Hypothyroidism – Your Diet Is The Boss

By David Grisaffi, Author Firm and Flatten Your Abs

Hypothyroidism is a dangerous condition that should be taken seriously. It can have a major impact on every aspect of your life; however, controlling your diet can help you curtail the effects of the condition. This article will inform you on what hypothyroidism is, how it affects the body, and ways to help control its affects through diet.

What Hypothyroidism Is

Hypothyroidism is due to an abnormally low production of thyroid hormone by the thyroid gland which is controlled by the pituitary gland. The low levels of thyroid hormone are known to affect cellular processes and metabolism and growth and development. The thyroid creates its hormones from the amounts of iodine in food and released when triggered by the pituitary gland. Hypothyroidism is rather common and is often caused by medication, low iodine levels, a malfunctioning thyroid or pituitary gland, radiation, or associated with another disease such as Lymphocytic thyroiditis and Hashimoto’s thyroiditis.

Effects of Hypothyroidism

Individuals with hypothyroidism can have devastating effects on the human body and as the disease furthers without treatment the signs and symptoms worsen. Hypothyroidism can affect just about every part of the human body; here are a few examples: can cause thinning and change the texture of your hair, dehydrate your skin, puffy eyes and face, cause constipation, inability to tolerate colder temperatures, fatigue and sleepiness, depression, leg swelling and all around aches and pain, increased cholesterol levels, and weight gain due to a slow metabolism. Know that if the condition is not properly treated coma and death can result.

Although hypothyroidism can be treated, areas that will more difficult to regain control of would include weight gain. Medication can control the effects of hypothyroidism rather quickly but there will still be the issues of the weight that was gained while the condition was out of control. It’s imperative that weight gain is controlled to better the condition; diet and exercise can help.

Hypothyroidism and Diet

Your diet directly affects hyperthyroidism and therefore must be addressed and controlled. As with just about any medical condition there are foods that help and hinder. Now, you will still need to exercise with dealing with hypothyroidism. Remember, exercise increases your metabolism, helps you lose weight, makes you feel healthier, lessens stress levels, and makes your body function better.

To better control hypothyroidism via diet, increase foods that have high doses of tyrosine such as lima beans, pumpkin and sesame seeds, fish and lean meat, poultry, bananas, lentils, avocados, low-fat milk and yogurt, spinach and carrots. Each of these foods will help increase your thyroid production and will help your thyroid function better. Now, these may not be your favorite foods, but you can get them past your lips to better the quality of your life.

Now, if there is a ying than there is a yang; thus, to control your hypothyroidism you will have to avoid some foods as well – even if they are your favorites. Remember, the goal is to control hypothyroidism and to better your quality of life. Avoid tofu, soy beans, strawberries, radishes, peaches, broccoli and cauliflower, turnips, peanuts, and everyone’s beloved carbohydrates which will increase insulin levels and lead your body to resist weight loss.

As few other tips for dealing with hypothyroidism and diet: avoid stimulants like coffee, soda, and alcohol and control your salt intake. Additionally, try eating several small meals throughout the day instead of three heavy meals. Add fiber to you diet if you are not getting enough and lessen its intake if you are getting too much. Fiber can be tricky when dealing with hypothyroidism; too much fiber, prevents nutrition from being absorbed and too little leaves waste and water weight gain in your body. Keep a healthy balance. Exercise and add some weight training to your workout to help boost your metabolism. Focus on being healthy, exercising, and especially keeping your daily eating habit in check and your body will keep your thyroid in check.

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Raw food is gaining popularity with many individuals rightfully seeking better ways to increase health through food, while promoting greater harmony and sustainability among all people and the Earth. While this is a noble goal, one I aspire to participate in, this article points out some common misconceptions of raw food nutrition to assist in expanding your thinking and allow for more objectivity.

Raw foods are alive; however, many health educators and most nutritionist claim this is so because of the bioactive enzymes. While there is some truth to that statement, it is at best only half-truth. Raw foods not only contain bioactive enzymes but also bacteria. Most people are unaware of the fact that enzymes do not reproduce, breath, or eat. Therefore, enzymes are not alive! This is an important misconception. Raw foods are alive mainly because of the activity of bacteria.

Enzymes essentially are protein structures that act as keys to unlock nutrients by disassembling food into smaller particles for digestion to take place by trillions of bacteria. Imagine placing your car key in the ignition and the engine turns on. Just because the engine is now “alive” doesn’t mean the key is alive. Processing food by heat, freezing, dehydration and chemicals changes the shape and structure of enzymes. The enzymes are no longer able to fit properly into the ignition situated on cell membranes. Therefore the enzymes are not able to perform their digestive task of disassembling food molecules into the microscopic particles that feed the bacteria in our gut; bacteria that perform the final stages of actual digestion. Because of this fewer nutrients are available for absorption primarily in the small intestine. Living foods such as sauerkraut, kefir, yogurt, kimchee, and miso, are “alive” because they are loaded with bacteria. And ironically we are a bacteria-phobic culture!

If you eat your unwashed vegetation you will be eating more “aliveness” because of the micro-organisms, not because of the enzymes. If you choose to consume raw fish, meat, dairy or eggs then you are taking in millions of bacteria to aid in the efficient digestive process. Just a little food for thought, according to bio-energy nutritional expert and author, Mark Mincolla, PhD he says “in every teaspoon of saliva there are at least 10,000,000 bacteria and 99.99% are necessary to enhance digestion.” Read more…

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“How can I gain muscle and lose fat at the same time?” That’s right up there with “How do I get six pack abs” as one of the most frequently asked fitness questions of all time. The problem is, when you ask it, you get all kinds of conflicting answers – even from experts who are supposed to know these things. So what’s the deal? Is it really possible to lose fat and build muscle simultaneously?

Short answer: Yes it’s possible to gain muscle and lose fat at the same time.

Long answer: It’s difficult and it’s complicated. Allow me to explain….

First we have the issue of whether you really lose fat and gain muscle at the “same time.”

Well, yes, if your definition of the “same time” is say, a month or 12 weeks. But in that case, you’re probably not gaining muscle at the “same time” literally speaking, as in, right now this very moment you are reading this, or 7 days a week, 24 hours a day for months in a row.

The best explanation for what’s really happening is that you alternate between periods of caloric surplus (anabolism) and caloric deficit (catabolism) and the net result is a gain in muscle and a loss in body fat.

You see, if you stay in a calorie surplus, it’s the body’s natural tendency for body fat and lean body mass to go up together. And if you stay in a calorie deficit, it’s your body’s natural tendency for body fat and lean body mass to go down together.

There may be exceptions, but the general rule is that it is usually very difficult to gain muscle and lose fat at the same time – the mechanisms are mostly antagonistic to one another. When big increases in muscle and big decreases in fat are seen at the same time, it’s almost always the result of “unusual conditions” – I call them X factors.

The 4 X-Factors

The first X-factor is “training age” . Ever hear of “newbie gains?” The less trained your body is and the further you are from your genetic potential, the easier it is to gain muscle. The reverse is also true – an advanced bodybuilder with 20 years experience would be thrilled just to gain a few pounds of solid dry muscle in a year!

The second x factor is muscle memory. It’s easier to regain muscle you’ve lost than it is to gain new muscle in the first place (ergo, the fat out of shape semi retired bodybuilder who starts training again and blows up and gets ripped “overnight”).

The third X factor is genetics (or somatotype). Ever heard of the “genetic freak?” That’s the dude who sprouts muscle like weeds even when he’s on the “50-50 diet” (50% McDonald’s and 50% pizza)… and he never gets fat. (That dude chose the right parents!)

The fourth X factor is drugs. It would stun (or sadden) you if you knew how many people take performance and physique-enhancing drugs. I’m not just talking about pro bodybuilders, I’m talking about “Joe six pack” in the gym – not to mention those fitness models you idolize in the magazines. How did some of them get large muscle gains with concurrent fat loss? Chemicals.

I’m not a gambling man, but I’ll place a wager on this any day: I’ll bet that in 99% of the cases of large muscle gains with concurrent large fat losses, one or more of these x factors were present.

That’s not all! There are actually 5 more X factors related to your body composition and diet status (the X2 factors). I talk about those in my new program that’s going to be released on September 28th. More on that later.

So you’re not a beginner, you don’t take roids, you’re not a genetic freak and you have no muscle memory to take advantage of. Are you S.O.L? Well, I do want you to be realistic about your goals, but…

There IS a way for the average person to gain muscle and lose fat at the same time.

The Secret: You have to change your “temporal perspective!”

Traditionally nutritionists and fitness pros have only looked at calorie balance in terms of 24 hour periods. At midnight, you could tally up the calories like a shopkeeper closing out his register, and if the balance were positive, you’d say you were in a surplus for the day. If the balance were negative, you’d say you were in a deficit for the day.

But it’s entirely possible that you might pass through periods of “within-day” surplus where you were in a highly anabolic state (for example, you eat the biggest, highest carb meal of the day after your workout), and you were in a deficit the rest of the day.

Furthermore, exercise changes everything. certain types of training will alter your hormones and physiological response to how you handle calories and nutrients.

If you did intense weight training, and you timed your nutrient intake just right, isn’t it possible that you could gain a small amount of muscle during those anabolic hours, while losing fat the rest of the day? Granted it might only be grams or ounces – but what if you kept that up for a week? A month? Three months?

As you pan out and look at the bigger picture, what if most days of the week you were in a deficit for the entire day, and on some days of the week you were in a surplus? If so, then isn’t it possible that over the course of the week, you’d have a small net gain of muscle and loss of body fat as a result of the caloric fluctuation?

These within-day and within-week phases are what I refer to in my new book as nutritional microcycles and mesocycles. If you also had a primary goal with a longer term focus of several months, say 12 weeks or 16 weeks, that would be a nutritional macrocycle.

What I’ve just described is nutritional periodization. Some people call it cyclical dieting. It’s where you manipulate your calories (primarily by fluctuating carbohydrate intake, hence “carb cycling”) in order to intentionally zig zag your way through periods of surplus and deficit.

The end result: muscle gain and fat loss during the same time period!

I know that someone out there is having a hissy fit because I’ve only talked about calories: deficits and surpluses. Rightfully so. Calories matter but there’s more to it than calories – most importantly, hormones and “nutrient partitioning.”

If you’re in a calorie deficit you are going to pull energy from your body. The question is: From WHERE? If your hormones are out of whack because you’re eating crap and you’re living an unhealthy lifestyle, you could lose more muscle than fat in a deficit and gain almost pure fat, not muscle, in a surplus!

But WHAT IF you could manipulate within day energy balance, use nutritional periodization AND control your hormones with food and lifestyle strategies?

NOW we are seeing how concurrent muscle gain and fat loss are starting to look possible!

Make no mistake – concurrent muscle gain and fat loss is a difficult goal to achieve. It’s the “Holy Grail of Fitness Goals.” The good news: difficult does not mean impossible. Or as George Santayana said, “The difficult is that which can be done immediately, the impossible, that which takes a little longer.”

If you’d like to learn more about losing fat and gaining muscle at the same time, I just recorded a fantastic introduction to the subject in a one hour interview and you can have it for free as a gift because I want to get the word out about my newest ebook, The Holy Grail Body Transformation System.

In my new book, you’ll hear all the details about nutritional periodization, cyclical dieting, hormonal manipulation, within day energy balance, nutrient partitioning, AND the all the X factors, including the 5 “X2-Factors” – which are the keys to gaining muscle and losing fat at the same time.

You’ll also get my new “TNB” training system, which was originally published as a workout in Men’s Fitness magazine. Then I expanded it into a total program that has never been seen before except in my member’s only inner circle.

My new free report that you can download now in MP3 and PDF (transcript) is available for a limited time this week over at my new Holy Grail website. It’s a great introduction to the program and you’ll pick up some great tips just from this free report alone.

Download your Free “Holy Grail Body Transformation Revealed” report at:

http://budurl.com/holygrailworks

David Grisaffi

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I’m often asked to pick my favorite “to do’s” when it comes to slimming the waistline. So here they are:

1. Cut Calories

Cutting calories is the key to maintaining a trim midsection. The only way to see a solid set of abs is in the absence of body fat. To achieve this goal a person must reduce calories. However, what I find is people go whole hog and drop caloric intake too much and too fast. When reducing calories make sure it is not too drastic. This slows your metabolism and allows you to store more stubborn fat. When you reduce calories and increase energy output the body will be forced to burn fat all over, not just in one area. I’m not saying to starve, simply drop the junk food and reduce calories by 10 to 15percent. That may mean cutting out the donuts.

2. Eat at Least Five to Six Small Meals Per Day

Small meals eaten frequently help to keep your metabolism high, allowing you to burn fat, even while you sleep. This approach is in vogue with many fitness authorities. The main reason is stoking the furnace within your body. The more you practice eating small meals more often, the more you will find body fat leaving your body. For more information on this check out “Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle” mentioned at the end of this manual.

3. Reduce Carbohydrate Intake at Night

Since the majority of carbs consumed are complex (slow release), tapering them off toward the end of the day will minimize the possibility of carb-to-fat turnover. This is a proven fact eat, carbs at night and you will gain body fat. Think about it, if you eat late are you ever hungry in the morning? No! Blood sugar levels are still above average. So what happens? You do not eat a good breakfast …and poof you eat like a hog at lunch so you’re not hungry again until late at night….and the cycle continues over and over.

4. Eat a Healthy Serving of Fiber with Meals

Fiber helps with the digestion of protein, carbs and fat. It is the key to burning the sugar from carbs making muscles leaner. Adding fiber to your diet is one of the best things you can do. Also, anything containing fiber is usually going to be low in calories (i.e. vegetables). Get as much of this stuff as you possibly can. Fiber is necessary for a balanced nutritional plan. Read more…

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By Dan Hegerich

The cookbooks of life have been created to entertain you, not
necessarily nourish you.  Because we have drifted so far away from
nature’s laws we have no reference point for what foods support or
detract from our health.  30-minute meals replace sound human nutrition
for quick fixes, but they create a deficit to our nutritional bank
account.  A quick “bam” of cayenne only adds entertainment value, while
the nutrition is burned in the hell and heat of cooking.  Gourmet chefs
prepare food for pleasure and entertainment; human nutrition and
physiology are not on their menu.

The first course in this meal is the basic concepts of honest nutrition
that I established to lift me up out of the dis-eases of modern living.
Now in my home, raw food is on the menu and I use it as a main course to
absolute health and healing.

When you hear diet you might think of only food and beverage.  But that
is only one component of diet.  Diet is everything you put in your eyes,
ears, nose, mouth, on your skin and hair (because your skin absorbs up
to 80% of what you put on your skin), and in any other orifice.  Diet is
everything you take into your mind and body.  It can come exogenously
(from outside of yourself) or endogenously (from within, as in your
thoughts or chemical byproducts from metabolism such as carbon dioxide).
Your life-diet is everything you have consumed in mind and body over
your entire lifetime.  What you see, hear, listen to, smell, breath, and
eat will either nourish you mal-nourish you (take vitality away).

Life doesn’t stand still.  It is either moving towards health and
vitality or towards death and disease.  And you are the doctor writing a
prescription for life or death with every thought, word or action.
Nutrition is the quality of life.  Therefore, nutrition is directly
related to the quality of raw materials that you feed your soul, mind
and body.

Regarding food stuff, the following components make up the whole
nutrients to nourish our whole self:

•    Sun light
•    Moon light
•    Air
•    Water
•    Soil that contain micro-organisms, bacteria, parasites, molds,
yeasts and fungi
•    Macro-nutrients of fats, proteins, and carbohydrates
•    Micro-nutrients of vitamins, minerals, and phyto-nutrients
(pigments or colors of foods)
•    Farmers’ attitudes

These are the fundamental nutrients that make up the fundamental
elements of life.  When consumed, these nutrients then become the
efficient byproduct of the metabolic process required to extract,
synthesize, and deliver energy with the least amount of effort and waste
byproducts.  Efficiency is one of nature’s basic laws.  Think of a
really hot fire with really dry hard wood and sufficient air
circulation.  Very little ash or soot remains because of the heat and
quality of the wood.  Burn green, wet and sappy wood and you get lots of
smoke and wood tars that fill the air and leave a very sticky resin that
hardens when cooled.  Food stuff will do a similar thing in your body,
relative to the quality of the food and efficiency of your digestive
system. To achieve health you have to stoke the fire with foods that
nourish.

So why would we want to nourish our cells? Might seem like a dumb
question and maybe a better question would be why would we want to mal-
nourish our cells? According to Dr. Bill Timmins’ definition of disease,
the first stage of bodily disorder (disease) is the deviation from
homeostasis or inner balance due to a deficiency and an excess
(toxicity). The natural yearning of all organisms is to return to the
state of relative inner balance-The Garden of Eden.  The organism begins
to experience discomfort as a messenger to the owner, you.  If you
ignore this discomfort, and the organism’s true needs are not met, then
it progresses to the next stage where changes are now harming the DNA.
This progresses until the tension turns to pain, and you begin to feel
real symptoms and enter into stage four deviations from honest health,
homeostasis.  This built-up tension into pain and disease is diagnosable
and it arises into our consciousness.

When in stage four, we can no longer deny the yearning of the organism.
We can no longer hide our discomforts and we seek palliative services
to reduce or eliminate the symptoms or we self-medicate or sugar-coat
the pain with the sweet things in life.  If you don’t do anything about
it you are heading to stage five, death!  Cells are dying faster than
your body can reproduce healthy, vital cells.  Organs are weakened,
systems begin to fail and your spirit prepares to leave the body.  This
can go on for many years as people become among the walking dead,
living outside of the body until the stress of life is over.  Just look
at the type of food you consume, how you are eating and how well you
rationalize your addictions.  That will let you know the amount of
suffering you try to silence.  Your body cannot lie.

Diet and disease are married just as nutrition and health are married.
Both are a lifestyle choice.  How you live determines disease or
health. The foods you eat, how that food is prepared and how you eat
them can assist or hinder this healthy healing process of returning to
inner homeostasis.  Raw foods provide all the nutrients and elements of
life required for you to thrive.  They adhere to nature’s laws and are
unadulterated; that is cooked, dehydrated, frozen, irradiated, combined
with chemicals, or genetically modified in any way.  All processed
foods, organic or not, are manufactured by man’s laws.  Man’s laws are
filled with controversy and greed; greed for money, power, fame, and
lust.  Nature’s laws have no controversy, her love is unconditional.

When you start to add heat to your food you enter into a scientific lab
where new molecules are formed.  The scientific community at large
agrees that when you cook food, you begin to lose nutrients or create a
deficiency of the whole.  Additionally, you create numerous chemically
toxic byproducts such as:
•    Acrylamides from cooked and baked starches
•    Heterocyclic amines from cooked proteins
•    Lipid peroxides from cooked fats,
•    Advanced glycation end-products (AGE’s) formed from the
metabolic combustion of raw natural and/or cooked sugars and starch
•    Trans fatty acids

Cooking foods disrupts and alters the size, shape and chemistry of the
molecules.  When you consume cooked foods, white bloods cells flood the
digestive track in an attempt to neutralize the toxic soup.
Furthermore, the water content in raw food is 100% usable, while cooking
reduces this to 8% so you crave and need water all the time.  You also
need that water to help dilute the toxic effects of cooking.  On a raw
food diet rich in usable water and raw fats, the body requires minimal
to no additional water.

At the very least, cooked food creates an imbalance by creating a
deficiency and toxicity.  This is literally disease by definition.  That
is why you are always looking for more food and constantly needing
something to fulfill the yearning of the organism to return back to the
state of inner-balance. Cravings can become unbearable as we fill our
outer and inner-life with empty possessions and ‘comfort food’ to give
us the impression we are fulfilled, content or satisfied.   This is an
illusion.  Is our world, culture or home life in harmony?  Is it
reasonable to consider that your outer-world reflects your inner-world?

Nature only seeks balance, interconnectedness, and harmony.  When you
consume food according to nature, you move towards balance and harmony.
When you eat foods according to man, you eat separateness and greed.
When I consume cooked food it is usually with the intent to slow down my
detoxification/healing process because I am creating more energy than I
am able to handle (think of it as running down a steep hill too quickly,
you become afraid of falling and put on a natural braking response).
Thus, the cooked food will utilize some of that energy and allow me to
manage my healing.  Excess energy is excess energy; the body doesn’t
judge it as good or bad energy.  That is the meaning behind the Chinese
saying “extreme joy produces sorrow.”  Excess energy needs to move
freely through the organism.  This is why riots often take place in a
city after a sports team wins the championship. They need release for
the “joy” that seeks expression.   Take a look at what these sports fans
put down their mouths during a game, cooked and processed foods and
beverages.  Celebrating victory and life can be harmonious if we begin
to live accordingly.

To summarize:

•    Diet is everything you take or put into your mind/body.
•    Not all diets are nourishing
•    Disease is really a disorder of imbalance in which your body is
deficient and toxic or  something in your life is missing and something
in your life must go
•    Health and healing is living to experience inner balance and
express unconditional love
•    Life doesn’t stand still
•    Raw food leads you towards wholeness and aliveness
•    Cooked and processed food leads you towards death and disease
•    You are the doctor and with your free will choose how you want
to experience life and express love
•    How you choose to live and love directly affects everyone around
you and indirectly affects all of life

In part two, I will expand on raw vs. cooked food and discuss a Vegan
vs. Carnivore approach to food.  To whet your appetite, consider that
much of the Vegan/Vegetarian community base their lifestyle on spiritual
and religious philosophies, while the Carnivore/Omnivore community
relies on anthropological and evolutionary philosophies.
Until I write again, keep your body tuned up and your soul tuned in.

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The first question to ask before being aware of the correlation between
inflammation and the a larger waistline is: What is inflammation?

Definition: Inflammation is the result of natural defense activities
undertaken by the white blood cells and cellular secretions called
cytokines in order to fight disease, injury, infection and irritation.

Symptoms:The most common symptoms of inflammation are swelling, heat,
pain and redness in all or some areas of the body. Also prevalent are
symptoms such as:
+    Indigestion - food intolerances and digestive problems causes
your gut to leak toxins back into your blood stream. This hampers fat
loss period.
+    Dry eyes
+    Weight gain - This is a very common side effect of inflammation.
+    Shortness of breath
+    Increase in allergic reactions

Why is inflammation bad?

When the natural balance of the immune system is disrupted, it tends to
go into overdrive; this is when our ‘good’ cells, which are crucial for
the optimum functioning of our bodies, are also attacked. This imbalance
results in many underlying factors, one of which is a bulky waistline.
Chronic inflammation has been linked to chronic diseases such as heart
disease, cancer, Alzheimer’s, arthritis, diabetes, and even obesity. The
latter case is where a bigger waistline is closely linked to
inflammation.

In a society where expanding waistlines are becoming more commonplace,
inflammation cases have increased and a huge percent of the population
does not even know that their weight issues are linked to this state!

Why the size of your waistline matters more than your overall weight?

Results published in Circulation magazine of a study conducted on 44,000
nurses established that elevated waistlines of women even with ‘normal
weight’, irrespective of BMI (Body Mass Index), placed them at a higher
risk of dying from heart disease than  women who were significantly
overweight, but had a narrower waistline to body weight ratio.

A waistline measurement of or exceeding 34.5 for a woman, and 40 for a
man, is considered the basis for abdominal obesity caused due to
waistlines which have not been kept in check thanks to a poor diet and
exercise routine.

Several clinical studies have shown that the incidence of inflammation
has been reduced drastically when a person’s waistline shrunk over time.
Abdominal fat is a glaring sign there could also be excessive fat build
up around your organs, which, in turn, is thanks to protein and hormone
releases caused due to toxic inflammation.

This leads us to survey how we should strive to maintain a svelte,
healthy and ‘tight’ waistline to ward off not just the fat, but also
stop the never-ending cycle that runs between chronic inflammation and a
bulging waistline.

Fast Food Nation
We are probably the unhealthiest species of modern man that ever lived.
Neanderthal Man would have had a laughing fit when he observed our diet
pumped with nothing but trans fats, gluten, refined carbs and sugars;
add to that, a largely sedentary lifestyle that only seems to make our
waistlines blow up like helium balloons.

Waistline measurement is a prime indicator of visceral fat, which should
be combated through a balanced diet comprising:
1.    Omega 3 fatty acids found in fish, walnuts and flaxseed; avoid
red meat.
2.    Fresh, ‘colorful’ fruits and vegetables such as your greens and
orange, red and yellow foods.
3.    Plenty of water, herbs and a cut down on caffeine and all the
bad foods - you know what they are.
T
The importance of exercise in this regard cannot be stressed upon
enough. More specifically, focus on exercises which tone down your
waistline, such as:
1.    Core conditioning exercises in Firm and Flatten Your Abs
2.    Interval Training
3.    Exercises and sports that depend on a lot of lateral movement,
like martial arts, hockey, soccer and basketball.

What else you can do

Apart from nourishing your body with good food and exercise, get enough
sleep and try to lead a stress free life.

It has been found that increased stress levels and inadequate sleep not
only encourage inflammation, but also boost the build up of fat in your
tummy area and contribute to a growing waistline.

So make sure you include some relaxation time in your routine, get good
sleep, eat healthy food and exercise properly; because when you do, you
can finally bid adieu to that generous waistline and to inflammation as
well.

Find out more about “Firm and Flatten Your abs” at
http://www.flattenyourabs.net

Learn more at my website:  http://www.FlattenYourAbs.net

Sincerely,

David Grisaffi
Author, Firm And Flatten Your Abs
http://www.flattenyourabs.net

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EVERYONE walking the face of this earth has an abundance of
fat cells throughout their bodies. In fact, if you’re a healthy
adult with normal body composition, you have approximately
30 billion fat cells. This is an astronomical number when you
think about it. Did you ever wonder why you have so many?
Have you ever wondered what those fat cells are for?

Fat Cells Are Genetically Programmed

The answer is, fat cells are part of our genetic code and they
enable us to use stored energy when food is scarce. This survival
mechanism works very much the same today as it did 10,000
years ago. However, there is an abundance of food in modern
society today, and we no longer need to store so much fat to
survive.

When you consume too many calories, your body goes into
storage mode for the “lean times,” so to speak, but the lean
time never comes. So your body simply stores those extra
calories as fat. When you eat fewer calories than your body
demands, your cells release stored fat for energy. Pretty simple
equation; however, not all fat is the same.

Placement of Fat Deposits in Your Body

The placement of fat deposits on our bodies varies depending on
each person’s genetic influences, lifestyle choices, and nutritional intake.

Men tend to store their body fat around their
bellies and chest. Women tend to store it around their hips,
buttocks, thighs, and the backs of their arms. A complete
discussion of hormones and fat storage is beyond the scope of
this article, but let it suffice to say that certain hormonal
processes do determine body fat distribution.

The Primary Factor in Failing to Lose Fat

Many people who attempt to lose body fat fail to account for
one major factor, a stumbling block to long-term success. They
approach fat loss and fitness with great enthusiasm and
determination and, with this attitude, they lose body fat and
feel great. Even so, they just can’t seem to get rid of all the fat
they want to. They lose fat successfully for a time, but ultimately
get stuck just before all of the fat is completely gone.

This is commonly known as a plateau, and this phenomenon
causes many people who were previously successful to lose their
enthusiasm and return to their old ways. When old habits take
over again - and this happens to the majority of dieters - the
body fat comes back with a vengeance. This is due to
programming of the fat cell. Each time you try to lose body fat
again, it seems to take longer and require more effort.

The Solution to Stubborn Fat

So what is the real solution? It’s simple: you must understand
how fat cells work and how to move past the plateau
phenomenon and lose the last bit of body fat-what we call
“stubborn fat.”

I have worked with many clients and I would say most of them
have a good amount of stubborn body fat. This fat is literally
programmed to be very difficult to lose. It seems to remain on
our bodies no matter what we do, hence the phrase stubborn
fat. Most modern diets and weight loss programs seem to work
in the beginning, but they never really address this crucial part
of fat loss -the last bit of stubborn fat.

Your Hormones and Stubborn Fat
Stubborn fat develops when your hormonal pathways are
broken down. Age does play a role in this: fat deposits increase
and become more resistant to fat loss methods as you get older.

This you have little control over, but some things that lead to
stubborn fat development are under your control. Yo-yo dieting
is one of them. Losing weight on crash diets and then regaining
it-often known as the “ebound effect” - only increase
stubborn fat in the long run. A decrease in exercise and activity
level also compounds the stubborn fat problem. This is why
people who crash-diet on low calories and refuse to exercise
often have the worst stubborn fat problems of all.

Our ancestors really never had to deal with this problem
because they moved and engaged in physical labor as a regular
part of daily life, whereas technological conveniences and the
modern lifestyle have caused many of us to become lazy and
inactive.

Stubborn fat is metabolized extremely slowly and resists the
hormonal process that takes place when the fat burning process
starts up. To burn fat, the adrenal hormones (better known as
adrenaline and noradrenaline) attach to the fat cell receptors
and essentially “open them up” so the fat can be used in the
energy pathways. There are two kinds of receptors in your fat
cells: one is alpha and the other beta. The beta receptors are
much more active and respond to adrenal hormones. To lose
body fat, the adrenal hormones switch on and the body begins
to use fat as energy. However, in the case of people with
stubborn fat, this does not occur, so no body fat is lost.

According to my good friend and colleague Ori Hofmekler,
author of The Warrior Diet, stubborn fat has a lower ratio of beta
receptors to alpha receptors. Therefore, your body’s hormonal
“fat dissolver,” adrenaline, is unable to enter the fat cell and
open the door. Hofmekler also points out that “to make these
matters worse, stubborn fat has more estrogen receptors, which
cause even more stubborn fat.”

If all this sounds bad enough, what makes it even worse is that if
you indulge in the typical modern diet and sedentary lifestyle,
this often results in insulin sensitivity. (For more information,
read my past article on “Insulin Sensitivity.”) On top of
everything else, your fat tissue becomes so incredibly resistant
to your attempts to lose it, it seems like you will be stuck with it
forever.

Why Dieting Alone Doesn’t Work

Diets fail because they only look at the caloric reduction side of
the equation. You need to understand the other variables in the
equation - exercise and lifestyle. You must understand the
deeper issues you are really dealing with. Getting rid of
stubborn fat is not nearly as simple as just slashing calories and
dieting. Stubborn fat is the result of a complex interplay of
biological and hormonal processes - all of which are affected by
how you eat, how you move, and the type of lifestyle you lead.

The Crucial Question

Now that you understand why you have stubborn fat, right
down to the hormone and receptor level, the question is: How
do you alter your nutrition, exercise, and lifestyle to get rid if this
EVERYONE walking the face of this earth has an abundance of
fat cells throughout their bodies. In fact, if you’re a healthy
adult with normal body composition, you have approximately
30 billion fat cells. This is an astronomical number when you
think about it. Did you ever wonder why you have so many?
Have you ever wondered what those fat cells are for?

Fat Cells Are Genetically Programmed

The answer is, fat cells are part of our genetic code and they
enable us to use stored energy when food is scarce. This survival
mechanism works very much the same today as it did 10,000
years ago. However, there is an abundance of food in modern
society today, and we no longer need to store so much fat to
survive.

When you consume too many calories, your body goes into
storage mode for the “lean times,” so to speak, but the lean
time never comes. So your body simply stores those extra
calories as fat. When you eat fewer calories than your body
demands, your cells release stored fat for energy. Pretty simple
equation; however, not all fat is the same.

Placement of Fat Deposits in Your Body

The placement of fat deposits on our bodies varies depending on
each person’s genetic influences, lifestyle choices, and nutritional intake.

Men tend to store their body fat around their
bellies and chest. Women tend to store it around their hips,
buttocks, thighs, and the backs of their arms. A complete
discussion of hormones and fat storage is beyond the scope of
this article, but let it suffice to say that certain hormonal
processes do determine body fat distribution.

The Primary Factor in Failing to Lose Fat

Many people who attempt to lose body fat fail to account for
one major factor, a stumbling block to long-term success. They
approach fat loss and fitness with great enthusiasm and
determination and, with this attitude, they lose body fat and
feel great. Even so, they just can’t seem to get rid of all the fat
they want to. They lose fat successfully for a time, but ultimately
get stuck just before all of the fat is completely gone.

This is commonly known as a plateau, and this phenomenon
causes many people who were previously successful to lose their
enthusiasm and return to their old ways. When old habits take
over again - and this happens to the majority of dieters - the
body fat comes back with a vengeance. This is due to
programming of the fat cell. Each time you try to lose body fat
again, it seems to take longer and require more effort.

The Solution to Stubborn Fat

So what is the real solution? It’s simple: you must understand
how fat cells work and how to move past the plateau
phenomenon and lose the last bit of body fat-what we call
“stubborn fat.”

I have worked with many clients and I would say most of them
have a good amount of stubborn body fat. This fat is literally
programmed to be very difficult to lose. It seems to remain on
our bodies no matter what we do, hence the phrase stubborn
fat. Most modern diets and weight loss programs seem to work
in the beginning, but they never really address this crucial part
of fat loss -the last bit of stubborn fat.

Your Hormones and Stubborn Fat
Stubborn fat develops when your hormonal pathways are
broken down. Age does play a role in this: fat deposits increase
and become more resistant to fat loss methods as you get older.

This you have little control over, but some things that lead to
stubborn fat development are under your control. Yo-yo dieting
is one of them. Losing weight on crash diets and then regaining
it-often known as the “ebound effect” - only increase
stubborn fat in the long run. A decrease in exercise and activity
level also compounds the stubborn fat problem. This is why
people who crash-diet on low calories and refuse to exercise
often have the worst stubborn fat problems of all.

Our ancestors really never had to deal with this problem
because they moved and engaged in physical labor as a regular
part of daily life, whereas technological conveniences and the
modern lifestyle have caused many of us to become lazy and
inactive.

Stubborn fat is metabolized extremely slowly and resists the
hormonal process that takes place when the fat burning process
starts up. To burn fat, the adrenal hormones (better known as
adrenaline and noradrenaline) attach to the fat cell receptors
and essentially “open them up” so the fat can be used in the
energy pathways. There are two kinds of receptors in your fat
cells: one is alpha and the other beta. The beta receptors are
much more active and respond to adrenal hormones. To lose
body fat, the adrenal hormones switch on and the body begins
to use fat as energy. However, in the case of people with
stubborn fat, this does not occur, so no body fat is lost.

According to my good friend and colleague Ori Hofmekler,
author of The Warrior Diet, stubborn fat has a lower ratio of beta
receptors to alpha receptors. Therefore, your body’s hormonal
“fat dissolver,” adrenaline, is unable to enter the fat cell and
open the door. Hofmekler also points out that “to make these
matters worse, stubborn fat has more estrogen receptors, which
cause even more stubborn fat.”

If all this sounds bad enough, what makes it even worse is that if
you indulge in the typical modern diet and sedentary lifestyle,
this often results in insulin sensitivity. (For more information,
read my past article on “Insulin Sensitivity.”) On top of
everything else, your fat tissue becomes so incredibly resistant
to your attempts to lose it, it seems like you will be stuck with it
forever.

Why Dieting Alone Doesn’t Work

Diets fail because they only look at the caloric reduction side of
the equation. You need to understand the other variables in the
equation - exercise and lifestyle. You must understand the
deeper issues you are really dealing with. Getting rid of
stubborn fat is not nearly as simple as just slashing calories and
dieting. Stubborn fat is the result of a complex interplay of
biological and hormonal processes - all of which are affected by
how you eat, how you move, and the type of lifestyle you lead.

The Crucial Question

Now that you understand why you have stubborn fat, right
down to the hormone and receptor level, the question is: How
do you alter your nutrition, exercise, and lifestyle to get rid if this
resistant body fat?

The answer is revealed in Part 2. Read on-

The answer is revealed in Part 2. Read on-

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Women who eat a high-carbohydrate diet — especially if they eat a lot of bread, pizza, jam, and similar products — are at an increased risk of coronary heart disease, researchers said.The same effect, however, wasn’t seen in men, according to Vittorio Krogh, MD, of the Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori in Milan, and colleagues.

The finding comes from a large prospective study of nearly 45,000 Italian volunteers who were followed for more than seven years on average, Krogh and colleagues said in the April 12 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine.

The analysis, studying causes of cardiovascular disease, looked at Italians taking part in the long-running European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) study, the researchers said.

Participants’ diets were assessed using a questionnaire, from which the researchers calculated the glycemic index, a measure of how much a carbohydrate raises blood glucose levels compared with glucose or white bread. They also calculated the glycemic load, defined as the product of the glycemic index of a food and its carbohydrate content.

Foods with a high glycemic index included bread, sugar or honey and jam, pizza, and rice, while foods with a low glycemic index included pasta, fruit, and cakes.

For each participant, the average glycemic index was the sum of the indices for each food they ate, multiplied by how much they ate and the percentage of carbohydrates, and divided by the total daily carbohydrate intake.

The glycemic load calculation was similar, but without dividing by carbohydrate intake. For the analysis, participants were divided into quartiles based on carbohydrate intake.

Over the follow-up period, the researchers found, there were 463 new cases of coronary heart disease among the 44,132 participants, including 305 among the 13,637 men and 158 among the 30,495 women.

For both men and women, the average daily glycemic load increased by about 50% from the lowest to the highest quartile, Krogh and colleagues reported in the journal.

In a multivariate analysis, they said, women with the highest carbohydrate intake had a significantly greater risk of heart disease than did those in the lowest quartile. The relative risk was 2.0, with a 95% confidence interval from 1.16 to 3.43.

Those in the second and third quartiles were also at significantly elevated risk, compared with the lowest quartile, and the trend was significant at P=0.02, they found.

Increasing carbohydrate intake from foods with a high glycemic index was also associated with increasing heart disease risk. Compared with the lowest quartile, those in the highest group had a relative risk of 1.68, with a 95% confidence interval from 1.02 to 2.75. The trend was significant at P=0.04.

On the other hand, there was no significant increase in risk if the increased carbohydrate intake came from foods with a low glycemic index, the researchers found.

Among men, on the other hand, there were no significant associations linking carbohydrate intake and coronary heart disease, they said.

There is some evidence, they said, that changes in HDL cholesterol and triglycerides are stronger risk factors for cardiovascular disease for women than men. Such a difference might explain the lack of association found among men in the study, they said.

The study’s strengths include its prospective design, the researchers said. As well, the researchers used glycemic index values set for Italian foods, rather than using international tables.

On the other hand, they said, the questionnaires were not designed to estimate dietary glycemic index and load. In addition, they were only administered once, and some participants may have changed their diets over the study period.

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By David Grisaffi
http://www.flattenyourabs.net

A new study published in the journal Nature Neuroscience
says that you may be addicted to food!

They claim that junk food can be every bit as addictive
as hard drugs.

Here is the skinny - The study showed when rats were
permitted unrestricted access to unlimited amounts of
junk foods such as sausage, pound cake, candy and
candy bars and bacon, they didn’t stop eating and
the rats gained weight rapidly.

You would expect that the satiety mechanisms would
kick in and both physical fullness would be reached
and hormonal messages would be sent to signal fullness.

But the rats kept eating and eating the junk food.
The researchers speculated that the rats had become
addicted

But here’s the kicker. Even when they were given an
electric shock if they consumed more than a normal
amount - they STILL kept eating!

The control group of rats were fed a healthy diet,
also with unrestricted access to the food in unlimited
amounts, but they did not gain anywhere near as much
weight.

The main case made for claiming the junk food eating
rats had become addicted revolved around the effect
that the junk food had on dopamine receptors.

These brain receptors are a part of the body’s reward
system. Rats eating too much junk food suppressed this
system and thus ate much more to satisfy themselves.

The researchers found that if they artificially suppressed
the receptors implicated in addiction to cocaine and
heroin of other rats these rats will begin to eat junk
food compulsively.

Here are my thoughts after reading this study.

If you think this is an isolated study or it does not
apply to humans, think again.

There have been many other studies on food addiction
both in animals and humans and the findings have
been similar.

This trend toward junk food is easy and we tend to
slide towards the easy way out, which is turning to
food to feel better and eating junk food for the
perceived convenience.

Whether it is an easy lunch at McDonald’s or a thin
crust pizza from the frozen food isle at dinner, the
frequent consumption of these types of processed foods
can become habitual or even addictive, contributing to
obesity and all kinds of health problems.

The simple fact is we CAN become addicted to sweets,
high starch carbohydrates, all kinds of fats, processed
foods and salty foods and this realization, now backed
by research, should be a wake up call!

It can happen easily. You give in one too many times
and next thing you know, wham, you feel like you can’t
stop.

Although it’s controversial, some people - even some of
the addiction researchers themselves - believe that food
could be as addictive as heroin. Read more…

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A Princeton University research team has demonstrated that all sweeteners are not equal when it comes to weight gain: Rats with access to high-fructose corn syrup gained significantly more weight than those with access to table sugar, even when their overall caloric intake was the same.
In addition to causing significant weight gain in lab animals, long-term consumption of high-fructose corn syrup also led to abnormal increases in body fat, especially in the abdomen, and a rise in circulating blood fats called triglycerides. The researchers say the work sheds light on the factors contributing to obesity trends in the United States.

“Some people have claimed that high-fructose corn syrup is no different than other sweeteners when it comes to weight gain and obesity, but our results make it clear that this just isn’t true, at least under the conditions of our tests,” said psychology professor Bart Hoebel, who specializes in the neuroscience of appetite, weight and sugar addiction. “When rats are drinking high-fructose corn syrup at levels well below those in soda pop, they’re becoming obese — every single one, across the board. Even when rats are fed a high-fat diet, you don’t see this; they don’t all gain extra weight.”

More of High-fructose corn syrup prompts considerably more weight gain

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