Need a new weight-loss ally? Something that could help you not only lose the pounds but improve your general health and wellbeing.

Then head for the nearest lemon tree. That’s what Theresa Cheung, author of The Lemon Juice Diet, recommends. Having done detailed and extensive research, she believes that lemons and lemon juice is is all you need to kickstart a new healthier and slimmer you.

Lemons have natural detoxifying powers which stimulates the digestive system in a healthy and effective way.

And a healthy digestive system is very important if you have any hope at all of losing weight.

So I thought I’d jump on in and give it a go.

The first step turned out to be the hardest. Having always started my day with a cup of coffee, suddenly having to change to a glass of lemon juice diluted with warm water instead left a bitter taste in my mouth. But then, what’s a little bitterness if it’s going to aid in the battle with the bulge.

Once you master the early morning lemon juice, following the rest of the seven principles of The Lemon Juice Diet looks like a piece of cake (oops! take that back. NO cake)

• Drink lemon juice with warm water every morning – this helps jump-start your digestive system.
• Eat at least five portions of fruit and vegetables a day.
• Keep your blood sugar levels balanced to avoid sugar cravings - that means eating little and often and using lemon in your cooking.
• Cut down on sugar-rich foods. The easiest way to do this is to swap refined foods like white bread, white rice and pasta for wholegrain alternatives.
• Avoid saturated fats and increase your consumption of good fats, like omega 3 and omega 6 which are found in nuts, seeds, oily fish and extra virgin olive oil.
• Eat more fresh whole foods, including beans, pulses and lentils. These contain plenty of fibre, which can help to stimulate your digestive system and slow down the conversion of carbs into glucose.
• Slow it down! It takes your brain 20 minutes to realise that you’re full. If you take your time eating you’re less likely to overeat and this in turn will help with your weight-loss mission.

The Lemon Juice Diet is a easy read with plenty of sound and sage advice (and recipes) for anyone looking to loss weight in a healthy and comfortable way. But even if you are not looking to lose weight, there is much in this book that you can use. There’s even a chapter on lemon cures for everything from acne to varicous veins.

It’s Healthbolt Carnival time again, so I hope you have a cup of coffee and some time to sit and click…

Talking about dieting and hunger in the same sentence somehow doesn’t seem right.

But what if you could lose weight and help feed the hungry at the same time?

That’s the idea behind a new campaign created by General Mills, NBC’s The Biggest Loser and the non-profit organization Feeding America.

It’s called the Pound for Pound Challenge because, for ever pound you lose, General Mills will donate 10 cents to Feeding America. That’s enough, apparently, to provide one pound of groceries to a local food bank.

Imagine all those 10 cents added together - just think of how many pounds of groceries Feeding America could provide for those without food.

 

All you have to do is take the pledge, start dieting (and of course exercising) and watch your lost pounds convert into pounds of groceries for those who desperately need them.

 

 

Of course, if you are one of those lucky people who don’t need to lose any weight, you can still become involved with the Pound for Pound Challenge  by…

• Mailing-in the Pound For Pound lids and seals from specially-marked General Mills products. For every lid or seal mailed in, General Mills will donate 10 cents to Feeding America.
• Donate directly to Feeding America, a network of more than 200 member food banks. As the nation’s leading charitable hunger-relief organization, Feeding America serves all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.

All in all, the Pound for Pound Challenge sounds like a truly win-win situation.

What do you say?

Are you up for it?

Bad news if you’re overweight and are employed by the state of Alabama. If you don’t ease up on your Southern-fried favorites and hit the gym a bit more, you’ll end up paying $25 a month for insurance that is otherwise free to the un-fat folk.

That’s right, in an unprecedented move to encourage state workers to slim down, Alabama will be the first state in the nation to charge overweight workers who don’t make the effort to lighten up.

This $25 insurance fee will join the already-in-place $24/month fee that ‘Bama employees are charged for smoking. The state says it’s seen some success in getting their workers to quit lighting up, so they reason this new fee will encourage thicker employees to skinny up. Alabama is, after all, ranked second in the nation for obesity.

So how do you feel about this bold move? Would you welcome a change like this in your state, or should one’s employer butt out? Let us know…

So in a moment of “don’t shoot the messenger”, I am sorry to have to share the news that “moderate” exercise is no longer going to cut it, if weight loss is your main goal. And by “moderate”, I’m referring to the old standby of 30 minutes a day, most days of the week.

Bummer, eh?

As if we don’t have enough on our plates (heh. Punny, huh?) Now we need to ramp up our routines in order to shed a few. This, according to a recent article on TIME.com.

Truly, it makes sense. When I first went on a crusade to lose the baby weight from my second child and consistently exercised “moderately”, at first, the pounds flew off. But then I plateaued and, well, from that point on it was just maintenance. Losing more would’ve taken more effort, and thus, I see now where the TIME.com article’s study arrived at the recommendation they did.

So here’s my question: in this world full of obligations, responsibilities and very little “me” time, do you plan to carve this extra twenty-five minutes into your day somehow to fulfill this new recommendation? Or does it seem way too far-fetched? Or maybe you’re already exercising this hard? Let us know your habits and plans. I love to hear how people go about achieving their health goals.

For the science behind this new magic number, be sure to catch the whole TIME.com article.

Read a man’s take on this from Scott at Health and Men.

The Healthbolt Carnival is back once again, full of interesting, informative, and entertaining posts about ‘everything to do with health.

So grab a coffee and have a read. You’ll be amazed at what you find.

Walter from Highlight HEALTH writes about The Upside of High Food Prices, saying, “As the price at the gas pump continues to climb, so does the cost of diary, grain and meat products. However, there is a healthy upside to the increasing cost of food.”

Trisha at Women’s Health Research News tells us in a review of the new fad diet Sensa that There’s no magical way to lose weight.

Petra Ioni from Fountia suggests that Caffeine After Workouts Refuels Muscle. Sounds like my kinda of exercise!!!

Dean Moyer from The Back Pain Blog responds to a reader’s question about herniated discs in his post Can Herniated Discs Really Heal?

Mad Kane’s Humor Blog provides us with another humorous post, this time about De-Stress Or Distress?

Mike Remer from My Path To Fitness Blog offers a quick weight loss tip in A Great Weight Reducing Secret | My Path To Fitness Blog.

The Joshua Seth Blog offers a few Summer Weight Loss Tips saying, “”It’s swimsuit season and chances are if you’re like most people your old New Year’s Resolution is about to become your new summer weight loss program. Oops! Here are 3 simple things you can do today to start losing weight this summer…”

James Chambers from Hyperhidrosis tells us about Hyperhidrosis Causes.

James Brausch at Weight Loss Dude looks at Diabetes posted at .

Tip Diva provides us with Top Ten Tips - Avoiding Foot Pain saying, “If you’ve ever gotten home, kicked off your shoes and announced, “Oww, my feet hurt,” then you’re probably not wearing proper shoes. Here are ways to alleviate common sources of foot pain”

Ralph Jean-Paul at Potential 2 Success gives us a list of presents The 20 Healthiest Foods You Shouldn’t Live Without, saying, “Get your hands on these foods and begin to experience the powerful health benefits they provide.”

Peter Murphy at Communication Skills Power has advice on How to Get Your Man to Express his Feelings.

Matthew Philip from EnviroHumanImpact writes a Sigg Water Bottle Product Review | EnviroHumanImpact, saying, “We recently did a product review of the Sigg metal water bottles as an alternative to typical Nalgene plastic water bottles. Many people have made the switch after it has been found that Nalgene style bottles tend to leech nasty chemicals into the water inside them. Our health conscious readers have made this one of our most popular articles to date.”

Carl Mills from Master Carl Mills reports on KARATESIZE - Basic Kicks saying, “Learning Karate techniques will give some great benifits!!”

Ed Pudol of Healthy life style looks at Becoming A Healthy Eater

Toni Graybill at Maximize Health and Wealth suggests that the The Secret to Better Grades is Dancing? saying, “Music, dancing and its effect on health”

Neelakantha from NursingDegree.net provides this amazing resouce The Ultimate Guide to Yoga: 100 Blogs, Tutorials, and Resources while Sagar Satapathy, also from NursingDegree.net lists 77 Surprising Health Benefits of Yoga.

Elizabeth Day writes about Alternative Cancer Treatments.

Well, that’s it for this edition of the Healthbolt Carnival.

Hope you all enjoyed it and prehaps learned something new.

The Healthbolt Carnival will be back again in a couple of weeks.

So don’t forget to submit your blog article to the next edition of Healthbolt Carnival using our carnival submission form.

Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

And if you want to host Healthbolt Carnival, drop us a line and we will set it up…

Technorati tags: a healthbolt carnival, blog carnival.

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You think you have weight loss goals? Well, I’m guessing Manuel Uribe has you smoked. His goal is to be able to walk down the aisle at his own wedding. And we’re betting he’ll do just that.

The 43-year-old Uribe has dropped an astonishing 550 pounds over the last two years after breaking the Guinness World Record of 1,235 pounds. He’s now down to about 700 pounds and has dreams of whittling down further.

Currently living in Northern Mexico, Uribe attributes his obesity to the American way - a nonstop diet of soda and junk food - after he came to the US in 1988 to live for a few years. He also claims that a liposuction surgery gone bad left him with huge tumors on both legs weighing a total of 220 pounds.

Now, the cause, I ’spose, is beside the point. The fact is that Uribe is currently sticking to a doctor-monitored diet and exercise program which he does in bed (he hasn’t been able to leave his bed in 6 years) is what’s important. His fiance is thrilled with his progress and can’t wait to tie the knot.

We wish him luck in all his weight loss endeavors and hope to hear the happy follow-up news of their wedding.

Source

Are you looking to lose weight? Be sure to visit one of the latest and greatest blogs in our channel, Weighting Line, where the awesome Hope makes it her mission to inspire you throughout your quest for health.

Japanese people may smoke too much and work too much. But on the whole they really can’t be accused of being overweight or metabo as the Japanese prefer to call it.

The Japanese goverment, however, thinks otherwise and has embarked on a mandatory campaign to slim it’s nation down. Two months ago they passed a national law that requires all companies and local governments to measure the waists of their employees (including family members) aged 40 to 74 as part of their annual checkups. With almost half the Japanese population fitting into this category, that makes an awful lot of waists to be measured.

The new law puts the maximum limit for male waistlines at 33.5 inches and women at 35.4 inches. Anyone exceeding this will be expected to bring their waists into line with the approved government standards through dietary advice, guidance, and education.  Failure to do so will result in the financial penalties being imposed on the employee’s company and local government.

Reducing waistlines has much scientific merit. Studies have proven that being thick around the middle increases your risk of having a heart attack, or gettng cancer, diabetes, and dementia.

So maybe the Japanese government is on the right track but somehow I can’t see the same tactics being used in the United States or England.

Can you?

(source)

POSTSCRIPT: After posting ‘Japanese Government Attacks Metabo’ I received an email from a reader who suggests that my statement ‘reducing waistlines has much scientific merit’, based on information from a NYT article,  might not necessarily be right. The email went on to say ‘ Please consider that all studies are not created equally and correlations are not causations. The facts do not support waistlines as a causative factor in any chronic disease of aging’ and included a link to Metabo — Is a small waistline a measure of health? an article that asks “While having a trim waistline to avoid the dreaded metabo and reduce medical costs has become a popular health mandate, is it evidence-based?” Have a read. Citing numerous studies, Sandy makes a compelling arguement that ‘having a small waist was not a measure of lower risks and having a larger waist size was not a measure of higher risks.’

Walking without a pedometer may be getting you nowhere…

Image details: Group of woman walking served by picapp.com

Sure, you talk the talk…but do you walk the walk?

If you’re walking without a pedometer, probably not.

See, most people aren’t all that good at monitoring their own progress. They tend to overestimate the amount of effort (or in the case of walking, the amount of steps) they’ve accumulated. It’s human nature - we like to think we’re better than we are - or at least more ambitious.

However…

According to a study by the University of Michigan, wearing a pedometer (a small computer worn on your waist which measures the amount of steps you take) may keep you moving 20 to 40 minutes longer than those who go technology free.

So for a little investment up front (you can score a basic model totally on the cheap or spring for a more tricked-out model with all the bells and whistles) the result can be great fitness success later on. Sounds like a good trade-off to me, no?

So, do you already use a pedometer while walking? Does it keep you motivated?

Are you thinking of trying it?

Let us know in the comments below…