This article is a part of “Truth about weight loss” series.
Imagine that you wake up one morning, look in the mirror and see that you have a few extra pounds. All of a sudden. You tell to yourself that it’s not possible the body has changed so much overnight. Unfortunately, it is so… well certainly not from the view of human physiology – the weight and fat is increased gradually. But the finding out comes all of a sudden. And with a bit of a shock usually. Few of us are looking in the mirror every day and see if we gained any pound of weight. Of course, we would not even recognize that even if we did. Simply said, we suddenly come to conclusion that we are not as fit as yesterday.
With the speed of light, this shocking idea travels through the brain to the “center of panic”, where it begins to formulate plans. Fortunately, today’s modern age offers an inexhaustible range of options from which to choose. So the brain will not be bored.
Here are some options between which our mind can choose:
1. “Not a big deal. It doesn’t matter. Not such a great tragedy. Rounded body curves can have their charm. Certainly no one would even notice.”
Considerations such as these have their origin in our laziness. Some of us are just lazy to introduce any change in life:
- We don’t want to buy different food, because we don’t know which. No one explained to us. Changing our diet is therefore impossible.
- We don’t want to restrict our diet. Most of us are controlled by a mysterious being who calls itself “Mr. Stomach“. Whenever it talks to us, we listen and fulfill its wishes. In short, we are being controlled by our appetite.
- The idea that I would sweat somewhere in the gym, where everyone will watch me, leads me to fainting.
2. We stop eating food about which we read that it causes fat gain.
One of many examples… Somewhere we heard that the bread is a cause of getting fat. The best solution therefore is to stop eating it altogether. Of course this is a nonsense, because normally we ear many other foods richer in energy than bread. This is a real thread only when we eat only bread all day.
Sadly, in our infinite resourcefulness combined with ignorance we are able to exclude any food supplements in the belief that such action will solve the problem of fat storage in our body. That’s of course completely wrong because when we exclude a food which should be an integral part of our daily diet (remember – our daily diet should be rich and diverse), we will never solve the problem of overweight. Yes, we can exclude the consumption of sweets, which are usually significantly involved in overweight (sweets, cakes, pies, candies, dairy chocolate, …) Or fatty foods that are too often a cause of this problem (fat meat, fried foods, butter, low quality chocolate, …) Excluding such foods has sense. But this is not food, without which we could not live.
3. We will start a diet.
We want to start a diet, but because we don’t know which one, we have to look around a bit first…
- We open a magazine and let ourselves be dazzled by beautiful photographs of the bodies of individuals, who reportedly mastered a diet before us.
- We turn the TV and watch the advertising, where perfectly muscled bodies of young bodybuilders are promoting some miraculous diet.
- We ask our neighbors if they don’t have any experience with diets.
- We’ll buy books from some well-known celebrities who managed to lose weight and we’ll be grateful that they didn’t keep this secret to themselves.
- Egg diet, apple or pineapple diet – I better not describe in detail what such a stereotypical diet does to our metabolism. I am not soft-natured, but the consequences of such diets make me feel sick. Just imagine how you would feel after a week of eating only apples (for example).
- Low-carb diet – for some time, we will restrict sugars in our diet. This means excluding foods like potatoes, rice, pasta, bread. After a short time, our body will reorient on other energy sources (protein, fat). We will lose weight, but there is a risk of acidification of the body. In addition, after returning to the original diet, we will take the fat slowly back.
- High protein diet – very similar to the low-carb diet. There are plenty of variants, the most demanding consists of eating practically only protein and fiber. There are people who will like this diet very much – eating only meat and vegetables. The question is, for how long and with what implications for their health.
- High-fat diet – which is interesting, because it is based on extremely high fat intake. Logic tells us that this can’t work, because fats are a concentrated source of energy. Nevertheless, approximately 10% of the population can hold out this diet very well and even lose weight in the process, because their metabolism works differently. But imagine what happens when these 10% of people begins to “shout” to the world how great it is to lose weight while eating fatty and fried foods…
- Low-energy diet – I highly recommend everyone to try it… sorry, this was a lame attempt of a joke. After two or three days of restricted food intake, when we are groggy and tired, most of us wouldn’t want to hear anything about weight loss. In addition, mother nature cleverly arranged that in such situation, our body will “switch” to standby mode, which slows down all processes. We are thus genetically programmed from ancient times, when our ancestors alternated in periods of hunger and abudance. When they were hungry, their bodies automatically began to restrict the energy spend and additionally, anything they got to eat was stored as fat “for bad times”. So, this diet can reduce body weight, but it also increases amount of stored fat.
4. Let’s buy some miraculous supplements
There are supplements that have effective composition and are really interesting. This means that their regular use could get our body to lose weight. The rest of the market (sadly in this case a predominant part) only pulls money from our pockets. In other words, the vast majority of supplements promising miraculous results just does not work. It’s a scam. Period.
Suppose we are interested in the products that are trully effective. In this area there are two product groups:¨
- Those who work and have no undesirable side effects. These include conjugatec linoleic acid (CLA), carnitine, or some gainers with balanced composition. Each product works on a completely different principle, but they are all effective with proper use.
- The second group are those supplements that are effective, but could be harmful to our health at the same time. These products are popular for one simple reason – they have a quick stimulating effect on our body. They can thus start creating energy and we feel inexhaustible after using them. Commonly referred to as “fat burners”, they contain different supporting substances as caffeine, guarana, synephrine, extracts from a variety of exotic plants, vitamin B complex and many other.
They have one little flaw – they only work for a short amount of time and are potentially dangerous because they affect the central nervous system or heart.
5. We find an expert who can help us.
If we look for any specialist in the field – a doctor or nutritionist – he/she should be able to guide us through all the pitfalls that may await us on our weight loss journey. We should be assured that this path will not be miraculously fast, but safe and without yo-yo effect.
6. We will run to the aesthetic or plastic surgery clinic.
In such facility, they will likely perform a liposuction (fat suction) for a fee. It’s quick, however not painless and unfortunately not without aesthetic impacts on our body. After a few years we might pick up the fat again and our body will not look quite natural.
7. We can destroy the excess fat with modern, painless methods.
Modern times continues to offer a wider range of choise for non-invasive methods. One of them if cavitation. Simply explained it’s a set of methods, in which ultrasound and radiofrequency waves break down the excess fat tissue. At the same time, this method is able to improve the overall condition of cellulite. It’s no wonder that such clinics are always busy… Even though there are well known side effects of this method, apparently not everyone is willing to take them into account. Once the fat cells are broken, fat doesn’t just evaporate. It must “retire” somewhere. The body then processes it in several ways, depending on what specific cavitation method is used. In older procedures, it was needed to include lymphatic drainage, use of certain specific supplements and thorough drink regime. So it’s not so easy as presented in commercials.
Certainly not uninteresting method since the last couple of years is cryolipolysis. Hidden behind this complex name is a simple technique, a method which freezes the fat cells in our skin. This de facto kills them and they will not “live” again. A perfect method at first glance. But not really.
We should bear in mind that any passive method of weight loss without the active treatment of diet leads to re-gaining weight. This is because of one simple fact – we did not remove the causes of overweight.
As you can see, there is a lot of choices of how to lose weight. But if you choose not to cooperate with someone who truly understands the whole problem, you have a very little hope of achieving any reasonable success. In addition, you risk damaging your health. These are basic things that we should always keep in mind.