CLARE GOTT: weight loss coach

I found this clip on you tube that explained perfectly the reasons why you should limit your carbs. They are as addictive as drugs!!

Low carb pizza

A friend of mine was moaning the other day about missing her high carb treats now she was on this “low carb way of eating”. I searched around for a few substitutes for her most missed meals. One of them was PIZZA. I have tried this and it WORKS!

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

• 1 and 1/2 cups flax seed
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• Sweetener to equal about 1 Tablespoon of sugar
• 3 Tablespoons of oil
• 3 eggs
• `1/2 cup water

Preparation:

It’s really best to start your low carb diet on a Friday. That’s because the first two days will be the hardest of the ENTIRE diet. Up until now, your body has been ‘coasting’ on high sugar foods, not having to work at all to get easy energy. It uses some to keep itself going, and the rest goes right to your waist and bum as fat. Your body has become sluggish, used to this ‘easy sugar diet’.

When you go low carb, you’re really going “healthy” – which means your body has to do what it is SUPPOSED to do and actually break down healthy foods into the vitamins and nutrients it can use. Think of it as having been addicted to heroin. If you went off heroin, your body would crave it at first! It is EXACTLY the same with sugary carbs. Your body will get cranky, tired, shaky. Believe me – the worse your symptoms are, the more your body was addicted to the bad stuff.

But GREAT news is around the corner. Your body – and every human body – only carries “raw carbs” for 2 days in its system. The rest is stored as fat. So after Day 2, your body will be done with its sugar-seeking and will do the NORMAL thing that bodies have been meant to do since the days of cavemen-eating-mammoths, which is that it will start processing fat and protein for energy.

Since this diet gives you AMPLE fat and protein, plus HEALTHY nutrients as well, your body kicks into high gear! And once it gets rolling, it does very well with these. The next two weeks are often an amazing revelation to people, as they realize that all the roller-coaster mood swings, hunger cravings, bloating, stomach puffiness and the rest was really all caused by the sugar high-and-low that a sugar-rich diet causes. Suddenly you’re feeling better, have much more energy, and are losing weight WITHOUT feeilng hungry at all.

So stay with it for those first few hard days, when your carb addiction is being fought with. It’s well worth it to win, and to go on to much more healthy living!

Who among us has not been short of time and at least tempted to drive through at a fast-food restaurant? Depending on the definition of “fast food,” most of us eat food from fast-food restaurants at least once per week and often more. The finger has been pointed at this practice as one of the reasons for the obesity epidemic, and indeed, it is difficult to get a healthy fast-food meal. On the other hand, it is not impossible to eat fast food occasionally without ruining your diet.

There are three main rules to maximizing the healthy food and minimizing the sugars and other carbs at a fast food restaurant:

1. Compare the Nutritional Information at the fast-food restaurants in your area. In particular, look for salad dressings with little sugar — some have packets with over 4 teaspoons of sugar included! And look for other low-carb items such as these:

2. Order Salads with Grilled Chicken (not “crispy fried”, or other chicken with breading). Occasionally, you’ll see salads with other protein, but chicken is the mainstay of fast-food meal salads. Tips: 1. Skip the croutons, tortilla strips, and similar additions. 2. Be very careful about the dressing! (This cannot be over-emphasized. You may have to bring your own.) Also, look for salads with a mixture of greens, and a variety of vegetables.

3. Order Burgers and Sandwiches Without Bread – Again, check the carb counts ahead of time. Anything breaded and fried, as most fish and many chicken sandwiches contain, is going to have a lot of added carbohydrate. Add a “side salad,” following the above tips, to the bunless sandwich. In some places, you can ask for a separate larger container such as those the meal salads come in. Then dump the side salad into it, and put the protein on top.

How do you produce an addictive substance?

You take the juice of a poppy, refine it into opium, then you refine this, first into morphine and finally to a strange white substance called heroin.

How do you make another? You take the juice of a cane and refine it to molasses, then you refine it, first to brown crystals and then to strange white crystals called sugar.

Sugar is like a narcotic drug, one on which you get hooked and one that has terrible side effects.  Sugar comes under different names; fructose, glucose, maltose, lactose – anything ending in “ose”.

There is refined sugar in mayonnaise, ketchup, baked beans, ready prepared sauces, cereals, tinned fruit, stock cubes…..the list is endless.  Watch out for honey…

The consumption of ‘natural’ sugars in moderation is an entirely different matter from eating foods containing refined sugar. For example fructose in a piece of fruit or lactose in a small quantity is unlikely to cause much problem.

Do you recognise the slump you get after you have had something sugary?  A few hours later your energy levels will dive and your body will crave another boost from sugars.  The craving is likely to be intensive…and so the roller coaster ride continues: Eat some sugar, suffer a short lived high, crash down, need another pick up!

By now I hope you can see why sugar makes you hungry and fat.

Many of my clients have succeeded in eliminating sugar from their lives and have been amazed to see the difference it has made.  As well as losing weight, they have renewed energy, a fresh skin and lose those all damaging addictions.

I was away last weekend with a group of friends. We all came down to breakfast. It was a help yourself buffet. I sat down first, with my usual egg and bacon, and my well trained husband had the same with the addition of a sausage! The next few people came in with their bowls brimming with tinned fruit and highly processed yoghurt! They sat on the opposite side of the table to my husband and me. There was a comment about having a “healthy” side of the table and an “unhealthy” side of the table! My side being the “unhealthy” side. They really had no idea that breakfast that they were eating, (probably followed by a couple of pieces of toast) was a carb loaded, insulin producing nightmare! The fructose in the fruit would be transported to the liver and turned into fat and stored. The carbohydrate in the toast would give an energy rush and cause a slump a few hours later, and leave them searching for more carbohydrates! Of course it goes without saying, that the carbohydrates would be stored as fat! If only they knew that the protein breakfast that my husband and I were having, would sustain us through the morning and the calories would be used for energy and not be stored as fat! (See my earlier blog on the dangers of fructose)

Smoothie

Throw a cup of Greek style yogurt, a handful of berries, a half a banana, ¼ cup full fat milk and some ice in a blender and mix! Add a tablespoon or two of flax seed for some healthy omega-3s.

The best way you can see progress is through a weight loss graph and through daily monitoring of your food intake. “Fitday” do a free personalised service that charts your progress. It is for use on your computer and your phone. Good Luck!

In terms of health and nutrition, fruit and vegetables have very little to offer. Telling us to eat 5 portions a day AT LEAST is compounding one of the worst fallacies in recent history. This may come as a surprise to most of you. 

Fruit contains high levels of fruit sugar known as fructose. Amoung dieticians, fructose is known as the “fattening carbohydrate”. Fructose goes straight to the liver and is stored as fat. Very few people understand or want to believe this biochemical fact!

Another argument that is often put forward by dieticians on behalf of fruit and vegetables is that they are a source of “antioxidants”. Fruit has a fraction of the antioxidants that coffee has, although you never hear dieticians recommending that we drink more coffee!

It would be far more beneficial to our bodies to concentrate on limiting the oxidants from sugar, chemicals, smoke and processed foods, rendering the need for antioxidants in the first place!

Then of course comes the issue of fibre. Dieticians tell us we all need fibre in order to feel full and keep our digestive systems moving. The thing is, we cannot digest fibre. How can something that is so important to us nutritionally be so difficult to digest?

According to a recent survey, we are as a nation deficient in vitamins A, D and E. All of these are fat soluble. If we added a dollop of butter to our vegetables we would be better off, not worse!

It is a shame the government have wasted vast amounts of money promoting the 5 a day campaign. If they had spent that money on giving out information about the most nutritious foods to eat, we would be a much healthier nation!

These are the foods that contain everything the body needs for optimum health:
-EGGS (the all round super food)
-LIVER
-MEAT
-FISH
-DAIRY PRODUCTS
-SUNFLOWER SEEDS
-DARK GREEN VEGETABLES
-COCOA POWDER

Add the vegetables for colour and variety, but for little else!

I WILL NEVER BINGE AGAIN!

Have you ever heard yourself say these words? Most bingers will say this every time they have a binge! Two, three times a week, every day, once a week………………………

Don’t say these words. Then when you do binge, you have failed again! You feel bad about yourself again, you need food again to make yourself feel better. Try to improve your current binging record. Try to make the gaps between your episodes of binging longer. Try to make your binging episodes shorter. ABOVE ALL DO NOT SAY, “I will never binge again”

Hear are some extracts from a blog I recently read, which illustrates the point I am trying to make, exactly. 

 Never binging again is possible but the biggest mistake that people who binge make is saying to themselves, “I’ll never binge again!” Yet, we all do it. The food is finished and then we promise ourselves that it will never happen again. Even though almost everyone that binges says that to themselves, it sets you up for self-hatred, guilt and failure. You see, no one that ends a pattern of binging does it cold turkey. You don’t decide to stop and then never binge again. It’s just not how ending a pattern of binging works. That’s because the binge serves a very important purpose. It makes you feel better emotionally. So, if you’re committed to never binging again what are the signs along the way the signify that you’re succeeding:

*More time between binges (even something small for example, I used to binge every other day and now only do it every third day)

*Shorter binges (My binges used to last two days, now they only last an hour)

*Binges on smaller amounts of food (I used to eat a gallon of ice-cream, now I eat half a pint)

*The ability to stop a binge in the middle (I used to not even realize I was having a binge till it was over, now I can stop myself in the middle)

*Forgiving yourself more quickly after a binge ends (I don’t talk to myself in a mean way when I binge, I have compassion for myself)

*Bouncing back more quickly when a binge happens (in other words recommitting to understanding and stopping your binge pattern)

*Understanding what feelings set off the binge (I was able to see that I had the binge after I had a fight with my boss)

*The ability to see a binge coming (even if you can’t stop it yet)

Being able to acknowledge the small successes along the way is a really important step on the road to recovery. It can be all too easy to see how far you still need to go and forget how far you’ve already come. Ending a binge pattern is hard work but you can do it. One day you might not binge at all but it won’t happen by making a declaration, it will happen by being loving to yourself and staying aware. So, don’t say, “I’ll never binge again.” Instead, take it one gentle step at a time. Remember, you’re looking for progress, not perfection.