Blog on weight, How to Lose Fat on the Cheap

I was overweight and couldn't walk up a flight of stairs at work without stopping to catch my breath. I needed to lose weight. I couldn't keep up anymore. I was always tired. I didn't like my clothes or the way my clothes fit. How did this happen to me? O.K., I'll tell you the story of how I grew to be 220 pounds before I decided to lose it. I was working a very physical job when I was in my 20's and then I got hurt. While I was working I burned so many calories and my metabolism was working so fast I never had to worry about what I ate. In those days I weighed 170. I was 6 foot tall, I wasn't doing any exercise, except for work. After an injury I was in the hospital for about 5 weeks. In those days I was smoking and because I was in a ward in a private hospital with other patients with broken bones waiting for surgery, they allowed me to smoke. After a few weeks in traction and extreme pain the smoking increased to 4 packs a day. The smoking was totally out...

You want to get back to a healthy weight, but some people have been overweight for so long they don't know what their normal weight is. For the person who just doesn't know where to start, I recommend you set a small goal of 10 pounds. Lose the 10 and keep it off for 2 weeks and then work on 10 more. The second 10 will be harder and take longer, but by this time you should be feeling a little better and want to lose more. Now that you lost the first 10 and you want to lose more, you'll have to do some exercise. If your not use to exercise you have to start slow. I recommend walking. A goal of 5 miles a day is what you want to achieve. But you want to start out doing about 30 minutes a day, 5 days a week. It's easy if you have a dog. Take the dog for a walk at night. An after dinner walk will help you digest your meal, help the dog exercise, and help you. If the dog can only walk 15 or 20 minutes at first, you can both build up to 30 minutes. Don't give up because ...

When you see someone smoking, you might question “Why would you do that to yourself when you know it could kill you?” Do you react the same way when you know someone doesn’t exercise? You should. When I was at a recent medical conference, one of the presenters reminded the audience that research has shown physical inactivity to be as deadly as smoking. I was shocked at this when I first heard it a couple of years ago, but I think I was just as shocked hearing it the second time. My guess is you are too. It’s hard to imagine being inactive could be comparable to smoking, but it is. You wouldn’t dream of smoking (and if you do smoke, you’re likely trying to quit), so why poison yourself with inactivity? But many of us do. Nearly 80% of us don’t get the recommended amount of exercise . Many experts agree the inactivity epidemic is more concerning than the obesity epidemic. The benefits of exercise are numerous and irrefutable. It helps prevent heart dis...

Losing weight isn't that hard, if you really want to. You stop eating the things you're eating and start walking faster and more often. You have to change your diet and start eating fresh, healthy food; stop eating big meals and eat more often. Sounds simple, right. Then why is it so hard to lose weight? What most of us don't know is that you can't cut back on your food and lose weight.  Most of us thing that losing weight is easy. I'll just cut back on food. I'll just have coffee for breakfast or I'll just grab a snack from the snack machine and skip lunch. You can't lose weight like that. When you cut back on food your body will go into a defensive mode, it thinks you are starving and starts to hoard calories. It does happen immediately, it might take a week or two, so at first you might lose a few pounds but then you stop losing and start adding more fat. What I mean, is your body will cut the amount of calories it normally burns and storages...

I don't have a simple answer for that question. A healthy weight for anyone is constantly changing. Being at a healthy weight is really about how much body fat you have. If your Body Mass Index is lower than 25 then you're at a healthy weight. Your Body Mass Index is an indicator of the percentage of body fat you have. Look up Body Mass Index on the web and there are several websites that will show you a formula to use to find your number. If your number is between 18 and 24 then you are at a healthy weight. If your number is more than 24, you're overweight. I'm not a fan of this way of measuring body fat. If you belong to a health club or know someone that can take you, they measure body fat with a caliper. You can even buy a "body fat caliper" on the web. I read somewhere that you can buy one on Ebay for about $8. A health club will measure you free of charge. So even if you and your friend are the same height your number can be different. Muscular peopl...

Weight cycling is the repeated loss and regain of body weight. When weight cycling is the result of dieting, it's called "yo-yo" dieting. A weight cycle can range from small weight losses and weight gains (5-10 lbs. per cycle) to large changes in weight (50 lbs. or more per cycle). This is something we all have done. If you have gotten past this, you've conquered the biggest problem a dieter has. Some experts believe that weight cycling may be harmful to your health and that staying at one weight is better than weight cycling, even for those people who are obese. However, there is no convincing evidence to support these claims, and most obesity researchers believe that obese individuals would continue trying to control their body weight despite some weight cycling. Yes, that's true, but having the cycling problem is a big cause for failure. Dieters want to avoid cycling if at all possible. Most of the time your not losing body fat when you lose, but you're...

I know all of us will usually find something else to do instead of exercise, but if you have a weight problem exercise even in moderation can be the answer to your problem. We don’t always realize that we’re inactive. We think that the work we do around the house or on the job is all the activity we need, but the amount of food you eat has a direct affect on the amount of exercise you need. You must burn all the calories you eat or you will add body fat. Seniors have the same problem. You can’t stop exercising because you have a few aches or pains. Actually, I do moderate exercise to reduce my pain. I have arthritis in my hands and knees and by doing a few stretching exercises, I don’t have to take any pain killers. Read this part of an article I found about exercise. It applies to anyone who’s inactive. Research found exercise increases the odds of healthy aging as much as sevenfold. And apparently it's never too late to start: Even adults who don't begin exercising until ...