Your posture can affect your weight

People who rush and eat standing up, in the car, talking on the phone or while watching television
are prone to eating more volume than people who take the time to sit down and savor food. Typically, quick consumption of calories leads people to continue eating before realizing they are full. It must become a
practice, states Connie Guttersen, author of The Sonoma Diet. Enjoying food, especially with the people you love, not only helps your waist line stay in shape but your entire state of living become more enjoyable.

Toxins affect your weight.  When you clean your home, do your laundry, wash your dishes are you using products that are non-toxic (don't have chemicals) and biodegradeable (break up)?  If not, there are several reasons why you should:

1. Toxins absorb in the fat cells of the body, which promotes weight gain.
2. Toxins cause cancer, lupus, MS, asthma, allergies and the list goes on.
3. If you are buying store bought items, you are getting toxins and they are not breaking up in the septic fields, in your pipes, and in the sewer system, which hurts our planet.

What can you do?  Loosing weight is a Cinch and when following the program for 12 weeks you can Get Clean.  Click on the names and learn more.

You can also call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308 for a complimentary Personal Confidential Nutrition Consultation.   

Eat well in tight times

Do you have to give up eating well because your budget has been reduced?  No.  According to Catharine H.Powers R.D. of the Nutrient-Rich Foods Coalition, "If you do it right, it's cheaper than what you're doing now."  Catharine goes on to say, "if you wait until 6 p.m.to decide what to eat for dinner you won't have all the ingredients." 

You don' t need to eat meat every day.  If you're family won't go meatless, reduce portions to 3 ounces and the meat will last for more than one meal. 

Want to add nutritional value to convenience foods?  Add frozen mixed vegetables to noodles or mix grated reduced-fat cheddar cheese into macaroni and cheese from a box.

Smart Switches

Switch from   Individual packets of sweetened oatmeal
To                  Quick-cooking oats

Switch from    Hamburger and pasta seasoning mix
To                   Whole-grain pasta, dried herbs

Switch from     Instant rice
To                    Brown rice or quick-cooking brown rice

These are a few of the switches Catharine recommended.

You can do switches in smart ways without overwhelming yourself or your family.  One is make one  or two of the above changes in a month and continue to do this on a monthly basis.  Or just do it without telling your family.  They probably won't even notice if you are the primary cook in the house.  Most importantly food will taste better and it is better for everyone.

Are Multivitamins Dead?

When I was pregnant, I thought the pre-natal vitamin was good.  But then it was packed with iron and well I didn't do so well with the iron.  It wasn't the iron, it was what they didn't put with the iron to help it absorb into my body.  Why?  It was synthetic. 

In the November 2010 article in Prevention Magazine there was an article "Should you Kick the Multivitamin Habit?"

The article concluded that multivitamins provide not proven benefit and may actually cause harm.    the readers of Prevention were encouraged instead to focus on supplements containing Vitamin D, omega-3 fatty acids and calcium.

So, the quesiton becomes "Are multivimins dead?"

The media only gives half the story.  Why?  Pharmaceutical companies don't want us to take whole food supplements.  Think about it.  If we eat healthy 80% of the time, exercise and take a high end natural line of supplements, we won't need prescriptions or we will need a bare minimum.  Thus reducing their profits significantly. 

Balance is the key.  Are multivitamins good?  Depends on what brand you take.  Should that be the only thing you take?  It depends on you.  Age, lifestyle, gender, all of these factors need to be considered when determining what supplements you need.

Who can help?  ME.  I am passionate about helping people who want an honest, reliable and trusting person.  

We can work together to  help you live a long, healthy and HAPPY life. 

Sugar

It is said that we do need some sugar for brain health.  However, like with many things, too much of one thing is not good for the body and the mind. 

Today is Halloween.  How much sugar will your child consume?  According to UCLA med research we lose 5 hours of immunity for every tsp of sugar we consume.

If you're like me you "help" your child eat candy.  I can eat one piece and that satisfies my craving.  But it is hard to resist candy and maybe you like to eat more than one piece and your child is the same way.  We do like to give our children treats.

However, what happens is eating candy and Halloween being in the cold and flu season, children get sick.  So how can you let your child indulge one day and still help him with his immune system?  Well one is giving them a good dinner before trick or treating.  Two, supplements (vitamins and herbs that we can't get from our food supply).  This offsets the affect of candy, keep in mind it doesn't replace good food (fresh fruits and veggies).

Here are supplements I recommend:  Multi vitamin, vitamin C, immune builder, probiotic.

Prevention is the key to something as common as the cold to cancer.

Have a Happy and Healthy Halloween.

Mary Beth

Low Fat vs Low Carb

Literally dozens of studies have been published on the subject.  They are in agreement that initial weight loss (mostly water) is faster on the low carbe diets but weight lostt at one or two years is essentially the same on both.

The unique feature of the study just published inAnnals of Internal Medicine (153: 147-157, 2010) was that it included an intensive behavior modification program to optimize the weight loss over the two year period of the study.

Here is how the study was conducted: 

The low-carbohydrate group was instructed to eat no more than 20 grams of carbohydrate per day for 3 months and then to increase the carbohydrate by no more than 5 grams per day each week until they achieved their desired weight.

The low-fat group was instructed to decrease calories and restrict fat intake to no more than 30% of calories.

All of the patients were enrolled in a lifestyle program designed to help them improve their physical activity and other lifestyle factors.

The program met weekly for 20 weeks, every other week for another 20 weeks, and then monthly for the rest of the 2-year study. In short, this was a very good behavior modification program.  Weight, blood pressure, blood lipid levels and side effects were measured at the beginning of the program and at 3, 6, 12 and 24 months.  Considering the enormous effort put into behavior modification, the results of this study were somewhat disappointing.

The participants lost an average of only 22 pounds and the end of year one and had gained back 7 of those
pounds by the end of year two.  And that only included the ~50% who stayed with the program for the whole two years. Who knows how much weight was gained by the people who dropped out of the study?

Since the behavior modification program used in this study did not significantly impact either weight loss or weight maintenance, it's perhaps not surprising that the other findings of this study are pretty much the same as the findings from previous studies. 

Weight loss was slightly greater in the low carb group at 6 months, but did not differ significantly between the two groups at either 1 year or two years.  Triglyceride levels and blood pressure were lower for the low carb group at 6 and 12 months, but were the same for both groups at 2 years.

The only significant differences between the two groups at 2 years were LDL (bad) cholesterol levels - which
were significantly lower in the low fat group - and HDL (good) cholesterol levels - which were significantly higher in the low carb group.

Ironically, I've already seen blogs from proponents of the low carb diets trumpeting the increase in HDL levels as "proof" that low carb diets are better for your heart.

But, it's not just HDL or LDL that's important, it's the ratio of total cholesterol to HDL cholesterol that
determines your risk of heart disease.  And at two years the ratio of total cholesterol to HDL cholesterol was virtually identical on the two diets.

As for side effects, the patients on the low carb diet reported more constipation and more problems with bad
breath. If you've beeen on a low carb diet before, that's probably not news to you.

So what is the take home message from this study? 

1) The laws of thermodynamics still work. It's all about calories in versus calories out. Low carb and low fat diets work equally well for weight loss.

2) If you just focus on blood lipid levels and blood pressure there is also no significant difference between the two diets.

However, I still recommend against high fat (low carb) diets as a long term lifestyle strategy.  We know that high fat diets are much more likely to cause inflammation - which is a risk factor for multiple diseases.  We also know that long term consumption of high fat diets is associated with increased risk of heart disease, certain types of cancers & diabetes.

So a diet is a way of changing your eating habits. 
 
Thank you Dr. Chaney for providing this excellent information.  
 
What if you could loose the fat and maintain/increase muscle, without it being difficult, would you do it?  Is it a Cinch?  Call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308 and find out how simple it is.

Will Belly Fat make you dumb?

Abdominal obesity (otherwise known as "belly fat") increases your risk of dying from both heart disease and cancer.

But you probably knew that already.

Here is a recent study that breaks new ground and should really grab your attention.

This study showed that abdominal obesity dramatically increases your risk of developing dementia as you age (RA Whitmer et al, Neurology, 71: 1057-1064, 2008).

This study involved 6,583 members of Kaiser Permanente of Northern California, ages 40 to 45, who had their abdominal obesity measured between 1964 and 1973.

The investigators then pulled their medical records between 1994 and 2006 when they were between 73 and 87 years old and asked how many of them had dementia.

The results may shock you.

The participants were divided into five groups based on their abdominal circumference. Those with the largest abdominal circumference were nearly 3 times more likely to have developed dementia than those with the smallest abdominal circumference.

And that was after the data were adjusted for age, sex, race, education, diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, stroke and heart disease - all factors that are known to affect the risk of dementia.

Interestingly enough the abdominal circumference was a better predictor of dementia risk than was BMI, the most frequently used measure of obesity.

Those subjects who had high abdominal obesity and normal BMI had a 2-fold increased risk of developing dementia, while those subjects who were obese but had normal abdominal circumference had only an 80% increased risk of developing dementia.

Of course, those people who were both obese and had a large belly were the worst off - they had almost a 4- fold increased risk of developing dementia.

Are you thinking, "If I don't like what I see when I look into the mirror, am I doomed to develop dementia when I get older?"

The answer is no. Most experts feel that the effects of abdominal obesity are reversible.

But the time to act is now!

If you wait until you get older, you might just forget that you ever read this article.

Thank you to Dr. Stephen Chaney for this valuable information.

If you are reading this, know there is a safe, tasty way to loose that belly fat.  Contact Mary Beth at Mama Bear Productions to find out how much of a Cinch it really is!

Soy and Boys

You've probably seen some of those web sites talking about the dangers of soy - or read newsletters based on the information in those web sites.

If you believed those web, sites you would think that soy protein products were some sort of evil plot to undermine the health of the American public.

A topic that is not always discussed but a concern especially to moms.  The effect of soy on males.

The anti-soy web sites claim that the weak estrogenic effect of soy isoflavones can cause feminization of boys and weaken men's sexual drive and reproductive ability (Evidently, someone forgot to tell the Chinese about that last one!).

That is nonsense because testosterone is structurally very similar to estrogen.

The soy isoflavones resemble natural testosterone just as much as they resemble natural estrogen - which is probably why some studies show that soy isoflavones slow the increase in PSA levels for men with prostate cancer.
 
The claims found in the anti-soy sites are primarily based on animal studies, but that is misleading because mice don't metabolize the soy isoflavones in the same way that humans do.

Two recently published studies have looked at the effects of isoflavones and isoflavone-containing soy protein in men. Both analyzed multiple previously published double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trials (meta-analyses). This approach increases the statistical power of the conclusions by smoothing out some of the natural variation seen in individual studies.
 
The first study (Hamilton-Reeves et al, Fertil June 11, E-pub ahead of print, 2009) combined the results of 15 clinical trials and showed that soy isoflavones and isoflavone-containing soy protein intake had no effect on:  total and free testosterone, sex hormone binding globulin (a protein that binds to, and stabilizes, testosterone in the bloodstream,  and free androgen index (FAI) - an index of all of the hormones in the bloodstream that have masculinization effects (Yes, guys - it's not just testosterone that makes us who we are).
 
The second study (Messina, Fertil. Steril., 93:2095-2104, 2010) combined the results of 9 clinical trials and showed that soy isoflavones and isoflavone containing soy protein consumption had no effect on:  total or free testosterone levels, circulating estrogen levels (Yes, guys - we do make some estrogen), sperm or semen parameters (Some guys might argue that this is the bottom line).
So the definitive results are in and, once again the Emperors (the doctors writing the ant-soy web sites) have been shown to have no clothes.

So soy and boys are a good combination.  Thank you to Dr. Stephen Chaney for this excellent information.

To find out about high quality and non GMO Soy Protein products, click here.  Or call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308.

Belly Fat -- Will it make you dumb

This week is great information from Dr. Chaney.  My hope is that this recent study that breaks new ground will really grab your attention.

This study showed that abdominal obesity dramatically increases your risk of developing dementia as you age (RA Whitmer et al, Neurology, 71: 1057-1064, 2008).

This study involved 6,583 members of Kaiser Permanente of Northern California, ages 40 to 45, who had their abdominal obesity measured between 1964 and 1973.

The investigators then pulled their medical records between 1994 and 2006 when they were between 73 and 87 years old and asked how many of them had dementia.

The results may shock you.

The participants were divided into five groups based on their abdominal circumference. Those with the largest abdominal circumference were nearly 3 times more likely to have developed dementia than those with the smallest abdominal circumference.

And that was after the data were adjusted for age, sex, race, education, diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, stroke and heart disease - all factors that are known to affect the risk of dementia.

Interestingly enough the abdominal circumference was a better predictor of dementia risk than was BMI, the most frequently used measure of obesity.

Those subjects who had high abdominal obesity and normal BMI had a 2-fold increased risk of developing dementia, while those subjects who were obese but had normal abdominal circumference had only an 80% increased risk of developing dementia.

Of course, those people who were both obese and had a large belly were the worst off - they had almost a 4- fold increased risk of developing dementia.

Now let's get to the question that I'm sure that many of you are dying to ask:  "If I don't like what I see when I look into the mirror, am I doomed to develop dementia when I get older?"  The answer is no. Most experts feel that the effects of abdominal obesity are reversible.

But the time to act is now!

If you wait until you get older, you might just forget that you ever read this article.

It is a Cinch to reduce the Belly Fat.  Click here.

Of course you can call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308 for your Personal Confidential Nutrition Consultation. 

My passion is to help people.

That's the Fat Jack

We don't like to discuss it, but that doesn't make it go away.  What?  BELLY FAT!  Have you heard about the dangers of abdominal obesity?

Belly fat increases the risk of:

diabetes

heart disease

cancer

Did you know that it could literally be killing you, even if you are at an ideal body weight?

A group of scientists at the National Institutes of Health recently analyzed data collected from 44,000 women in the Nurses' Health Study over a 16-year period and asked if abdominal obesity affected their death rates from heart disease and cancer (Zhang et al, Circulation, 117: 1658-1667, 2008).

The answer was yes!

You ask "How can they be at ideal body weight and still have abdominal obesity?"Of course, the women who were both overweight and had abdominal obesity were even more likely to die from heart disease or cancer.

There is a natural tendency to lose muscle mass as we age. When we add in the inactivity associated with the American lifestyle that loss of muscle mass is accelerated and the muscle is replaced with fat.

Thus, it is actually possible in today's world to have both normal weight and abdominal obesity - and that is not a good thing!
So it is not just about not looking good in your bathing suit - abdominal obesity is a killer!

The good news is that you can do something about abdominal obesity.  A combination of exercise, a healthy diet and the "Cinch Inch Loss Plan" is a proven way of getting rid of that unsightly belly fat forever!

Thank you to Dr. Stephen Chaney for this information.

If you want a credible person to speak with who will help you get rid of abdominal obesity (belly fat) and want confidentiality, call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308.

What is Resveratrol and what good can it do?

It has been awhile since I've posted any information in my blog.  Life has a way of throwing curve balls, right?  Anyway in getting back on track, I wondered what would be good information to provide.  Many testimonies and emails told me to write about resveratrol. 

What is resveratrol?  According to MD Cancer Center, A substance found in the skins of grapes and in certain other plants, fruits and seeds. It is made by various plants to help defend against invading fungi, stress, injury, infection and too much sunlight. It is being studied in the prevention of cancer and heart disease. ... 


So what good is it?  Why should we take resveratrol?  Are all resveratrol supplements the same? 

Resveratrol, when combined with elderberry extract, pomegranate juice, elderberry juice powder and pomegranate extract is a concentrated supplement that actually gets to the DNA level in our bodies.
Why should we take it?  If you want to slow down the aging process, have more energy,  address health issues, wanting to prevent a health issue that is hereditary, etc.  then you would want to take this specific formula.

Like a multi-vitamin there are many products out there that claim to be natural, the best, the cheapest, etc.  So if you're like me, you want a company that puts science and research first.  A company that doesn't make something because it is the fad.  A reputable company that has it's consumers' best interest at heart. 

If' you're like me, you want to live a long HEALTHY life and not be a victim to prescription drugs.   You only want side benefits!

Click here to see what I'm talking about.  Call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308 if you want vitality and increase your energy level.

Many blessings,

Mary Beth

What's that smell?

Do you walk down the isle that has detergents, cleaning products, fabric softeners and the like?  If I must go down that isle for something other than those products, I run.  The smells are so strong and too fragrant for me.  Some people like those smells.  They think clean smells just like that.  But did you know clean really doesn't have a fragrance?

But did you realize that many of the cleaners that you buy in the supermarket - and some of the biodegradable cleaners that you buy in the health food store - release toxic fumes in your home that can adversely affect the health of you and your children?  Want to know if the products you use are dangerous to your family's health and to your health?  See the list.

Dr. Stephen Chaney relayed the following:  The prevalence of childhood asthma increased 74% between 1980 and 1994 and has continued to increase in the years since.  The causes of this rapid increase in asthma prevalence are likely to be complex, but evidence has accumulated in recent years that some of the increase may be caused by early exposure to toxic chemical fumes in the home.

And to get the smell out of the home, well no one opens their windows any more.  That would be wasting energy and contributing to global warming.

The other thing is that we live in a fast paced world.  No news to you, right?  So we want something that will clean without a lot of effort.  Here's what I know, my family doesn't get headaches when they are cleaning (yes my son 15 and daughter 12 help clean the house), I don't have to worry about pets getting sick or something fatal because they licked the floor, and if I don't want to use gloves when I'm cleaning my hands don't feel like they've been in the desert for 40 days. Why?  Click here to find out what I use.

If you want to do everything you can to prevent illness, have clean air in your home, save money, and reduce landfills, call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308.

Who is testing your supplements?

Thank you to Dr. Stephen Chaney for providing this information.  This is the rest of the story from March 10.

The FDA did not initiate the law suits and force the manufacturers to take their contaminated products off the shelves.

Instead an environmental consumers group had to sue them for not including PCBs on the label! They sued them under California proposition 65 which requires a warning label whenever a product contains toxic ingredients.

The defendants in this lawsuit were Omega Protein, a Houston-based company that is the world's largest producer of omega-3 fish oil, and the many companies that they produced fish oil for - companies like Rite Aid, CVS, GNC, Now Health Group, Pharmavite, Solgar and Twinlab.

And those aren't the only ones. The Mateel Environmental Justice Foundation only tested 10 omega-3 supplements manufactured by Omega Protein to date and have found PCBs in all of them. They plan to continue testing and to add other companies to the lawsuit if their products are also contaminated.

Even scarier is that many of labels on these products said that the omega-3 supplement was treated to reduce or remove PCBs. As a consumer you were lead to believe that they were safe!  The bottom line is that the manufacturer probably didn't test for PCBs and neither did the companies selling their omega-3 supplements to the consumer.

The alternative - that they tested the products, knew that they were contaminated with PCBs and sold them to the public anyway - is even worse.  As if that weren't scary enough the FDA announced a massive recall of products containing textured vegetable protein manufactured by a company called Basic Food Flavors because of salmonella contamination.

The problem is that there are at least 56 different kinds of consumer products containing this company's textured vegetable protein - including salad dressings, dips, packaged snacks, potato chips and soup mixes (Who knew that salad dressings contained textured vegetable protein?).

That means that this recall will be huge. It will affect many foods that most people buy and use every day.

What can you do as a consumer to protect yourself?

1. Get your supplements from an established company with a reputation for quality and integrity. I would recommend choosing a company that has been around for a number of years so that you know that their reputation is based on their track record over the years rather than just on hype.
2. Make sure that they run rigorous quality controls on their products. I would choose a company that requires pharmaceutical grade quality controls on their products.
3. Make sure that they have published clinical studies on their products that prove both safety and effectiveness. Again I would recommend choosing a company that has many published clinical studies on their products rather than just one or two.

Of course, I am here to help you.  Call Mama Bear Productions at 810-813-3308.

Who's Testing Your Supplements

It's so tempting... You've been getting your supplements from a company that you know and trust - a company that does clinical studies on their products and performs rigorous quality controls.

You know their products are pure, safe and effective... BUT... You're shopping in your favorite drug store or discount store and you see the same supplements for just a couple of dollars! You can't help thinking... "Wow! Here's the same stuff I've been taking for a lot less money"..."Why not save my money?"..."They must have run some quality control tests on their products"... "After all, how bad can they be?"

The answer is - pretty bad! Check out the following information from Stephen Chaney, PhD.
The events of last week illustrate just how bad. On March 2nd, 2010 the makers and sellers of fish oil supplements were sued by the Mateel Environmental Justice Foundation in California for not telling consumers that their products contained toxic levels of PCBs.
The FDA did not initiate this action and force the manufacturers to take their contaminated products off the shelves. Instead an environmental consumers group had to sue them for not including PCBs on the label! They sued them under California proposition 65 which requires a warning label whenever a product contains toxic ingredients.
The defendants in this lawsuit were Omega Protein, a Houston-based company that is the world's largest producer of omega-3 fish oil, and the many companies that they produced fish oil for - companies like Rite Aid, CVS, GNC, Now Health Group, Pharmavite, Solgar and Twinlab.

And those aren't the only ones. The Mateel Environmental Justice Foundation only tested 10 omega-3 supplements manufactured by Omega Protein to date and have found PCBs in all of them. They plan to continue testing and to add other companies to the lawsuit if their products are also contaminated.

Stay tuned next week for the rest of the story.
 
Mary Beth Potrykus
Mama Bear Productions

GE-Alfalfa

What is GE Alfalfa?  It is geneticially engineered Alfalfa.  Translation is chemically grown Alfalfa. 

Many people put price before quality.  What has happened is that many organic farmers are becoming extinct.  The reason being is that they their crops are being grown the way they use to back in the pioneer days.  Naturally.  Part of which is crop rotation, limited or no pesticides and herbicides (which is a word that is misused as they are chemicals and, basically, not good for humans or animals). 

Organic contamination is devastating for organic farmers, especially organic dairy farmers, most of whom use organic alfalfa for feed. The presence of even the smallest amount of GE material can cause a farm to lose its organic certification.  To read the whole story, click here. 

Tell the USDA you can about GE contamination.  Keep Monsanto's genes out of our food! 

What we do today, affects our children's future.  Be a part of the change!!

Zero Calories

Dr. Stephen Chaney once again brings up excellent facts on why people can't loose weight. 

"Are "zero calorie" foods making you fat?"

That question might seem like a no-brainer. Eating calorie-free foods rather than foods that contain calories has to be helpful in keeping your weight under control. Right? Let's look at calorie free soft drinks.

Between the years 1987 and 2000 the number of people drinking calorie free soft drinks in this country increased from 70 million to 160 million.

During that same period of time:
- the percentage of adults who were overweight increased from 52% to 66%.
- the percentage of adults who were obese (obese is defined as a BMI greater than 30) increased from 20% to 32%
- the percentage of children who were obese increased from 10% to 17%.
The answer is that we are using these calorie-free soft drinks to wash down Big Macs plus fries, Mrs. Fields' super-size brownies and Starbucks' chocolate chip muffins. 

The theory is that the high sweetness of both diet and regular soft drinks causes the brain to release chemicals that make us crave other sweet foods - so we eat more.

Before I knew how harmful aspartame is, I was just like that.  Big Mac and Diet Coke.

There is some evidence that they may even be making your weight control problems worse by encouraging you to eat high calorie foods to go along with them.  Also, aspartame has been linked to neurological problems. 

So the next time you reach for that "zero calorie" soft drink or the packets of "zero calorie" sweeteners to add to your coffee or tea, just be aware that there is no evidence that they are useful in helping you control your weight.

Now this is the short version of what Dr. Chaney has to say on Zero Calories.  Want the whole story?  Contact Mary Beth at marybeth1957@sbcglobal.net

Muscle Mass

Have you ever heard that loosing inches is more important than loosing pounds?  Why?  Muscle weighs more than fat.  Really it does!  Most diets a person looses pounds of fat as well as muscle mass.  

According to Dr. Chaney, you lose about 5 pounds of muscle for every 12 pounds of weight loss.

Lean muscle is important as it speeds up the metabolism naturally.  One pound of muscle burns 50 calories a day so that 5 pounds you just lost means it cost you 250 calories a day. 
  
If you continue to loose weight at that same rate, you will need to reduce your calories by about 250-500 calories per day.  Yikes!  Let's say that you lose 12 or 24 pounds (corresponding to 5-10 pounds of muscle or 250 to 500 calories per day) and go off of your diet because you got discouraged by the plateau.

When you regain your weight it comes back mostly as fat, not as muscle.  You need to again reduce your calorie intake 250-500 calories a day.  Are you following me?  Then you regain more weight back then where you were at in the beginning.  Now you understand the cause of the dreaded weight loss yo-yo!  

Adding exercise can't do it all.  What you eat is important as well.  This is where leucine comes in.  What is leucine?  Leucine is an essential amino acid.  Leucine has been used by bodybuilders for years to increase muscle mass when they are working out.  It has just been in the last few years that evidence started to accumulate that leucine can also help preserve muscle mass when people are losing weight.  This research was spearheaded by Dr. D.K. Layman and colleagues at the University of Illinois.

How can you get leucine in your diet without a prescription or chemicals?  Cinch.  Cinch is a weight management program.  Click here and find out more about Cinch.

Look next week for more information on lean muscle mass.  We can help you to achieve your New Year's Resolution.

Calories Rule Part 3

Don't forget the other part of the calorie equation.

That's right, exercise.  While you burn some calories every time you exercise, the real value of exercise is that it increases lean muscle mass and lean muscle mass burns more calories than fat.

Again, if you consult the National Weight Control Registry, you will find that virtually everyone who has been successful at keeping the weight off exercises on an almost daily basis.

Don't start if you can't finish.

Once again, the National Weight Control Registry puts that in perfect perspective.

Almost everyone who was successful at keeping the weight off long term had stopped thinking of it as a diet. It was just a way of life.

It was how they ate. It was the exercise that they liked to do on a daily basis. It no longer required any conscious effort. It no longer required any will power.

This is perhaps the most important weight control principle of all.

When you make your resolutions this New Year, don't make a resolution to change your weight.  Make a resolution to change your life!

A BIG thank you to Dr. Stephen Chaney who provided this information. 

If you or anyone you know, is looking for a reliable source to personally help them with weight management, lifestyle changes, and feeling wonderful call me at 810-813-3308.

To your health.

Mary Beth

Calories Rule continued

According to Dr. Stephen Chaney, "Your body type or blood type has absolutely nothing to do with which diet is going to work best for you." 

Changes in your diet will be necessary.  You will want to drop some foods from your diet and include some foods and drinks that are new to you.  Think about what you are eating and make conscious choices about which foods are helping you fulfill your goals of losing weight and which are not.

The diet should be one that is healthy in the long run.

Particularly the popular high fat, low carbohydrate diets.  It is clear that diets high in fat, particularly saturated and trans fats, are associated with increased risk of heart disease, diabetes, cancer and inflammatory diseases.  Plus high fat diets just don't work well for long term weight control.  Fat has more calories than carbohydrates. 

If it is hard to believe what Dr. Chaney has reported, you may consult the National Weight Control Registry.  This was established in 1994 and has tracked the weight loss strategies of over 5000 peple who have been successful at keeping their weight off long term.

While those people lost weight using every diet in the books, the vast majority of them that were successful at keeping their weight off long term, followed a low calorie, low-fat diet to maintain their weight loss.

Part three is next week and how you can achieve your goal weight and, more importanly, maintain that weight