1. Avoid becoming dehydrated. We become dehydrated when we lose more water than we take in. This has the effect of lowering our metabolism which in turn inhibits weight loss.  It is just a simple matter of drinking a little water through out the day.  It is not necessary to buy flavored drinks or sports drinks, tap water will do just fine.  You can filter it if you wish and store it in a fridge at work if that is convenient. It’s just a matter of developing a habit and once you become used to it, it will no longer be an issue.

2. Avoid convenience food. It is so easy to pick up a sandwich and coffee at your local deli for lunch.  After all they are so tasty and the environment is friendly.  But even if you choose healthy options you will certainly find that the calorie content is much higher than anything you prepare at home.  By bringing a home made lunch to work you will quickly find that as your wallet gets heavier your body will get lighter.

3. Get enough sleep. Healthy adults need about 7 hours sleep at night.  Of course most of us with our busy lifestyles do not achieve this.  Feeling tired during the day is often just the excuse we need not to go to the gym and to give ourselves that extra little treat to make us feel better.  But the fact of the matter is that if you take the exercise you will begin to feel better and you will enjoy a nights sleep all the more.  Try taking only decaffeinated drinks from lunchtime onwards and avoid eating large meals for 3 hours before going to bed.

4. Reduce your stress levels. Obviously this is so much easier said than done.  In todays hectic lifestyle it can often be almost impossible to devote time to our personal wellbeing.  But this is so counter productive.  It is so easy to comfort eat when you are under pressure and to flop down at home instead of taking that all important exercise.  Try to step back, take some time to look at your schedule.  Make a list of things that you could change to give your self some quality time.  This is very motivating and may put you on the right path again towards healthy eating and exercise.

5.  Avoid exercise autopilot. This is really the most important factor to consider in a weight loss program.  It is a very easy thing to fall into doing the same exercise every day.  Once you begin to feel comfortable with your program your body simply adjusts to it and you stay on a plateau.  When this happens you must make some changes.  You can increase the speed of your exercise or increase the intensity of your program.  Even minor changes will have an effect.  Try also to introduce something new such as changing from a treadmill to a bike or a climbing machine.  Whatever you do, try to keep your body guessing, if nothing else it will make for a more interesting workout.

If you think about these five areas which we can have full control over you may find those pounds falling off again.

One problem many people experience when trying to revert to a whole food diet is that our taste buds have grown accostomed over the years to the strong and addictive tastes of salt, sugar and other flavourings.  You almost have to retrain your palate to accomodate the more muted taste of whole food.  I promise though that once you make the change you will begin to feel so much better it will be  impossible to think of going back to processed foods again.  If you can’t go all the way at first  just try to replace some processed foods for whole food where you can.  There are however some habits that you should really try to break.

1. Stop eating sugar. When we eat a sugary snack we produce insulin which pulls sugar out of the blood stream and stores it in our cells where it is converted to fat.  Insulin does this so effectively that blood sugar levels plummet and we start to crave sugar all over again , and so the cycle continues.  Convenience foods are loaded with sugar even foods such as breakfast bars and yoghurts.  Try to enjoy naturally sweet foods such as strawberries or blueberries.  You can add these to natural yoghurts, you will soon get used to the taste and you will begin to notice how sweet they are after a short period of time.

2. Avoid “low fat” labels. As consumers we have been given the message that high fat foods are harmful.  This has led many of us to look for suitable low fat alternatives.  In many products however for example low fat yoghurts or mayonase the food will be bulked up with carbohydrate.  This isn’t much better than eating sweets/candy.  The story is the same for pasta or bread made from processed white flour, very little nutrition but lots of sugar which will make blood sugar levels fluctuate wildly.  Try to use whole grain bread (not whole wheat) and experiment also with whole grain brown rice and barley rather than pasta.

3. Use good oils. Basically there are three major types of fat in our diet.  These are saturated, mono-unsaturated and poly-unsaturated fats.  When a fat is exposed to oxygen it spoils and produces free radicals which damage our cells.  The more saturated the fat the less it spoils so for example butter which is a saturated fat can stay in a fridge for days without  going rancid.  It is now thought that small amounts of saturated fats such as butter and cream will do us no harm whereas polyunsaturated and hydrogenated oils give rise to high levels of free radicals in our bodies.  The  best oil to use would be olive oil either plain or extra virgin.

4. Include fish and raw food in your diet. Oily fish such as salmon and mackerel have lots of omega-3 fats which are very good for us.  These fats are anti- inflammatory and also help to lower cholesterol.  Raw foods contain enzymes that help with our digestion.  Its important to remember however that food that has been transported over long distances and that has been stored for long periods may have lost vitamins and enzymes.  It’s a good idea to buy your raw fresh food locally where possible.

If you follow these simple tips you should begin to feel more energized and hopefully see some pounds fall away.

Recently Professor Sven Carlsen from the University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway boldly challenged this view.  He acknowledges that breast fed babies are slightly healthier than formula fed babies but that this is the result of better conditions in the womb during pregnancy rather than because of the breast milk itself.  Professor Carlsen’s team reviewed more than 50 international studies on the relationship between breastfeeding and health and they have concluded that the only benefit to be gained from being breast fed is a slight increase in IQ.

It does not come as any great surprise to me that food scientists can create a product similar to breast milk and containing all the appropriate nutrients in the correct ratio.  They wouldn’t be very good scientists if they could not do this!  I’m also not surprised to learn that formula fed babies are healthy. If you just look  at your family and friends you will of course see that formula fed babies generally thrive and are not known to be any more sickly than breast fed babies.

It seems to me that this study is really missing the point.  There are many reasons why women do not breast feed.  It is a personal choice and it is good to know that there is a safe and practical alternative.  But feeding your baby is much more than a practical household task.  It is a normal, enjoyable and intimate part of the relationship with your new baby.  It’s not just a matter of nutrition.  It is also about creating a bond and socializing your child.

As adults we sometimes we have to use fast food because of our modern busy lifestyles.  It’s practical, convenient, tasty even nutritious.  But which would make you feel better, a pizza from the freezer or sharing a home cooked meal with all the trimmings?

Folk medicine offered a variety of cures for colds and flu.  Licking a young lizard or inhaling the breath of a gander were two rather interesting suggestions.  I imagine by the time you would find a young lizard to lick your cold would be well over!  Other suggestions include the consumption of whey, ass’s milk, mountain sage or scailt (this is a type of gruel).  An infusion of moss with honey and lemon juice was also recommended. To be honest this last one might be quite comforting.

There were also interesting options for tonsillitis and sore throat.  Rubbing a roast potato to the head was thought to transfer the sickness from the patient to the potato.  Similarly salt could be placed in the left foot sock and tied around the patients neck in order to draw out a sore throat.  If these attempts failed then pulling the hair at the top of the head was the next best option.

Preventative measures are also found in folk records.  Sipping forge water was thought to be beneficial.  Forge water was associated with iron which was thought to have curative properties especially  against diseases spread by fairies.  You could also try having three meals of young nettles in May.  This was thought to purify the blood and strengthen the stamina for the forthcoming year.

It’s interesting to look back and see what people believed in the past and how they tried to overcome disease.  Nevertheless I think I will stick to more modern remedies, no lizard hunting for me!

Over a 32 year period, data ,including weight and social and family relationships,  from over 12,000 participants in the Framingham Heart Study was analysed.  The researchers found that overall the participants gained weight during this period and that this was in line with the rise in obesity levels in the US in general.  However as the study also tracked the social networking within the group, the researchers found clusters of thin and heavy individuals.  It was not simply the case that thin people or fat people hung out together or that groups of people eat the same types of food or exercised in a similar way.  What the researchers found was that as people become obese there is a shift in what is regarded as the norm within a group.  It is ok to be big if everyone in your group is big.

The study found that if a close friend becomes obese, even if they live quite far away, a person’s  chance of becoming obese increases by 57%.  On the other hand if a family member becomes obese then the risk increases by only 40%. This is a significant difference.

Lots of research has been done into trying to find genes responsible for obesity.  What this study shows is that time should also be spent in trying to understand the effect we have on each other.  The social networking effect has been found to  extend to three degrees of separation.  It makes sense then that in helping one person to lose weight the beneficial effect can possibly spread to a large number of individuals.  The study has indeed shown that obesity and thinness is contagious.

The research was funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health/National Institute on Aging.

149 male students between the ages of 18 and 24 were tested in the experiment.  One third of the participants spoke to a male researcher and this group experienced a drop of between 2 to 7% in their hormone levels. The remaining students spoke with young female undergraduates and this group experienced the beneficial effects of raised hormone levels.

A further point of interest is that testosterone levels in men diminish as they get older and men in long term relationships have lower levels than men still “playing the field”.  So if you are a man the message seems to be, stop talking to your male friends, dump your long term partner and find pretty young women to talk to!

Good luck with that!!

An infection is said to be Endemic in a population when  there is a constant amount of  infection present.  For example in the UK there will be a number of chicken pox cases reported each year.  The chicken pox is passed around from person to person but as long as the number infected remains more or less the same each year, then we can say that chicken pox is endemic in the population.

On the other hand if we take malaria as an example, we will find a number of cases detected each year in travelers returning from abroad.  The number may even be the same from year to year.  There is one significant difference however, and that is, that the infection cannot be passed on from person to person.  In the case of malaria we need the presence of an external factor for the disease to run through the population.  This factor is the malaria carrying mosquito and since this insect does not exist in the UK, the disease cannot become endemic.

The definition rests on the fact that the numbers infected each year remains substantially the same and that the disease is capable of passing from person to person.

An Epidemic occurs when new cases of infection exceed substantially what is normally expected in a population.  The epidemic could be restricted to a specific hub such as a school or a city or it could affect an entire country.  For an epidemic we need high levels of infection that eventually level out and fall back.

For a Pandemic to occur we need a completely new disease to emerge which can be transmitted globally.  The present swine flu pandemic is such a disease.

The problem with the use of these terms in is that they lead to emotional responses in the general public.  When we hear of an epidemic or pandemic we assume the worst.  The terms refer to numbers and transmission of infection but they do not describe the seriousness of any disease.  For example it is possible to have a pandemic of a very mild infection. So when we hear of epidemics or pandemics we need to look at the disease in question as well as the risk of infection .

Tea Tree oil is obtained by distilling the leaves of the Meleleuca Alternifolia plant which is native to Australia. The Aboriginal people of Australia traditionally used this oil to treat bruises, insect bites and skin infections. They would crush the leaves and apply them to the affected skin. Scientific studies have since shown that Tea Tree Oil has antimicrobial properties effective against bacteria, yeast and viruses. In addition one study has shown that 5% Tea Tree oil is more effective than commercial medication for the treatment of scabies.

Tea Tree Oil can be found as a pure essential oil and can also be found as an ingredient in shampoos, soaps and creams etc.

There are some side effects associated with the use of this oil. Undiluted oil may cause skin irritation, blistering and itching. It should never be swallowed even in small doses. If swallowed it can cause amongst other things, diarrhea and central nervous system damage. It should also be avoided if you are pregnant or breastfeeding and it should be kept out of reach of children and pets.

Another rather surprising study found that three young boys who had used products containing Tea Tree Oil and Lavender Oil had developed enlarged breasts. When they discontinued the use of these products the breast size returned to normal.

Despite these side effects, if used properly Tea Tree Oil seems to  be a useful product against such skin conditions as Acne, Dandruff, Thrush and Athletes Foot.

What strikes me is the fact that both these women wanted to regain their figure following the birth of a child. Liposuction may be a solution for some women. I cannot say, I am not an expert. What I can say is that we are under increasing pressure to look perfect. We are surrounded by images of the perfect woman. The celebrity who looks perfect six weeks after giving birth is hailed as the ideal. Can we not even give ourselves time to enjoy a baby?  If appearance is what gives us validation in life then we are simply setting ourselves up for disappointment. We will be fighting this battle for the whole of our lives.

I believe in exercise and diet as a lifestyle choice. I believe it allows us to enjoy an active life maybe even to extend an active life. There is nothing wrong with a bit of glamour and fun and yes it is nice to fit into nice clothes. It is the search for the perfect body that is the problem. We have to begin to accept that it is the Hollywood image that is unnatural and not the rest of us.

Finally one sure way to begin to get back to your pre pregnancy shape is to breast feed. Not only does this stimulate your uterus to contract back to its original size but every pound your baby gains is a pound you do not gain yourself.

Richard Louv is a respected writer who has published books and articles on community and family life. He writes  mainly about peoples’ relationship with nature. In his book, Child Lost in the Woods, published to hugh acclaim in the U.S. in 2005, he describes a condition which he calls Nature Deficit Disorder.

His basic premise is that the children of today are so protected that many rarely explore the environment beyond a few yards of their home. As a result their interaction with nature is severely limited. Some children never get to experience the smells of the countryside. They may not notice the changing colours of the seasons, they may never have been stung by an insect. They definitely do not get to play with the kind of abandon their parents would have experienced as children.

It is the case that parents are trying to protect their children from such things as traffic, drugs, lurking strangers or possible abduction. But Louv believes that overprotection carries with it its own risks. Certainly if you look at increasing obesity rates in children and the boredom and low mood in some children, Louv has a strong case to make.

I’m looking  forward to the publication of his book in Europe as I think he is covering a fascinating area that I would like to know more about. I will reserve judgment on the disorder claim until later, but I believe there must be some consequence to the sedentary lifestyle of the children of today.

If you would like to know more about  Richard Louv  you can visit his website here.