The Sunday News
Siman Gama
Treat yourself
CHEER up. Even when you diet, you don’t need to give up all your favourite fatty foods. Studies have shown about 50 percent of dieters have a problem with the ol’bingeing blues.
However, binges result from an overly strict diet, according to most researchers. If a chocolate bar or a piece of cheese-cake is calling your name, go ahead . . . but enjoy it in moderation.Dont turn it into a binge.
Drinking and weight loss don’t mix
Alcohol is a strange nutrient (a nutrient in terms of its calories and certain metabolic effects, not in terms of physiological needs). It has virtually zero fat, but acts like a fat since it spares fat from being oxidised, according to Swiss indirect-calorimetry chamber studies. Since alcohol is oxidised in preference to fat, it appears to affect the diet in the same manner as an increase in dietary fat.
No fast way out
Fasting may be a fast way to lose pounds, but in the long run it’s usually ineffective and risky. Most of the weight that’s lost is fluid and mineral electrolytes, rather than fat.
As the fast continues, body fat is lost but so is a considerable amount of muscle including heart muscle and more minerals, says the University of California at Berkeley Wellness letter. A prolonged fast can be dangerous and may cause permanent injury. Another minus is the weight that may have been lost by fasting rarely.
A fast longer than 2-3 days called starvation can be hazardous and is not recommended.
What’s smoking?
If you are a smoker who won’t quit for fear you will gain weight, here’s something that you don’t have to huff and puff over.
Typically smokers gain weight during the first year or two after quitting, but a Canadian study reports that afterwards most female ex-smokers (but fewer men) lose all or more of the weight gained.
Women who have quit smoking for a while or who never smoked were also less likely to be overweight or who never smoked. Staying thin is no excuse for smoking as the research shows; smoking doesn’t keep you thinner in the long run. — Additional information from Online sources.
The writer, Simon Gama is a fitness coach at Body Works Gym in Bulawayo.
