Dieting and Weight Loss

As we’ve discussed in the past, the HCG diet protocol is one of the most popular and effective weight loss treatments in the world today. Compared to traditional methods, people who use HCG will lose more total weight over the course of any diet program. The reasons for this are simple. The hormone works by directly boosting your metabolism in your brain and decreasing your appetite. The effects are so pronounced, that in numerous studies people will lose roughly 400 to 500% more total fat than just by cutting calories alone. These results are highly reliable, as the studies have shown. On average, people using this hormone would lose 20 or more pounds per 30 day period. This level matches up well with the goal of most physicians, who have identified in the past that people who lose weight more quickly are much more likely to succeed in the long term.

The HCG diet has always been offered in injections taken each day, but recent moves from researchers have pushed into other alternative methods to enable more people to take this great treatment. A new administration method had been making headway in recent years prompted by wide adoption with clinicians and their patients. Oral drops of HCG are now commonly taken in place of injections, and offer the same great results as studies have shown. A person need only place this under their tongue a few times per day and they will generate the same results as they would with the daily intravenous administration. However, there are still things to consider before diving into one method or the other as part of your protocol.

Oral Droplets vs Injections: Advantages and Things to Watch For

Injections are widely prescribed by doctors, as they can be mixed yourself on demand. They are also very effective, delivering the dosage directly to your body. Yet, as so many people have found out, it can be difficult, expensive and painful to commit to daily injections. Oral drops, however, are much less expensive and easier to take. You have to take them more often, unfortunately, and there are some major things to keep in mind before selecting any HCG drops for oral consumption.

There are many different types of HCG drops being sold today, and most of them are what are known as “homeopathic” or hormoneless products. These do not contain any actual HCG and instead claim that they “simulate” the same effect with some kind of amino acids. This is patently false, and there’s no scientific basis for these claims. Only actual HCG, such as from a product like from the well known HCG plus drops from http://www.hcgplusdrops.com, will actually work as demanded by the protocol. A minimum of 150 IUs of the hormone is required each and every day in order to induce weight loss as seen in the studies on the diet. This means that anything that claims to be “doing the same thing” without the real glycoprotein ingredient is heavily misrepresenting reality.

Yes, injections are a fantastic way to lose weight on the HCG diet, but if you do choose to go down the HCG drops route there are a few ways you can protect yourself from these fake products. There are simple ways to tell fakes from the real thing, just by what they contain. Firstly, the product should clearly indicate how much of the hormone it contains and list it in either IUs (the most common measurement) or milligrams of purified powder. Secondly, no real HCG can go without refrigeration once opened, and it should have a relatively short lifespan. Real HCG degrades over time when exposed to air, and it’s a sure sign it’s not the real hormone if this isn’t indicate anywhere. Lastly, no alcohol should be in the product. This means that if the product contains alcohol as its base ingredient, it will not actually work as intended with the diet.

Many people have likely heard about a new weight loss supplement called Garcinia Cambogia recently.  If you have not, this is a novel treatment for obesity that’s gaining a lot of steam with physicians and their patients.  There’s been numerous studies which have shown this method cuts appetite, helps burn fat in your body by absorbing lipids which is what fats are converted into, and also burns your fat as well with a higher metabolism. This is why it’s grown so popular in recent years, as millions lose weight rapidly with these methods.

Garcinia cambogia comes from a plant, a fruit in particular, found in India and Africa.  It contains a particular substance, often denoted as HCA, which has a huge benefit for the user’s body.  Typically this helps induce thermogensis (fat burning through body heat) and prevents fat absorption in the body.  This is called hydroxycitric acid, only found in this plant.  Scientists discovered these benefits for weight loss after much trial and error, but it’s now being formed into natural extract supplements so that people can take it each day.

How the Use of Garcinia Works

This method is maintained for a period lasting several months, and garcinia actually improves the users health overall.  You do not have to have a prescription to try the diet, but you do need to adhere to a more natural food intake.  This allows you to lose weight more quickly than just by trying to take garcinia alone.  Studies did verify that without even changing diet, users lost 10 pounds or more per month using garcinia cambogia extract (assuming it was high in HCA).  However, those that dieted lost much much more than just trying to diet without the use of this extract.

You can, additionally, take Garcinia with other supplements as well.  Certain types of ingredients act differently than Garcinia, and can help you lose even more weight.  For example, HCG and garcinia together work very well, as HCG works through sending signals to your brain and garcinia works on stored fat directly.  There’s really no problems doing so, as long as you follow a natural and organic diet along the way as these require.

Garcinia is a completely natural ingredient that helps people lose weight, as a result, side effects from its use are quite limited.  There are certain cases where people actually do experience some minor changes, but these come primarily from any diet changes they commit to not the HCA or garcinia extract itself.  As always, you need to make sure that the dosages are rational and controlled and not try to “go all out” expecting massive unattainable results overnight.  However, for the most part, garcinia doesn’t negative interact with most medicines.  It’s always best to talk to a doctor prior if you’re on any prescription medicines of course.

Combining methods to reach your ultimate goal is a good way to succeed on any weight loss program.  Garcinia cambogia works by directly changing how your body digests and uses the food and fat it has stored.  This is one way to lose weight, but it’s not the only way.  As a result, you can add in other products that act in a different manner.  It’s important to only select methods which actually have clinical support for their efficacy and not dive into any trends or fads.  Garcinia is not a fad, it has hundreds of studies showing its effectiveness for users.

More so than with other diets out there today, the paleo diet is gaining support rapidly among clinicians and their patients.  This likely comes as no surprise for many who have heard of this diet, and read the studies.  This diet is based upon the “stone age” or “caveman” style plans.  The studies on this topic have identified a method that is not only highly effective, but safe for users in need of rapid and significant weight loss as well.

The Paleo diet bases the foods you eat upon the typical foods our species ate before the agricultural development of farming some 10,000 years ago.  Our species evolved as a nomadic group, which ate whatever food was available at the time.  This is what best serves our biology, according to this program.  Much research actually supports the intake of lean meats and natural fruits and vegetables as a highly effective way to lose weight and keep healthy.  As a result, the paleo diet has grown as a methodology used by many today.

Food Groups that are Part of the Paleo Diet

Food that is permitted on this dieet method are things like fibrous vegetables, meats/fish, berries and fruits and nuts or seeds.  The human species has been eating these foods for around 2.5 million years.  As a result these foods are what we can digest and deal with easiest.  Most of the food available today, particularly the processed garbage that most people eat, hasn’t existed in our diet for more than a few hundred years.  Our bodies just do not run properly on this type of food, and better quality and more natural ingredients are required to slose weight and stay healthy.

The kinds of modern foods that are removed as part of the paleo diet include: grains, legumes, dairy, processed oils, or highly processed foods such as anything with corn syrup in it.  These things are found in thousands of foods we typically consume at our local grocery stores.  Avoiding them as it turns out is one of the safest and most effective methods to lose weight and stay healthy.

Advantages to the Paleo Diet

There are many reasons to go on this diet, as there is s a huge list of concerns that are closely tied to maintaining a poor diet.  By far the most deadly things in the world today are the diseases humans develop from a poor diet.  In order to achieve the best results possible. you need to take in the right nutrients into your body, otherwise you risk problems down the road.

The structure of the paleo diet is designed to augment the needs of your body directly.  Feeding our body the right foods help our metabolism, help decrease appetite and help us lose weight.  This shouldn’t be a huge surprise for those that have tried cutting out some of their processed foods before (such as soda, which often results in significant and rapid weight loss on its own).

Two Major Payoffs for this Strategy

1) Cutting Your Risk of Disease

There are interactions that exist between your body and your environment, what kind of foods you’re eating as well as your health and performance.  Diet and nutrition all have a huge impact on your body and your health, which is no surprise.  The paleo diet has been proven to cut fat in many studies on this topic, allowing users to quickly lose weight, stay healthy, and cut their risk of disease.  Many of the world’s biggest killers are things related to obesity and weight gain such as cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes as well as hypertension.  All of these are closely related to the foods you eat and your diet.

2) Improving the Performance of Your Body 

Your genes and the food you eat have major impacts on your physiology, which is no surprise.  Your health and body performance have a huge impact on your livelihood and your mood as well.  Your digestive and immune systems are highly dependent upon the foods you eat and the dieting you undertake.  The healthier you eat the better your body will feel and you as well.  The nutrients we eat every day have a huge impact on the signals of our body to our brain and how much energy we produce.  For paleo diet methods, we are better adapted to digest and process these sorts of foods.  In addition, they have almost all of the nutrients we need to lose weight and feel healthy.  As a result they offer some stellar benefits for patients.

You’ve probably at some point heard of the HCG hormone.  Whether you heard about it from pregnancy scares, or test strips, or from its recent media attention due to its weight loss properties, you likely know about it.  Even if you don’t, the HCG hormone is fairly easy to understand: it’s the hormone women produce during their monthly cycle or when they’re pregnant.  The HCG diet has also hit the markets of late as a natural and effective weight loss treatment that helps boost a person’s metabolism and decrease their appetite.

The HCG diet was first theorized and tested by Dr. ATW Simeons in the 1950s.  He noticed that woman have a higher metabolic rate during pregnancy, as their body is producing energy for two people.  As such he tried out the treatment on many people who needed to lose weight.  The results were staggering, with the average person losing between 20 to 30 pounds each and every month of use.  For this reason, millions of people have now tried the HCG diet to help them lose weight and have succeeded.

The HCG diet works in two unique ways.  It boosts the users metabolism directly, through biochemical signals sent to the brain, as well as decreases the person’s appetite.  These effects are unique to this hormone and are not found in any other known substances.  When a person goes on the HCG diet protocol they actually have to do several things as part of that diet in order to succeed.  It’s not as simple as just taking the hormone and going back to your old habits.  There are three phases each designed enable people to lose weight effectively and continuously throughout the program.

How the HCG Diet Works and How You Can Give It a Try

The HCG diet is broken down into three distinct phases, each with a specific goal in mind to enable people to lose weight.  It works by directly boosting metabolism, but in order to see real results, people must go on a reduced calorie diet.  This is possible because of the appetite suppressing effects of the hormone as well.  Phase one of the diet lasts only two to three days but is a period of gorging during which the person takes HCG.  After that, phase two is designed to reduce calories to 500 to 700 per day for a period of up to 57 days.  Whereas phase three is designed for the period after the hormone and allows you to maintain the weight that’s been lost indefinitely.

HCG has been administered via injections for many years, however, in recent years it’s also been administered often via oral droplets placed under the user’s tongue.  This is a much better way of taking the hormone, as it’s completely pain-free and easily administered to patients.  However, not all hcg are real.  Sure real products exist out there, like hcgdropspure.com, however these are the exception to the general rule.  Most manufacturers nowadays are only selling what they like to call “hormone-free” or homeopathic HCGs which don’t contain any of the actual hormone.  It’s important to consider dosage of HCG when taking the hormone orally.

In order to achieve the results seen in studies, users must take in at least 150 IUs of the hormone per day sublingually.  However, these products almost never contain even 1 IU per day, which is why they’re often sold for so cheap.  The real thing produces far better results for users because it actually gets into the levels needed for it to work.

In spite all the difficulties we often feel when trying to shed pounds, it’s not a mysterious process.  Two major factors come into play, burning more calories than you consume, and keeping your metabolism high.  Both are fairly difficult things to do, as your metabolism will decrease significantly when you try to cut calories.  This actually creates periods of “plateaus” where weight loss is not only difficult, but slow.  There are only a few ways to increase your metabolism, and most of them are through various supplements.

The secret to weight loss is to make sustainable changes, ones that you intend on making permanent down the road.  You need to make small but steady changes to your diet until those changes just become routine and part of your life.  If you go on a rapid weight loss method like with HCG, you need to keep in mind that the maintenance afterward is just as important as losing the weight to begin with.  Sustaining your progress requires a sustainable approach to weight management.

Hard and Fast Rules for Weight Loss

In order to lose one pound of fat, a person has to burn over 3500 calories.  However, this may seem like you would have to exercise for a 4 or 5 hours per day to burn off that much weight, yet people can actually lose that much more rapidly in studies.  What gives?  The difference lies in your metabolism.  A person’s metabolism, if sped up properly, will burn off 200 to 300% more than it would normally just by sitting or walking.  That’s the secret for fast weight loss, and also the secret to keep it off forever.

Many people recommend that you calculate your BMR (or your basal metabolic rate).  This is what your body needs to maintain things like breathing and digestion, etc.  This is the minimum level you require.  There are a lot of calculators to choose from to do this online, but many of them will offer you a fairly good estimate of your number.  You need to eat at least this much each day (your body will burn off the rest it uses from stored fat).

You also need to calculate your daily activity level.  This is not always easy, because you burn calories at a different rate even for the same task throughout the day.  Track how much you walk each day, how much you exercise and a general idea of how much time you spend sitting throughout the day.  This will give you a rough estimate of the amount of activity you do per day and how many calories you are burning.

Last, but probably the most important, you have to count your food intake.  Contrary to a lot of the fad diets that claim you can eat anything, in order to succeed in weight loss you have to count your calories regularly.  This means daily caloric counting so you have a solid idea how much you are taking in.  You want to eat foods that are as natural as possible, which means no processed foods.  Foods such as fruits or vegetables are perfect just the way they are in their natural state.  This is what you should be eating, and avoiding all those processed products (like chips, or frozen dinners).

You take all of these numbers, and can calculate how much you burn in excess per day.  Your BMR plus activity burning should be greater than your food intake to lose weight.  However, your metabolism does not always cooperate with this unfortunately and can really slow down an disrupt this quickly.  Exercise to boost this or a proven treatment like HCG or garcinia can boost metabolism a lot to help you overcome many of these issues without needing to do anything drastic.