If you often feel uncomfortably full after a meal, it's time to make
some changes. Tackle your overeating issues for good by getting honest
and asking yourself if any of these habits are holding you back from
having a healthy relationship with food.
1. You Skip Breakfast
Skipping breakfast may seem like a great way to save calories, but when
you head to your next meal, you'll be far more likely to gorge yourself
on whatever's in sight. If you never seem to have time to cook a healthy
breakfast, plan ahead and cook up healthy make-ahead recipes.
2. You Eat By a Screen
Always chowing down in front of the TV or computer causes most people to
overeat since they're not connected to the activity of eating. When
your mind is focused on the plot of your show or all those e-mails, it's
significantly harder to focus on how full you feel. Designate mealtimes
for just that: meals. The tube will still be there once you're done.
3. You Don't Practice Portion Control
Either order a limited amount of food, be mindful about how you're feeling as you eat, or take Jillian Michaels's extreme tip
and just throw away leftovers. Hopefully you have enough self-control
to take a step back and say no to that second enormous slice of pizza,
but do whatever works for you.
4. You Confuse Hunger and Thirst
Many people confuse the sensation of thirst for hunger. If you've
recently eaten and you're feeling unsatisfied, take this advice from
Mara Z. Vitolins, R.D., and Wake Forest assistant professor of public
health sciences: "It's hard to distinguish between being thirsty and
being hungry, so try drinking water and waiting 20 to 30 minutes to see
if you're still hungry."
5. You Eat For Your Partner's Needs
When your partner isn't concerned about overeating, it can be hard to
stay connected to your healthy-eating goals. Cynthia Sass, M.P.H., R.D.,
has a helpful tip for when you're cooking at home: "We'll have similar
ingredients, but make different things. I have to make peace with the
fact that we don't have the same needs or maybe we're not on the same
page as far as our goal." For example, on taco night, Sass enjoys a
healthy taco salad with avocado and pico de gallo, while her husband
goes for a big burrito with all the fixings.
6.
Your Plates and Bowls Are Too Big
Did you know that the size of your plate or bowl can lead to overeating? Researchers at Cornell call it the large-plate mistake.
When there's more empty space on your plate or in your bowl, it makes
your portion appear smaller than it actually is. Instead of piling more
food on your plate, reach for smaller plates and smaller bowls whenever
possible.
When cooking at home, keep measuring cups and spoons on hand to make
sure your serving sizes are appropriate: this way, you'll know exactly
what you're getting.
7.
You Indulge With a Side of Guilt
Anyone who thinks that feeling bad after indulging will somehow make you
healthier might be surprised to learn that it's just the opposite. In
fact, you'll be more likely to overeat. In the well-known doughnut study,
researchers found that women who received a self-compassion message
after eating a doughnut ate less candy than those who weren't reassured
with a compassionate message that everyone indulges sometimes.
8.
You Never Snack
Unfortunately, some people thinks that all snacks are bad. It's
important to realize that snacking can help you reach your healthy
goals, as long as you go into it with a health perspective. Your pre-
and post-workout snacks fuel your body with the nutrients it needs, and
enjoying healthy snacks between meals can help you from overeating.
9.
You Overdo It After a Workout
Once you finish a tough
workout, don't use it as an excuse to
overindulge in a big decadent treat. Unless it's mealtime, your average
post-workout snack should be about 150 calories. If it's time for
dinner, try a quick workout. When you have something waiting for you at
home, you won't be as tempted to head to a drive-through.
10.
It's Just Emotional
If you tend to self-soothe with food, you're not alone. Chowing down on a
heaping helping of comfort food may seem like a quick fix when you're
feeling stressed or blue, but you're only doing your body injustice. The
next time you head for a snack, honestly ask yourself, "Am I hungry?"
It seems so simple, but these three little words make a world of
difference in taking stock of your overeating habits.
Friday, February 28, 2014
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
The Crazy Amount Of Hidden Sugar You're Eating
Your belly fat is a direct result of the 130 pounds of sugar hidden in the "healthy" foods you choose every day. Even if it doesn't say "sugar" on the label, sugar has dozens of different names — like dextrose, maltose, or even sorghum — so you have no idea that you're eating it. Your brain may be fooled, but your belly recognizes sugar!
The average American swallows a whopping 22 teaspoons a day of added sugars! That’s an extra 228,000 calories, or 65 pounds of body fat! And much of it is hiding in "healthy" foods that don't even taste sweet! New science shows that this overload of sugar can make organs fat, prime your body for diabetes, stress your heart, boost unhealthy cholesterol levels, and even damage the proteins in your skin that keep it healthy, firm, and wrinkle-free.
Saturday, February 15, 2014
15 Worst Diet Tips Ever
The most dubious diet advice
You know you can't believe everything you read. And still, you haven't eaten an egg yolk since the 90s, and you can't touch a French fry without being saddled with guilt. Oh, and don't even get us started on the whole don't-eat-after-8-PM-or-else mentality. Let's set the record straight once and for all by calling out these 25 worst diet tips—and offering up smart food rules to follow instead.
Fat makes you fat.
Why that's BS: It depends on the type of fats you're eating, says Tricia Psota, RD, a nutritionist based in Washington D.C. "Fats in chips, cookies, and greasy foods can increase cholesterol and your risk for certain diseases. But good fats, like nuts, avocados, and salmon, protect your heart and support your overall health." And when paired with a healthy diet, the right fats can help keep you from being, well, fat, adds Sharon Palmer, RD, author of The Plant-Powered Diet.Stop snacking to lose weight.
Why that's BS: Eating in small, frequent amounts is a great way to curb hunger, control portion sizes, and make better nutritional choices, says Mike Clancy, CDN, a personal trainer at David Barton's Gym in New York City. "Smarter snacks like nuts, fruits, and yogurt will keep your energy levels high throughout the day."A calorie is a calorie—and you should count them.
Why that's BS: "Not all calories are the same," says Clancy. "The type of calories, the timing of the calories, and the quality of the calories can significantly alter the effect of the calories on the body," he says. "Food creates reactions within our bodies and the type of food you eat is an important component in diets."For example, 50 calories of an apple will cause a different internal reaction than 50 calories of cheesecake, says Clancy. "The quality of the calories is also important because the chemicals, hormones, and general byproducts that are found within processed food effects the absorption of real nutrients." Quality calories are nutrient dense, like spinach. Calories that don't contain any nutrients—also known as "empty" calories—are like the ones found in French fries.
Bottom line: Calories are important for understanding portion control, but they’re not the only factor in good nutrition, says Clancy.
Load up on protein.
Why that's BS: Sorry, caveman lovers: eating lots of protein is not the key to healthy weight loss. Why? The body needs three macronutrients: Protein, carbohydrates, and fat, says Rania Batayneh, MPH, a nutritionist and author of the forthcoming The One One One Diet (published by Rodale, which also publishes Prevention), and focusing exclusively on protein for weight loss makes no sense. "You not only deprive your body of fiber and other antioxidants found in healthy carbohydrates—whole grains, fruits, and veggies—but you also run the risk of eating too much fat in your diet which can lead to high cholesterol and triglycerides.”Go gluten-free to lose weight.
Why that's BS: There's no scientific evidence that gluten is a particularly fattening ingredient, says Palmer. "The problem is that we eat too many refined grains—foods made of white flour or other refined grains," she says.And cutting gluten without checking with your doctor first can lead to deficiencies in important nutrients, such as fiber, iron, vitamin B12, and magnesium, says MaryAnne Metzak, CDN, a nutritionist in Southampton, NY.
You burn more calories working out on an empty stomach.
Why that's BS: Working out with or without food in your stomach doesn't affect calorie burn—but skipping meals before sweat sessions may result in muscle loss, finds a study published in the Strength and Conditioning Journal. And before you settle for a sports drink, know this: While a quick sip of sugar energizes your muscles, the drink’s other artificial additives can be harmful to your health, says Sanda Moldovan, DDS, MS, CNS, a diplomat of the American Academy of Periodontology.Instead, go for naturally sweet fruit, like bananas, peaches, and mangos before your sweat session. Or try an ounce of dark chocolate for the same caffeine fix you get from a half cup of coffee. "Chocolate also contains feel-good substances, called neurotransmitters, which are the same release during a 'runner's high,' " says Moldovan.
Eat every 2 hours to rev your metabolism.
Why that's BS: Going four or five (or even eight!) hours between normally-sized meals will not make your metabolism slow down, says Monica Reinagel, MS, a nutritionist based in Baltimore. "Eating more frequently may help stave off hunger, which can help you fight temptation. But if you want to do this, you have to be careful to keep your meals and snacks really small," she says. "Otherwise, eating every 2 hours can simply lead to taking in too many calories over the course of the day."Watch what you eat during the week, but take the weekends off.
Why that's BS: Throwing caution to the wind on the weekends can offset the consistency and success you had all week, says Batayneh. "On the weekends, we tend to sleep in, maybe missing our workout, typically drink more alcohol and have heavier meals. So if you lose about one pound between Monday and Friday, you just might gain it back—or at least maintain it, really taking away the efforts towards weight loss."Which means if you're trying to lose weight, the weekends shouldn't be a free-for-all. You still need a plan, says Batayneh. Some suggestions: passing on the bread basket and limiting yourself to one cocktail.
Swear off forbidden foods.
Why that's BS: "We tend to be in 'all or nothing' mode when we diet and never seem to find a middle ground," says Batayneh. "You have to realize that you can’t have pizza, French fries, and chocolate cake all in the same day, but—with careful planning—you can enjoy these foods when they are presented to you. Just don’t go for seconds and share if you can." In fact, research shows that moderately indulging in "forbidden foods" is what keeps people from bingeing on the stuff.Drink your fruits and veggies.
Why that's BS: While shoving five servings of fruits and vegetables into a juicer seems like a simple and efficient way to get the daily recommended amounts, it comes at a cost, says Batayneh. "Unfortunately, juicing fruits and vegetables removes one of their most valuable components: fiber. Found in the pulp, skin and seeds, fiber’s list of benefits ranges from filling you up to maintaining stable blood sugar levels." If you're juicing more sweet stuff (fruit and carrots) than green stuff you're also going to seriously spike your sugar. (Some juicers allow you to keep in the pulp, so that's another option.)Eat as few calories as possible.
Why that's BS: "Ugh, awful tip," says Carroll. "When you cut your calories too low, your body acts as if it's going into starvation mode and your metabolism slows down." But a reasonable goal, adds Carroll, is to cut approximately 500 calories each day through diet and exercise, which will lead to a healthy rate of weight loss of one pound per week.Skip breakfast to save up calories for later.
Why that's BS: This backfires, says Carroll. "People end up overeating at lunch and dinner, often in excess of what they 'saved' at breakfast," she says. "In fact, research on individuals who have successfully lost weight shows that they regularly eat a healthy breakfast." Better if it's high in protein, according to a study published in the American Journal Of Clinical Nutrition.Say no to nuts.
Why that's BS: Yes, nuts are calorie dense, but that doesn't mean they can’t—or shouldn't—easily be incorporated into a healthy diet when eaten in proper portions, says Carroll. A 2011 study in the Journal of The American College of Nutrition backs this up, with researchers finding that nut consumers, especially tree-nut consumers (think almonds, pecans and pistachios) had a lower BMI and smaller waist circumference compared to non-consumers.Your move: remove a less nutrient-dense food from your meal plan and incorporate heart-healthy nuts instead.
Schedule regular detoxes.
Why that's BS: "Your digestive system, kidneys, and liver are all actually fairly amazing at 'detoxing' your body on a regular basis," says Carroll. "There's no need for special cleanses or juices."No food? Grab a multi!
Why that's BS: "While insurance for your health, life, and car are often essential, insurance for your diet really doesn't exist!" says Kirkpatrick. "That's because, except for a few exceptions—folic acid and vitamin D—the vitamins and minerals you get from whole foods are significantly superior to the same nutrients you’d get in a pill."A 2011 study in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry found that the key components in broccoli and cruciferous vegetables were seriously lacking in pill form. And a study in the Archives of Internal Medicine found that certain dietary supplements, including multivitamins, folic acid, iron, and copper, appeared to be associated with an increased risk of death in older women.
There are about 10 More on this list, however I will save those for later.
Thanks for Reading.......
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
What Foods are High in Fats?
Your body needs some fat. It's necessary for cell membranes, to make
steroid hormones, and to lubricate body surfaces. Fat also insulates
your body from the cold. A little dietary fat is good because it helps your body absorb the fat soluble vitamins. But you don't need much fat -- about 20 to 35 grams per day is enough -- and many experts suggest avoiding foods that are high in fats.
That includes fried foods and baked goods like croissants and pie crusts. Snack chips, pork rinds and many frozen convenience foods are high in fat as well -- you need to look at the food labels to know for sure,
High Fat Foods
Butter, margarine, vegetable oils, shortening and lard are all fat, so any food that includes a lot of these ingredients is going to be high in fat as a results.That includes fried foods and baked goods like croissants and pie crusts. Snack chips, pork rinds and many frozen convenience foods are high in fat as well -- you need to look at the food labels to know for sure,
Meats
Meat can be high in fat, especially ground and processed meats like bacon and sausage. Red meats are particularly high in saturated fats. You can reduce some of the fat of certain cuts of meat by removing the visible fat. Some cuts of pork are high fat, but some, like ham, are lower in fat.Poultry and Eggs
Poultry products, including turkey and chicken are lower in fat as long as you avoid the skin. Be careful with ground turkey -- it may be high in fat, unless the skin was removed prior to processing. Egg yolks are high in fat, but the whites are fat-free.Dairy
Dairy products vary -- butter is all fat, but non-fat milk contains no fat. Most lies in the middle somewhere. Most types of cheese are high in fat, except for dry cheese like Parmesan. Whipping cream and half-and-half are high in fat as well. Yogurt is usually lower in fat.Seafood
Fish and seafood are lower in fat than most meat, but they can become high in fat if deep fry them in batter. Or if you add cream sauces or drench them in butter.Nuts and Seeds
Nuts and seeds contain fats. And although they're healthier monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, the calories can add up quickly if you're mindlessly munching. Watch your portion size when you eat them.Fruits and Vegetables
Most fruits and vegetables are low in fat, which is why they are generally low in calories and incorporated into all healthy diets. The two exceptions are avocados and olives -- like nuts and seeds, they're good fats, but still high in calories.Condiments and Extras
Salad dressings, creamed soup, gravy, creamy and cheese sauces, and ice cream are all high in fat unless they're specially formulated to be low in fat.Tuesday, February 11, 2014
How to Get Motivated to Lose Weight (The science makes Sense)
Many people believe that motivation is a magical quality that some
people have and some people don't. But there are easy techniques that
anyone can learn to get motivated and lose weight. By understanding how
motivation works, you can assemble the building blocks you need to
achieve weight loss success.
Intrinsic motivation, on the other hand, comes from within. If you exercise because of the sense of accomplishment you achieve at the end of the workout your source of motivation is intrinsic. If you choose a healthy snack because it makes you feel better about yourself, you are internally or intrinsically motivated.
So why do different types of motivation matter? Extrinsic and intrinsic inspiration will come into play at different times during your weight loss experience. By understanding how to use both extrinsic and intrinsic forms, you equip yourself with the tools you need for weight loss success.
When you feel outside pressure to lose weight, let it motivate you to gather information. You may not be ready to go on a diet, but you can learn more about weight loss plans and exercise programs. Find out if there are small steps you can take to improve your health before you take the plunge and commit to a full-scale weight-loss program. Ask your physician about how making small changes to your diet or lifestyle will affect your health.
Extrinsic motivation can also be helpful when you need a gentle nudge to achieve short-term goals. For example, you might know that exercise is good for you, you may even know that you'll feel better after you complete a workout, but on some days you might still struggle to get to the gym. On those days, promise yourself a healthy reward. Set the DVR to record your favorite show or pick up some bubble bath and reward yourself with time in the tub after the workout is complete.
So how do you create internal motivation? The good news is that most people already have it. All you have to do is find it, identify it and acknowledge it.
3 Steps to Foster Internal Motivation
Thanks for Reading..........
Different Kinds of Motivation
There are two kinds of motivation: extrinsic and intrinsic. Extrinsic motivation is the inspiration that comes from an external source, outside of you. For example, if your physician tells you that you need to lose weight, you may be externally motivated to go on a diet out of fear of poor health. Many rewards are extrinsic sources. If you go on a diet in order to fit into a smaller dress size, your motivation is extrinsic.Intrinsic motivation, on the other hand, comes from within. If you exercise because of the sense of accomplishment you achieve at the end of the workout your source of motivation is intrinsic. If you choose a healthy snack because it makes you feel better about yourself, you are internally or intrinsically motivated.
So why do different types of motivation matter? Extrinsic and intrinsic inspiration will come into play at different times during your weight loss experience. By understanding how to use both extrinsic and intrinsic forms, you equip yourself with the tools you need for weight loss success.
Use Extrinsic Motivation to Accomplish Short Term Goals
People often begin an exercise or weight loss program for external reasons: their clothes don't fit, their doctor has told them that they need to lose weight, family and friends have put pressure on them to slim down. These extrinsic factors are great for getting the ball rolling.When you feel outside pressure to lose weight, let it motivate you to gather information. You may not be ready to go on a diet, but you can learn more about weight loss plans and exercise programs. Find out if there are small steps you can take to improve your health before you take the plunge and commit to a full-scale weight-loss program. Ask your physician about how making small changes to your diet or lifestyle will affect your health.
Extrinsic motivation can also be helpful when you need a gentle nudge to achieve short-term goals. For example, you might know that exercise is good for you, you may even know that you'll feel better after you complete a workout, but on some days you might still struggle to get to the gym. On those days, promise yourself a healthy reward. Set the DVR to record your favorite show or pick up some bubble bath and reward yourself with time in the tub after the workout is complete.
Foster Intrinsic Motivation to Achieve Long-Term Success
While extrinsic motivation may help you overcome short-term challenges, people who are successful at weight loss are usually motivated by intrinsic factors. Eating well and exercising makes them feel good so they continue to practice healthy habits for the long term.So how do you create internal motivation? The good news is that most people already have it. All you have to do is find it, identify it and acknowledge it.
3 Steps to Foster Internal Motivation
- Set short-term goals. Set yourself up for success by setting very short-term achievable goals. Your long-term goal might be to lose 30 pounds, but a good short-term goal might be to eat a lean healthy breakfast each day during the week. If a weekly goal seems too broad, set a goal for just one day or even an hour. Swap the high calorie soda for water during one meal or commit to cut your lunch in half and save half for another day.
- Keep a journal. Write out each goal in a journal. At the end of the day, comment on the day's success. Keep in mind that just taking the time to write in your journal is healthy and an accomplishment in itself. Use positive words that describe how you feel about your actions.
- Acknowledge your success. Take time to review your successes and give yourself credit. Review your journal on a regular basis and take pride in every step you've taken to improve your health.
Thanks for Reading..........
Friday, February 7, 2014
What's Making America So Fat? It may not just be due to too much food and too little exercise
By Robin Marantz Henig
Of all the modern trends that have been linked to America's ever-expanding waistline—portion size, more McDonald's, couch potato lifestyles, and some lesser-known possibilities, like air-conditioning, viral exposure, and lack of sleep—one of the weirdest is designer handbags.
If your brand-name clutch is making you fat, it would be because it contains, as at least some high-end handbags do, a new kind of chemical to worry about: compounds known as obesogens.
Obesogens are believed to work in at least three ways: first, by directly affecting adipocytes, or fat cells, by either increasing their fat-storage capacity or increasing their number; second, by changing metabolism, by both reducing the number of calories burned at rest and promoting the storage of calories as fat; and third, by changing the way the body regulates feelings of hunger and fullness.
Don't think you're avoiding them because you've never paid a week's salary for a purse. Obesogens are ubiquitous. If you've ever eaten seafood, plugged in an air freshener, handled a cash register receipt, eaten canned vegetables, sat on a couch treated with flame retardant, or cooked in a nonstick pan, you've already been exposed. (Taking showers with vinyl curtains count, too.) Most alarming is new animal research that suggests that chemicals to which your parents, grandparents, or great-grandparents were exposed—including the long-banned pesticide DDT—can cause you to gain weight, even if you've never been exposed yourself.
"It's impossible to know the precise contribution of obesogens to the obesity epidemic, but I would bet that it's significant," says Bruce Blumberg, PhD, professor of developmental and cell biology at the University of California, Irvine. Even on a normal diet, he says, mice in his lab that are exposed to obesogens in utero grow up to be about 15% heavier than unexposed mice. "Fifteen percent," he says. "That's the difference between what we weighed a generation ago and where we are now."
Of mice and men
The obesogen hypothesis was unknown back in 2005, when Dr. Blumberg submitted his first grant application to study it. Some reviewers were outraged, he says. "How dare you waste our time with such a ridiculous idea?" one wrote. That grant was rejected, no surprise, but by 2007, Dr. Blumberg and a handful of other researchers managed to get the funding they needed to explore the connection between toxins in the environment and the global obesity epidemic.
When Dr. Blumberg and his colleague Felix Grun, PhD, used the term obesogen for the first time in 2007, they applied it to a variety of chemicals, including tributyltin (TBT), a fungicide that can contaminate seafood and drinking water. (The usual route: via TBT-treated boat hulls, docks, and fishing nets, where it was once used to discourage barnacle encrustation, as well as industrial water-cooling systems used in paper, leather, and textile mills, which discharge wastewater into rivers and streams.) They fed pregnant mice a single dose and found that the offspring were born with greater fat stores than normal. At 10 weeks of age, these mice weighed about 15% more than mice that had not been exposed to TBT before birth.
Obesogens are believed to work in at least three ways: first, by directly affecting adipocytes, or fat cells, by either increasing their fat-storage capacity or increasing their number; second, by changing metabolism, by both reducing the number of calories burned at rest and promoting the storage of calories as fat; and third, by changing the way the body regulates feelings of hunger and fullness.
Don't think you're avoiding them because you've never paid a week's salary for a purse. Obesogens are ubiquitous. If you've ever eaten seafood, plugged in an air freshener, handled a cash register receipt, eaten canned vegetables, sat on a couch treated with flame retardant, or cooked in a nonstick pan, you've already been exposed. (Taking showers with vinyl curtains count, too.) Most alarming is new animal research that suggests that chemicals to which your parents, grandparents, or great-grandparents were exposed—including the long-banned pesticide DDT—can cause you to gain weight, even if you've never been exposed yourself.
"It's impossible to know the precise contribution of obesogens to the obesity epidemic, but I would bet that it's significant," says Bruce Blumberg, PhD, professor of developmental and cell biology at the University of California, Irvine. Even on a normal diet, he says, mice in his lab that are exposed to obesogens in utero grow up to be about 15% heavier than unexposed mice. "Fifteen percent," he says. "That's the difference between what we weighed a generation ago and where we are now."
Of mice and men
The obesogen hypothesis was unknown back in 2005, when Dr. Blumberg submitted his first grant application to study it. Some reviewers were outraged, he says. "How dare you waste our time with such a ridiculous idea?" one wrote. That grant was rejected, no surprise, but by 2007, Dr. Blumberg and a handful of other researchers managed to get the funding they needed to explore the connection between toxins in the environment and the global obesity epidemic.
When Dr. Blumberg and his colleague Felix Grun, PhD, used the term obesogen for the first time in 2007, they applied it to a variety of chemicals, including tributyltin (TBT), a fungicide that can contaminate seafood and drinking water. (The usual route: via TBT-treated boat hulls, docks, and fishing nets, where it was once used to discourage barnacle encrustation, as well as industrial water-cooling systems used in paper, leather, and textile mills, which discharge wastewater into rivers and streams.) They fed pregnant mice a single dose and found that the offspring were born with greater fat stores than normal. At 10 weeks of age, these mice weighed about 15% more than mice that had not been exposed to TBT before birth.
Even more worrisome was the trend that Dr. Blumberg and his colleagues found when they followed prenatally exposed mice through subsequent generations. The mice born to the second generation of fatter mice (that is, the mice who had been exposed in utero) were also fatter—even though they'd had no direct prenatal exposure to TBT.
There's a simple explanation, Dr. Blumberg says: "If you expose a pregnant female, inside the fetuses are germ cells [immature sex cells] that will be the grandchildren." In other words, altered egg cells in the second generation can be expected to give rise to fatter mice in the third generation. But here was the surprise: When the fatter third-generation mice had pups, the pups were also fatter—even though this fourth generation was never exposed to chemicals, not even indirectly through their mothers.
"Once it's in the great-grandchildren, it's permanent," Dr. Blumberg says. The effects, known as epigenetic changes, can be passed along from one generation to the next, long after the original exposure has passed.
Recently, reproductive biologist Michael Skinner, PhD, and his colleagues at Washington State University reported similar dire news about another obesogen, DDT. The pesticide has been banned in the United States since 1972 but can still be found—in the form of a by-product, DDE—in the urine of pregnant women in many parts of the country. In Dr. Skinner's study, female rats exposed prenatally to DDT did not grow up to be obese, but 50% of their great-grandchildren did—even though they had no direct DDT exposure. Dr. Skinner's bottom line: "Obesity may be in part due to environmentally induced epigenetic transgenerational inheritance."
If the effects of obesogens really can last long after exposure, then identifying and eliminating them takes on a special urgency. While DDT isn't used in the United States, TBT still is. Though it's no longer mixed into marine paints because of a global ban, TBT is still permitted in a variety of common household products, such as wood preservatives; disinfectants; and tiles, shower curtains, and window blinds made with polyvinyl chloride. It also persists in the food chain. If what occurs in lab animals holds true for humans, this chemical could be contaminating generations to come.
Hormonal havoc
Most obesogens are classified as endocrine disruptors, a category made famous by recent controversies regarding BPA (bisphenol A) in baby bottles and canned food. Endocrine disruptors interfere with the action of a variety of hormones, especially estrogen and testosterone, and have been associated with problems in the reproductive, neurological, and immune systems, as well as cognitive development. Though the FDA has taken steps toward eliminating BPA from pacifiers and sippy cups, it's still ubiquitous, found in everything from medical devices such as catheters and IV equipment to cash register receipts and the inside of metal food cans. It's also in your home's water supply pipes if they're made of polyvinyl chloride (PVC). The CDC estimates that 92.6% of Americans age 6 and over have some BPA in their urine.
Dose matters, but in a surprising way. Unpublished research from the University of Missouri suggests that BPA is actually more potent at very low doses—1,000 times below the level thought to be safe—than at high doses. This is probably related to a phenomenon known as receptor down regulation. Hormone receptors usually respond to very low levels of hormone, so when a compound like BPA mimics a hormone, it, too, can spark a response at a very low dose. At these very low levels, an endocrine disruptor can fool the body into creating more hormone—and, in the case of BPA, more fat cells.
Obesogens are probably most dangerous when fat cells are forming most rapidly: during the critical window of fetal and early development. That's what makes soy infant formula—which, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics, may account for nearly 25% of the infant formula market—so worrisome. It contains genistein, a chemical that naturally occurs in soy. Genistein is an endocrine disruptor linked to obesity in experimental animals.
Retha Newbold, a now-retired federal biologist, studied the obesogenic effect of genistein in newborn rats. She gave a group of them a dose of genistein comparable to what a human infant would get on an exclusive soy-formula diet. When she looked at the rats again at 3 or 4 months of age, those that had been fed genistein as newborns had more fat stores and higher weights than the control group, even though there was no difference between how much the two groups were eating or exercising.
Some endocrine disruptors can work to cause weight gain through a mechanism known as the PPAR gamma pathway. PPAR gamma (short for peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma) is expressed in cells called preadipocytes (pre–fat cells) and becomes set in the "on" position, which stimulates preadipocytes to become adipocytes, thereby increasing the number of fat cells in the body.
Phthalates are another class of chemicals that are also more likely to increase the risk of obesity in people who were exposed prenatally. Dibutyl phthalate, for instance, has been shown to cause developmental disorders in male offspring exposed in utero, and di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate has been linked to thyroid irregularities that could affect metabolism. Phthalates are found in the artificial fragrances used in personal-care products such as shampoos and body lotions, as well as in air fresheners, scented candles, and nail polish.
Sunscreens, shampoos, detergents, pajamas—the list of products that might contain obesogens is long. Even the healthiest-seeming items on the list can be suspect: Leafy vegetables, for instance, are often treated with triflumizole, a fungicide that has been shown to cause obesity in mice. Pregnant women might be passing obesogens to their offspring by exposure to contaminants that are so commonplace, they're hard to avoid.
Scientists at the University of Albany detected possible obesogens in a variety of household products: wallpaper, tile, vacuum cleaner dust, and a designer handbag (the researchers didn't specify the designer). And the nonstick cookware touted as healthy because it lets people cook without adding butter or oil is made with another possible obesogen, perfluorooctanoic acid, also known as Teflon. PFOA is used not only in pots and pans but also in lots of housewares with proof in their descriptions—stainproof carpets, greaseproof food wrappers, waterproof clothing.
In another odd twist, the hand sanitizers used by some people because they're so careful about their health contain triclosan, which is also a possible obesogen. One way triclosan may affect body weight is by interfering with thyroid hormone, which regulates metabolism. (Try this DIY recipe for sanitizer you can trust.)
According to R. Thomas Zoeller, PhD, a professor of biology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, if the presence of triclosan leads to impaired thyroid function, metabolism could slow, causing weight gain. Dr. Zoeller suggests reducing the spread of colds and flu simply by washing your hands with soap—plain soap, not antibacterial types, which can also contain triclosan. (Here's how to get antibacterial soaps and triclosan out of your life.)
Humans getting heavy
Obesogens can have an impact on adults as well. As Dr. Blumberg points out, certain medications, such as the diabetes drug Avandia, are notorious for causing weight gain. Phthalates have been shown to have an effect on adults, too: A 2007 study at the University of Rochester found that phthalate by-products in the urine were associated with bigger waistlines and increased insulin resistance in men.
Those who are already overweight might be especially susceptible. In 2013, a team of scientists at Inserm—the French version of the NIH—fed a group of mice a high-fat diet containing low doses of some putative obesogens: dioxins, PCBs (found in vinyl tiles and purses), phthalates, and BPA. Most of the mice, both male and female, experienced metabolic changes, but the females developed worse glucose control and had extra trouble: alterations in the estrogen pathway. When working normally, this pathway can offer some protection from metabolic syndrome, a cluster of conditions—excess belly fat, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and elevated glucose—that are the reason obesity is a health risk, explain researchers Brigitte Le Magueresse and Danielle Naville.
Animal experiments are great, as far as they go. They've helped scientists discover a connection between chemicals and weight gain and work out the possible mechanisms for how it might work. But that's not quite enough for those who resist the idea that obesogens exist, such as the food and chemical industries whose products are implicated. What are needed still are studies involving humans.
Those are, obviously, much trickier to do. You can't just feed one group of newborns an obesogen and use another group as a control to see what happens when they grow up. The best you can hope for in humans is what Robert Lustig, MD, a professor of pediatrics at the University of California, San Francisco, calls causal medical inference—the most convincing kind of evidence available, short of a controlled clinical trial, which no one can ethically do in the case of obesogens.
Causal medical inference comes from population studies that have found a connection between obesogen exposure and body weight. One such study, conducted at New York University in 2012, looked at BPA levels in more than 2,800 young people ages 6 to 19. Among those with the highest urinary levels of BPA, 22% were obese; among those with the lowest levels, only 10% were. The obesity rate for most Americans in that age range is about 18%.
That's a dramatic association, but lead author Leonardo Trasande, MD, points out that it's still hard to distinguish cause and effect. It could be that people with high BPA levels have an increased tendency to gain weight—or it could be that people who are already fat have higher levels of BPA in their urine, because the chemical is stored in fat cells. Dr. Trasande thinks that the evidence points to the first explanation. "Laboratory and animal studies add plausibility to the notion that BPA may be an obesogen," he says.
And human evidence continues to mount. For one thing, newborns are bigger than ever. "If you look at birth weight around the world, it's been going up a lot: 200 g per baby over the past 25 years," says Dr. Lustig. That's a little less than 1 pound heavier, which almost sounds positive—perhaps a sign of better nutrition in pregnant women worldwide. But Dr. Lustig insists that it isn't a good thing; it's a problem. When newborns are submitted to a DEXA scan—a two-beam x-ray that measures body composition—that 200 g turns out to be "all fat," he says. "These babies are laying down more fat cells even before they are born. And once you make a fat cell, it wants to get filled." In Dr. Lustig's view, these bigger, fatter babies are more likely to struggle with weight their entire adult lives.
When a trend toward higher birth weight occurs across populations, he adds, it's a good bet something is crossing the placenta. And it must be an all-purpose, widely dispersed something, because it occurs all over the world, and not only in human babies but in lab animals, too.
This is an especially puzzling fact, since laboratory animals' diets and activity levels have remained constant over the past 20 years. But during that time, every species of lab animal that has been weighed and measured—marmosets, macaques, chimpanzees, vervet monkeys, rats, mice—has shown an increase in body weight, from 7.7% to 35% per decade, depending on the species. Since the calories-in/calories-out balance hasn't changed for these animals, something else must be going on.
So, what now?
New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof has called obesogens the tobacco of our time, a danger to public health about which scientific evidence keeps accumulating while politicians do nothing. "Science-based decisions to improve public health, like the removal of lead from gasoline, have been among our government's most beneficial public-policy moves," Kristof wrote early last year. He suggested that a "starting point" would be to fund more research into the relationship between environmental toxins and human obesity.
Slowly, politicians are starting to pay attention. The White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity mentioned obesogens in its 2010 report to President Obama, suggesting that "fetal and infant exposure to such chemicals may result in more weight gain per food consumed and also possibly less weight loss per amount of energy expended...[which might] persist throughout life, long after the exposures occur." The task force recommended more research and was followed by a 3-year effort launched in 2011 by the National Institutes of Health to investigate the role of chemical toxins in the development of obesity, diabetes, and metabolic syndrome.
If nothing else, the obesogen hypothesis should force people to reconsider the prevailing view of how people get fat. The so-called energy balance hypothesis might be undermined as evidence piles up about obesogens, wrote Dr. Blumberg and his grad student, Amanda Janesick, in a chapter they contributed to Dr. Lustig's recently edited volume Obesity before Birth. As scientists learn how obesogens affect metabolism, fat cell number and function, and hunger signaling, they wrote, they might ultimately move beyond "the simplistic model that caloric intake and exercise can be trivially balanced like a checkbook to achieve optimum weight."
So if obesogens really do contribute to weight gain, who should make a real effort to avoid them? Everyone, says Dr. Blumberg, "but the people who need to be most careful are women who may become pregnant, are pregnant, or have young children. I think that's the most vulnerable group."
That means women of childbearing age should try to purge chemicals from their households as much as possible, opting for organic fruits and vegetables; buying cosmetics that do not contain endocrine disruptors; avoiding canned, prepackaged, and processed foods; and removing plastics from their lives as much as possible. And consider putting away that gorgeous designer satchel until after the kids are grown.
Thanks for Reading
Of all the modern trends that have been linked to America's ever-expanding waistline—portion size, more McDonald's, couch potato lifestyles, and some lesser-known possibilities, like air-conditioning, viral exposure, and lack of sleep—one of the weirdest is designer handbags.
If your brand-name clutch is making you fat, it would be because it contains, as at least some high-end handbags do, a new kind of chemical to worry about: compounds known as obesogens.
Obesogens are believed to work in at least three ways: first, by directly affecting adipocytes, or fat cells, by either increasing their fat-storage capacity or increasing their number; second, by changing metabolism, by both reducing the number of calories burned at rest and promoting the storage of calories as fat; and third, by changing the way the body regulates feelings of hunger and fullness.
Don't think you're avoiding them because you've never paid a week's salary for a purse. Obesogens are ubiquitous. If you've ever eaten seafood, plugged in an air freshener, handled a cash register receipt, eaten canned vegetables, sat on a couch treated with flame retardant, or cooked in a nonstick pan, you've already been exposed. (Taking showers with vinyl curtains count, too.) Most alarming is new animal research that suggests that chemicals to which your parents, grandparents, or great-grandparents were exposed—including the long-banned pesticide DDT—can cause you to gain weight, even if you've never been exposed yourself.
"It's impossible to know the precise contribution of obesogens to the obesity epidemic, but I would bet that it's significant," says Bruce Blumberg, PhD, professor of developmental and cell biology at the University of California, Irvine. Even on a normal diet, he says, mice in his lab that are exposed to obesogens in utero grow up to be about 15% heavier than unexposed mice. "Fifteen percent," he says. "That's the difference between what we weighed a generation ago and where we are now."
Of mice and men
The obesogen hypothesis was unknown back in 2005, when Dr. Blumberg submitted his first grant application to study it. Some reviewers were outraged, he says. "How dare you waste our time with such a ridiculous idea?" one wrote. That grant was rejected, no surprise, but by 2007, Dr. Blumberg and a handful of other researchers managed to get the funding they needed to explore the connection between toxins in the environment and the global obesity epidemic.
When Dr. Blumberg and his colleague Felix Grun, PhD, used the term obesogen for the first time in 2007, they applied it to a variety of chemicals, including tributyltin (TBT), a fungicide that can contaminate seafood and drinking water. (The usual route: via TBT-treated boat hulls, docks, and fishing nets, where it was once used to discourage barnacle encrustation, as well as industrial water-cooling systems used in paper, leather, and textile mills, which discharge wastewater into rivers and streams.) They fed pregnant mice a single dose and found that the offspring were born with greater fat stores than normal. At 10 weeks of age, these mice weighed about 15% more than mice that had not been exposed to TBT before birth.
Obesogens are believed to work in at least three ways: first, by directly affecting adipocytes, or fat cells, by either increasing their fat-storage capacity or increasing their number; second, by changing metabolism, by both reducing the number of calories burned at rest and promoting the storage of calories as fat; and third, by changing the way the body regulates feelings of hunger and fullness.
Don't think you're avoiding them because you've never paid a week's salary for a purse. Obesogens are ubiquitous. If you've ever eaten seafood, plugged in an air freshener, handled a cash register receipt, eaten canned vegetables, sat on a couch treated with flame retardant, or cooked in a nonstick pan, you've already been exposed. (Taking showers with vinyl curtains count, too.) Most alarming is new animal research that suggests that chemicals to which your parents, grandparents, or great-grandparents were exposed—including the long-banned pesticide DDT—can cause you to gain weight, even if you've never been exposed yourself.
"It's impossible to know the precise contribution of obesogens to the obesity epidemic, but I would bet that it's significant," says Bruce Blumberg, PhD, professor of developmental and cell biology at the University of California, Irvine. Even on a normal diet, he says, mice in his lab that are exposed to obesogens in utero grow up to be about 15% heavier than unexposed mice. "Fifteen percent," he says. "That's the difference between what we weighed a generation ago and where we are now."
Of mice and men
The obesogen hypothesis was unknown back in 2005, when Dr. Blumberg submitted his first grant application to study it. Some reviewers were outraged, he says. "How dare you waste our time with such a ridiculous idea?" one wrote. That grant was rejected, no surprise, but by 2007, Dr. Blumberg and a handful of other researchers managed to get the funding they needed to explore the connection between toxins in the environment and the global obesity epidemic.
When Dr. Blumberg and his colleague Felix Grun, PhD, used the term obesogen for the first time in 2007, they applied it to a variety of chemicals, including tributyltin (TBT), a fungicide that can contaminate seafood and drinking water. (The usual route: via TBT-treated boat hulls, docks, and fishing nets, where it was once used to discourage barnacle encrustation, as well as industrial water-cooling systems used in paper, leather, and textile mills, which discharge wastewater into rivers and streams.) They fed pregnant mice a single dose and found that the offspring were born with greater fat stores than normal. At 10 weeks of age, these mice weighed about 15% more than mice that had not been exposed to TBT before birth.
Even more worrisome was the trend that Dr. Blumberg and his colleagues found when they followed prenatally exposed mice through subsequent generations. The mice born to the second generation of fatter mice (that is, the mice who had been exposed in utero) were also fatter—even though they'd had no direct prenatal exposure to TBT.
There's a simple explanation, Dr. Blumberg says: "If you expose a pregnant female, inside the fetuses are germ cells [immature sex cells] that will be the grandchildren." In other words, altered egg cells in the second generation can be expected to give rise to fatter mice in the third generation. But here was the surprise: When the fatter third-generation mice had pups, the pups were also fatter—even though this fourth generation was never exposed to chemicals, not even indirectly through their mothers.
"Once it's in the great-grandchildren, it's permanent," Dr. Blumberg says. The effects, known as epigenetic changes, can be passed along from one generation to the next, long after the original exposure has passed.
Recently, reproductive biologist Michael Skinner, PhD, and his colleagues at Washington State University reported similar dire news about another obesogen, DDT. The pesticide has been banned in the United States since 1972 but can still be found—in the form of a by-product, DDE—in the urine of pregnant women in many parts of the country. In Dr. Skinner's study, female rats exposed prenatally to DDT did not grow up to be obese, but 50% of their great-grandchildren did—even though they had no direct DDT exposure. Dr. Skinner's bottom line: "Obesity may be in part due to environmentally induced epigenetic transgenerational inheritance."
If the effects of obesogens really can last long after exposure, then identifying and eliminating them takes on a special urgency. While DDT isn't used in the United States, TBT still is. Though it's no longer mixed into marine paints because of a global ban, TBT is still permitted in a variety of common household products, such as wood preservatives; disinfectants; and tiles, shower curtains, and window blinds made with polyvinyl chloride. It also persists in the food chain. If what occurs in lab animals holds true for humans, this chemical could be contaminating generations to come.
Hormonal havoc
Most obesogens are classified as endocrine disruptors, a category made famous by recent controversies regarding BPA (bisphenol A) in baby bottles and canned food. Endocrine disruptors interfere with the action of a variety of hormones, especially estrogen and testosterone, and have been associated with problems in the reproductive, neurological, and immune systems, as well as cognitive development. Though the FDA has taken steps toward eliminating BPA from pacifiers and sippy cups, it's still ubiquitous, found in everything from medical devices such as catheters and IV equipment to cash register receipts and the inside of metal food cans. It's also in your home's water supply pipes if they're made of polyvinyl chloride (PVC). The CDC estimates that 92.6% of Americans age 6 and over have some BPA in their urine.
Dose matters, but in a surprising way. Unpublished research from the University of Missouri suggests that BPA is actually more potent at very low doses—1,000 times below the level thought to be safe—than at high doses. This is probably related to a phenomenon known as receptor down regulation. Hormone receptors usually respond to very low levels of hormone, so when a compound like BPA mimics a hormone, it, too, can spark a response at a very low dose. At these very low levels, an endocrine disruptor can fool the body into creating more hormone—and, in the case of BPA, more fat cells.
Obesogens are probably most dangerous when fat cells are forming most rapidly: during the critical window of fetal and early development. That's what makes soy infant formula—which, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics, may account for nearly 25% of the infant formula market—so worrisome. It contains genistein, a chemical that naturally occurs in soy. Genistein is an endocrine disruptor linked to obesity in experimental animals.
Retha Newbold, a now-retired federal biologist, studied the obesogenic effect of genistein in newborn rats. She gave a group of them a dose of genistein comparable to what a human infant would get on an exclusive soy-formula diet. When she looked at the rats again at 3 or 4 months of age, those that had been fed genistein as newborns had more fat stores and higher weights than the control group, even though there was no difference between how much the two groups were eating or exercising.
Some endocrine disruptors can work to cause weight gain through a mechanism known as the PPAR gamma pathway. PPAR gamma (short for peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma) is expressed in cells called preadipocytes (pre–fat cells) and becomes set in the "on" position, which stimulates preadipocytes to become adipocytes, thereby increasing the number of fat cells in the body.
Phthalates are another class of chemicals that are also more likely to increase the risk of obesity in people who were exposed prenatally. Dibutyl phthalate, for instance, has been shown to cause developmental disorders in male offspring exposed in utero, and di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate has been linked to thyroid irregularities that could affect metabolism. Phthalates are found in the artificial fragrances used in personal-care products such as shampoos and body lotions, as well as in air fresheners, scented candles, and nail polish.
Sunscreens, shampoos, detergents, pajamas—the list of products that might contain obesogens is long. Even the healthiest-seeming items on the list can be suspect: Leafy vegetables, for instance, are often treated with triflumizole, a fungicide that has been shown to cause obesity in mice. Pregnant women might be passing obesogens to their offspring by exposure to contaminants that are so commonplace, they're hard to avoid.
Scientists at the University of Albany detected possible obesogens in a variety of household products: wallpaper, tile, vacuum cleaner dust, and a designer handbag (the researchers didn't specify the designer). And the nonstick cookware touted as healthy because it lets people cook without adding butter or oil is made with another possible obesogen, perfluorooctanoic acid, also known as Teflon. PFOA is used not only in pots and pans but also in lots of housewares with proof in their descriptions—stainproof carpets, greaseproof food wrappers, waterproof clothing.
In another odd twist, the hand sanitizers used by some people because they're so careful about their health contain triclosan, which is also a possible obesogen. One way triclosan may affect body weight is by interfering with thyroid hormone, which regulates metabolism. (Try this DIY recipe for sanitizer you can trust.)
According to R. Thomas Zoeller, PhD, a professor of biology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, if the presence of triclosan leads to impaired thyroid function, metabolism could slow, causing weight gain. Dr. Zoeller suggests reducing the spread of colds and flu simply by washing your hands with soap—plain soap, not antibacterial types, which can also contain triclosan. (Here's how to get antibacterial soaps and triclosan out of your life.)
Humans getting heavy
Obesogens can have an impact on adults as well. As Dr. Blumberg points out, certain medications, such as the diabetes drug Avandia, are notorious for causing weight gain. Phthalates have been shown to have an effect on adults, too: A 2007 study at the University of Rochester found that phthalate by-products in the urine were associated with bigger waistlines and increased insulin resistance in men.
Those who are already overweight might be especially susceptible. In 2013, a team of scientists at Inserm—the French version of the NIH—fed a group of mice a high-fat diet containing low doses of some putative obesogens: dioxins, PCBs (found in vinyl tiles and purses), phthalates, and BPA. Most of the mice, both male and female, experienced metabolic changes, but the females developed worse glucose control and had extra trouble: alterations in the estrogen pathway. When working normally, this pathway can offer some protection from metabolic syndrome, a cluster of conditions—excess belly fat, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and elevated glucose—that are the reason obesity is a health risk, explain researchers Brigitte Le Magueresse and Danielle Naville.
Animal experiments are great, as far as they go. They've helped scientists discover a connection between chemicals and weight gain and work out the possible mechanisms for how it might work. But that's not quite enough for those who resist the idea that obesogens exist, such as the food and chemical industries whose products are implicated. What are needed still are studies involving humans.
Those are, obviously, much trickier to do. You can't just feed one group of newborns an obesogen and use another group as a control to see what happens when they grow up. The best you can hope for in humans is what Robert Lustig, MD, a professor of pediatrics at the University of California, San Francisco, calls causal medical inference—the most convincing kind of evidence available, short of a controlled clinical trial, which no one can ethically do in the case of obesogens.
Causal medical inference comes from population studies that have found a connection between obesogen exposure and body weight. One such study, conducted at New York University in 2012, looked at BPA levels in more than 2,800 young people ages 6 to 19. Among those with the highest urinary levels of BPA, 22% were obese; among those with the lowest levels, only 10% were. The obesity rate for most Americans in that age range is about 18%.
That's a dramatic association, but lead author Leonardo Trasande, MD, points out that it's still hard to distinguish cause and effect. It could be that people with high BPA levels have an increased tendency to gain weight—or it could be that people who are already fat have higher levels of BPA in their urine, because the chemical is stored in fat cells. Dr. Trasande thinks that the evidence points to the first explanation. "Laboratory and animal studies add plausibility to the notion that BPA may be an obesogen," he says.
And human evidence continues to mount. For one thing, newborns are bigger than ever. "If you look at birth weight around the world, it's been going up a lot: 200 g per baby over the past 25 years," says Dr. Lustig. That's a little less than 1 pound heavier, which almost sounds positive—perhaps a sign of better nutrition in pregnant women worldwide. But Dr. Lustig insists that it isn't a good thing; it's a problem. When newborns are submitted to a DEXA scan—a two-beam x-ray that measures body composition—that 200 g turns out to be "all fat," he says. "These babies are laying down more fat cells even before they are born. And once you make a fat cell, it wants to get filled." In Dr. Lustig's view, these bigger, fatter babies are more likely to struggle with weight their entire adult lives.
When a trend toward higher birth weight occurs across populations, he adds, it's a good bet something is crossing the placenta. And it must be an all-purpose, widely dispersed something, because it occurs all over the world, and not only in human babies but in lab animals, too.
This is an especially puzzling fact, since laboratory animals' diets and activity levels have remained constant over the past 20 years. But during that time, every species of lab animal that has been weighed and measured—marmosets, macaques, chimpanzees, vervet monkeys, rats, mice—has shown an increase in body weight, from 7.7% to 35% per decade, depending on the species. Since the calories-in/calories-out balance hasn't changed for these animals, something else must be going on.
So, what now?
New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof has called obesogens the tobacco of our time, a danger to public health about which scientific evidence keeps accumulating while politicians do nothing. "Science-based decisions to improve public health, like the removal of lead from gasoline, have been among our government's most beneficial public-policy moves," Kristof wrote early last year. He suggested that a "starting point" would be to fund more research into the relationship between environmental toxins and human obesity.
Slowly, politicians are starting to pay attention. The White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity mentioned obesogens in its 2010 report to President Obama, suggesting that "fetal and infant exposure to such chemicals may result in more weight gain per food consumed and also possibly less weight loss per amount of energy expended...[which might] persist throughout life, long after the exposures occur." The task force recommended more research and was followed by a 3-year effort launched in 2011 by the National Institutes of Health to investigate the role of chemical toxins in the development of obesity, diabetes, and metabolic syndrome.
If nothing else, the obesogen hypothesis should force people to reconsider the prevailing view of how people get fat. The so-called energy balance hypothesis might be undermined as evidence piles up about obesogens, wrote Dr. Blumberg and his grad student, Amanda Janesick, in a chapter they contributed to Dr. Lustig's recently edited volume Obesity before Birth. As scientists learn how obesogens affect metabolism, fat cell number and function, and hunger signaling, they wrote, they might ultimately move beyond "the simplistic model that caloric intake and exercise can be trivially balanced like a checkbook to achieve optimum weight."
So if obesogens really do contribute to weight gain, who should make a real effort to avoid them? Everyone, says Dr. Blumberg, "but the people who need to be most careful are women who may become pregnant, are pregnant, or have young children. I think that's the most vulnerable group."
That means women of childbearing age should try to purge chemicals from their households as much as possible, opting for organic fruits and vegetables; buying cosmetics that do not contain endocrine disruptors; avoiding canned, prepackaged, and processed foods; and removing plastics from their lives as much as possible. And consider putting away that gorgeous designer satchel until after the kids are grown.
Thanks for Reading
Thursday, February 6, 2014
Get Back to Running After a Long Break. How to Start Running - Again
If you've been away from running for less than a week:
It's possible to take up to a week off without losing any ground. In fact, a few days of rest may even improve your performance, especially if you've been feeling exhausted and sore. But after a week of not training, you'll quickly start to lose your fitness -- a lot faster than it took you to build it up. If you've been suffering from a cold or other short-term illness, make sure you're healthy enough to get back to running. The general rule of thumb for running with a cold is that if your symptoms are from the neck up (sore throat, runny nose, etc.), then it's OK to run with a cold. If your symptoms are below the neck (chest congestion, diarrhea, etc.), it's best to wait until you're feeling completely healthy.If you haven't run for less than seven days, do NOT try to "make up" the miles that you missed. If you try to squeeze all your missed miles into a short period of time, you could be at risk for a running injury due to overtraining. Just pick up your training schedule where you left off. You may feel a bit sluggish during your first run back, but it should only take one or two runs before you're feeling like your old self.
If you've taken one to two weeks off from running:
If you've been out of your running shoes for only a week or two, start at about half the distance you were running before the injury. If you were recovering from an injury, go easy when you first return to running because if you run too hard, you risk re-injuring yourself. You should be able to build back to your former level in two to four weeks.If you stopped running for more than two weeks:
With a layoff of more than two weeks, you need to be conservative when you return to running. Chances are you haven't run for more than two weeks because you've been injured, so make sure that you're definitely ready to come back. If you've been under the care of a medical professional, make sure you get cleared to return to running. If you're not ready to come back, you could possibly cross-train in the meantime, if it doesn't affect your injury.Once you're ready to run again, don't assume you have to run your entire distance. Start with a run/walk approach. As you build your endurance, you'll be able to extend your running segments and reduce your walking time.
In the beginning, take a day off after every running day. For your weekly mileage, you'll need to gradually work up to your previous level. And don't keep making jumps in your mileage. It's good to get comfortable with a specific weekly mileage by staying there for a couple weeks, and then bump up your distance.
Thanks for Reading.........
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
10 Calisthenics Exercises for Strength and Muscle
'Calisthenics' is falling from favor as a term meaning body movement
training or physical training. Much more meaningful to trainers these
days is 'PT' or 'Bootcamp'. Either way, calisthenics describes physical
movement, more or less grounded around one spot and mostly without
additional equipment. Calisthenics can provide muscle strengthening,
flexibility and even muscle endurance in a regular program. Here are 10
must-have exercises.
The Star Jump is not the same as the Jumping Jack but it is mildly similar. The Star is more dynamic as you thrust arms and legs to the side and back together in a unified movement. This is a high energy exercise.
Give them a try and reply what you think..........
Burpee
Burpees, the exercise with the funny name are challenging, done correctly with high energy. This can genuinely be called a full-body exercise. Start standing, squat down and thrust the legs out to the rear, recover to standing and jump in the air thrusting hands upward. And repeat.Pushup
We all know the standard pushup, but you can do them with variation to position of hands closer to the body to make them more difficult, or even with knees on the ground to make them easier. Either way, pushups are a must in any calisthenic workout.Jumping Jack
Jump up, legs outstretched and clap your hands above your head with arms extended and return to ground for one repetition. Keep repeating this cycle for a set number of repetitions or time. A good old favorite, especially for children getting started with calisthenics, developing rhythm and balance and other physical attributes.Squat
You can do many types of free squats without weights. Two-legged, one-legged, half-way, full squat to floor, arms crossed, arms outstretched, arms overhead. Try them all because they build lower-body strength and endurance. Be careful you don't overdo the knee joints though.Lunge
Now for a relative rest. The lunge is great work for the butt and legs without too much high-intensity commitment. Do forward or rear, side or 45 degrees for variety.Combo Crunch
One great abdominals exercise is the combo crunch. It combines a standard crunch with legs raised, or even legs cycling.Plank
How long can you hold the plank? Suspend your body on bent forearms and toe tips, knees off the ground. Brace the abdominals and hold tight. If you can get to 3 minutes you are doing well.Wall Squat Isometric
This is an isometric variation of the standard squat, except you brace yourself against a wall in the squat position with quads roughly parallel to the floor. Hold, hold, hold. Sixty seconds is good, 90 seconds is very good.Bench Dip
On a secure chair, bench or platform, face outward with hands on the chair, heels on the ground. Push up from the chair for a set of 12-15 dips. Straight legs increases intensity and bent knees makes it easier.Star Jump
The Star Jump is not the same as the Jumping Jack but it is mildly similar. The Star is more dynamic as you thrust arms and legs to the side and back together in a unified movement. This is a high energy exercise.
Give them a try and reply what you think..........
Monday, February 3, 2014
The Best Lunch for Weight Loss
Every so often, new research comes along that's so awesome, we can't believe the findings are actually true. The latest: Eating half an avocado at lunch could help you feel full until dinnertime, according to a study published recently in Nutrition Journal.
Now—full disclosure—the study was funded by the Hass Avocado Board. That said, the findings are still in line with previous pro-avocado research. For this study, the researchers gave 26 overweight adults a standard breakfast and then one of three lunches: one without avocado, one identical to the first option with about half an avocado added to it, and a smaller version of the first lunch with about half an avocado incorporated into it. Researchers tracked participants' hunger levels for three hours after the lunch and fed them a buffet dinner two hours after that.
What happened? Lunchtime avocado eaters weren't as hungry throughout the afternoon. Those who had some of the green stuff at lunch were 26 percent more satisfied and had a 40 percent decreased desire to eat three hours after the meal when compared with those who hadn't had the fruit at all. And five hours later (i.e., right before dinner), the avocado eaters reported that they were 23 percent more satisfied and had a 28 percent decreased desire to eat than the control group.
Interestingly, though, all three groups ate roughly the same amount at dinner—meaning that decreased hunger levels didn't translate to fewer calories consumed during the meal. That could be due to the fact that five hours is too long for any of the effects of a lunchtime meal to still be at play, say the researchers. Plus, since research shows that having higher quantities—and a greater selection—of food available can cause you to overeat, the participants likely consumed more at the buffet than they would have under normal circumstances.
Still, eating half of an avocado at lunch could help you feel full enough throughout the afternoon to curb your vending machine snack cravings. That, combined with the fact that avocados are filled with good-for-you nutrients like fiber, potassium, and healthy fats, make it a smart addition to your midday meal if you're trying to eat better.
Thanks for Reading.......
Now—full disclosure—the study was funded by the Hass Avocado Board. That said, the findings are still in line with previous pro-avocado research. For this study, the researchers gave 26 overweight adults a standard breakfast and then one of three lunches: one without avocado, one identical to the first option with about half an avocado added to it, and a smaller version of the first lunch with about half an avocado incorporated into it. Researchers tracked participants' hunger levels for three hours after the lunch and fed them a buffet dinner two hours after that.
What happened? Lunchtime avocado eaters weren't as hungry throughout the afternoon. Those who had some of the green stuff at lunch were 26 percent more satisfied and had a 40 percent decreased desire to eat three hours after the meal when compared with those who hadn't had the fruit at all. And five hours later (i.e., right before dinner), the avocado eaters reported that they were 23 percent more satisfied and had a 28 percent decreased desire to eat than the control group.
Interestingly, though, all three groups ate roughly the same amount at dinner—meaning that decreased hunger levels didn't translate to fewer calories consumed during the meal. That could be due to the fact that five hours is too long for any of the effects of a lunchtime meal to still be at play, say the researchers. Plus, since research shows that having higher quantities—and a greater selection—of food available can cause you to overeat, the participants likely consumed more at the buffet than they would have under normal circumstances.
Still, eating half of an avocado at lunch could help you feel full enough throughout the afternoon to curb your vending machine snack cravings. That, combined with the fact that avocados are filled with good-for-you nutrients like fiber, potassium, and healthy fats, make it a smart addition to your midday meal if you're trying to eat better.
Thanks for Reading.......
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