1) Removing excess fats
The only known method is liposuction. This is a [rocedure where a small tube is inserted in areas where fats may be removed (eg. thigh, abdomen) and the fat cells are first minced before being sucked out. While this is an instant way to remove fats and weight, it is more cosmentic than healthy. If there are no efforts to change the lifestyle, the fat cells will reacummulate. Overall, this is more of a cosmetic surgery than a weight loss surgery.

2) Reducing caloric absorption
This can be done via gastic banding, gastric stapling or a bypass surgery. In gastric banding and stapling, the volume of the stomach is reduced and therefore producing the feeling of early satiety (early fullness). In a bypass surgery, the stomach is also stapled, but the food the bypasses the duodenum (first part of small intestine). This would allow less calorie to be absorbed as the food does not undergo the first portion of the small intestines.

Overview
Surgery is often a tempting solution for people looking for weight loss, especially people who have failed multiple weight loss programme. Anyone who thinks of undergoing a surgery for weight loss have to be certaina dn have evaluated the risk vs benefits of the surgery. All surgeries come with risk and there has been more than multiple reports of people who have lost their lives after undergoing these surgeries. As mentioned in the previous article, surgery should be used only as a last resort.

1) Diet

I put this first because this is the most important part of weight loss. Some people believe that they can eat whatever they want as long as they work out. This is possible for maintaining weight. For weight loss, dieting is of utmost importance. Take a look at this article :Dieting to lose weight for a short introduction. No specific diet program has been proven to work better than another.

2) Increase activity levels.

While I mention that dieting is the most important component. Exercising help speeds up the weight loss process and also helps to prevent weight gain. While regular exercise is important, it is shown to increasing regular physical activities such as using that stairs, walking to the shops etc on a daily basis actually expends more energy than short spurts of exercises.

3) Medication

Currently, most of the weight loss drugs are no longer approved due to undesirable side effects. Consider this only if you are grossly obese and seek medical attention. Never buy any weight loss medication without consulting a physician.

4) Surgery

There are various surgical methods to increase the feeling of satiety (feeling full) while reducing the amount of food taken. This is only for the morbidly obese and a last resort.

At the end of the day, it is important that you aim for healthy and happy weight loss. Do what you know is right, don’t be tempted by false claims and you should do fine.


 

1) Sleep well

Studies have shown again and again that the lack of sleep indirectly causes wright gain. Whether this is due to the increase in stress hormones or increase in amount night time snack does not matter. What matters is a good night sleep daily will not only allow you enough energy to go through the day, but also keep your weight in check.

2) Eat half share

If you are overweight and has not been losing weight or have been gaining weight, you are eating too much. Often, it is too difficult to count calories. The easiest way to reduce your caloric intake is to take 1/2 share of what you normally take.
Begin by taking half share of everything you take for dinner. After 1 months, half your lunch share too. Depending on how heavy your breakfast is, you might or might not want to half the share. If you keep to this, weight loss is almost certain.

3) Hydrate hydrate hydate

Water is essential for most bodily functions. It also helps to keep blood circulations up and therefore keeps you awake. Water can also fill your stomach and make you feel less hungry. Take at least half a cup of water before each meal and have regular sips throughout the day.

4) Walk and not drive, climb and not ride.

Humans are made to run and jump. However, modern devices like escalators and cars now allow us to not even walk or climb. This just means that the body will not have any avenue to use the calories we take in. So, walk to your neighbouring shop or climb the stairs rather than take the lifts. 2 flights of stairs twice a day not only helps reduce weight but also keeps your heart stronger.

5) Keep doing it.

The major problem with weight loss is the lack of continuity. We try one thing and give up soon enough only to gain ore weight before trying another. Decide on what you want to do and stick to it. The going will get tough, this is inevitable. But the benefits you’ll see from weight loss will be worth it.

So here are a few simple tips to follow to keep your weight stable during this Christmas:

1) Eat slowly

There is no doubt that you will need to eat, and anytime your plate is empty, please sure that your host will be promptly refilling your plates for you. In order not to look impolite by refusing food, eat slowly. Eating slowly not only allows time for you stomach to feel full, it also keeps your plate filled most of the time, preventing the need to refuse any top up to your plates

2) Minimise alcohol intake

Too much alcohol not only dull your senses and gives you a hangover the next day, it is also an excellent source of calories. Keep to 1 to 2 glasses of wine or beer.

3) Eat what you want but limit the portion

The idea is to enjoy the Christmas season. Don’t become miserable this Christmas just because you have to forgo your favorite log cake or turkey in order not to gain weight. Eat the food that you want, just limit yourself to the portion taken.

4) Have lighter meals

If you are going for a Christmas party, try having a lighter and healthier lunch so that the total caloric intake for the day is balanced. Try having just some salad with vinegar dressing or no dressing for lunch. Alternatively, have some fruits for breakfast.

5) Exercise

If you have to take in the calories, the alternative is to burn them off. Keep to your usual exercise regime this festive season.
6) Enjoy

Finally, it’s important that you enjoy this Christmas season. Remember, don’t end up being a slim grump. Stay healthy, but more important, stay happy.


 

1) Preventing further weight gain

2) Gradual weight loss

3) Maintaining final ideal body weight.

The most effective was to achieve the above goals requires a change in eating habits, exercises and increase physical activities, and good social support. In general, studies shows tht only about 20% of obese people who start a weight loss programme lose weight and maintain it for 2 years. The problem seems more of a problem of maintaining weight lost rather than losing weight itself.

One of the most common reasons for failure of a weight loss programme is that lack of motivation. If you are not fully motivated to lose weight, you should not even bother to start. There are no magic pill for weight loss, only better or lousier methods. For example, if you think that keeping a food diary is just too much of a chore, then you may not be motivated enough to go through a successful weight loss programme.

How fast to lose weight and how much weight should you lose? For most people, a weight loss of 10% over a period of 6 months would be ideal. After the loss of the first 10% of body weight, weight loss would usually slow or even stagnate die to the lower energy expenditure associated with lower body mass. The caloric intake and exercise programme will need to be reassessed at that point. Obesity are usually considered “treated” after a 2 year period where the likelihood that any lifestyle changes that was implemented would be permanent.

Most people who are unable to lose weight are people who have higher intake of calories. Most of these comes from fats which are tasty and easily available in fried food or fast food. The overall aim of dieting to lose weight is therefore to reduce calories while keeping enough nutrient and vitamin content. In particular, care must be noted that completely avoiding one class of food (like fats) may need to malnutrition as fats are necessary for absorption of fat soluble vitamins like Vitamin A, D, E and K.

In general, a food diet plan that creates a caloric deficit of 500 kcal a day less than the usual diet a person is taking will produce stable weight loss. The easiest way to do this is to replace 1 meal of high fat diet (eg fast food) with 1 meal of food high in nutrients and fibre (keeps you full) like salad with fruits, banana, or low fat yogurt with oat cereals. The usual problem is weight loss is not attempting the diet programme, it is maintaining it. It is therefore important that anyone who wants to diet should keep the regime simple (no heavy cooking) and continue to enjoy food they love eg.ice cream) but in lesser quantity.

Exercise increases the energy usage and is especially useful for long term weight reduction. Exercise reduce the desire for food that are high in fat, thus reducing the overall fat intake. It will also prevent the decrease in basal energy use that occurs with any dieting. How then can we use exercise to lose weight?

Increase in physical activities can take many form. This could mean joining a gym and a exercise programme, to doing something as simple and using the stairs rather than the escalator or elevator. It has been shown to being active is daily activities (walking more, climbing more and watching less TV) actually maintains weight better than exercising 20 minutes every day.  While this is said, a decent exercise programme can help build cardiovascular strength, and induce a physical and non physical well-being that merely climbing the stairs don’t offer.

How should we start? Always initiate exercise slowly. People who are above 35 years old and those with any health problems should consult a physician before embarking on an exercise programme. Starting by adding 5 to 10 minutes of exercise a day and slowly tail up to 30 mins a day. The key is to exercise regularly in small amounts rather than intermittently.
An exercise programme should include activities for at least 3 times a week, although at least 5 times a week is more ideal. Any lesser than 3 times a week is less likely to build cardiovascular strength and maintain weight loss.

A good exercise programme will usually produce an additional calorie usage of 100 to 200 calorie per day. Couple this with a good diet programme, weight loss can be achieved.

To understand why we get stuck in the process of losing weight, it is important to udnerstand the process of weight loss. In general, when the energy intake is lower than the energy output, weight will be lost over a period of time. This sounds simple. However, because our body is made to conserve fats rather than to lose fat, our body often “outsmarts” us in out weight loss attempts. I shall explain how this occurs below.

Initial weight loss: Loss of Lean Mass

In general, most people in the world are in a stable state of weight. Whether they are obese, fat or normal weight, the weight itself seldom change much as the energy intake and output are balanced. When a person starts to diet, the energy intake decreases. This then causes a loss of weight. The problem lies in the fact that lean weight (muscle) is lost first in preference to fats. This is because proteins are more easily broken down to produce energy for our body. When this happens, the overall lean mass in our body decreases. While we will see a loss of weight at this time, our loss is mainly muscle and not fats.

Decrease Metabolism

Most people will ask, so what if I lose some lean mass. After-all, most people are seeking weight loss and not gain in muscle. The problem lies in the loss of lean mass also causes a decreasing in metabolism. This is because our muscles are the most active users of our energy. A decrease in lean mass therefore means our body starts to expend less energy. So the body comes to a new equilibrium. The overall energy intake has decreased, but the energy usage has also decreased. This means the weight will be “stagnant” and stable once again despite dieting.

Increasing Energy Usage

It is therefore very hard to lose weight purely based on dieting alone. In fact, to lose weight based on dieting alone often requires an unhealthy level of diet. The next step is therefore to increase energy usage. This will once again cause the equation to shift such that energy usage is more than energy intake and thus losing weight. The best way is by exercise. What kind of exercises are best is another huge topic on it’s own. But the key is that it should consist of both aerobic and toning exercises to ensure the building of muscle mass.

When exercises are persistent for more than 2-4 weeks, the body has to build up more muscle mass in order to cope with the exercises. This not only increases the energy usage, but also allow the body to start burning fats in order to supply energy. Over a period of time, the fats will slowly be used and fats cells will shrink, causing a loss of weight and slimming of the body.

So if you are stuck in the stage where you are asking, why can’t I lose weight? My advice is, you can. Add some exercises, at least 45 minutes a day. Keep going at it and like myself last time, you will start to see the magical effects of weight loss the natural way.

The best was of losing weight and obesity is a combination of diet, exercise, and change in behavioral modification. Before starting on any weight loss programme, it is important to determine both how fast to lose weigtht and how to lose weight safely. Therefore, goals of weight loss must be set before anyone begins any weight loss.

Goals of weight loss

• Many Obese individuals are still actively gaining weight. The most important is to stop any more weight gain.
• The next goal is to calculate the idea weight of the obese person. Do this by calculating the BMI of the person.
• The thrid goal is to indentify the initial weight loss targetted. Most programmes will be considered successful if they can achieve a weight loss of 5% in 6 months time.
• The fourth goal is to identify what the obese person hopes to gain by losing weight. Is it appearance, health, mobility or other reasons. This helps the person to understand his motivation better and the likelyhood of him keeping to his diet plan would be higher.

Calculating required calorie for an obesity diet

Approximately 22 kcal/kg is required to maintain a kilogram of body weight in a normal adult. The expected or calculated energy expenditure for a woman weighing 100 kg is approximately 2200 kcal/day.

This can vary by up to 20%. Target calorie deficit should be 500kcal/day in a person’s diet. This should help the person lose about 2% of his weight a month.

Different types of Obesity Diet

Knowing that we are targeting a caloric deficit of 500kcal/day in an obesity diet. There are four general ways which tese diets can be achieved:

• Balanced low-calorie diets/portion-controlled diets
• Low-fat diets
• Low-carbohydrate diets
• Mediterranean diet
• Fad diets (diets involving unusual combinations of foods or eating sequences)

Commercial weight loss programs and internet-based programs are discussed elsewhere.

• Balanced low-calorie diets

These are most recommended by nutrionist. Keeping a balance diet reduces the chance of having any vitamin, mineral or even essential fatty acid deficits. This can usually be done via reduced portion intake or carefully calculating a balance diet for all 3 meals of the day. The other method is to take replacement milk/drinks in place of certain meals.

• Low-fat diets

Most people understand which are the fatty food and avoiding them as much as possible helps to reduce weight. Fats are classified at the top of the food pyramid in a good diet, which means they should constitute no more than 25% of a person’s diet, even in non obeses individuals

• Low-carbohydrate diets

Such diets typically avoids most carbohydrates, mainly potatoes, rice and bread. Pasta is included in this category. This is easily achieved since most carbohydrates are not particularly tasty, unlike fats and proteins. The key is to ensure there are no increase in amount of fats taken when a low carbohydrate diet is being adhered to.

• Mediterranean diet

A mediterranean diet consist of high level of monounsaturated fat and lots of vegetables, fruits, legumes, and grains. Some amount of milk and dairy products and wine are also taken.

This quick summary of diets should get you started on losing weight safe and fast.

Medically, being obese can lead to diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, heart disease and even arthritis of the knees. Socially, it has been shown that obese people have lower self esteem and tends to be viewed as having less self control. Therefore the benefits of weight loss simply means reduce chances of having these illness. For some people who already have them, losing weight can improve the control of these problems and can even cure them of it.

Financially, being overweight also means that insurance premiums are higher and that certain diseases are not covered by the insurance. So the benefits of weight loss equals to saving more money.

Since we know the many benefits of weight loss, why then is it so hard to lose weight. There are many reasons, and being lazy is not the only reason.

Often, when a person diet and reduces the caloric intake, the body naturally reduces the caloric usage by decreasing energy expenditure. Often, the initial weight loss achieved is not sustainable and weight loss is eaily regained again. What then are the important strategies to losing weight. Believing that you can lose weight is one the most important of them lot. I will discuss them more in future articles, but you have to first believe that you can lose weight. Once you have gone past this barrier, losing weight becomes more of a walk in the park.