obvious yet ineluctable truth: the more food people are served, the more they will eat. Simple as that.
Maybe it's a cultural compulsion to get the most bang for the buck, or perhaps it's a biological imperative to bulk up in case of famine, researchers say, but only a select few can resist the almost gravitational pull of the supersizing option, especially when it is so cheap to take the plunge.
At 7-Eleven, 37 extra cents buys four times as much soda. At Cinnabon, pay 48 more cents and one gets a sweet roll nearly three times as large as the regular size. At McDonalds, 87 cents buys almost three times as many French fries. You get the picture.
The impact on caloric consumption is particularly pronounced because Americans are eating out as never before. In 1970, for instance, about one-quarter of the average household's food budget was spent outside the home. Today it is roughly one-half. What is more, researchers at the University of Minnesota say, restaurant food typically contains 22 percent more fat than food consumed at home.
Then there is the speed at which Americans eat. So many meals are now wolfed down in the car, at the desk, on the run, that we tend to stuff ourselves before our brains have the chance to slow us down. The satiety signals that usually tell us we've had enough may not kick in for a full half-hour, scientists point out, long after many dietary crimes have been committed.
The experience of hunger may itself have changed as well. With sugar and highly refined starches becoming a much larger part of the average diet, often as substitutes for fat, blood-sugar levels tend to rise very rapidly, then plummet within a few hours. That stimulates hunger again, much faster than with a diet rich in fruits, nuts and vegetables, none of which seem to hold much appeal for the average consumer.
And why is that, by the way? If Americans know junk food carries such consequences, why does it continue to cast such a powerful spell? While some scientists cite the ubiquity of sweet and fatty foods — in the mall, in vending machines at school — others suggest there may also be a primal instinct at work.
Researchers at Yale University, for example, say that when laboratory animals are fed healthy food, they will eat their fill but refrain from stuffing themselves. Yet when they are switched to a high-calorie diet with lots of fatty fare, they will keep on eating until they swell up to as much as three times their original weight, possibly because of an instinctual preference for foods that deliver the most calories — as a way to stave off starvation in bad times.
"It's not like those animals have seen any fast-food commercials," said Kelly D. Brownell, a professor of psychology at Yale. "It's just their hard-wiring driving them towards that food."
Another New York Times article today
in the Sunday magazine. Someone should give him a recipe for a low carb blueberry pie.
A Dieter's Dilemma
By JASON EPSTEIN
In August and September, as the blueberry crop advances northward across Long Island on its way to Canada, I like to bake a blueberry pie, to which I add an entire lemon, including the peel, coarsely chopped. By the time the pie is baked, the peel and its pith caramelize and give the berries a surprising tang. A tablespoon or two of arrowroot doesn't quite absorb all the lemon juice, but I prefer my blueberry pie a little runny, not glutinous and stiff with cornstarch like pies from the bakery. I enjoy the way a scoop of vanilla ice cream melts into the warm juice.
During blueberry season, I usually make a dozen or so of these pies, their top crusts lightly browned with egg wash and accented with little rivers of purple syrup. But this year I'm not making any. And when they ripen, I'm not cutting up plump Golden Delicious or crunchy Mutsu apples from the Milk Pail in Water Mill on Long Island and laying the thick slices out neatly in circles in caramelized sugar and butter on the tarte Tatin pan that I bought from Fred Bridge in the 1960's. Nor will I be topping the apples with a thin sheet of buttery pie dough and sliding the tarte in the oven for 50 minutes at 360 degrees, to keep the apples from sticking to the pan the way they would at a higher temperature. And I won't be adding a tablespoon of flour to thicken the syrupy apple juice, because a tarte Tatin, unlike a blueberry pie, should not be runny at all.
Never again will I make the buttery muffins that I used to bake on Sunday mornings. I am also giving up ketchup, which is mainly corn syrup flavored with tomato and vinegar. Moreover, I'm going to think twice before I buy another Walla Walla onion, laden with sugary carbohydrates, or the wonderful rolls from Amy's Bread. That probably means no more hamburgers either and, for that matter, no more onion marmalade, the perfect accompaniment to magret de canard (the breasts of moulard ducks, the kind raised for foie gras), sautéed until warm and pink inside, then sliced and fanned out on the plate accompanied by the marmalade, a silky reduction of a half-dozen large, sweet onions -- a critical mass of carbohydrate waiting to turn itself into body fat.
According to Dr. Robert Atkins, 60 percent of the American population is perilously plump, an endangered group from whose condition I have been withdrawing for the past month at the rate of a pound every other day. I am especially wary of pecan pie, of which a single triangular slice contains three times the daily amount of carbohydrate permitted during the two-week initiation phase -- Atkins calls it the Induction Phase -- of his diet. This is the phase I have recently completed, having lost 10 pounds. I am now well into the Ongoing Weight Loss (O.W.L.) phase, with the permission of my wise friend and physician Stanley Mirsky, who for years has been urging me to avoid carbohydrates. But it was to the evangelical pitchman Dr. Atkins, not the stately Dr. Mirsky, that I finally succumbed, goaded by my son, Jacob, who, though not at all plump, lost 27 pounds and reduced his cholesterol in two months on Atkins.
The physiological case against excessive carbohydrates, reported in this magazine seven weeks ago, is fairly straightforward and by now well known. The low-carbohydrate diet, touted originally by Atkins and adopted successfully by millions of his followers, contradicts the widely accepted theory, introduced in the 1980's and later promoted by the Department of Agriculture's Food Guide Pyramid, that carbohydrates should be the basis of the American diet. Most researchers now agree that carbohydrates, especially refined ones like sugar and other vegetable-based sweeteners, white flour and rice, are quickly absorbed as energy by the body, while carbohydrates in excess of the body's immediate needs are stored as fat for future use. A secondary effect of this quick absorption is renewed hunger soon after a high-carbohydrate meal, for example after a Chinatown dinner of noodles, rice, wonton wrappers, egg-roll skins, syrupy ribs and cornstarch thickeners.
A low-carbohydrate diet, on the other hand, not only forces the body to seek energy by consuming its own stored fat but also suppresses appetite, since dietary fat and protein take longer to digest and enter the bloodstream than carbohydrates. Moreover, the body expends more energy burning fat than burning carbohydrates, yielding what Atkins calls ''a metabolic advantage.'' These phenomena explain the quick weight loss, especially during the Induction Phase, which allows only 20 grams of carbohydrates per day, about half the amount in a single bagel.
Even in its rigorous two-week Induction Phase, however, Atkins provides a rich larder of bacon and eggs, steak, lamb, pork and poultry, fish, including most shellfish, cheese, butter, cream (but not whole milk) and green vegetables except leeks, onions, peas and artichokes. Gin, vodka, whiskey and other spirits, according to Atkins, become ''acceptable,'' as does wine. Excluded forever are pasta, pizza, pastries and so on. No more sushi, congee, cookies, cereals, bagels, croissants, pancakes or waffles; no potatoes or corn, though one or two chips with guacamole is allowed. Above all, no more pretzels, which deliver five times as many carbs as potato chips. Orange juice, alas, is also out. But pecans, almonds and macadamia nuts are in.
Despite these restrictions, you can make a splendid breakfast of eggs scrambled through a strainer and cooked gently in a Teflon pan over simmering water, accompanied by warm prosciutto or its Austrian cousin, speck, with a few spears of asparagus, or a lunch of lobster, shrimp or chicken salad with homemade mayonnaise. (My favorite, Hellmann's, contains sugar.) For dinner you can have a pan-roasted rib-eye steak or striped bass with braised fennel or grilled trevisano radicchio. Most cheeses are acceptable, including blue, cheddar, cottage, cream and mozzarella. Tomatoes are iffy, but Atkins includes a recipe for fried green tomatoes using a noncarbohydrate bake mix. He may be an evangelist, but in his recipes he is not inflexible.
For the moment, at least, I seem to have successfully reversed my compulsions. Not only am I no longer addicted to croissants, hash-brown potatoes, blueberry pies and lobster salad stuffed into hot-dog rolls, but I am also slightly repelled by them. For moderately resourceful cooks, a low-carbohydrate diet offers abundant opportunity, and many of the recipes in ''Dr. Atkins's New Diet Revolution'' are worth considering. Nevertheless, I include my recipe for blueberry pie. Perhaps one day, when I am beyond Atkins's O.W.L. phase and into Maintenance, I'll make it again.
ANOTHER GOOD BOOK FOR SUGAR BUSTERS TO READ!
