Boredom as the Enemy of Weight Loss — Passion as the Key
In a class I taught recently, I asked participants to think about what they thought caused them to go against their better judgment and head for the cookie jar or the refrigerator to pig out when they knew better.
The people who spoke up said that they thought the culprit was boredom. While I believe that [...]
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Don’t Starve Yourself to Diet
I had an interesting exchange with a dear friend yesterday who mentioned that she had a new “addiction” — carb-free chocolate ice cream.
I mentioned to her that in a certain sense, I’m more in favor of the real thing. In Italy, the whole low-fat, no-fat, no-carb mania hasn’t caught on the way it has here. [...]
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Is Obesity “Contagious?”
A study published in this week’s New England Journal of Medicine suggests that obesity tends to spread through social networks.
According to findings of the study, a person’s chance of gaining weight skyrockets if a close friend or family member becomes obese, possibly because this alters their attitude towards what weight is acceptable.
None of this is [...]
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Summer Weight Loss in Florence
Reports about the heatwave in Europe make me remember my own experience of a very hot summer in Florence and the weight loss experience of a friend of mine who was living there at the time. I just spoke to Jerry a couple of days ago.
“My story is simple,” he said. “I ate and drank [...]
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Europe’s Scorching Weather Teaches Weight Loss Lesson
As many of you know, Europe is experiencing a massive heatwave that has forced evacuations in parts of some countries, including Italy.
Power consumption has soared from the use of air conditioners, causing blackouts in some areas. And among other things, the blackouts have trapped many people in elevators.
If you’ve downloaded my free copy of the [...]
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Yo-yo Dieting Increases Risk of Kidney Cancer
American and Swedish researchers studying over 140,000 women ages 50-79 have found that yo-yo dieting more than doubles the risk developing kidney cancer.
According to the study, reported in the American Journal of Epidemiology, women who gained or lost at least 10 pounds more than 10 times during their adulthood were two and a half times [...]
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Curbing Cravings Helps Weight Control
The latest results of a calorie restriction study conducted by the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University indicates that keeping cravings at bay may be the most important ingredient in weight management.
Susan Roberts, one of the authors of the study, said that allowing yourself to have the foods you [...]
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“Slow Food” Diet Adopted by Italian Hospitals
I was happy to read that Italian hospitals are wising up and will be overhauling their food services to implement the “Slow Food” method of cooking and eating, thanks to an agreement signed by Italy’s health ministry.
Slow Food is a non-profit organization founded in Italy’s Piedmont region nearly twenty years ago to offset the accelerated [...]
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“Bandaid Therapy” for Losing Weight
I am always amazed at the silly weight loss ideas promoted in the media. I read today that this is what the editors of Time magazine came up with when they spoke with a bunch of medical experts about appetite triggers:
Take a sweater when you go to a restaurant, because being cold makes you eat [...]
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Kids No Longer Walking to School
A new study that will be written up in the August issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine indicates that fewer than half of American children who live near schools walk or ride their bikes.
And we wonder why obesity is skyrocketing among kids today?
Whether this trend has to do with laziness or parents’ safety [...]
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