Related Links

Featured Links

Recommended Sites
Diets Links





Quote of the Day

"A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person."








 


 
 
Featured Diets Articles

Health And The Economy
Copyright 2005 Dr Randy Wysong We normally do not think that health is related to economics other than with regard to the costs of medical care. But there is another more fundamental way money impacts our wellbeing. If you could not pay your bills or ...

Losing Weight And Celiac Disease
Many celiacs lose weight before they are diagnosed; indeed it is often one of the reasons people go to their doctors in the first place. Once on a gluten-free diet the symptoms disappear, and as a result of better absorption or simply eating more, some ...

Tips For Avoiding Dark Circles Under Your Eyes
How to remove dark circles under your eyes: 1. Try and sleep for about 8 hours every day. As much as possible, follow a routine, like going to bed regularly at 10 PM and waking up by 6 AM. Avoid sleeping late and getting up late in the morning. 2. Wash ...

The Atkins Diet - Separating Fact From Fiction
 

The Atkins Diet has been in existence for over 30 years and has enjoyed a surge in popularity over the last few years.

Pioneered by Dr. Robert Atkins, the theory behind the Atkins Diet is simple. Your body prefers to utilize carbohydrates (such as in grains, cereals, breads, etc.) for energy and will burn them first prior to body fat. By cutting down dramatically on carbohydrates in your diet, you force your body to burn fat for energy.

Reducing the carbohydrates in your diet puts your body into a state called "ketosis." This word is derived from the "ketones" that are used by your body for energy when sugars/carbs aren't available. When you are in this state of ketosis, your body is producing ketones from your fat that is being burned for energy. Ketones are essentially the leftovers from this process and are used in place of sugar in the body.

For more information on ketosis, go to

http://www.ketosis-ketoacidosis-difference.com/

One of the major misconceptions about the Atkins Diet that has been widely reported is that you can or should eat extremely unhealthy, fatty foods all the time. This is not actually true. Dr. Atkins recommends that you limit your intake of these types of foods (e.g. butter, sausage, bacon, etc.) and instead focus on healthy fats such as olive oil, fish oil, nuts, etc.

The Atkins Diet has many positives and negatives that have been associated with it. Some of the positives include:

Rapid Weight Loss - though the first couple of days the majority of weight lost is water, your body does become more efficient at fat burning and you do lose fat.

Reduced Mood or Energy Swings - eating carbohydrates (especially sugary ones) can lead to mood and energy swings. This is often seen as the post-lunchtime or afternoon energy crash. When you eliminate the carbs, you eliminate the source of this problem.

Reduced Consumption of Refined Foods - highly refined foods are the source of many health problems. The more processed a food is, the less nutrients are generally in it. The Atkins Diet encourages a focus on the consumption of more natural state foods such as vegetables, lean meats, fish, eggs and healthy oils.

Some of the negatives that have been associated with the Atkins Diet include:

Rapid Regaining of Lost Weight - this can happen when a person comes off the Atkins Diet. They regain all the weight they lost. One of the major reasons for this is that when you eliminate the carbs from your diet for a long period of time, your body becomes more sensitive to them. When you go back to your regular eating habits (which may not have been great to begin with), your body reacts more strongly to the sugar and carbs in foods, leading to weight gain. This weight gain can be reduced by easing off the Atkins Diet gradually rather than by feasting on carbohydrates.

Lack of Food Choices - it can be difficult to find things to eat that are low carb. Most grocery stores are primarily stocked with carbohydrate-laden foods and it can get boring eating the same things over and over again. Luckily, with the popularity of the Atkins diet and other low carb diets, there are many delicious recipes available to help alleviate this boredom.

The Atkins Diet may not be for you but by incorporating some of the principles in it, such as lowering your carbohydrate intake and eating more natural-state foods, you may find that you can achieve great results without ever having to restrict yourself. It may take a little longer but the results will be more permanent as it is more of a lifestyle change than a diet.

About the Author
Nick Nilsson is Vice President of BetterU, Inc., an online exercise, fitness, and personal training company. Check out his latest eBook "The Best Exercises You've Never Heard Of" at http://www.thebestexercises.com or visit http://www.fitstep.com. You can contact him at betteru@fitstep.com or subscribe to BetterU News, his fitness newsletter at betterunews@fitstep.com.


Google
Diets News

For Gateway, thin laptops are not in - Computerworld
January 8, 2009 (Computerworld) While vendors such as Hewlett-Packard Co. , Dell Inc. and Lenovo Group Ltd. are putting their latest laptops on crash diets, Gateway Inc. is boldly dismissing this as a fad. Today, Gateway introduced a pair of consumer ...

High-Fat Diet Converts Beneficial Gene Variant Into A 'Villian' - Med India
The results indicated that the 12 percent of people who carry the so-called Ala12 version of the gene that serves as a master controller of fat differentiation would be more sensitive than most to the amount of fat in their diets. The fat-moderating ...

Brits turning to nip n tuck to shed Christmas bulge - Thaindian.com
London, Jan 8 (ANI): An increasing number of Brits are ditching diets and going under the knife to get rid of their Christmas bulge. Plastic surgeons say that they have already seen a 40 percent rise this year. Apart from liposuction or tummy tucks ...

Low-carb diets may boost attention but blur memory - HealthCentral.com
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Low-carb diets may make people's short-term memory a little foggy, but they could improve people's ability to focus and pay attention, new research hints. The key to keeping one's smarts while dieting seems to be not to ...

HEALTH Q&A: Fad diets don't deliver like the diabetic diet - Beaumont Enterprise
1. Do diets like the Zone and Atkins really work or are they fads? There is no denying the fact that people who follow these diets do lose weight. However, the important part of losing weight is that you do it long-term. Studies have shown that ...

Is Your Local Supermarket to Blame for Your Unhealthy Diet? - Health and Age.com
Poor dietary patterns and obesity are established risk factors for chronic disease, and they have been linked to low-income, minority, and rural neighborhoods. In the January 2009 issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, researchers ...

Budget-wise diabetic diets possible - United Press International
ALEXANDRIA, Va., Jan. 1 (UPI) -- Income uncertainty should not lead diabetics to wonder if they can afford diet and fitness, a U.S. educator says. Sue McLaughlin of the American Diabetes Association says it is easy to think, "Why bother making New ...