Weight Loss Program - Losing Weight Is Not Just About Diets

Any weight loss program takes time, determination, practice and support and more so a positive mindset. As we all know that losing weight is a big challenge and to some it is very tough.

Once you have made up your mind and have decided to lose weight, you should make a firm commitment and catch up a weight loss program with a positive attitude. In other words you should have an achieving mindset that brings changes to your life time habits.

Losing weight is a process by itself that you must learn continuously in order to succeed. Without this positive weight loss approach you will not be successful and remember you alone are the one who has the power to lose the unwanted pounds from your body.

A simple technique is to strengthen your positive thoughts that are like muscles and the ones you use most grow the strongest. 'Think like a winner'. If you always look at the negative side of things and opting to be pessimistic in your approach, even your weak negative thoughts will have stronger impact on you and last longer than your powerful positive thoughts.

When a negative thought seeds in your mind, immediately replace it by talking to yourself that you're the one having unique strengths and capabilities to turn things possible. Negative thinking doesn’t do anything good; on the contrary, it holds you back from achieving anything in life that you want to.

Day in and day out you must always think what lies ahead of you. Investigate the weight loss programs that appeal to you and that you feel should teach you the skills you need to stay with, the program, throughout the weight loss process.

Never forget that losing weight is not just about diets, it’s about a personality in you and about creating a possibility for a new life for yourself.

In all of the success stories across the globe, people who have lost several of excessive pounds, miraculously, say that their mental attitude, as well as their outlook about existence in life, has witnessed a total change. The changes brought them more optimistic oriented life with full of self-confidence.

If you are willing to take few simple steps for physical fitness as a daily routine, you will quickly begin to feel better, and the improvement will reflect itself in every angle of your daily life. It will certainly raise your confidence limits while your approach to anything in life will exude optimism.

Your weight loss program will, most likely, include some physical exercises. You should look at the exercising aspect of your program as fun and recreation and not as a form of grueling and sweaty work. The fact is that physical fitness draws extra energy and improves personal effectiveness in every walk of your daily life.

Walking is one of the best exercises. It helps the total micro circulation of blood to all parts of the body, and thus has a direct effect on your overall better feeling of health. There are things such as aerobics, jogging, swimming and many other exercises which will benefit a weight loss program.

Diets and weight loss programs are more flexible and there are many prepared foods already portioned out. They are made attractive and can be prepared in a matter of minutes. Low-fat and low-calorie food products are on the shelves everywhere.

You will need to learn wiser eating skills. You will want a weight loss regimen that gives you some control over your eating habits, instead of imposing one rigid system. Look for one wise eating skill that offers a variety of different diet plans, so you can choose the one that's best and compatible for you.

You need to discuss the options with your physician and take his advice in planning your exercise and weight loss program. A periodical guidance from your doctor will definitely put you on the road map of success to weight loss program.

Get the support among your family and friends. It can be of immense help to discuss obstacles and share skills and tactics with others on the same path. You might look for this support from others you know who are in weight loss programs and you can seek guidance from someone you know who has lost weight and kept it off.

The seed of successful weight loss program or losing weight, is sowed in the mind and grows into a tree that will give fruits of the same kind. Life begets life is the fundamental natural principle, based on this the answer for losing weight is in your mindset.

Diet Plans And Menus - The Automatic Diet

Charles Stuart Platkin, a medical doctor, created the Automatic Diet. One of its major principles is eating less. During the first three days of this diet, dieters analyze their food intake to determine their exact food intake. They read food labels and then choose foods that are low in calories, lipids, and glucides. It is important to increase their athletic activity. Dieters should avoid as much as possible saturated fats, often found in meat, dairy products, and egg yolks. Don't cook food in oil; use a Teflon pan or steam them.

For your diet to be automatic, you must assume good alimentary habits. To do so, increase your protein intake and consume the least lipids (fats) possible. Consume low-starch foods including vegetables. Foods to avoid include cold cuts, dairy products, sugary cereals, and foods rich in fat and sugar such as chips, pizza, cookies, cakes, ice cream, and other sweets. Another principle is having a good breakfast. Enjoy balanced, nutritious snacks and eat only when hungry. Engage in sports and remember that it is more efficient to exercise during three ten minute sessions a day than once a day for thirty minutes.

Advantages of the Automatic Diet include the fact that it isn't strict and so is easy to follow. The change in your dietary habits is progressive. This diet claims to be quiet effective in the long term. The major disadvantage is the absence of a psychological aspect. Here are two sample menus: Menu 1 Breakfast: 1 Two slices of whole grain bread with margarine and light jam. 1 glass of soy milk. 1 orange. Tea or coffee. Lunch: Green salad. Filet of sole with zucchini and carrots. Pineapple slices. The mid-afternoon snack is carrots. Supper: Green salad, chicken breast, broccoli, and cauliflower. 1 skim-milk yogurt.

Menu 2 Breakfast: 3 egg whites, a slice of bran bread, a tomato, a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice. Tea or coffee. Lunch: Grated carrots, mussels in garlic, and a green salad. The mid-afternoon snack consists of a half cantaloupe, 1 skim-milk yogurt, and 1 kiwi. Supper: Vegetarian chili and a baked apple.

Some information in this article comes from a fascinating new book, La Bible des Regimes, written by Jenny de Jonquieres and published by Amerik Media. Her book describes more than 80 diets and weight reduction programs. Each diet is presented with 5 menu plans, a detailed discussion of its advantages and disadvantages, and lots more. La Bible des Regimes is presently available only in French. For additional information consult the publisher's website www.amerik-media.com.

You can find additional info at the following links:

Click Here for more information
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Nutrition Tips to Improve Fat Loss

Incorporating these fat loss tips will improve your nutrition program. Start off slowly and add one a week, you don't have to adopt all of them at once. Before long, you’ve cleaned up your nutrition program and on your way to reaching your goal. Trendy diets, fads and the infomercial product of the month, are not going to help you reach your weight loss goals. A well thought-out nutrition and exercise program will.

Eat breakfast

Proven time and again, those who eat breakfast are more successful at controlling their weight than those that don't. Plus, when doing strength training exercises (and you know you should be), it's even more important to make certain you fuel those muscles after an overnight fast. The perfect time for burning fat because glycogen, blood glucose and insulin levels are all low.

Unfortunately, it may also be perfect for burning muscle, because glycogen levels are low, and levels of the catabolic stress hormone cortisol are high. If you skip breakfast and eat lunch at noon, you’re not only in a highly catabolic (muscle wasting) state, you’re also sending an unmistakable starvation signal to your body.

Eat less sugar

Start reading labels! Sugar is hidden in almost every commercial food item. A single tablespoon of ketchup gets 3 of its 4 grams of carbs from sugar. A 12 oz can of cola has a staggering 40 grams of sugar, and ALL of the carbs in a cola are sugar! Why does that matter?

Simple sugars are digested very quickly and cause a rapid spike in blood sugar. Your body then releases large amounts of insulin. Insulin quickly clears the glucose from the bloodstream leading to low blood sugar (hypoglycemia.) Low blood sugar causes cravings, hunger, weakness, mood swings and decreased energy. These cravings for sugar result in a vicious cycle of ups and downs in blood sugar levels throughout the day.

Eat More Often

Studies have shown that those who eat 4-6 smaller meals per day have less body fat than those eating 2-3 meals a day, even if both groups eat about the same number of calories. This is because of maintaining steady blood sugar levels. Too much insulin activates fat storage enzymes and forces fat in the bloodstream into fat cells for storage.

High insulin levels also inhibit enzymes that promote the breakdown of existing stored body fat. You can manage your blood sugar and insulin levels by choosing fewer simple carbohydrates, more complex carbohydrates, eating fiber and having your carbohydrates with lean proteins approximately every three hours.

Eat protein

Be sure to include enough protein for your level of activity (you are exercisingÂ…right?)

Protein speeds up your metabolism because your body has to work harder to digest, process, and utilize it compared to fats or carbs.

The "thermic" effect of protein is one of the reasons that a higher protein diet is more effective for fat loss than a diet high in fat or carbs. Too much of any food can be stored as body fat, but protein is less likely to be converted to fat than any other nutrient.

Eat nothing from a box

The closer your food is to nature the better off you are. Have you looked at the ingredients list in most packaged food these days? You need to be a scientist to figure out what half the ingredients are. Stick to real, wholesome foods, fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean protein, etc.

Eat your vegetables

I don't mean fast food french fries. Try to get as many vegetable servings into your meals as you can. It's nearly impossible to over eat vegetables. They are full of fiber and will help keep you full between meals. They also contain loads of antioxidants. Raw is great, steamed is another good way to have them. Hold the heavy cheese sauces please!

Eat protein and carbs together

If you want to keep your blood sugar in check, then don't eat your carbs by themselves. Strive to always have balanced meals of protein, carbs and healthy fats. You'll feel better and your muscles will thank you.

Prepare your own food

Best for several reasonsÂ…It's cheaper than eating out, you know exactly what you are eating, and it saves time. It takes no more time to cook up 6 healthy chicken breasts than it does to cook one or two. Make things easy. Prepare them over the weekend and your lunches for the next few days are done. While you are at it, put on a pot of brown or wild rice, or bake up some sweet potatoes and you're good to go.

Drink water

LOTS! Most people are already dehydrated. Strive to drink a gallon a day. If you drink a lot of coffee, then you need an extra 8 oz for each cup of coffee. Exercise will put more demands on your fluid levels. You need water. Drink 50-75% of your body weight in ounces of water. Add an additional 16 oz for strenuous exercise. No complaining!

Get more exercise

Get some exercise on most days of the week, and alternate between strength training exercises and cardio training. If you are a beginner, shoot for two weight workouts a week and progress to 3 or more depending upon your goals. Get in as many cardio sessions as your schedule will allow, but aim for at least 3.

Commit to adopting these nutrition program changes and you'll be well on your way to reaching your weight loss goal, whether it's ten pounds or many more. Sound nutrition and exercise will always succeed in the long run. Don't give into the temptation of fads.

The information contained in this article is strictly for informational purposes and is not intended to provide medical advice. If you are sedentary or over 40 please get clearance from a doctor before starting an exercise program.

© By Rick DeToma

Weight Loss - The Natural Way

weight loss is such a BIG issue with so many people. We have hundreds of thousands of companies vying to sell you weight loss products, and doctors all over the place telling people to lose weight. So, you'd think after all this time and effort that weight loss would be easy!

Wouldn't you?

Why isn't weight loss easy with all this effort that's gone into it?

The Yo-yo Diet

This report is dedicated to all those of you who feel the pressure to lose weight. On the one side are all the doctors and the magazines telling you to lose weight. On the other side, all the diet companies are selling magic cures with diets that, somehow, just don't seem to work. You try diet after diet after diet, and always end up with just as much weight, if not more, than before.

Remember the Atkins diet? Sure, it got you to lose weight. And with it, your health. After the Atkins diet was over, what happened? That's right, all the weight came back on again, only this time your health was damaged. Not one nutritionist that I've spoken to had anything good to say about this diet.

The Reality

The reality isÂ… Diets don't work.

If you don't believe that, consider this. Depending on whom you ask, up to 97% of diets don't work. If diets did work, would people be struggling to lose weight? No! They'd take a diet, the weight would come off, and that would be the end of the story.

Instead, around two-thirds of people in the UK are overweight. About a quarter of people are obese. At any one time, a half of all women and a quarter of all men are trying to lose weight.

How many people do you know have tried more than once to lose weight?

Did you know that people in the UK spend around £335 million on diet products after their New Year's resolutions? Then, they spend more during the rest of the year. That's a whole lot of money spent on something that doesn't work!

HmmÂ…

Now, I won't say that diet companies make their money by selling products that keep you overweight. But it does make me wonderÂ…

What else?

Health. Overweight problems cost the UK around 30,000 deaths each year — at an average of nine years off your life. It'll soon overtake smoking as the UK's biggest killer. The NHS spends £500 million each year just on weight-related health problems. That's a lot of tax money!

Our children. More children than ever before suffer weight-related health problems such as cancer. So many children are overweight that some people say today's children will die before their parents!

The emotional toil. Depression, lack of sleep, tiredness, lack of self-esteem and confidence, feelings of failureÂ… The list is endless.

The cost. How much money do you spend on diets that don't work, gyms that you don't go to (or that don't help), and on food you didn't want to eat? If you've finally given up on trying to lose weight, how much does it cost you in happiness?

The gym myth

How many people do you know are trying to lose weight through going to gym? Well, gyms have an 80% dropout rate. That means they make most of their money from people that don't go! I'll bet most of those people wanted to lose weightÂ…

Do you know, most people I know that don't have a weight problem also don't go to gym.

HmmÂ…

This leads me on to the next pointÂ…

The willpower problem

Willpower is probably the worst possible way to try to lose weight. In fact, it's probably the worst possible way to change anything. Very few people give up smoking, change their drinking habits, stop biting their nails, or lose weight, through willpower. In almost all cases, it simply doesn't work.
And that's one of the problems with diets. Diets usually require willpower.

SoÂ…

To summarise, then:

Diets don't work. After a diet, you usually put on as much, or more, than you lost.

Being overweight is unhealthy. The problem is, dieting is also unhealthy.

Being overweight is costly not only in health, but also emotionally and financially.

You may not lose much weight by going to gym — if you manage to keep going, that is.

Willpower doesn't work. Otherwise, you wouldn't be reading this!

Well, then, what does work?

The answer, of course, is to look at people who find it easy to keep to their correct weight. And then to copy what they do! The rest of this report will be about what does work. Specifically, it will tell you about:

Losing weight and then keeping it off for good.

Making the changes pleasant, so you don't use loads of willpower.

Why these changes are healthy for you, and how they keep getting better.

Why the changes work naturally, the way nature intended, so it becomes easier and easierÂ…not harder and harder!

How these changes naturally increase your metabolic rate, helping you to lose weight and keep it off.

In short, it's about changing your relationship to food.

Eat!

The biggest myth of weight loss is that you have to starve yourself. Now, tell me: Is it natural to starve yourself? Of course not! Your body has powerful ways to make that hard. When you starve yourself, your body goes into shock. It slows your metabolic rate, and it makes you feel really bad, to try to persuade you to eat again. Whenever you do eat, your body sends out masses of endorphins — those are hormones that make you feel great — so that you find it hard to stop eating. And, when your diet is over, your body remembers the starvation and does everything it can to keep your metabolic slow, and store as much fat as it can — "just in case it happens again!"

Notice how everything is the exact opposite of what you want!

So, am I telling you to eat? Yes, I am! But, be carefulÂ…

There are good ways to eat and bad ways to eat.

Before I tell you about the good ways to eat, let me tell you two things that are even more important to weight loss.

Breathing

Yes, breathing! If you want to lose weight, you've got to learn to breathe properly. You see, the primary purpose of food is energy. And, you get most of your energy from oxygen. If you breathe badly, your body may ask for more energy; and you can confuse this with a request for food.

Good breathing will also lift your spirits, which is good if you often feel down, and it will improve your health.

Breathing is simple once you know how. Perhaps you want to check out my breathing tips & exercises.

Water

You know you get most of your energy from breathing. Believe it or not, you get most of the rest of your energy from water. Ensure you drink plenty of water every day. If you don't like water, try getting a good water filter and notice the difference.

Here are three important tips about drinking.

Fruit juice is excellent for you, but processed juice (such as you get from the shops) often doesn't contain enough water and can contain excess sugar.

How do you know when you've had enough water? Simply put, check the colour when you pass water. It should look clear (or very pale yellow). If it's yellow, drink more water. You should drink water before you feel thirsty.

Anything with caffeine (coffee, tea, certain soft drinks, chocolate, slimming tablets) or alcohol forces your body to dehydrate itself. If you have these, be sure to take extra water. Better still, stay off the caffeine and reduce your alcohol.

If you feel hungry, have a glass of water. This will always reduce your hunger, although perhaps at first only by a little.

Adding water to your daily diet will have many other health bonuses, such as a better skin.

Before making sudden changes to your drinking and eating habits, please consult a physician or nutritionist first, in case of undiagnosed illnesses.

How to eat

Well, you already know that to eat properly, you first have to have a good breathing habit and a good water habit.

You also know that you should never starve yourself. Instead, you need to eat in a way that will increase your metabolic rate and decrease the amount of fat that your body stores.

So, here it is, direct from the nutritionists:

Eat when you're hungry

This means that you may eat several times a day — at least six times! Instead of eating two or three big meals a day, eat six or seven small portions a day. This has two important effects. Your body remembers those starvation diets, right? Eating every time you're hungry sends your body the opposite message — there's too much food. After a while:

Your body will relax — it will stop trying to store all the food it can.

Your body will slowly start to increase its metabolic rate — permanently.

I never used to understand why I stayed so thin. I always ate many times throughout the day. Now you know the answer, of course: My body believes there's too much food, and so instead of storing fat, it throws it all out.

Concentrate on your eating.

I have a friend. She eats a full plate of food. But she's as skinny as a rake. The thing is, she never eats while talking or listening or watching TV or anything. When she eats, that's all she does. My friend stops whatever she's doing; takes a mouthful; puts her knife and fork down; and concentrates on her food. After she's chewed and swallowed, if she's not doing anything else (like listening), then she picks up her knife and fork and takes another bite.

My friend always remembers what she ate and what it tasted like. She loves her food. Because she thinks about what she's eating.

So, here are the tips:

When you eat, do nothing else.

Don't eat in front of the TV, in the cinema, or while reading.

If you're chatting with people, wait for a lull in the conversation (or ignore the conversation for a short while) while you eat the next mouthful.

Concentrate on what's in your mouth: Put down your knife and fork. Enjoy the taste, the texture, the temperature, the smell. When you swallow, feel the food going down your throat. After you've swallowed, wait for another lull in the conversation before you pick up the knife and fork.

If you're eating a sandwich — at work, for example — stop working. Each time you take a bite, put down the sandwich. Enjoy your sandwich, every single bite, every single chew, every single swallow!

Remember: There's no rush!

What about your diet?

This is only a short report, so there's plenty I haven't told you yet. However, these few things will make a big difference. Of course, you should eat healthy food; but for now, unless your doctor, nutritionist or other health expert has told you otherwise, just eat what you'd normally eat.

You'll find some interesting changes start to happen all by themselves. As your body starts to adjust, it will gradually start to send you different messages. As you get more oxygen, more water, less fat, and a faster metabolic rate, your tastes will start to change. To start with, you may find oily food (chips, hamburger) becomes less tasty. You may find wholegrain foods (wholewheat bread, wholegrain rice, wholegrain pasta) becomes tastier than the refined versions. And so on. It takes time, but it will happen.

What else?

These are just some of the things that I work with when I deal with people's weight problems. It's amazing how much your appetite can diminish when you feel good about yourself!

As I said, there's plenty that I haven't included in this report, but the point is: You don't need willpower, you don't need diets, you don't need to starve yourself. You just need to know what it is that you need to know, and a little help to get there!

Weight Loss: Why Low Carb Diets don't work and are Dangerous!

Thinking about losing those holiday kilos? Planning to use a low carbohydrate diet to achieve this weight loss? Think againÂ…Low Carb diets can be extremely dangerous for women between the ages of 14 and 40! While maintaining a healthy weight is importantÂ… the dangers associated with low or no carbohydrate diet’s quickly outweighs the initial benefits. Low carb diets have become very popular in recent years as a quick fix for weight loss, however it has been found that most of the initial weight loss is due to fluid and muscle tissueÂ…not even fat!

Low carbohydrate diets aim to reduce the amount of carbs/sugar from your diet and increase the intake of proteins and fats. On a No carbohydrate diet or Low carb diet you cut out things like pasta, bread, rice and alcohol, but you can eat as much meat, cheese and fatty things as you like. Low carb diets, like the Atkins or South Beach Diet aim to limit the carbohydrate intake to about thirty carbs per day.

Over the last 10 years since low carb diets have become popular, scientists and nutritionists have discovered many long term side effects and dangers of low carbohydrate diets! It has been discovered that Low or No Carb diets actually reduce brain function and affect your memory!

Your brain cells need two times more energy than the other cells in your body… and Glucose (sugar) is the only fuel normally used by brain cells! So by reducing carbohydrate intake or cutting carbs out completely you are doing serious damage to your brain cells! A low carbohydrate diet effectively starves the brain of glucose – leading to foggy thinking, poor concentration and reduced memory function. Not only this, but low glucose levels can also lead to mood swings, fatigue and even depression! It is agreed that reducing the amount of carbohydrates in your everyday diet is beneficial…however most of the Low Carb, No Carb diets on the market are too extreme for the body to cope with and can lead to serious health problems. A healthy, balanced eating and exercise plan is recommended by doctors and nutritionals if you want to lose weight… Low carb or No carb diets are dangerous!

Atkins Diet Plan � What�s it All About?

A typical breakfast consists of 3 or 4 strips of bacon, two or more eggs and coffee. A snack would maybe be chunks of cheese and a cup of coffee with cream. Dinner might be a huge steak fried in butter. Sounds really good right? It sounds so tempting but there is a trade-off. You will have to give up carbs such as breads, potatoes, pasta, rice, and other things like chocolate, cake, some fruits, veggies, and milk at least in the beginning.

The theory is that when you cut out carbs your body are forced into burning fat that your body has stored to give it energy. Your body burns more calories when burning fat than when it is burning carbohydrates and you will lose weight more quickly. Your blood sugars stabilize which prevents overeating.

The first phase of the Atkins Diet Plan is the Introduction Phase and must be followed for at least two weeks. You are only allowed to consume 20 grams of carbs a day. You can load up on as much red meat, chicken, fish, cheese, eggs, mayo, cream, and butter. It is during this phase that your body switches from the burning fat to burning carbs.

The second phase is the ongoing weight loss phase. During this phase you increase your carb intake by about 5 grams daily until you find your critical carbohydrate level for losing weight. The most carbs that you can eat and still lose between 1 and 3 pounds a week. Breads, pasta, potatoes, and rice are still off limits.

The third phase is the pre-maintenance phase that you enter when you have only five to ten pounds to go to meet your goal weight. Your carb intake increases by ten grams each day for a week in order to help your body adjust to the addition of carbs and the final phase of maintenance.

The fourth phase is called lifetime maintenance and intended to help you keep your motivation. Carbs are limited to less than 90 grams a day. Get used to it though because you will be on a low carb diet for the rest of your life.

There are some concerns about the long-term effects of the Atkins Diet Plan and other low carb plans. There is such a high consumption of fat, particularly saturated fats and this can cause an increase risk of heart disease.

The Atkins diet eliminates some nutrients and this could cause deficiencies and other health problems in the future. Since there is a limited intake of bone building calcium you could be at increased risk of Osteoporosis. A very limited intake of antioxidant nutrients could cause problems such as heart disease, cancer, and premature aging.

One drawback of the Atkins Diet is that it can become boring. Vegetarians have difficulty with this diet because veggies, seeds, and nuts are off limits in the first stages. The diet does present a view of healthy eater, which keeps us healthy and free from disease.

Other concerns are that the initial weight loss comes back quickly when you go off the Atkins plan and a lot of people drop out in the induction phase. The carbs are very low and ketosis can result which is dangerous for a diabetic or anyone else for that matter.

This diet is high in cholesterol and you can develop constipation and/or heart disease because of the high fat content. Since the diet is low in fruits and vegetables, it also lacks cancer-fighting antioxidants. The most serious drawbacks to the Atkins plan are that it is not intended for long term use and there are unsafe if not downright dangerous side effects.

A few positive notes about the Atkins Plan are that it works! You lose a lot of weight quickly and you can eat as much as you want of certain foods especially protein and fat.

The Atkins Diet eliminates to a great degree carbs from rice, pasta, potatoes, breads, some fruits and veggies. It also eliminates cancer-fighting antioxidants. It is a high fat and high protein diet that can increase the risk for certain diseases like high cholesterol and heart disease.

On the upside, this is one diet that actually works but it is not a diet that you can be on for an indefinite period of time. Once you go off the program and resume more ‘normal’ eating the initial weight loss will come back. Also, as with any diet plan check with your doctor to be sure you can safely do it.

To conclude let me give you a reminder. The Atkins diet is not for long term use and it has inherent health risks. If you need to lose weight you may already be at risk for heart disease and high cholesterol, the Atkins plan has the potential of actually increasing those risks.

(c) www.atkins-diet-plan-n-books.com

Atkins Diet Plan � What�s it All About?

A typical breakfast consists of 3 or 4 strips of bacon, two or more eggs and coffee. A snack would maybe be chunks of cheese and a cup of coffee with cream. Dinner might be a huge steak fried in butter. Sounds really good right? It sounds so tempting but there is a trade-off. You will have to give up carbs such as breads, potatoes, pasta, rice, and other things like chocolate, cake, some fruits, veggies, and milk at least in the beginning.

The theory is that when you cut out carbs your body are forced into burning fat that your body has stored to give it energy. Your body burns more calories when burning fat than when it is burning carbohydrates and you will lose weight more quickly. Your blood sugars stabilize which prevents overeating.

The first phase of the Atkins Diet Plan is the Introduction Phase and must be followed for at least two weeks. You are only allowed to consume 20 grams of carbs a day. You can load up on as much red meat, chicken, fish, cheese, eggs, mayo, cream, and butter. It is during this phase that your body switches from the burning fat to burning carbs.

The second phase is the ongoing weight loss phase. During this phase you increase your carb intake by about 5 grams daily until you find your critical carbohydrate level for losing weight. The most carbs that you can eat and still lose between 1 and 3 pounds a week. Breads, pasta, potatoes, and rice are still off limits.

The third phase is the pre-maintenance phase that you enter when you have only five to ten pounds to go to meet your goal weight. Your carb intake increases by ten grams each day for a week in order to help your body adjust to the addition of carbs and the final phase of maintenance.

The fourth phase is called lifetime maintenance and intended to help you keep your motivation. Carbs are limited to less than 90 grams a day. Get used to it though because you will be on a low carb diet for the rest of your life.

There are some concerns about the long-term effects of the Atkins Diet Plan and other low carb plans. There is such a high consumption of fat, particularly saturated fats and this can cause an increase risk of heart disease.

The Atkins diet eliminates some nutrients and this could cause deficiencies and other health problems in the future. Since there is a limited intake of bone building calcium you could be at increased risk of Osteoporosis. A very limited intake of antioxidant nutrients could cause problems such as heart disease, cancer, and premature aging.

One drawback of the Atkins Diet is that it can become boring. Vegetarians have difficulty with this diet because veggies, seeds, and nuts are off limits in the first stages. The diet does present a view of healthy eater, which keeps us healthy and free from disease.

Other concerns are that the initial weight loss comes back quickly when you go off the Atkins plan and a lot of people drop out in the induction phase. The carbs are very low and ketosis can result which is dangerous for a diabetic or anyone else for that matter.

This diet is high in cholesterol and you can develop constipation and/or heart disease because of the high fat content. Since the diet is low in fruits and vegetables, it also lacks cancer-fighting antioxidants. The most serious drawbacks to the Atkins plan are that it is not intended for long term use and there are unsafe if not downright dangerous side effects.

A few positive notes about the Atkins Plan are that it works! You lose a lot of weight quickly and you can eat as much as you want of certain foods especially protein and fat.

The Atkins Diet eliminates to a great degree carbs from rice, pasta, potatoes, breads, some fruits and veggies. It also eliminates cancer-fighting antioxidants. It is a high fat and high protein diet that can increase the risk for certain diseases like high cholesterol and heart disease.

On the upside, this is one diet that actually works but it is not a diet that you can be on for an indefinite period of time. Once you go off the program and resume more ‘normal’ eating the initial weight loss will come back. Also, as with any diet plan check with your doctor to be sure you can safely do it.

To conclude let me give you a reminder. The Atkins diet is not for long term use and it has inherent health risks. If you need to lose weight you may already be at risk for heart disease and high cholesterol, the Atkins plan has the potential of actually increasing those risks.

(c) www.atkins-diet-plan-n-books.com