Blog on weight, How to Lose Fat on the Cheap

No, not just to lose weight. I exercise to firm up. If you lose several pounds quickly, without exercise, you can end up pear-shaped. I’m sure you’ve seen people walking on the street and it seems to happen to women more, but the first pounds that they lose always seem to be above the waist. The face, shoulders, arms, and chest always lose fat first. Why you might ask? I think it’s because no matter how much time you spend sitting or standing without moving, your arms and shoulder are still usually moving. When you spend time at a desk you are generally moving from the waist up even though you're just sitting. That’s one reason that walking for exercise is the best exercise you can get. Basically, that’s your problem in this country, the reason obesity is at an all-time high. We as Americans don’t walk enough. Recently I saw a news show about the treadmill desk. I don’t know if you’ve heard about them, but it’s a workstation mounted on a treadmill. I first read about these 2 years ...

It’s boring, but everything you read today will tell you the best thing for you when you’re trying to lose weight, is water, 64 oz. a day.  If you think water is too boring you have problems. Okay, I know you’re rolling your eyes but water is perfect for you. And people are catching on. In the last 20 years, the sales of bottled water and designer water outsells soda. And if you’re reading financial papers Coke and Pepsi are worried. They’re scrambling to try to recapture share-of-market. That’s what all retail companies live or die by. There’s hope for those of us who need flavored water if we are to consume 64 oz. You can make flavored water at home. I like Basil, and orange water. It’s what I drink if I crave a salty snack, usually mid-afternoon. The taste kills the cravings and the drink looks beautiful in the glass so I feel like I’m treating myself. You can find recipes for making flavored water on the internet, pick the ones without calories. You can invent yo...

Perhaps you’ve made a new year’s resolution to start eating more healthfully, or you just feel it is time to change your dietary habits to promote a healthier lifestyle as well as for weight management. But where do you begin? Start with and keep in mind these five key principles for healthy eating, and you will always be on the right track. 1 Focus on Vegetables and Fruits Study after study has shown that the more whole fruits and vegetables you eat, the lower your risk for many chronic diseases, including cancer, obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease—including heart disease and stroke. Fruits and vegetables constitute low-calorie foods. A report by WHO has stated that there is convincing evidence that eating fruits and vegetables decreases the risk for obesity. Compared to high-calorie foods such as processed foods that are high in sugar and fat, fruits and vegetables are less likely to contribute to obesity or overweight. Fruits and vegetables from the produce department of ...

 I wanted to write about health today because in my area the virus threat is back again. I live in a small gated area with only about 9 dozen homes and 8 people that I know of have covid. Some of the social gatherings have been canceled. Because this is a 55+ community we tend to be a little nervous about covid. One of the health risks that seniors have is being overweight. When a person is young, under 40, you might think those extra pounds don't bother you, that being a little heavy isn't a big deal. As you get older, over 40, then you notice your body changing. You might be seeing your doctor more often. Maybe your blood pressure is elevated. Your doctor may have suggested that you lose weight. Maybe he put you on a diet. Maybe the doctor wants you to get more exercise.  All the symptoms you have today are just a sign of the bigger problems you will have in the future. All the small health problems you have today are putting stress on your immune system making it weaker and...

When it comes to losing weight, the evidence is pretty clear – “you can’t outrun a bad diet,” according to a recent editorial in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. If your goal is weight loss, that gym membership is going to do little to drop the pounds when your diet is out of shape. If you hit the gym five days a week for 30 minutes a day and you’re not losing weight, you now know why. It’s not your metabolism. It’s not your hormones. It’s what and how much you eat. We would be surprised if we knew how few calories we really need. Foods like fish or seafood, grains, fruits, and vegetables don’t have that many calories. The average American will consume more than 3000 calories a day when actually 1500 is plenty. Unless you run 5 miles a day you don’t need a lot of calories. We consume half our daily calories in the drinks we consume. If we only drank water, coffee, and tea we could cut more than 1000 calories daily.  Actually, most people that are overweight don't understand ...

 Older adults are complaining about sagging skin and why that happens. This is my take. Younger people tend to bulk up in the upper body and the legs. That's pretty normal. Many of today's young adults are doing the opposite. Slim and trim is the new-looking "healthy body". Maybe these slim and trim adults can avoid the problem of sagging skin? That's still a maybe because we have to see how long they can stay slim.   Back to sagging skin. No matter your size or built, when you're young you have a more firm body mass. That might be because most younger people are more active. Why, because they have more energy. We tend to slow down after 35 and that body mass starts to soften up, slowly turning into fat.  As we get older that upper body mass starts to shift and slide lower. You can see that just by walking down the city streets and watching people. Seniors with a weight problem tend to be more spear shaped. The upper body bulk is now below the rib cage. Once t...

Before you read the following post, I realize many people with weight problems think that exercise is impossible for them. But the best exercise for losing weight and strengthening the body is “walking”. And some of us can’t walk much, but don’t let that stop you. I walk in the Mall every morning I can and see the elderly with canes, walkers, and even wheelchairs doing their best to walk. Some only walk for 10 minutes at a time and then sit for 10 minutes and then walk for 10 minutes and then sit again and keep going. In a few weeks, they become stronger and will walk farther. It’s uplifting for me to see the effort people are making to try and become healthier. Read the post below from  VeryWell.com . Is Walking 15 Minutes Helping Me Any? Yes, your body still has burned calories that it wouldn’t have burned. If you are on a low-calorie diet, your body still will be burning fat as it doesn’t have enough calories to get through the day. But there may be a slight advantage if your wa...

Sometimes we take things for granted. We listen to the advertising, look at the attractive sign with the calories listed by the price, and think “o.k., this seems healthy. It’s a basic sandwich, how bad could it be.” Restaurant food is made to taste good, no one said it had to be good for you. The same with the prepared foods we buy at the supermarket. The object of the food industry is to make your food tastes good so that you will buy it again. In most cases, healthy food is sort of bland. It lacks the seasoning, sauces, and gravy that gives the flavor that everyone loves. All that extra flavor that we love adds extra calories but no extra nutrition. In order to lose weight, we want to eat fresh. Buy fresh fruits and vegetables, fresh poultry, and seafood, and stop drinking calories. It’s a well-known medical fact that the more calories you consume, the shorter your life span. Eating fresh and eating clean reduces your calories without dieting. When we stop drinking calories we can r...

  I should say that methods of weight loss usually work on a small percentage of those that try the method. We’re all different with different body chemistry. Using a “trial and error” method is the best way to find a way that works for you. This is the reason most people give up on weight loss. Read on and you’ll see how I found what worked for me. First, I researched all I could find about why the body adds weight. I found that once your fully grown which could be 18 to 21 years of age, you shouldn’t be adding weight. Now those years can vary for some of us. For instance, I am the same size as I was at the age of 16. Actually, I weight a few pounds less today. Second, I realize some of my weight management is just dumb luck. I used to yo-yo around a lot. You should know the whole story because in my early 20’s I never really tried to maintain my weight or exercise, but in those days, I worked blue collar and worked very hard, physical labor. I drove a route truck for Cola-Cola fo...

I wrote an entire e-book on this subject but today I want to tell you why. Why losing body fat is important. It’s not unusual that you have gained weight since you left school. Most adults gain more than 20 pounds before their middle 30’s. When you add weight in your adult years most likely you add body fat. And when you try and lose weight only a little of that weight is body fat. There’s a big difference between flabby muscles and body fat, but when an adult loses weight it’s normally more flabby muscle than fat. Why is that important? What’s important for good health is your percentage of body fat. When you’re overweight that is a case of a person carrying around too much body fat. And why is that a problem? Because your body has to maintain all body mass, fat, and muscle. In order to maintain all mass, the body has to feed all the mass with blood, and in order to do that, your body has to grow the network of veins and arteries to bring the blood into the expanded areas. Feeding...

Good question. The answer is different for everyone. If you are only 20 pounds or so over your goal weight, then a 200-pound man can expect to lose about 2 pounds a week depending on your diet, age, and activity level. Personally, I lost almost 20 pounds of fat after I retired at 66. If you’re a woman who weighs about 140 and wants to lose 20 pounds then 2 pounds every week might be too much to expect. Middle age women will find it more difficult but not impossible. The same three variables will still be critical. For instance, a young woman who has had a baby recently will lose 20 pounds faster than a woman in her late 40s who has carried the extra weight for a few years. If you have been overweight for some time, it will take longer to lose it. So several things are being considered, 20 pounds may take 2 months for a new mom to lose, or it might take a woman 200 pounds age 65, one year to drop the weight. This is what you need to consider; your weight and your age, what kind of p...