Why People Use Diet Programs...

When we fell unhappy with ourselves it is appealing to want to push the blame elsewhere. A large part of the reason diet programs are appealing is that if they do not work we can say it is someone elses fault.

Losing Weight Improves Health of Knee Joints

Losing small amounts of weight can have significant impacts on your life:

A new study shows that for each pound of body weight lost, there is a 4-pound reduction in knee joint stress among overweight and obese people with osteoarthritis of the knee.

Researchers say the results indicate that even modest weight loss may significantly lighten the load on your joints.

I think it is something that many people miss, that each large change consists of many small changes that add up over time.

Dairy Industry Sued for Weight Loss Ads

I just posted how email spamming people with health tips can cause people to live healthier. Apparently the dairy industry wants you to have your spam with a tall glass of milk, but some people are not buying it:

A health advocacy group filed suit Tuesday against the dairy industry, accusing it of false advertising in its $200 million campaign that ties dairy product consumption to weight loss.

Later they state:

The lawsuit charges that the dairy industry based its marketing overwhelmingly on research by one scientist whose work it has supported.

You can usually tell more about research by who paid for it than what it's results are.

You can skew numbers, embelish facts, only test certain anomalies, and leave out whatever facts do not support your position. It is not honest work, but then again most people bathing in money are usually not all that honest.

It is amazing that - like cows or a gallon of milk - scientists can be bought. Lets hope their research does a body good...

Intentional Weight Loss May Shorten Life?

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. At least it seams that way with a new weight loss study:

Overweight people who are otherwise healthy may increase their risk of dying by intentionally losing weight, according to provocative new research.

A study of 2,957 twins in Finland found that those who were overweight who lost weight on purpose were about 86 percent more likely to die for any reason over the next 18 years compared with those whose weight remained stable.

I think how rapidly your weight shifts is probably more important than how much weight you lose.

I also believe that 50 happy years is better than 100 miserable ones. Not sure if it will happen anytime soon, but I would much rather feel happy about the way I look than to have the mirror bring forth depression.

It is all just an issue of balance, and that is an issue I strugle with nearly every day.

More People Using Surgery for Weight Loss

To each their own, but I am not usually a fan of instant success type programs, because if you do not address the underlying fundamentals surgery might not be a long term solution. With that being said, more and more people are using surgery to lose weight.

In the hospital trade, big people have become big business.

Orange Coast performed 467 weight-loss operations last year, up from 19 in 1997, the year it began with one surgeon. Since then, the hospital has added three surgeons to keep up with demand. Patients have flown in from as far away as Alaska, Japan and Germany for surgery.

Across the United States, stomach stapling and other weight-loss surgeries, with their promise of a trim physique, have grown nearly tenfold in a dozen years. More than 140,000 patients underwent the procedure in the United States last year - at an average cost of $25,000 - generating revenue of more than $3.5 billion.

$3.5 billion dollars is more revenue that Google made last year, and right now they are the 23^RD most valuable corporation in the United States.

Have you had weight loss surgery? Did it hurt? Did it change your life? Did it help you keep the weight off, or was it a temporary fix?

The Spam Diet

CBC reports that email spamming people with health tips causes many to live more healthy.

Spam, or unsolicited e-mail, can be healthy if it convinces you to change your couch potato ways and eat better, a Canadian researcher says.

People who were e-mailed tips promoting healthy behaviour tended to increase their physical activity levels and lose weight, his team found.

Talk about the power of suggestion, eh?

More Tennis & the Perpetually Sore Ankle

So I played tennis with the roommate again yesterday. It worked out fairly well. Both of us played better than in the past. One thing that was a real ephiphany for me was using a different grip for a backhand. I never used to do that.

Of course my ankle was super sore earlier today, but after having read about runners high and delayed onset muscle soreness I seem to feel like I understand it all a bit better and the pain seems to have lessened.

Yippie.

What Causes Runner's High?

Some runners are known to get high. No, not from smoking drugs or doing anything illegal, but from running. For a long time, people have associated runner's high with endorphans, but some are critical of that point of view:

What's wrong with the endorphin theory? "Everything," Dietrich said. "The endorphin theory has only survived as a popular myth. In pharmacology, it's been dead a long time. Endorphins are peptides. The beta endorphin is a 31-amino acid chain, a molecule too large to get through the blood-brain barrier."

While endorphans are produced from strenuous exercise, and they are known to reduce our sensitivity to pain, they are not what causes the high feeling some runners get. The high feeling may be directly related to higher anandamide levels. Anadamide levels increase during strenuous exercise, and - unlike endorphins - can cross the blood-brain barrier. Anadamine may also influence brain dopamine levels.

The article also compares runners high with illegal drug usage:

"Releasing dopamine in a natural way, like listening to music or running, does not do the damage a drug does by short circuiting that path," Allan said. "You don't develop a tolerance because the brain doesn't adapt. You have natural mechanisms to handle it. The brain knows how to measure it and how to get rid of it. Whereas with an amphetamine or THC, the brain can't regulate it. You've essentially hit yourself with a sledgehammer. Consequently, your brain doesn't know how to get rid of it. So it soaks up the receptors, thereby creating a tolerance."

Post Exercise Soreness (DOMS)

When you do not exercise often after you go back to it delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) may occur. If you exercise exceptionally hard you can get runners high, which combined with elevated endorphin levels means that you may not feel pain sharply while you are exercising.

Delayed onset muscle soreness can occur anywhere from a few hours to about a week after strenuous exercise. DOMS occurs more commonly when people do peak athletic type events, but is also common when people who have not exercised much start up an exercising program.

Sometimes starting exercising becomes a wall which people feel they can't scale. When you don't work out and then you suddenly get pains the first time you do exercise then you may associate exercise with the pain. The thing is, one of the best treatments for DOMS is further exercise.

This article covers DOMS in depth, and offers the following tip:

Although the relief is temporary, exercise of the sore muscle probably is the best way to reduce DOMS.

Examples of DOMS: Flat Foot & Hosed Ankle:
I am exceptionally flat footed. Although this will sound a bit random, one time my left foot and ankle got ran over while I was still in the car (idiot driver using 2 feet). Years later my ankle is one of the first things to hurt whenever I exercise.

My favorite sport to play is basketball, and recently I have also been playing tennis. Due to the sharp movements these sports place a ton of stress on my ankle. I normally feel minimal pain while I am exercising, but notice it significantly a while afterwards.

The mind and body build up a tolerance to anything though. The more you are used to something the less it hurts. This means that after the second or third time you exercise the pain should likely not be as strong as it was after the first time. So you have to get past the innitial pain to really notice the benefits of exercise.

Another Example of DOMS: Wearing a Football Helmet:
I played football my sophmore year of highschool. After wearing the football helmet for one day it hurt extrordinarily bad. I played another day or two and my neck muscles and body adjusted. The pain disappeared.

I was the guy who played against our all state linebacker in tackeling drills, and I can assure you that it usually hurt though :)

Weight & Stress:
As your weight goes higher the stress from exercising is much greater. Sounds logical obviously, but if you are having trouble doing strenuous exercise you may want to start off by doing things that are a bit less strenuous and working your way up. Also if your diet is exceptionally bad sometimes you can lose weight by doing nothing.