Nutrition Not Another Resolution. We would like to invite you to join our 2009 New Year’s Weight Loss Challenge.

New Year's is upon us and many of us make the same old resolution each year to lose weight. Don't just resolve to eating only salad, eliminating carbs, or going to the gym 4 hours a day. Instead we would like you to try something new for you. No more empty New Year's Resolutions. Proper nutrition is what you need to lose the weight for good.

Learn more or Register for the Challenge

The holiday season is with us.  Celebrations and Holiday parties abound. Along with all of the festivities we need to remember to enjoy ourselves while maintaining our wonderful habits and health during the holidays.

Holiday Habits Redefined

• Remember to eat every 4-5 hours or have a snack in order to not skip meals or eat at irregular meal times, which can result in the risk of overeating.
• Share portions when eating out at restaurants. It makes the occasion more intimate and special.
• Carry appropriate snacks such as 5 dried apricots, 6 almonds, and 1 Babybell lite cheese in a plastic bag so that the desire to grab those holiday sweets is diminished.
• Eat slowly at the festivities. By enjoying one another’s company, it takes longer to chew and digest the food. After about 20 minutes, our bodies recognize satiety which will assist one from over-eating.
• Bring a healthy dish to the holiday festivities. Not only will others enjoy the dish, but you’ll have something light and healthy to eat, too.
• When at the party, don’t deny yourself the pleasure of tasting food. Instead, choose a few favorite dishes you’d like to try and take small portions of each. A good portion size is about the size of your palm.
• Determine your goals for the holiday season.  For example, do not make food the center of attention. Instead, focus on enjoying other activities. Mentally go through the event, picturing your self as a success.
• Stick with your plan. By maintaining and planning, we can be prepared for times when we might be hungry or tempted.
• Believe in yourself. Remember your commitment to strive towards your goals and you can stick with it.

 
Remember to relax and enjoy yourself this season! Take a breath! Take a quick stretch. Stress can lead to imbalance and that can result in excessive eating. By sticking with these healthy holiday habits and protecting yourself from stress overload you can treasure the moments and stay focused on your goals. 

 
By: Registered Dietitian Sarah Koszyk,  RD

IFs and BUTs

These are two words that often accompany weight loss. I could lose weight IF I had the time, IF I had the money, IF I lived alone, IF I didn't work so hard.  I wish I could BUT I just can't lose weight, I have tried everything BUT nothing works, I know I am not healthy BUT my lifestyle is too busy to change.  The excuses and reasons can stretch on forever.

There is no doubt about it- weight loss can be very difficult.  But why do some people succeed and others do not?  What did they do differently?  Did they have a better diet or is there more to it?

The Truth about Diets

Expenditure greater than Intake = Weight loss

There you go.  Simple as that.  But something is missing from this equation.  If it were this easy Americans wouldn't spend millions of dollars each year trying to lose weight.  What is lacking?  Why do many people have so much trouble losing weight?

The reason is that most weight loss diets and pills don't teach you about you. They don't illuminate the reasons why your weight grew.  They are band aides that only address the pounds and not the root causes of weight gain.  So as soon as you stop the pill/diet or shake, the weight comes back, and then you are left right back where you started because nothing has really been solved.

The Real Key to Weight Loss

Expenditure greater than Intake + MOTIVATION = Weight loss

Before starting a weight loss regimen, it is important to find your ultimate motivation; your deep, passionate and meaningful reason for weight loss - your key that will kick all the ifs and buts to the wayside.

This is one of the reasons why Nu4You works so well.  Your nutrition coach is there to help you understand yourself, the choices you make and the barriers you face.  Not only do they provide you with a great plan that works - they practice behavior modification, so those bad habits become memories of the past. 

We will help you find your supreme motivation - your key to weight loss.  Once you have that firm in your heart, shedding the pounds becomes easier. Then all it takes is a little time, dedication, simple mathematics and the reminder of why you are making changes.

Manuel Villacorta talks about metabolism:

What’s a metabolism?
Metabolism refers to your body’s ability to digest and utilize food energy (in calorie form) in order to maintain essential bodily functions like breathing and regulating heartbeats. “It’s the amount of calories that your body uses to make sure that it’s continually surviving,” Villacorta explains. One’s metabolic rate is determined by how quickly it can use up consumed calories, and that rate is affected by a variety of factors: age, weight, exercise, eating habits, and so forth. In order to condition our metabolisms to perform at peak levels, we must address each of these factors when coming up with a plan.

If you want to learn more about metabolism, read the entire article on DivineCaroline.com

O.k. of course not.  But today when I was finishing up my morning workout at my athletic club I noticed something.  I looked over into the lounge area and there was a huge tray of donuts there for the taking.  Free of charge.  Congratulations on a good workout it said!  I couldn't believe it.

Wow. I've talked about mixed messages before and how detrimental it is to your nutritional well-being.  This is just one glaring example of how it can get out of hand. There are two things that are important to recognize.

1. It's very easy for people to distract you with bad or over-simplified advice

The headline "Donuts are good for your workout" certainly caught your attention.  It's something we want to be true, but unfortunately it's not.   When you read nutrition advice on the web, or see and hear it on radio and television, you need to take a look at the motivations of the qualifications of the person providing the advice.  Do they really just want to sell you pills? or food? their book? or advertise their thigh master?  If so they still might have credible advice, but remember that it's always going to be skewed towards their own product, not your health.  Also take a look at the credentials of the people providing nutrition advice.  If that person is not a registered dietitian (RD) then they are not focused 100% on nutrition and diet.  Even a licensed M.D. generally only has a small amount of training in nutritional science.

At Nutrition for You we are clear about our motivation and credentials.  We want you to lose weight and we want you keep it off permanently.  We want you to be proud to tell everyone that meets the "new you" how you did it with sound nutrition, not fad-diets, gimmicks, or pills.    Our program was created and is maintained by Manuel Villacorta, MS, RD, CSSD a board certified registered dietitian, and certified specialist in sports dietetics and a team of people that want you to succeed.

2. Mixed messages do not help you with weight loss

Everyone has to eat, so it generally fools all of us to think we are food experts.  We're not.  If we were we wouldn't have an obesity epidemic in the United States.  What works for one person may not work for you.  Each of us is an individual.  If you follow food, nutrition, and weight loss expertise from everyone you'll get many conflicting messages and end up even more confused.

What do I mean by mixed messages will not help?  Here are some examples:

• Your friend telling you that carbs are bad (they aren't) and that they lost 25# on Atkins while snacking on a muffin is a mixed message.
• Your grocer telling you that Organic is always better even if the food was shipped overseas using a lot of fuel rather than locally cultivated.
• Web sites that give you solid nutrition advice but have ads saying "How I Lost 44 Lbs Fast!" on the same page is a mixed message.
• and yes, Donuts in your gym is a mixed message.
  

Nutrition for you will not give you mixed messages to confuse you. We really want you to succeed so we want you to focus on what we teach you.  We are experts at weight loss and weight management.  Work with us with your mind open and ready for a change and you will succeed.

The economy is something that is on everyone's mind these days.  In fact it's pretty easy when looking at your expenses to consider dropping that gym membership, or putting off joining Nutrition for You to save money.  It reminds me of a comment made by a friend of mine, "It's expensive to eat healthy."

It's not.

In fact eating healthy will save you money.  It really comes down to where you eat and what you eat.  Members of Nutrition for You work with real nutrition experts on more than just calories and macronutrients.  We work with you to find ways to make real long-term changes to your life-style. One of the aspects of working with us is how you approach what and where you eat and how that can make you healthier and save you money.

Saving money by where you eat

Many of us love to dine out.  We have our favorite restaurants and eat out a few times a week.  But dining out is expensive and you often have to pay more to be healthy at a restaurant.  How often have you seen something like $1 extra for egg beaters ™ or egg whites instead of eggs? And you know that filet mignon (a lean meat) is a lot more expensive than at rib-eye (medium fat meat).

The price of a single meal at a moderate priced restaurant for one person can often feed an entire family if you cook a meal at home.    The cost of common food items, flour, bread, milk, fruits and vegetables are all sky rocketing.  You feel this at home, but you fill feel it even more at your favorite restaurant because restaurants pass that cost on to you with their service markup.

Another problem with dining out is that you really don't know how the food is prepared.  You might find that the entree you ordered is drenched in butter when it arrives to your table.  You've already ordered and paid for your food so you're not turning back now!  This is not healthy and expensive.

Dining out is not necessary a bad thing, but it can be very expensive.  Don’t give up your health and fitness tools so that you can dine out.  If you have grown accustomed to dining out try to cut back and prepare your own meals at home. You’ll find that you can easily incorporate egg whites at a fraction of the cost of a restaurant and you can save significant money by choosing leaner cuts of meat from your grocer rather than from a restaurant.    Get to know your kitchen again and you may find that you are a great cook and that you will be eating better, healthier, and certainly save yourself some money.  

Saving money by what you eat

A couple of the latest trends with supermarkets and food companies are increasing prepared and pre-packaged foods for convenience.  Supermarkets and companies like Weight Watchers save you time by creating prepared foods and they charge you a lot of money for it.  Prepared foods that aren't "boxed" generally don't have enough nutrition information for you to know what was used in them and sometimes you pay up to $6 and $7 a pound for prepared foods.  Just think about how many dietary staples you can buy for a pound of prepared food!  Prepared foods like Lean Cuisine at least provide you nutrition information and many of them are a good way to have a quick meal while on the go, but don't make every meal come from a box.   They are selling you portion control.  Portion control is extremely important, but you can prepare the healthy food yourself and freeze the extra portions for later meals.  Make your own portable healthy entrees and don’t pay extra for a box.

Beware of packaging gimmicks.  Remember that re-packaging foods into smaller convenient packages costs you money.  Those 100 calorie packs are a waste of money.  Beside the fact that most of them are nutritionally useless, they cost more and you are getting less for your money.  They are great for portion control, but you can do the same thing with a snack bag and a kitchen scale.    Remember that if you see individual portions and single serving portions you are paying a lot of money simply for the convenience.   Make your own snack packs and you will have healthier snacks and save a lot of money.

Plan for the future

Just like any financial plan you should also plan for the future for your health.  We teach people to lose weight and get healthy and to keep it off for the long term.   Eating well and being at or near your ideal weight and body fat will help you stay healthier.  And staying healthier is great way to reduce the likelihood of costly weight related problems in your future.    

So remember it doesn't cost more to eat healthy.  It will save you money, and you will be happier in these tough economic times if you commit to improving your nutritional quality of life.

Manuel Villacora MS, RD, CSSD was interviewed and provided some good comment sense advice about The Most Common Weight Loss Mistakes with the people at Divine Caroline.

“Make time to go food shopping, to plan your meals, to exercise. Not until you start prioritizing yourself and your plan will you see results.”

We continue our five part series where we talk about the five biggest conclusions of the National Weight Control Registry's research.

5 Proven Behaviors for Long Term Weight Management:

1. Follow a low-fat diet
2. Record keeping
3. Monitor weight frequently
4. Eat breakfast daily
5. Exercise

Part 2: Record Keeping

You may have heard or read about one of the many news stories last week about Food Record Keeping. A recent study by Kaiser Permanente reported that keeping a food diary, on average, doubled the weight loss as compared to those that did not record keep. Record keeping is so important that it's one of our key Success Tracker tools available to all of our members.

For weight loss, we recommend practicing daily food record keeping. If you don’t food record keep for a day or two, don’t worry about backlogging. Just pick-up again from where you are. It is important not to let a bad day (or week!) throw you off completely. Start fresh from where you are and do not stress about past choices. Even if you are not proud of the food you are recording, just keep going.

Record keeping isn't just for those losing weight. It is also important for those that are doing weight maintenance and weight gain. Food record keeping helps to keep you on track and makes you aware of your eating habits and choices. When on weight maintenance you do not need to food record keep everyday, but it is helpful to check in every once and a while, just to see how many calories you are consuming and to ensure you are eating from all of the food groups to ensure adequate nutrition. We recommend checking in for a total of one week every month.

It is an important habit to maintain that will help you for life. It takes just a little time each day to record keep. If you need tips on how to speed up your record keeping or to understand how it works don't forget to ask one of our nutrition coaches.

Snacks are a very important and often underrated part of the day.  With work, family, errands, obligations, it can be tough to take the time to pack a lunch much less multiple snacks.  But when it comes to weight-loss, snacks really make all the difference.

When I got serious about losing weight, snacking was a hard habit to learn.  Eat more, lose weight - it just seems so contradictory!  But when I journaled my foods for the days that I snacked, I actually ended up eating less calories.  I realized that snacking kept me from overeating when it came time to break for meals.  Plus, because I wasn’t starving I made better choices.

Snack Tips:

1. Over the weekend, pre-portion snacks into little baggies or plastic containers.
2. Pack snacks that you like and look forward to eating.
3. Leave snacks out on desk so you don’t forget to eat them.
4. Eat snacks at a specific time (e.g., 10:30am and 3:00pm) - before you get hungry so you aren’t tempted by a better looking/unhealthy snack.  Set an alarm or computer reminder (I put a snack reminder in my calendar).
5. Leave multiple snacks at work so you can choose what you are in the mood for.
6. Keep an “in case snack” in your bag, purse, car and/or desk drawer, so you will always be prepared when hunger strikes.
7. Don’t eat out of the bag or container - it is too easy to overeat!  Take a portion size out and place it on a napkin/plate, etc. and eat from there.
8. Mix and match allowances, a.k.a “Food Combining” - you will stay fuller for longer.

Ideas for Snacks:

Salty

•    Low-fat microwave popcorn
•    Pita chips
•    Whole-wheat crackers
•    Baked chips
•    Pretzels/pretzel nuggets
•    Beans
•    Low-fat cheeses (laughing cow, baby bell, string cheese)
•    Nuts (watch portion size)
•    Turkey Jerky
•    Dried soy nuts
•    Wasabi peas
•    Seeds (watch portion size)

Dips/spreads

•    Hummus
•    Salsa
•    Canned refried beans
•    Fat-free ranch/blue cheese
•    Jam/jelly
•    Spreadable cheese (Laughing Cow)
•    Guacamole
•    Sweet mustard
•    Bruschetta topping

Sweet

•    Fruit
•    Dried fruit (watch portion size)
•    Flavored low-fat/fat-free yogurt
•    Frozen yogurt bars
•    Frozen fruit bars
•    All fruit roll-ups
•    Cereal bars
•    Skim milk latte with 1/2 tbsp sugar, topped with cinnamon
•    ¼ oz dark chocolate
•    Fat-free hot chocolate
•    Cereal

Other

•    Veggies (carrots, celery, bell peppers, green beans, cucumber, jicama, zucchini, cherry tomatoes, radishes, broccoli, cauliflower) with dip
•    Canned soups
•    Deli Slices (turkey, chicken, ham, roast beef)
•    Tuna, canned in water
•    Whole wheat breads, pita breads, tortillas

Kate’s Favorite Snacks:

Morning

•    1 apple, 4 walnut halves
•    1 granola bar (Kashi), 2 tbsp raisons
•    ¼ c dry soy nuts, 1 all fruit roll-up
•    Cereal bar, ¾ c berries
•    1 hard-boiled egg, 1 orange
•    ¼ c trail mix
•    Celery with 2 tbsp low-fat peanut butter (Better than Peanut Butter), 20 mini rye toasts

Afternoon

•    6oz low-fat yogurt, ½ c high fiber cereal, 1 tbsp sunflower seeds
•    ½ c pinto beans heated with 1 slice low-fat cheese (Jarlesberg Lite), topped with ¼ c salsa (or fat-free sour cream)
•    Veggies dipped in 1/3 c hummus, 6 almonds
•    5 dried apricot halves, whole-wheat crackers (Ak-Maks) with low-fat spreadable cheese (Laughing Cow)
•    8 mini-rice cakes dipped in salsa, 15 pistachios
•    ½ c low-fat cottage cheese topped with sliced fruit, 1 tbsp pumpkin seeds
•    1 oz deli turkey slices wrapped around cucumbers sliced lengthwise and dipped in sweet/spicy mustard

 

You don't have to tell those of us at Nu4You that tracking what you eat can help lose weight.  We know it.  That's why our Success Tracker's Food Record is a key part of our nutrition program.  It's simply a fact that if you record keep you are more likely to lose weight and to lose more than if you do not. 

Yesterday there were innumerable articles on the web about Kaiser Permanente's new study that basically says that keeping a food diary doubles the weight loss over those that do not keep a food diary.  That study is not new news for us, however it is nice to see scientific studies that validate our own experience.

Studies come and studies go, but this article by TIME magazine's Anita Hamilton explains it in a way that we can all understand.