Weight-loss after Pregnancy

In average mothers gain 25 to 35 pounds during pregnancy, shed 12.5 to 14 pounds during the birth, and have to loss about 12 to 21 pounds of excess weight to regain the pre-pregnancy figure. Since the body needs to recover, weight-loss after pregnancy is not recommended until about three months following childbirth. Just as weight-gain during pregnancy, weight-loss after that should better be done slowly and steadily; another nine months is considered appropriate for that. In general, losing more than 2 lb a week is unhealthy.

Check the following for the purpose.

Breastfeeding

At least for the first 12 months breastfeeding may give you weight-loss after pregnancy. It makes your body expends about 200 to 500 calories everyday, and, according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, it helps your uterus to return to its pre-pregnancy size and shape by releasing a number of hormones into your body.

However, for many women, pregnancy may cause permanent changes such as softer bellies and wider hips or waistlines. Also, for weight-loss after pregnancy, it’s best to combine breastfeeding with healthy eating and exercising to avoid gaining weight instead.

Healthy Eating

You need a healthy balanced diet to heal and recover from childbirth at least for the first three months. Even if you’re not breastfeeding, don't rush out to dieting. Start your weight-loss after pregnancy program when your body has begun to recover and your period has returned to normal. Even breastfeeding women could diet as long as they could maintain to have at least 1800 calories a day to keep mothers and babies healthy.

Your high nutritional foods should be low in fat, nutrient-dense and high in fiber to get enough calories everyday. Breastfeeding women need 4 servings of dairy foods or other calcium-fortified foods. For portion sizes and number of servings within other food groups, follow the Healthy Eating Guidelines. All new moms, regardless of weight, should focus on nutrition, not on weight-loss! If you're breastfeeding, your baby's nutritional needs outweigh your need for a slim body. The best way to get weight-loss after pregnancy is by expending more energy than you take in. To lose roughly a pound a week, cut out 500 calories a day from your intake and perform regular moderate exercise.

Exercising

There are many benefits of exercising beside for weight-loss after pregnancy. It alleviates post-partum depression, improves your mood, and boosts your confidence and energy level, so that you could better adapt to your new situation, meet the demands of motherhood, and battle the fatigue of caring for a newborn without interfering with your breastfeeding.

However, wait six weeks after a vaginal birth and eight weeks after a c-section, and choose low-impact exercises such as walking, swimming or yoga. Yoga is perfect for in-home working out; walking is one of the best and don't require special equipment. Six to eight weeks after giving birth you may involve your baby in the exercises for weight-loss after pregnancy to stimulate them.

OBESITY AND WEIGHT LOSS DIET

One of three people in the U.S. is overweight. About 20% of the population is even meets the clinical criteria for obesity. Here is some information about obesity and weight loss diet excerpted from an article in www.mothernature.com.

Because excess body weight enhancing the risk for many disorders, including heart disease, diabetes, several cancers, prostate enlargement, female infertility, uterine fibroids, gallstones, gestational hypertension, and various disorders of pregnancy, maintaining a healthy body weight seems prudent. Weight loss can significantly improve physical function and vitality as well as decreased bodily pain. So, weight loss diet is very important for people with obesity.

Conventional weight loss diet plan to overcome obesity includes dietary changes to limit fat and calories, increased exercise, and changes in eating habits or patterns.

Dietary changes in weight loss diet for obesity include limitation of fat intake. Foods with a high proportion of calories from fat should be limited from the weight loss diet; these include red meat, dark poultry meat, poultry skins, fried foods, dairy products, junk foods, and most processed foods. Vegetable oils, nuts, seeds, and avocados should be consumed in moderation while fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and nonfat dairy products (with low-fat fish for non-vegetarians) should be predominated the diet.

Adequate amounts of dietary fiber are believed to be important in weight loss diet to overcome obesity. Fiber contains bulk and tends to produce a sense of fullness, helping people consume fewer calories. Foods containing high amounts of carbohydrate with high Glycemic Index (GI – a numerical value that shows certain food’s ability to raise and sustain blood glucose levels), such as white rice, baked potato, corn flakes, white bread, which promotes a more rapid return of hunger and increases subsequent intake of calories, should be substituted with a lower GI food, such as brown rice, all-bran cereal, oat bran bread, whole grains.

Lifestyle changes in weight loss diet for people with obesity may include shopping from a list, storing foods out of sight, keeping portion sizes under control, and avoiding fast-food restaurants. Attending group sessions aimed at changing eating and exercise patterns, keeping daily records of food intake, and exercising and eating a specific low-calorie diet are much more successful in helping to make this lifestyle changes.

Exercise has been found to enhance the effectiveness of weight loss diets. Studies have shown that exercise alone can promote weight loss in people with obesity. Preliminary research suggests that the most significant contribution by exercise may be in helping to maintain weight loss following a diet.

The most successful weight-loss programs appear to use a combination of moderate caloric restriction, moderate exercise, and behavior modification, including examination and adjustment of eating habits.

Diets that are low in total calories may not contain adequate amounts of various vitamins and minerals. For that reason, taking a multiple vitamin-mineral supplement is advocated by many types of weight loss diet plan for people with obesity.

Dieting For Kids and Teenagers

Dieting is the practice of ingesting food in a regulated fashion for a purpose, like losing weight. To lose weight, a person may try to eat fewer calories than the body uses in order to lose body fat and decrease body weight. Some dieting practices even cut out entire categories of foods or require dieters to just eat specific food, which can deprive the body of necessary nutrients.

Unlike adults, kids and teenagers are still growing and developing. Receiving adequate nutrition through a well-balanced diet is crucial for them. So, dieting is not necessary for most kids and teenagers.

According to the ADA (American Diabetes Association) there has been a 39 percent increase in obese teenagers. Still, dieting is not necessarily what they need. Often time overweight teenagers can improve their health simply by being more active and eating nutritious foods in a balanced diet.

Physical activity is important in securing weight loss. Energy for muscle activity is first derived from the glycogen, then from the fatty acids stored in the body. Exercise may also increase the basal metabolic rate (BMR - resting energy consumption) for some time after exercising, which leads to an additional caloric loss. Joining sports teams, hiking, cycling, or rowing are good choices, as well as more casual activities like shooting hoops at the park, dancing, or helping parents cleaning the house. Even the smallest lifestyle changes like walking to school or jogging up and down the stairs a couple of times before shower can really make a difference.

A balanced diet gives the proper amount of the right nutrients to the body, such as, carbohydrates for producing energy, protein for building body structures, calcium for growing bones, vitamins and minerals for helping maintain body functions, and fiber for healthy digestion. It includes variety of foods from different food groups i.e.:

· fruits and vegetables

· milk and dairy products

· meat, nuts, and other protein-rich foods

· grains, especially whole-grain foods

Based on the body mass index (BMI - weight in kilograms per meters squared of height), doctors may still recommend dieting for some kids and teenagers, usually to slower gaining weight pace, or to maintain current weight. But this should be done with the guidance of an expert, like a dietitian, who can explain how to reduce calories safely while still getting all the necessary nutrients.

Being overweight can cause health problems; however, quick or “crash” dieting with pills, special drinks, and all-liquid diets, to name a few, and extreme dieting that requires skipping meals or eating only lettuce, for instance, may hurt the health even more. These dieting may lead children to consistently overeat later in their life despite adequate nutritional intake, because the brain is unable to learn how to correlate taste with nutritional value. It may also lead to eating disorder, like anorexia nervosa (starving oneself) or bulimia nervosa (eating and then deliberately throwing up).

Low Carb Diet Tips

Carbohydrate is a nutrient that provide 17 kJ (4 kcal) of energy per gram. They constitute a large proportion of foods such as rice, noodles, bread, and other grain-based products.

Carbohydrates may be classified as monosaccharides, disaccharides, or polysaccharides by the number of monomer (sugar) units they contain. While polysaccharides – or complex carbohydrates – take longer to digest and absorb, simple sugars – abundance in modern diets – in contrast, are absorbed quickly, and therefore raise blood-sugar levels more rapidly. The spike in blood-sugar levels after ingestion of simple sugars is thought to be involved in causing heart and vascular disease.

For those reasons some diets are low-carbohydrate or low-carb. These are dietary programs that restrict carbohydrate consumption usually for weight control or for treatment of obesity. The American Academy of Family Physicians’ definition of the diet is:

Low-carbohydrate diets restrict caloric intake by reducing the consumption of carbohydrates to 20 to 60 g per day (typically less than 20 percent of the daily caloric intake). The consumption of protein and fat is increased to compensate for part of the calories that formerly came from carbohydrates.

Following are some tips on Low-Carb Diet:

1) Get the basic knowledge, like how to cut carbohydrates works, what foods have carbohydrates, and how to eat a balanced low carb diet, so you won’t fall into myths, like you should just eat meat all day.

2) Make a good planning of what you’ll eat so you won’t run into old habits before new healthier ones come naturally. Nothing will sabotage your goals more quickly than realizing that you're hungry but don't know what to eat.

3) Watch out the calories. Although you don’t count calories, calories do count! Let your appetite be your guide - eat when you are hungry, and stop when you are comfortable.

4) Have enough fiber, especially from vegetables and fruit, the fruit being low in sugar. There are also low carb sources of fiber.

5) Create variety to avoid getting bored too quickly and to get better nutrition. Every cuisine on the planet has low carb options or can be "de-carbed" - just skip the starch and sugar.

6) Be careful with "low carb" packaged foods, such as meal replacement bars, ice cream, and other "treats" labeled low carb or sugar-free. They often contain ingredients such as maltitol, which are just as bad as sugar in a lot of bodies.

7) Get enough exercise. Exercise is important in any diet for at least three reasons: it lowers insulin resistance; it is good for our bodies in so many ways; and it ensures us to maintain a significant weight, which by diet alone we are unlikely able to.

8) Don’t get sway from the planning midway. Don’t push yourself overboard that you’ll find the diet too much to endure and give up midway, or conversely, too easy on yourself that you are often tempted to lose up a bit and end up having carb cravings and gaining weight.

Fat Loss Diets

Fats are macronutrients that produce the biggest energy, i.e. 37 kJ (9 kcal) per gram, compare to carbohydrates and proteins that provide only 17 kJ (4 kcal) of energy per gram. Excess energy from the food intake that isn’t used for body functions and physical activity is stored in the body, usually as fats; and hence causing weight gain. No wonder some diets are targeting on fat loss. Following are two examples:

Fat Smash Diet

This is a 4 phases (detox, foundation, construction and the temple), 90 days long diet plan for developing healthy eating habits and healthy lifestyle to promote fat loss and maintain a healthy weight.

Phase 1 (9 days) rids the body of toxins and impurities with mainly fruits and vegetables diet and plenty of water - plus daily exercise. Phase 2 (3 weeks) establishes good eating and exercise habits, where lean meat/seafood, selected cereals and extra dairy are added and exercise is increased by 15%. Phase 3 (4 weeks) builds the diet up, pasta and bread are added, portion sizes increased and exercise is again increased by 25%. In phase 4 (remainder of the 90 days) dieters’ lifestyle achieves a balance for maintaining the desired body weight. Most foods are included in limited quantities, and exercise is set at 1 hour a day, 5 days a week.

Flat Belly Diet

The basic of this fat belly loss targeted diet plan is a 1,600-calorie Mediterranean-style diet with an emphasis on wholesome, unrefined foods including fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, beans, seeds, lean protein, and very little red meat (once a month), with the addition of a monounsaturated fat (MUFA), at every meal. MUFAs are found in olives, avocados, nuts, seeds, dark chocolate, soybean, flax, and olive and sunflower oils.

This 32 days diet begins with a 4-day anti-bloating jumpstart, followed by the 4-week eating plan.

MUFAs have health benefits and target belly fat. They also help control satiety, so by adding in one MUFA at meals and snacks it is easier to stick with the plan and get belly fat loss.

A breakfast high in MUFAs is able to boost calorie burn for 5 hours after the meal, particularly in people with higher amounts of belly fat. MUFA-rich diet helps people lose small amounts of weight and body fat without changing their calorie intake. In addition, it also prevents and controls type 2 diabetes, reduces the risk of heart disease, and helps reduce markers of inflammation. A weight loss eating plan that incorporates MUFA-rich foods into every meal tested on some panelists showed that fat loss not only happen on belly, but also all over their bodies and they felt more energized than they had in years.

Keeping Diets while on the Go

Keeping a diet – whether it is for weight loss, health problems or special diet like vegetarian or kosher – from our own kitchen is relatively easy, but away from home is another story. Whether we eat out or travel, some preparation should be made to maintain our diet.

The following mostly excerpted from an article by Sarah Schlichter in Independent Traveler:

1. Destinations

a. Research your destination regarding local eating customs. Search in websites about your particular condition for useful tips, restaurant and accommodation directories and links to local support groups in your destination.

b. Call ahead. Given plenty of notice, most travel outfitters can make arrangements to meet your dietary needs. Before dining out, ask your destined eateries to fax you take out menus and choose your entree ahead of time.

c. Bring a food allergy translation card, which explain your allergy or other dietary restriction in local languages of your destined country. Several companies offer these wallet-size cards.

2. Transportation

a. Whenever possible, bring your own food onto the plane or train. Find out and follow all pertinent airport security rules and customs regulations. Traveling by car, keep your foods in a cooler for longer freshness.

b. Most airlines can accommodate a wide variety of special diets upon advance notice requested at least 24 hours earlier. Many airlines no longer serve peanuts on flights while others will refrain serving them knowing a passenger has severe allergy. Check their website for this policy.

c. Cruise lines have grown increasingly accommodating of special diets. Vegetarians in particular will find at least one option in most onboard restaurants, while other dieters should call ahead of time to make arrangements.

3. Accommodations
Whenever possible, book accommodations where you can cook for yourself, such as vacation rentals, home exchanges, or a hotel with a kitchen. In some cases the owners of a small bed and breakfast may grant you access to their kitchen.

4. Restaurants

a. Inside your country, chain restaurants where you've eaten in the past are good choices – you're already familiar with the menu and know which items you can eat.

b. Explain your dietary needs to the waiter or chef. Don't hesitate to ask them to modify a dish – boil, broil or roast entrees and sides that usually batter-dipped or fried – or to prepare something aside from the menu — most restaurants can quickly prepare a simple dish such as veggie-only salad.

c. For weight losing dieters eating out remember the following:

(1). Make your earlier meals smaller; have a small, healthful snack in between to quell hunger so you're not end up overeating.

(2). Order an appetizer, plus a side salad if necessary and then stick with a single entrée.

(3). Choose lean cut meats like loin or flank; elect steamed, roasted, broiled, boiled, grilled, or baked poultry.

(4). Avoid cream sauces, butter, oil, battered or batter-dipped and gravy.

(5). Ask the server to wrap up half your meal before you start eating.

(6). Banish buffets. Given more choices we tend to eat more.

5. Medical Considerations

a. Make sure you have adequate medical insurance in the case of an allergic reaction.

b. Research hospitals, doctors or other medical providers where you're going.

c. Carry your doctor’s written explanation of your condition, medical history and how you should be treated in the case of an allergic reaction, along with his/her contact information at all times. Consider wearing a medical ID bracelet.

d. Bring a full supply of antihistamines, epinephrine needles or any other medications for dealing with an allergic reaction.

Lose Weight Counseling

As more people adopts sedentary lifestyle there’s an increase in obesity, which in turn raises the risk of diseases like type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, stroke, osteoarthritis, some cancers, physical and mental functioning decline resulting in increased rates of nursing home admissions, and premature death. The World Health Organization classifies about 400 million people around the world as obese. So losing weight is an important issue.

More and more studies suggest that counseling could help obese people losing weight. It is a potentially simple but effective tool in the fight against obesity. Unfortunately, research shows us that most physicians are not counseling their patients about losing weight or exercising. In 2003, the US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTC) released clinical guidelines recommending physicians provide weight loss counseling to their overweight and obese patients.

It is vital that patients are informed of how important losing weight is to maintain their good health. Introducing the subject of losing weight to a patient can be a sensitive issue — especially if patients are comfortable with their appearance and don't consider themselves as extremely overweight. Some patients may think that they have no control over their weight. They, for instance, may believe they are victims of their own genetics, when in fact other factors such as environment and behavior may also contribute to overweight and obesity.

Unrealistic ideas about how much weight they need to lose or what it takes to lose weight and keep it off may also inhibit the patients' motivation. Educate patients that even a moderate amount of weight loss (5% to 10%) along with moderate activity and a modified diet can significantly decrease health risks.

In counseling, patients can get good lifestyle advices that help them deal with their problems. The advice includes encouragement to keep fit, such as taking a walk at lunch and eating a healthy diet. It doesn’t entail any particular weight-loss target. This kind of counseling can bolster more aggressive weight-loss targets for overweight people.

Counseling could also be done by phone or e-mail. Some studies show that phone and e-mail counseling help people sustained their weight loss better than those who met face-to-face. A study, for example, shows that people on phone counseling lost 3.3 pounds more than those in the control group while people using email lost about a pound more. For some people talking to someone may make them feel a bit more pressured to make the change, while the key to lose weight is not to pressure people to make big changes.

Healthy Weight

A healthy weight is neither overweight nor underweight. Overweight can lead to illnesses, such as heart diseases, stroke, or diabetes, while underweight can affect your health, because your body doesn’t get enough food. For a healthy weight, consider these:

Eat According to the Need

An increase in body weight results from an imbalance between energy intake (food) and expenditure (metabolism, thermo-genesis and physical activity). The excess energy is stored in the body, usually as fat. Body weight gain can also result from an increasing muscle mass. So for people having regular weight training, it doesn’t necessarily mean unhealthy.

Make sure that you eat as much food as your body needs. Think before you eat: Do you really hungry? Is there a healthier choice?

Balance the Diet

To get all the necessary nutrients for keeping a healthy body, you need a balanced diet. Ban strange diets. They may work in short term, but almost all are doomed to fail. Choose healthy foods and eating smaller portions, slowly. For most people a balance diet should consist of:

· More fruit and vegetables, whether fresh, frozen, canned, dried, cooked, or juiced. They should make up a third of the diet. Take at least five portions a day.

· More starchy foods such as bread, cereals, pasta, potatoes, beans and lentils. They should also make up one third of your diet. Try to eat in variety and choose whole grain, whole meal or high fiber varieties whenever possible.

· Less fat – especially saturated – salt and sugar. You'll probably eat some foods containing fat, like butter, cooking oils, salad dressings and mayonnaise; keep these to minimum and choose low fat varieties where possible. The same goes to cakes, biscuits, pastries, ice cream and sugary drinks. Sugared soda, fruit drinks, or juice can give you several hundred calories a day. Boil, steam, grill, poach or microwave food rather than fry or roast.

Getting Physical

Be more active. Physical activity is a good way of using up extra calories, and maintaining body weight. Choose activities you enjoy and do them every day. No need to join a gym, though. Some daily routines may help you burning off excess energy, for example, walking after lunch, using stairs instead of lift, walking (or jogging) for some shorter journeys or getting off the bus one or two stops earlier.

Measuring Healthy Weight

There's a good way to know whether or not you have a healthy weight, based on the ratio of weight to height, called the body mass index (or BMI). It based on the fact that taller people have more tissue, and so tend to weigh more.

Your BMI is calculated by dividing weight in kilograms by height in meters squared. For example, a woman 1.67m in height and weighing 65kg would have a BMI of 23.3. The healthy weight is ranged from 18.50 to 24.99, overweight is measured as 25 or more with obesity determined as 30 or more.

Loss Weight Tips

There are many tips of losing weight. I categorize them into four parts:

I. MENU

1. Don't cut out all the food you enjoy. Eat your favorite foods in healthier versions or get them in low amount just enough to satisfy your desire once a week.
2. Encouraged:

a. High fiber-low calorie foods like fruits and vegetables (take fruit instead of fruit juice, use vegetables to bulk up meals, balance your grains with equal portions of vegetables), cereal (take it for breakfast five days a week), nuts (take it in place of a sugary snack - nuts also high in protein)

b. Eggs. Eating eggs for breakfast could result in a 2lb a month weight loss.

c. Spicy flavorings: hot sauce, salsa, and Cajun seasonings provides lots of flavor with no fat and few calories, and also turns up your digestive fires, causing your body to temporarily burn more calories.

d. Frozen dinner designed for weight loss (take one serving of this pre-portioned meal to keep dinner calories under control).

e. Water: make it your primary drink. At breakfast you can still drink orange juice or 1-2% fat or skim milk. The calcium in dairy foods triggers a hormonal response that inhibits production of body's fat cells and boosts fat breakdown. The same goes for low-fat yogurt.

3. Discouraged

a. Prepared food that lists sugar, fructose, or corn syrup among the first four ingredients on the label.

b. Cookies, regular soda, sweet orange juice, or fast-food hamburger.

c. White foods like white flour and sugar.

d. Coffee and alcohol; if you can’t give them up switch to ordinary coffee with skim or low fat powdered milk; and always measure alcohol consumed carefully.

II. HABITS

1. Eating Habit

a. Eat only when your stomach growling; don’t eat out of boredom, nervousness, habit, or frustration. Eat slowly and calmly. Your brain lags your stomach by about 20 minutes when it comes to satiety signals.

b. Eat five or six small meals or snacks a day instead of three large meals. You’ll consume fewer calories and the body releases less insulin, which keeps blood sugar steady and helps control hunger. Pack up baby carrots for snacks or mix made with nuts, raisins, seeds, and dried fruit when you're on the go.

c. Don’t overlook calories in spreads, dressings, sauces, condiments, drinks, and snacks. Get most of your calories before noon. The more you eat in the morning, the less you'll eat in the evening.

d. Eat most of your meals at home and don't eat with a large group. You're more likely to take more eating out or with others.

e. Serve individual courses with the first two being soup or vegetables rather than piling everything on one plate.

f. Downsize your dinner plates or pare your portions (remove one-third of the food on your plate). The less food put in front of you, the less food you'll eat.

2. Writing and Counting Habit

a. Write everything down and be honest with yourself. It’s OK to go overboard a bit, but keep a record to maintain the average calorie intake. Add 10 percent to the amount of daily calories you think you're eating.

b. Use scales in the kitchen to avoid deceiving oneself

3. Clothing Habit

a. Buy some new clothes when you are down size, throw out clothes that doesn't fit. The idea of having to buy a whole new wardrobe if you gain the weight back will motivate you to maintain your new figure.

b. Dress up in your most flattering outfit while eating out. You'll get loads of compliments, which will be a great reminder to watch what you eat.

4. Other Habits

a. Watch one less hour of TV. We tend to eat more watching television.

b. Close out the kitchen after dinner. Late-evening eating significantly increases the overall number of calories you eat.

c. Brush your teeth after every meal. That clean, mint freshness will serve as a cue to your body and brain that mealtime is over.

d. Choose nutritious foods while shopping with no partially hydrogenated oil and high-fructose corn syrup, short ingredient list with fewer flavor enhancers and empty calories, more grams of fiber per 100 calories in all grain products (cereal, bread, crackers, and chips).

III. EXERCISES

1. Walking

Walk more steps or for longer time. On average, sedentary people take 2,000 to 3,000 steps a day. Adding more than 2,000 steps or beyond 30 minutes will help you lose weight and fat.

2. Washing

Wash something thoroughly once a week -- floor, windows, shower stall, bathroom tile, or car. These will burn calories.

3. Socializing

Make an active social outing once a week, like a tennis match, a guided nature or city walk, cycling on a bike path, or join a volleyball league or bowling team.

IV. MIND

1. Bring the color blue into your life more often. Blue functions as an appetite suppressant, while red, yellow, and orange encourage eating.
2. Sniff a banana, an apple, or a peppermint when you feel hungry. The more frequently people sniffed, the less hungry they were. One theory is that sniffing the food tricks the brain into thinking you're actually eating it.
3. Find ways other than eating to express love, tame stress, and relieve boredom: celebrate special events video shooting instead of having rich desserts, take a stress-management course or take up an active hobby.
4. Repeat positive thoughts like ‘I can lose weight,’ ‘I will go for my walk,’ or ‘I know I can resist the pastry after dinner’, like a mantra all day long; before too long they will become their own self-fulfilling prophecy.
5. Balance your self-pity each time you forgo a favorite food with the pleasure of getting better appearance.
6. Don’t ever give up! You are going to get bad days/weeks! Just get straight back on it and limit the damage.
7. Find an online weight-loss buddy. This will help you keep the weight off.