The media sounds a loud alarm over the celebrities who get too thin. And then they go right on showing us image after image of the very same women as beauty icons. It’s insane.
*The hottest boutique in Los Angeles, catering to the stars, carries only sizes 0-8.
*The average American women wears a size 12 or 14.
*The usual waist size for a celebrity’s pair of jeans is 28.
*The average woman wears a size 34 jean.

In a recent celebrity magazine, the following heights and weights were listed for five well-known performers:

*Terri Hatcher 5-6, 109 pounds
*Kate Bosworth 5-7, 107 pounds
*Lindsey Lohan 5-5, 102 pounds
*Victoria Beckham 5-6, 105 pounds
*Joan Allen 5-10, 110 pounds

All are severely underweight. This is starvation imagery. Anorexic-type bodies regularly presented as the beauty ideal.

Today’s female body is expected to be slim, trim, lean. Tight, toned muscles. Six-pack abs. Hard bodies. Sounds like a description of a man’s body doesn’t it? The only feminine characteristic remaining on today’s “perfect woman”: fake, plastic breasts. The real ones disappear when a woman is underweight.

The ideal female body looks like a young, very thin, muscular prepubescent boy with large breasts. This is where 100 years of media brainwashing has left us. “Brainwashing” seems like too strong a term until you consider that most females see 400 to 700 media-generated images of thin women every single day.

Rounded bellies, padded hips, curvy thighs. These are “problem areas” to be worked on. In reality, they are beautiful, natural qualities of a healthy female body.

It’s time we define our own style. Make our own rules. Turn our backs on the media and embrace the beautiful bodies we were been born with. It’s time to live with grace and beauty instead of self-hate and struggle.

Too many of us have learned to dislike our own bodies:
*53% of 13 year-old girls,
*78% of 17 year-old girls, and
*80% of adult women spend every day disliking the only bodies we will ever have.

How about a world where all body types are appreciated…
*Where naturally thin bodies are considered beautiful.
*Where naturally curvaceous bodies are considered beautiful.
*Where the thin aren’t trying to get plump.
*And the curvy aren’t trying to get skinny.

Let’s live in a world where the bodies we were born with are the best, most beautiful bodies we could each have.
How to do that?
*Stop buying from companies who advertise their products with starvation imagery.
*Don’t go to movies that star emaciated actresses.
*Make your voice heard. Email or write companies to complain about their irresponsible imagery.
*Swear off TV shows, fashion magazines, and other media that depict only thin women. (Just 5% of American women are naturally underweight. Among the actresses on television…it’s 87%.)
*Reinvent your sense of female beauty with images of all types of women. Old art is one of the best choices. Go out of your way to view old paintings and sculptures to help get you started.
*Reeducate your eyes to appreciate the natural, average female body.
*Don’t talk about your own weight loss or gain and don’t comment on others’ bodies in that way.
*Appreciate the women in the world around us. Practice seeing without the anorexic eyes we’ve been trained to view the world through. There is beauty in our natural curviness.
*Move with grace and pride.

You are beautiful. Reject the propaganda of starvation imagery. Love the body you’re living in, it’s the only one you get and it deserves your love, honor, and affection.

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1. Be a ‘healthy’ role model. The number one thing that parents can do is to be a good role model for their children, Parents so often unknowingly set their kids up for failure.  If there are chips, cookies and Twinkies and no fruit or vegetables when your kids look for snacks, how can they succeed?  Line your refrigerator and cabinets with fresh fruits, nuts, low-fat cheese, easy things for kids to snack on besides ‘junk food’.

In a 2000 survey conducted by the CDC, close to 80% of adults reported eating fewer than the recommended five or more servings of fruit and vegetables daily — not good role-model behavior.

2. Be positive. Don’t tell your child to ‘lose weight’ say, ‘Let’s be healthy and start taking care of our bodies’. Focus on the foods you can eat, not the ones that you should limit eating. Say, ‘Let’s go pick out fruits and make a fruit salad,’ not ‘Don’t eat this or that.’ Instead of saying, ‘We have to exercise,’ say, ‘Lets go to the park.’ Use positive words and phrases when talking with your kid.

3. Make healthy eating a family affair.  Create family meals together and for the entire family. Do not single out an overweight family member with special diet food.  Your entire family can benefit form healthy eating regardless of weight.

A family that eats together, eats better, according to a recent study in the journal Archives of Family Medicine. The study showed children who report frequent family dinners have healthier diets than their peers who don’t.

4. Avoid portion distortion. When serving food you must use portion control, buffet-type or family-style situations tends to promote overeating.  Fill up on salads and cooked vegetables  at meals and always wait 10-15 minutes before having a second helping.  Second helpings should only be taken if truly hungry.

5. Start the day off right with a good breakfast. A bowl of low-sugar cereal with low-fat milk, low-fat yogurt with a granola or breakfast bar, or an English muffin with peanut butter, rather than a doughnut or muffin. A healthy breakfast will put your family on the healthy track for the rest of the day.

6. Make time for physical activity. Make physical activity a family activity. Every night after dinner in the summer, go for a half-hour walk and make it an activity that kids look forward to. If you can afford it, enroll your kids in dancing or a sporting activity that they enjoy because they need to enjoy it to keep doing it. Or just turn on some dance music and have a dance party around the house.

7. Try again.  Weight loss and healthy eating is not easy.  There will be times when you and your family will struggle with this new lifestyle.  It is important to keep trying.  Failure is certain if you are not trying.

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There are 101 reasons why, but it can be a real pain to finally get that weight off. You push really hard, make a little progress, get side tracked, and bam you are heavier then you started.

It’s maddening.  Enough with that hassle, I have put together 5 simple steps to actually losing weight and keeping it off. These steps can be applied to anything, but we are focusing on weight loss here.

1.    Know What You Want
2.    Know Where You Are
3.    Track Your Results
4.    Make Course Corrections
5.    Being held Accountable

Now all your extra weight will effortlessly melt off.  Yeah right! A simple list of 5 items is not going to do it, so let me explain the intricacies of the 5 items and where the hang up normally occurs when applied to losing weight.

1.    Know What You Want

This one is dead simple. Most people that want to lose weight have an idea of how many pounds they would like to lose or how they would like their body to look.

I think we can safely say if your body started looking the way you wanted it, you would know, even if you didn’t have it completely mapped out and detailed.

2.    Know Where You Are

This is the big trip up. It is almost always overlooked and is the number one reason for the up and down Yo Yo effect we experience with losing weight. We are unhappy with how our body feels and how it looks and it is painful to zoom in and get an accurate picture of where we are. Unfortunately, we have to know where we are, to be able to accurately judge the results we are getting.

You are on a trip to San Diego, California. You would like to start your trip from Phoenix, Arizona, but you really don’t know where you are. No problem.  You get an Arizona/California map and find that a simple 6 hours trip west on interstate 8 will get you to San Diego.

6 hours later, you have no clue where you are and it is definitely not warm San Diego.  You feel defeated and you want to give up!  Do you blame the car? The stupid maps? San Diego? Yourself?

Now what if I told you, you were actually in New Your City, not Phoenix, Arizona. A 6 hour car ride west from New York City will never get you to San Diego.

If you took the time to accurately find out where you were, you would have been able to choose the appropriate means to get to San Diego and have an expectation as to how long it would take.

This is the same with weight loss and our personal physical condition. In our minds, we think we are starting in a different physical condition then we really are. When the results don’t follow the illusion in your mind, we get upset.

3. Track Your Results

This is conceptually simple. If we have no clue as to WHAT we are doing, how do we know what is working? It might be a simple to do, but is also simple not to do. In the end, most people never track their results.

4. Make Course Corrections

We love to do this one. We have it hands down. It is like step 1 of knowing what you want. We try the new food diet, the super sit up machine, and the cardio hip hop power energy yoga fat burner class.

We might be great at switching it up, but without knowing where we are starting from and a history of tracked results, we have no clue as to what we should change or even which direction we should go.

5. Being held Accountable

No, not accountability! That is an evil word. I don’t want someone to know what I am doing, or more importantly what I am not doing.

So, why do we resist accountability, your secret weapon to weight loss?  Because it works!  If you know someone is going to be watching, you would follow through or at least feel very uncomfortable not following through.

Accountability when used wisely is the ultimate turbo booster to your weight loss. Since you are going to be accountable anyway, you might as well get something out of it.

Using accountability up front, you can achieve the body of your dreams. If you let your body hold you accountable, it will throw on fat in places you don’t want it to be.

The biggest obstacle to weight loss is not taking any action. It doesn’t matter how good the plan is, it is worthless if you don’t follow it. So what do I do now?

First and foremost get Accountable.

Forward this article to someone you respect and care about and tell them I want to be accountable to finally taking off my extra pounds. When they agree to support you, start working through Steps 1 – 5.

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Obesity and overweight are term often used interchangeably. However, technically they refer to two different states.

Being overweight technically means excess body mass. This includes all the body tissues. Obesity on the other hand refers explicitly to excess body fat e.g. a professional heavy weight body builder is overweight because of excess muscles but is not obese.

Obesity is what should concern you. Losing weight is no longer an issue you can afford to procrastinate, and probably a good health scare is in order.

Reason #1 to lose weight

Diabetes:- It is well known that 80 -90% of type-two-diabetes patients are overweight. Diabetes is the third leading cause of death in the U.S., as well as the leading cause of adult blindness in the world. One of the direct causes of obesity is eating wrong foods. Some of these wrong foods include high glycemic foods. High glycemic foods are energy dense foods that quickly increase the level of blood glucose in your body after been eaten. This results to the body reserving the unnecessarily high glucose/energy into fat. This makes losing weight very difficult.

Releasing a hormone called insulin does this. Type-Two-diabetes occurs because the body cannot produce enough insulin to remove the excess blood glucose and store it as body fat. This will occur after straining insulin production for some time. And that’s how you end up being fat and diabetic.

Reason #2 to lose weight

Stroke:- Obesity is associated with arteriosclerosis, the build up of fatty deposits in the arteries through out your body. This makes them narrow slowing blood flow and among other things increases risk of the blood clotting. Arteries at risk include those supplying blood to the brain. If clotting occurs due to narrowed artery, it blocks blood supply to an area of the brain resulting to stroke. Losing weight reduces this risk.

Reason #3 to lose weight

Cancer:- The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates between 25% – 33% of cancer world wide are overweight and physical inactivity related. Body fat evidently promotes higher levels of insulin production and excess estoregens, a hormone. Both insulin and estorogens accelerate cell division.

[Probably to create adipose tissue; new fat cells to store fat, in addition to the regular cell division]

As research has indicated, the faster cells duplicate the more they increase chances of a cancerous cell developing. The situation is further complicated as the rapid cell division caused by the excess hormones lead also to rapid cell reproduction of the one cancerous cell, hence cancer starts to develop actively. In addition fat cells tend to keep carcinogenic i.e. cancer-causing agents, trapped in the body which increases chances of developing cancer.

Types of cancers you will be at high risk to get include:-

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It may be generally agreed that eating wisely and weight loss do not often agree. Just look back that the parade of “fad diets” that didn’t seem to work over the long term and, in retrospect, were not wise from the onset.

This article will be a “union” of ideas from Ayurvedic principles, modern fitness concepts, and overall strategies for better health.

It goes without saying that a vegetarian diet is healthy. Only a decade ago, there were many reservations, among local physicians in New England, in regard to this concept. How rapidly knowledge, insight, and opinions change.

Marie, my wife, exposed me to the vegetarian diet. Before that, I ate what is now called the “Mediterranean Diet.” The diet I eat, to this day, is a combination of the two. The combination of these two, “classic” diets, are easy for me to live with and it is not an effort, at all, for me.

That is the biggest hurdle for most people. Many of us take on a radical dieting change that we cannot live with. Most of us can afford to make a few small changes at a time, instead of changing everything at once – unless you are dieting under the guidance of your doctor or dietician.

Therefore, I propose a few small changes to your eating habits that will make sense. You do not have to change them all at one time.

Sit down and focus on eating your meal.

Avoid television, reading, heated conversations, etc.

Thoroughly chew your food at a slow pace and do not put more food in your mouth until you have swallowed the previous bite.

Be aware of how hungry you are before your meal.

Try to avoid too much time between meals, as this leads to over consumption and your stomach should never be more than three quarters full, after a meal.

Exercise tip: Some of you practice Yoga and understand the many benefits of Sun Salutations, but have you ever tried weight resistance?

Strength training increases energy expenditure during a weight resistance training session. The high intensity of strength training indicates a high utilization of carbohydrates during a training session.

During the post-exercise recovery period, energy expenditure is elevated for a period ranging from two to fifteen hours (1). The increased energy demands are obtained by burning more calories, and a good portion of the calories are coming from fat stores.

Reference (1) – Melby C, Scholl C, Edwards G, Bullough R. Effect of acute resistance exercise on post exercise energy expenditure and resting metabolic rate. Journal of Applied Physiology 75(4): 1847-1853, 1993.

Even if you work every body part just once a week, this method of cross training will effectively burn calories. When you combine this with any aerobic activity, you have a powerful combination. Rowing and bicycling are good substitute forms of resistance too.

Strategies for results: Get help from a qualified Personal Trainer, Dietician, or a Life Coach. You could do it all yourself, but how much time do you have to “spin your wheels.” without any progress? These services exist for those who don’t want to waste time and want solutions now.

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Some people in America suffer obesity through medical problems which is not fault of their own and cannot be helped but others are just far to lazy and eat far to much. Americans are taking the lead in obesity and no one seems to be doing anything about it except the medical research teams and endocrinologists who are trying to find ways to battle the bulge. With out the help of professionals it will be very hard for any obese person to loose weight, and they definitely need the support of their friends and family.

In 2004, the U.S. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ranked obesity as the number one health threat facing America and no one seems to be taking notice and doing anything about it. Obesity not only impacts your medical health but can also lead to lower self-esteem, and cause depression and discomfort in social situations, and is significantly reducing the quality of life among adults or children in American communities. Obesity in America is a growing story and needs to be tackled immediately.

Obesity is not a simple condition of eating too much. It is now recognized that obesity is a serious, chronic disease although eating to much does add to the discomfort and problem of obesity. American eating habits are different to many places, they are mainly carbohydrate eaters and that’s where the problems lye. Obesity is defined as having a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or higher. A BMI of 30, in most cases, means that an individual is about 30 pounds over their ideal weight. Calculating your BMI is the safest way to determine how overweight you are as it calculates your height to weight ratio to give you a very close estimate to what your weight should be.

Obesity in American is a serious and growing problem that is almost out of hand and needs the American people to take a look at each other and do something about it. If nothing is done then obesity is just a time bomb lurking in Americas shadows waiting to explode!

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**Book claims obesity “epidemic” is a big lie

In his new book, “Fat Politics: The Real Story Behind America’s Obesity Epidemic”, writer Eric Oliver claims that the ramped up concern over obesity in the last ten years has been driven by the weight loss industry.

According to Oliver his research led him to conclude that, “Based on the statistics most of the charges saying that obesity caused various diseases or that obesity caused thousands of deaths were simply not supported.”

The writer does not dispute that the average American adult is between 8 and 12 pounds heavier today than in 1975. But he does dispute the significance of this weight gain to average health.

He claims that pharmaceutical companies and the diet industry have funded groups like the International Obesity Task Force whose objective has been to promote the dangers of obesity. According to Oliver, “nearly every prominent obesity ‘expert’ has been financed or supported in some way by the weight-loss industry.”

One important outcome of this effort was the successful lowering of the obesity standard in 1998. As Oliver says, “Suddenly tens of millions of Americans became ‘obese’ even though they hadn’t gained a pound.”

Oliver’s main contention is that “the scientific evidence is simply not there that most people who are either ‘overweight’ or ‘obese’ are in any danger directly from their weight.”

This flies directly in the face of current orthodoxy on the impact of obesity on health. Those who warn us about obesity say it greatly increases the likelihood of conditions such as high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease, and even some cancers.

**Obesity in Children linked to lack of exercise facilities

In a study published in the February issue of Pediatrics, researcher Penny Gordon-Larsen of the University of North Carolina’s School of Public Health and Medicine looked at the correlation between overweight and availability of exercise facilities.

The researchers gathered statistics on the number of physical-activity facilities, the rate of overweight children, and the average physical activity levels for each area. Facilities included were schools, public recreation facilities, parks and YMCAs, as well as dance studios and private gyms.

Not surprisingly, the study concluded that “more disadvantaged communities have a great deficiency in terms of the number and types of exercise facilities available.”

**Link between “food insecurity” and obesity challenged

In another study conducted by researchers at Tulane University, the link between “food insecurity status” and obesity has been challenged.

Prior studies suggested that people not sure where their next meal was coming from might overeat when they got food, or possibly eat less-nutritious, higher calorie foods.

But in the study of nearly 17,0000 kindergarten children, kids in “food insecure houselholds” were found to be 20% less likely to be overweight.

The researchers concluded that some risk factors did contribute to overweight. These were low physical activity, watching TV more than two hours a day, high birth weight, being from a low-income family, and being either black or Latino.

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According to the American Heart Association (PCA), one third of children and adolescents and 66 percent of the adult population is overweight or obese. If the trend continues, there will be a reduction in life expectancy of our children, making it the first generation to live less than their parents.

Obesity in simple form is an excess of body fat. The body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference measures are most commonly used. The BMI is the ratio of weight in kilograms to height in meters measure. The normal BMI is between 18 and 24.9 kg/m2. Overweight is any measure between 25-29.9 kg/m2, and obesity a BMI greater than or equal to 30 kg/m2. The waist circumference should be <40cm in men and <35cm in women. Obesity is associated with the development of hypertension, stroke, blockage of the coronary arteries, diabetes, failure and heart rhythm disturbances. In young people, obesity is associated with the development of adult conditions such as hypertension, type 2 diabetes and cholesterol.

It is difficult to associate obesity a factor, as it develops a complex relationship that involves lifestyle, the environment and genetics. However, there is a causal relationship between poor nutrition and unhealthy lifestyles. The sedentary lifestyle, produced by busy lifestyles, overexposure to television, computers and video games, along with the excessive consumption of calories, breaks the balance needed to maintain a healthy weight.

Education is extremely important, particularly since early age, to establish good eating habits and healthy lifestyles.

To bring the message and awareness generation of young people about the importance of prevention, the American Heart Association created the Alliance for a Healthier Generation in conjunction with the foundation of former President William  Bill  Clinton.

On the Island, the association established partnership with the Government of Puerto Rico and the Puerto Rico Form.This government initiative and whose guidelines are based on those of the Heart Association, offers a real alternative for the prevention of obesity through education and offering physical activity programs, among other things.

Obesity, together with other factors such as hypertension, diabetes, hyperlipedemias and smoking is a risk factor crucial to the development of cardiovascular diseases. However, contrary to other factors, obesity (next to smoking), is the most changeable of all.

By developing or modifying good nutritional habits and increasing physical activity can have a healthier life.

Further information: Drugs in Canada Methods of Quitting Smoking

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If you are considered overweight, whether you know it or not, you are in the majority. In America, it has been recently estimated that 65% of the population is overweight with 30% being at least clinically obese. To add to this alarming statistic is the estimate that 15-20% of the nation’s children are overweight. Now, obesity is beginning to spread more and more to countries that have always had a relatively low rate of obesity, like China and Japan. This is one case where being in the majority is not considered a good thing. What really matters is, how being overweight or obese affects your overall health.

According to the body mass index, you are considered overweight if your index is between 25 and 29. If your index is over 30, you are considered obese. The American collage of sports medicine defines obesity as an amount of body fat that increases the risk of disease. As a general rule, more than 25% body fat for men and more than 32% body fat for women is considered obesity.

Let’s look at some of the most likely reasons that so many people are obese.
1: overeating
2: lack of exercise
3: genetic predisposition
4: psychological problems
5: too slow a metabolism
These are some of the things scientists are investigating as to the likely causes for obesity. Most of these can be overcome by lowering the fat in the diet and by exercising.

Regardless of the reasons for overweight and obesity, there is health risks associated with these conditions. According to the U.S.Surgeon’s report:
A bodyweight of more than 20% over ideal constitutes a definite health hazard.
Obesity is associated with a reduced life expectancy.
Risk factors for heart disease such as high cholesterol increase.
Obesity increases stress on the body joints.
Obesity increases the risk of surgery.
The presence of diabetes is nearly 3 times higher in overweight people.

According to the experts, all of these risk factors can be improved by a reduction in weight. Some have estimated that a weight loss of 10% can improve the risk factors for heart disease by 20%. Also, the greatest health benefits are reported to occur with the first 20 pounds of weight loss, which means that even if it seems to be hard to lose weight, it is still worth doing it. If you don’t lose all of the weight you want to lose, you can still improve your risk factors by losing some of the weight.

You can make losing weight a little easier if you just set a small goal at first, then when you reach that goal, set another small goal and aim for that. A good target is to try to lose 1 to 2 pounds per week. It is within reason to try to lose 10% of your current bodyweight, or 20 pounds in about six months if you are overweight.

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But what is commonly found that when people find out that obesity is embarrassing their life, they begin to torture themselves by doing various experiments like staying hungry, living only on juices or go to a gym. This kind of sudden change in one’s life leads to the worst rather than doing any benefits.

For along time from now, research was going on obesity. Though it was found that obesity cannot be cured completely, but oflate a drug named Phentermine is found to be very productive. FDA has found it to be the most effective drug to fight obesity. It is a drug which belongs to the class of anorectics that stimulates our nerverous system to inhabit the feeding centre and hence suppress our appetite. It is found that consumption of Phentermine pills along with a proper nutrition and a bit of physical exercise is very fruitful. One good thing about this drug is that it is used as a short term drug and a course can extend maximum to maximum unto 12 weeks. So within a short period of time you can get a new shape and get your self free from obesity.

Common side effects like diarrhea, impotency for a short period, insomnia as well as dizziness are said to be found in using Phentermine. So it is always better to consult a physician before including it to your daily routine and it is highly recommended for pregnant women. Generally a tablet a day is consumed before breakfast.

Do you know, how much of your work suffer due to obesity problem? In a resent survey about 40% of your work gets affected due to obesity. Along with it, your body becomes a home for various diseases. So it is always cleaver to be health conscious and try to get rid of it when you find problems due to obesity for it is not a big deal. Thanks to Phentermine.

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