Losing weight isn’t easy, but it shouldn’t be a lesson in frustration either. Just because you decide to lose weight doesn’t mean it’s going to happen, there can be factors that come into play that you may not have considered. Knowing what you’re up against can give you the ammunition you need to win the war on weight loss. Check out these 10 scenarios that could be sabotaging your weight loss plans.

Drinking Too Much Wine

Drinking one glass of wine can help your heart and only adds about 150 calories to your intake, but drinking 2 or more glasses can have a detrimental effect on your waistline and your body. At this point, it reaches over into the over indulgent side, adds 300-500 calories to your daily intake and puts you at risk for serious diseases and conditions like Stroke and Diabetes.

Eating Mindlessly

Do you “snack” on supper while you’re preparing it or “grab a little” while fixing the kids’ lunch or snack? These mindless eating activities can add hundreds of “forgotten about” calories to your daily intake. So when you’re thinking you are on track, you’re really missing the mark. Be aware of everything you put into your mouth because it ALL adds up.

You’re NOT Moving

If you are relying solely on your diet to help you lose weight, you’ve got a wake-up call coming. Yes, you can lose weight through diet alone, but the catch is you will lose fat, muscle and water. And once your diet is finished, the weight will come back (sometimes in as little as two years) and it may be more weight than before. Why? Studies have shown that eating a nutritious diet along with strength training and cardiovascular exercise not only helps you to lose more weight, it keeps it from coming back. Most importantly, the weight you do lose is fat, your muscle stays intact, which helps keep the weight from piling back on.

You’re NOT Moving Enough

OK, so you started an exercise program to go along with your new diet, great! But are you really doing enough? Once or twice a week is not enough to help you lose enough body fat to make a difference. Yes, you will lose, but it will be so slow and incremental that you will most likely become frustrated and stop the whole program all together. Real, sustainable weight loss requires dedicated actions. You have to perform at least five (5) cardio sessions per week with each one lasting at least 30 minutes in order to see and maintain real change. In addition, you need to perform strength training exercises at a minimum of 2 times per week. Anything else is like swimming in quicksand, going nowhere.

You are Cheating Yourself On Sleep

Good shut-eye helps you lose weight. Studies have shown that people who sleep 6 or more hours per night are more likely to maintain a healthier weight than their sleep-deprived counterparts. Getting 8-10 hours of sleep per night is crucial to allowing your body time to complete all the functions it needs to do at night such as repairing and rebuilding muscle tissue. Your body uses fat to fuel its efforts, so if you cut the shut-eye short you’re really cutting down on the amount of excess fat your body is able to burn while you are sleeping.

Check Your Meds

Certain conditions like Diabetes, High Cholesterol, Depression and Heart Disease (there are more) are controlled by medications that can cause your body to put on weight or make it more difficult for you to take the weight off. Discuss the side-effects of any medication that you are currently taking with your doctor to decide on the right course of action for your individual case.

You are Not Eating Enough

Just as over-eating can lead your body to store excess calories as fat, under-eating or starving your body can cause you to store fat also. Most people mistakenly think that if they eat way less than before they went on their diet their body will lose more fat.  Unfortunately this type of thinking leads your body to go into starvation mode. This means your body is now on survival alert status and begins to slow down all its processes in order to conserve (save) energy (fat) so that it can get through this perceived starvation period. So instead of turning your body into a fat burning machine, you’ve created the ultimate fat-storing machine.

Follow the tips listed above to make sure your weight loss plan is on track. For help with getting your weight loss program started the right way, check out Lee Haney’s 7 Day Systemic Cleansing Detox. On Sale NOW!

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Dr. Oz is back in full force for his new season. I usually don’t watch a lot of daytime shows, but when I see something pertaining to weight loss or fitness, I’m all ears and eyes.

Prior to the airing of this episode, Dr. Oz conducted a poll on his website asking women to choose their biggest hurdle to overcome when trying to lose weight. He took the top three hurdles and discussed them on his show. I’m revealing them to you here and adding a little extra advice on top of it.

#3: Eating Out

Food is all around. Eating is one of the hardest parts of your weight loss journey to regulate because it’s a necessity. You really do need to eat. And because of your hectic lifestyle, a lot of the eating is done at restaurants.

Dr. Oz recommends visiting the websites of the restaurants that you plan to patronize and research their menu. That way, you will know exactly what you can order to help you stay on track with your weight loss plan. He also says not to take home a “doggy bag” because you will most likely eat it right away. But I say, go ahead and get a “doggy bag,” just don’t eat it when you get home, save it for lunch the next day.

One more suggestion is to order an appetizer and a salad or a couple veggies and make a meal out of that instead of ordering a regular-sized entrée. In addition, be the first to order, that way you aren’t tempted by what everyone else is ordering and you can relax, knowing that your diet is safe.

#2: Your Busy Schedule

Let’s face it, everyone is busy these days. In fact, if you meet someone that doesn’t have a lot going on in their life, you may think to yourself “What’s really going on with them??” So it’s no surprise that your schedule can get in the way of your weight loss program, if you allow it to.

Dr. Oz says to create an exercise box where you take index cards and write a different exercise on each card and drop them in the box. Each morning you reach into the box and choose one exercise and do it for fifteen minutes. It’s that easy and you can color it done for the day!

I’m going to throw in a little twist, instead of just writing down a single exercise, write “visit optimumbody” and get a whole workout. There are several videos that you can choose from on the site. Each video lasts 30 minutes, so now you’ve actually completed an entire workout for the day. You are well on your way to success!

Finally, the #1 hurdle, Loss of Motivation:

That’s a tough one! You are so motivated and raring to go, in the beginning, but as time goes on and you really start to get into the process, it becomes harder and harder to keep yourself motivated to keep going.

I love Dr. Oz’s solution: Treat it like an event

I always tell my clients to choose an event like a run or walk or some other type of physical event as a goal to work towards to help them stay motivated. But this idea of throwing a big party for yourself to celebrate your accomplishment is ideal! So set the date (12 weeks from now works well) and send out the invitations! Now that you’ve announced your goal celebration to the world, you’ll be less likely to lose steam before you actually reach your goal.

Use these solutions to the three biggest weight loss hurdles to help you make your weight loss journey a success.

Let me know what strategies you use to help you stay on track.

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I’m sure that you’ve heard how expensive it is to eat healthy. Really?? Well, I’ve got some great news for you, you can eat healthier than you’re doing right now AND save a boatload of money. How? Couponing!

I know, I felt the same way, until I started watching Extreme Couponing, TLC’s new hit show and I had an epiphany. If these women could save 70%-95% or more on their grocery bill using coupons, I could do it too. So, I tried it, right after I watched the first show. And you know what? It worked. I actually saved over $100 on my grocery bill! Boy did that feel great!

It Takes Time

I’m not going to kid you, it does take time. You have to find the coupons, cut them out, download them, match them to store savings, organize them and then use them. All in all, I would say that I spent about 4 hours the first weekend getting everything together.

The Plan

I had to create a plan of attack in using the coupons, or I wasn’t going to be saving anything. I signed up for the free store cards, wellness card and shopper cards that were specific to each establishment. This is important because some stores only give you discounts if you have and use their cards. Yes, they are a way to track who spends what where, but nothing is really free, so get the cards.

Then, I had to sit down with the store sales papers and go online to each store’s website and see exactly what was on sale and when the sale expired.

Finally, I matched my coupons with the store sales and specials and I was ready to roll.

Secrets to Easy Couponing: MyFoxATLANTA.com

Don’t Lose Your Mind

Remember, just because you have a coupon, doesn’t mean you have to use it or that you even want to purchase that product. One of the things that I admire most about the women in couponing is that they purchase products that they actually use. That was one of the main reasons that I didn’t coupon before, I mistakenly thought that you had to buy only the stuff that you might not even want or need. What I learned was that there are thousands of coupons out there that are worth millions of dollars and the manufacturers WANT you to use them. If they didn’t, why on earth would they create those coupons in the first place? It’s really a form of creating brand loyalty, but that is a whole other lesson.

Couponing with the Frugal Gals: MyFoxATLANTA.com

Eating Healthy

Regarding eating healthy on the cheap, you now have the choice to use coupons on products that are actually good for you. The trick is to be able to buy the perishable items that live on the outer perimeter of the store by following these steps:

1. Contact the dairy, meat and fruit industry and ask them to send you coupons
2. Create overages from purchasing multiples of other products that you do have coupons for
3. Rack up store credit to use on non-couponed items

These three steps are available to you if you just work your coupons. For instance, I received a $5 store giftcard for purchasing toilet tissue and detergent together at Target. I had coupons for both items, so I saved even more, then I took the giftcard and applied it to a new transaction. It just takes some time and diligence and you’ll be singing the praises of couponing before you know it.

TIPS AND HINTS from MyFoxAtlanta.com

• Plan on spending a good chunk of time getting started. It takes time to sign up for Facebook coupons and individual store programs, special savings websites, and so on. Once you’re in the groove, it shouldn’t take as much time.
• All the shoppers we spoke to mentioned that the grocery store sales operate on six or eight-week cycles, so if you want to buy certain products only when they’re on sale, you need to stock six to eight-week supplies. That means collecting multiple coupons for the same products.
• Look for coupons everywhere. One of our experts, Carol Smith, mentioned that she’s gotten an Oscar Meyer bacon coupon at a gas station in the past. You just have to be on the lookout. You’ll find coupons on Facebook, as well as on individual store websites, and you can sign up for their mailing lists.
• Check to see if your grocery store will match sales prices from other stores. Also, find out if they’ll take other stores’ coupons. Basically, just make sure you know the store’s policies.
• Be VERY organized when you get to the checkout or you’ll drive all the other shoppers (and your checkout person) crazy.

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Americans love sugar, and the proof is in our consumption of this sweet white powder. The average American consumes 22 teaspoons of sugar every day.

That is a lot of sugar!

The American Diet, which is heavy in processed foods,  is quite saturated with sugar. Look at the nutrition label of spaghetti sauce, Ranch dressing, ketchup and even yogurt, and you’ll some form of sugar as one of the leading ingredients.

Research has helped us uncover many of the hidden and indirect effects of sugar. For instance, we now know that sugar has been linked to the obesity, diabetes, and heart disease epidemics. And a study published in the Journal of The American Medical Association showed that women who consume excess sugar have more chronic inflammation, lower levels of good cholesterol and higher levels of triglycerides than those who consume less sugar.

We also know that sugar has strong addictive characteristics. But rather than giving in to the addiction, you can retrain your mind and your body to desensitize its cravings for sugar.

Follow these four steps to break your sugar addiction.

1. Out of sight, out of mind: Clean out your kitchen, pantries or office drawer and get rid of anything with sugar listed as the product’s top three ingredients.  Read the labels on everything and if it contains sugar, get rid of it.

2. Load up on natural sweets: You don’t have to deny your sweet tooth. In fact, you can satisfy your need for something sweet by substituting it with fruit. Opt for fresh or fruit that has been frozen without any sugar added to it.

3. Choose drinks wisely: One of the biggest sources of sugar in the American diet is found lurking in sodas, energy drinks and juices. Switching entirely to water may taste a bit bland. But there are plenty of no-sugar beverages that offer a natural and subtle sweetness to them. Swap out sugary drinks for no-sugar beverages like herbal, green and black teas and sparkling water. Or make your own flavored water by adding fresh fruit slices to cold refrigerated water. Lemon, lime, strawberry and orange slices work great.

4. Eat enough protein: Protein is a great counter balance to sugar because it satiates your appetite, keeps your blood sugar levels stable, and reduces sugar cravings. Low-fat Greek yogurt, hard-boiled eggs, lean poultry, raw almonds, beans, legumes, low-fat string cheese and low-fat cottage cheese are muscle-building protein sources that require minimal, if any, preparation.

Give this sugar detox a try for one week. Throughout the seven days, take note of changes in your energy, mood and waistline. If you like what you’re feeling, seeing and eating, keep up the plan for as long as you like.

Heather Ashare, MPH is a staff writer and the yoga expert for DietsInReview.com, an online source that provides you with the tools and information needed to educate yourself to start living a healthier life for today and tomorrow.

http://www.dietsinreview.com/

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A celebration and a question. Why IS America so fat? This nation is about to turn an extremely young 234 years old in less than a week and even though we’ve excelled in many areas and are at the top of our game in quite a few, we are desperately failing to make the grade in the way we take care of our bodies.

I won’t bore you with all the statistics that I am sure you’ve heard many times, but here are just a few to digest:

• In the past two decades, the percentage of children who are obese has doubled. The number of obese adolescents has tripled. Source: American Academy of Pediatrics, Trust for America’s Health
  In fact, parents could soon begin to outlive their children because of the epidemic of obesity.
• According to a study in the Annals of Internal Medicine, 70% of American women and 90% of American men will eventually get fat.  The Journal of the American Medical Association states that roughly 70% of Americans are either overweight or obese, today!
• The World Health Organization lists overweight and obesity as one of the Top 10 causes of preventable deaths worldwide.

This information will either scare you straight or numb you into doing nothing. I would rather it scare you straight. But information, numbers, statistics and “gloom and doom” reports are no good without solutions. With that in mind, I’m giving you solutions and step-by-step directions to help get you out of the fog and into action.

The Pledge

The first thing that I want you to do is to take the GetFit Fitness pledge to get on the FitTrak. Take the GetFit Fitness pledge now by clicking this link.

Next Steps

Once you take the pledge, follow these simple steps to get you going.

• Step 1: View the video “It’s All About You: Be Realistic.” This video will teach you how to make healthier choices.
• Step 2: Download “Taking Steps in the Right Direction” to show you ways to put activity into your daily life.
• Step 3: Check back tomorrow for “Take 5 to Drop 5.” I’ll outline 5 moves that torch excess fat.

Now Get Movin’!

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If it were easy everyone would be walking around with a lean, sexy body.

But hey, it’s not in this world we live in today. Believe me, I understand all too well that there’s temptation around every corner.

Everywhere you look there’s fast food, junk food, chocolate, candy, ice cream, pizza…

And I know it tastes good. And I know when you get stressed your body craves it even more.

That’s why you have to have a plan. You have to know what you’re going to do to avoid those temptations. You have to plan your meals in advance.

Again, if this were easy everyone would be thin and in great shape. But they’re not.

The first thing to do is come to grips with reality. To accept the fact that getting the body of your dreams is going to take effort.

The second is to understand that it’s not going to be miserable. In fact, it’s going to be a LOT of fun.

When you exercise you feel awesome. Sure, the weight comes off. But you also feel stronger. You’re more alive. You can meet the demands of your day SO much easier.

How is that miserable?

And when you start eating healthier the same thing happens. It really, really is true: you are what you eat.

Now, take a second and really think about that.

What you are putting in your mouth is what your body is using to regenerate itself with all the time.

If you’re eating crappy food…

Get the picture

But don’t worry, I’ve got a really cool and inexpensive resource for you to help you out BIG TIME with your healthy eating.

My partners over at Prograde Nutrition have created this 197 Healthy and Delicious Fat Burning Recipes ebook. It’s only $4.95 and I highly recommend it to make healthy weight loss much easier on you.

Stay Fit!

PS – Again, if you’ve been looking for easy-to-make recipes that fit into your healthy weight loss plan then look no further.

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