Great ways to lose weight successfully

It is important to understand the mechanics of weight gain and loss if we are going to be successful in your quest to lose weight. We must ask ourselves the question Why did I put on weight in the first place? If we answer this question honestly we can look at changing our lifestyles to find ways to lose weight. The frightening trend towards obesity and premature death due to the effects of obesity in one trend we need to buck or we will become another statistic.

Food is a mainly a combination of the big three - proteins, fats and carbohydrates with some minerals and vitamins included. Each contributes to building our health and maintaining our bodies. Each is essential to good health and longevity and has a role to play in helping us lose weight. Food will become your friend and ally in losing weight, not an enemy to be quelled.

Starting with proteins, we find the building blocks of muscle, skin, nails and hair. Proteins are composed of different combinations of 20 amino acids. Amino acids are the building blocks of our genes and chromosomes. Our body digests proteins and breaks them down into these amino acids which are used to repair the body. Muscle, skin and connective tissue is made from proteins. Even your hair and nails. One gram of protein contains 4 calories of energy and this energy is used for repairing damaged tissue or building new tissues. Some proteins are called complete proteins, which mean that every amino acid the body needs for good health is present. All animal proteins from meat are complete and soy bean proteins are complete. Vegetable proteins are incomplete and cant sustain healthy life by themselves but only in combination with other incomplete proteins. For example beans are incomplete but eaten with corn or maize they are complete. This combining is important for vegetarians to understand. Proteins cannot make you fat because of the way the body digests them.

Fats range from oils found in nuts, grains and fruits like avocadoes and olives to the fats found in meats. A gram of fat contains 10 calories of energy. Fats are used to transport certain vitamins and minerals into the body and our bodies would stop functioning without them. Our brains are predominately made of fat (so the insult fathead isnt actually such an insult!) Fats provide much of the flavor of foods and very low fat diets are very tasteless diets. Excess fats are passed out through the bowel through the action of the liver and the gall bladder. Even though they contain lots of calories fats have been wrongly accused of causing weight gain. It is the next group that cause us the weight gain problems.

Carbohydrates. Carbohydrates contain carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. The body uses carbohydrates to supply energy and they are energy-packed. They contain their own oxygen molecule which assists the mitochondria in the cells to release the energy contained in the carbohydrates. One gram of carbohydrate contains 4 calories. Carbohydrates are sugars, both processed cane sugars, palm sugars, natural fruit sugars like fructose and corn syrup, and starches in grains such as bread. All sugars are carbohydrates and regardless of their source are treated by the body the same, so choosing to use a natural sugar like fructose over cane sugar makes no difference to the body. A calorie is a calorie regardless of the type of carbohydrate. Fruit, flour and wheat, alcohol, beer and wine all contain carbohydrates.

The body needs carbohydrates for energy and it uses a fascinating process called the insulin response to capture the carbohydrate during digestion. As the food passes through the stomach and intestines the acids and enzymes in the stomach and intestine release the carbohydrates bound up in the food. In simple terms this is converted into sugars which are released into the bloodstream. The blood sugar levels rise and the pancreas kicks in and releases insulin. The insulin converts the sugars into glycogen which is stored in the live for future energy needs. When this is depleted athletes hit the wall as we see so graphically in marathons. The other sugars in the blood continue to circulate and are used by the cells for energy. When the liver has a full store of glycogen the excess sugar that the body hasnt used is converted into an alternative energy source and stored in special tissue on the body, to be used at a later time. We call this FAT! When we eat too many carbohydrates we get fat. Its as simple as ABC.

The insulin response is a finely balanced act. Our blood sugar must stay constant because too much sugar in the bloodstream is very unhealthy. So is too little. When we eat highly processed carbohydrates such as sugary breakfast cereals, the rise in blood sugar is very rapid and the insulin response is too great. Our blood sugar levels drop rapidly and we are suddenly hungry again. If we eat the same type of snack food again, the cycle is repeated. The excess sugar is deposited as fat and our hunger bounces up and down like a yo yo. This is the key reason why we put on weight and the key to how to lose weight.

Our first step to losing weight is to find a good diet program that understands the weight gain mechanism and to follow it. By ourselves we will thrash around ineffectively and never quite get started. Any good diet program will provide sound advice on balancing your proteins, fats and carbohydrates. It will also recommend more complex carbohydrates which the body will digest more slowly and so avoid the excessive insulin response. A good program will show you how to lose weight by incorporating a sensible and achievable exercise regime into your daily life. Finally it should include a meal planner. A meal planner takes away the stress or working what to eat day to day by allowing you to plan ahead. A meal planner provides you sound dietary guidelines and provides the shopping list for your weekly groceries. Good programs identify the foods that help you lose weight and include these in their meal planners. Food becomes an ally in your plans to become slim again.

Finally one of the most powerful tools you have which will help you lose weight is you. Unless you have self-belief you simply wont succeed. You have to believe in yourself. If you struggle with low self esteem, and most of us who have been overweight can relate to that, you must find way to lift your own perception of your worth. There are some excellent programs available, because we are more than just flesh and blood. We are whole people with beliefs and hope and dreams and we need to feed these as well. I have no doubt that with the right advice and the right attitude you will find your way to lose weight.

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