Thinking of Becoming a Vegetarian?

Have you ever considered becoming a vegetarian? I have at times. My husband really loves his meat though. But after seeing this video (and having a toddler myself) I'm really serious about giving it a go for myself (sometime soon maybe).

In this video you see some agile tigers who hunt down a young buffalo. Then a crocodile tries to get their catch away from them. The fascinating part is when the buffalo herd comes back in full force to try to save their young one. This was the #1 most buzzed about YouTube video of last year. I felt a terrible revulsion at watching this, though I realize this is nature and the most natural thing these animals can do in nature. But it would be something if humanity could rise above this.

Goodbye to Chips, Cookies and Candy

Sean has lost 60 pounds. He's 6 feet tall and now weighs 280 and has much more muscle mass than when he weighed 340 eight months ago. He says eating chips, cookies and candy were 90% of his problem. At the age of 27 he was already feeling bad each morning when getting out of bed. His feet would be sore and tight. He's given up the junk food and is exercising regularly (with the help of a SWAT personal trainer) and feels great. See his success story and photo here.

The photo shown here is another success story featured on the SWAT Personal Training website.

A Virtual Weight Loss Gadget

Hi everyone. My name is Adriana and I developed the virtual weight loss gadget you see on the right sidebar. Isadora has kindly let me spout off about it here.

Although we've had this free virtual model for people to put on their website sidebars for a while now, just two weeks ago we got accepted as a gadget in iGoogle.

So now anyone who wants to try it on their own private iGoogle page can do so.

We are hoping to get some comments from people about the gadget. It's meant to be a fun tool for weight loss inspiration in that it shows what you might look like at your heaviest weight, current weight and goal weight.

One reader recently complained that the gadget makes a 100 pound woman look good in a red dress. This is something we need to fix very soon, as currently the images only go down to a BMI of 18, and everything below that looks the same. We definitely don't want to encourage thin people to try to get even thinner and are very aware of the serious illness of anorexia. (Update February 2008: We've made this change now.)

We realize this virtual model is simplistic and there's little people can add on it to make it look more like themselves. But our mega maniacal hope is that if enough people like it and use it, that we might qualify for Google's gadget seed investment program. At that point we would receive the funding to develop this model into something much more versatile and exciting!

There is one other virtual model that we are aware of and this is much more sophisticated than ours. It's called the My Virtual Model and it was developed by a very successful company that employs over 100 people. (See my overview of My Virtual Model on Squidoo for more info). One day we'd like to compete with My Virtual Model ! ;-)

I hope you have fun trying this gadget out and would appreciate any feedback.

Celebrity Diet Secrets

The Daily Mail has an entertaining article today about celebrity diet secrets. These celebrity diet tips are taken from the The Black Book of Hollywood Diet Secrets. They list the tips alphabetically. Here's a couple of examples;

A IS FOR ASPARAGUS: Celebrities live on it. It's a natural diuretic, it diminishes bloating and is on every Hollywood insider's must-eat list. Actor Owen Wilson never misses his daily double dose of asparagus and parsley.

B IS FOR BLUE PLATES: Why? Blue is the least appetizing color for human beings and studies show when you eat from a blue plate you eat less.

E IS FOR EPSOM SALTS: By bathing in these, you can actually-soak away the pounds

But despite all these entertaining tips, the main secret lies at the bottom of the article where the author says "These women don't skip the gym - ever. If they have to get up at 5am to start filming, they will get up at 3am to work out."

Check out their article about celebrity diet secrets here.

Craving Sweets or Alcohol?

If you crave sweets this may mean you have a vitamin deficiency and that if you ate more of certain foods it would be easier to quell and drastically reduce your craving for sweets.

Naturopathic medical doctor Colleen Huber says that if you crave sweets, what you really need are nutrients such as chromium (so eat more broccoli, grapes, cheese, dried beans and chicken) or carbon (eat more fresh fruit) or phosphorus (eat more chicken, beef, liver, fish, eggs, nuts, legumes) or sulfur (eat more cranberries, horseradish, cruciferous vegetables, kale, cabbage) or lastly tryptophan (eat more cheese, lamb, raisins, sweet potato and spinach}.

If your particular sweet craving is usually about chocolate, you are probably craving magnesium. Curb your desire for chocolate by eating lots of raw nuts and seeds, legumes and fruits.

See a very interesting list about various food and alcohol cravings and how they are related to mineral or vitamin deficiencies.

The art print above is by Jean-Baptiste Simeon Chardin

SuperFoods RX as a Focus

SuperFoods Rx is one of the few weight loss books that gets a five star rating on Amazon. The book has been out for over a year and has helped a lot of people. Essentially it recommends eating much more of the 14 healthiest foods and their substitutes.

Here are the superfoods;

* Beans -- reduce obesity
* Blueberries -- lower risk for cardiovascular disease
* Broccoli -- lowers the incidence of cataracts and fights birth defects
* Oats -- reduce the risk of type II diabetes
* Oranges -- prevent strokes
* Pumpkin -- lowers the risk of various cancers
* Wild salmon -- lowers the risk of heart disease
* Soy -- lowers cholesterol
* Spinach -- decreases chances of cardiovascular disease & age-related macular degeneration
* Tea -- helps prevent osteoporosis
* Tomatoes -- raise the skin's sun protection factor
* Turkey -- helps build a strong immune system
* Walnuts - reduce risk of developing coronary heart disease, diabetes, & cancer
* Yogurt-- promotes strong bones and a healthy heart

Here's one readers comments on Amazon;

I was never much of a cook, but I have always been interested in getting my family to eat healthy foods, and this book has shown me how easy it is to do just that. The 14 foods listed as "Superfoods" are delicious, and the authors include numerous "sidekicks," or foods that offer the same or similar benefits. After just one month of preparing foods using the recommendations in "SuperFoods Rx," everyone in my family has experienced significant health benefits--my husband's cholesterol level plummeted, and lifelong digestive problems have disappeared. Best of all, everyone from ages six to fifty LOVE the meals (one favorite is a stew I invented that contains turkey, carrots, cabbage, canned tomatoes, beans, spinach, onions, cubes of firm tofu and/or whatever else is on hand; I use Goya "cubitos" and seasoning for a delicious broth). Nobody wants sugar cookies anymore, now that we can go to the fridge anytime and enjoy luscious cultured yogurt with blueberries and diced walnuts, fresh watermelon--even some yummy dark chocolate with a pot of green or black tea. The possibilities are endless!!
Diets do not work--they are temporary, often based on absurd principles, and only perpetuate an unhealthy obsession with food. As the authors point out, what is needed is a permanent change for the better in eating habits for the entire family.

See a good interview with the author of SuperFoods RX here.

The accompanying book The Superfoods Rx Diet: Lose Weight with the Power of SuperNutrients was just released last week and is already one of the bestsellers on Amazon.

30 Pounds to Go

Meredith has 30 pounds left to go. She is halfway to her goal weight. Last year her goal was to lose sixty pounds and she succeeded in losing thirty. She did this by cutting out a lot of sugar and exercising regularly. She went from a size 16 to a size 12 (she is 5'10") and was feeling pretty proud and comfortable with her weight as she had not fit into a size 12 since she was a kid.

But over Christmas her father spent a long time in the emergency room in the hospital due to his Type II diabetes. She says;

There are few things that I fear more than developing Type II diabetes. I've seen how it can maim and cripple both mind and body when left unchecked, or when lifelong habits prove insurmountable. Having full and proper use of my limbs, appendages and brain is a better motivator than being able to tug on size-8 jeans, though you'd think otherwise if you read my food journals from the past few years.

Now she is determined to lose thirty more pounds. See her story; 30 Pounds to Go.