In light of quite possibly the most common New Years Resolution, I asked my resident nutritionist,  Health Coach Quinn to share her important information with the ESEMA community on our blog. Not only are her recommendations truly healthful, they are sensible and sure to result in resolutions kept this year.

The Only 10 Things You Need To Know About Weight Loss – after the jump

Quinn is a Health Coach, the creator of Kitschy Kitchen web show, Cooking Party host and FITrition Deluxe teacher, and emotional eating expert. She works with women of all ages to help them change their relationship with food…forever. She is a wealth of knowledge! See her advice for ALL year below.  Check her website here.

The Only 10 Things You Need To Know About Weight Loss

1.  DRINK UP.

Drink water, lots of it.  Or herbal teas, those are great too.  Often times we confuse thirst for huger and run right to the fridge.  When you start to feel an inkling for a treat, tap into your body and decipher if you are really hungry or if you’re actually bored, stressed, worried… or just thirsty.  Water not only hydrates the system but it also very cleansing.  It helps to flush toxins and purify the system so make sure you are drinking at least 8 cups a day.  Herbal teas can also help to calm nerves, headaches, cramps, and stomach aches.

• TIP: Keep a water bottle with you at all times, have it on your desk at work and in your purse when you are on the go.  Having water on hand will keep you fuller, focused, cleansed and make your skin positively GLOW.
• TIP: Immediately after waking up in the morning drink 2 cups of water at room tempurature.  It will get your system going better than coffee… and is MUCH better for you.
• TIP: Drink some comforting herbal teas while doing one of those things that usually ignites a snack attack.  Keep some tea bags in your purse. You can always find hot water where you’d otherwise find a snack.

2. STEP AWAY… FROM THE DIET FOOD!

“Foods” like diet sodas, 100-calorie snack packs, anything low fat, no fat, reduced fat… they are all programmed to destroy you.   Only eat real food. Real food grows on a plant (vegetables, fruits, whole grains, beans, nuts, and seeds) or comes from an animal.  Real food is nurtured by the sun.  Real food is NOT processed, packaged, pasteurized, chemicalized, homogenized, or well, bastardized in any way. It has nothing is added to it, and nothing is taken away.  If the majority of your diet is real food you will never have a problem with your weight. Or, in other words, if it wasn’t food 100 years ago—it’s not food now—It’s a food-like product designed to hypnotize and addict you.  Real foods have one ingredient.  They are ingredients you learned to identify in kindergarten…and they should be the bulk of your diet.

• TIP: Shop the perimeter of the supermarket or go to your farmers market for items that are fresh and in season.  When there pick up one new veggie a week to experiment with what you like.
• TIP: if it grows on a plant= eat it.  If it was made in a plant= avoid it.

3.  FORGET WHAT YOU KNOW.

Not all calories are created equal.  The calories in chips and cookies have a very different effect on your body from the calories in, say, kale and carrots.   Foods that are fried, processed or made with white sugar/flour have a detrimental effect on your body in the form of internal inflammation, which leads to weight gain.  OK, you know junk food is bad, but the truth is that “diet” foods wreak havoc on your system too!  When fat is removed, sugar is added, which is actually worse!  And when calories are replaced with artificial sweeteners you are essentially drinking poison that your body has no idea how to metabolize.  These chemicals mess with your brain chemistry making you more hungry. So, forget the low fat, low carb, and food pyramid schemes.  The food industry, in general, is not out to make you healthier, it is out to make money.  When looking at food labels, re-focus your attention onto ingredients rather than fat & calories, and choose natural foods—your body knows exactly what to do with them, and it will thank you.

• TIP: Read the ingredients on the back of your food.  Just because something seems healthy doesn’t mean it is…. Your whole wheat bread just might be hiding high fructose corn syrup.
  TIP:  If you can’t read it, don’t eat it.

4.  BE A DETECTIVE.

Notice your emotional connection with the food choices that you make.  Begin to examine your cravings. Are you craving foods because you saw them?  Or because your body genuinely want them?  What sparks the cravings?  Stress? Boredom? Loneliness? Or maybe it’s a food addiction.  For instance, sugar is like the [insert street drug] of the food world.  Are you eating things just because some celebrity eats it, or some nutritionist on TV says you should? Begin listening to your unique body and feed it what YOU need.  Your body is a sophisticated, high-tech piece of machinery that is rarely wrong.  If you wake up craving bread and cereal—take that as a message that you are carbohydrate person—and eat carbohydrates.  Just eat whole, complex carbs that breakdown slowly inside the body like steel cut oats, brown rice, kasha, quinoa or millet.  Or if you crave ice cream out of the clear blue, take that message that you need to incorporate more good sources dairy into your diet like full-fat yogurt or raw cheese.  Listen carefully, your body will always find a way to tell you want it needs.

• TIP: Keep a food journal.  Keep track of what you are eating, why you made the choices you did, and what else was going on at that time. See if you can identify any patterns in your eating.

5.  GET YOUR Zzzzs.

Lack of sleep decreases the hormone leptin, which tells your brain when you are full.  If you haven’t had enough sleep you’re setting yourself up for weight gain in two ways because A) your brain doesn’t get the message that you’ve eaten, so you’re likely to just keep going, and going and B) you have low energy, which instinctively makes your body crave things like sugar and caffeine in order to rev up … and thus begins a vicious cycle.

• TIP: Pick a bed-time and stick to it with the same tenacity that you stick to events like meetings, movies, or dinner plans.  If people ask why, tell them you are on the sleep diet.  They might all want to try it.

6.  NO MULTI-TASKING DURING MEALS.

This may be one of the hardest habits to break… but  it is the most important thing to conquer.  When you are eating, you are just eating.  That’s it.  No TV, cellphone, computer, magazines…. Just you and chewing.  Eating is how you nourish your body, it should be a special event, not another thing on your “to-do” list.  As another coach/friend of my says “Would you be on your blackberry during sex?  Then why are you on it during meals?”.  The thing is– when you are distracted you are bound to eat way more than necessary.  If you take time to really focus on your meal, and make it an event, then you are going to feel more satiated and less likely snack, binge, or overeat.  Take the time during your meals to slow down and chew.

• TIP: Find a quiet place with NO television, computer, newspaper, magazines or even cell phone.  Give yourself a full 30 minutes to eat your meal.  Take the whole time to chew and think about your food.  Notice the taste, texture and smell.   How do you feel?  When do you know you’re full?  Do this at least once a week.  The practice should start to roll over into other meals as well.
• TIP: Focus on your chewing.  Chew until you can’t chew any more.  Your food should be the consistency of a smoothy before you swollow.  This will help you feel fuller on less food.  It will also greatly increase your digestive function and decrease bloating, gassiness, constipation and other IBS symptoms.

7. PENCIL IN SOME PAMPERING.

Your body is designed for survival.  Throughout evolution it was imperative for humans to be able to hold onto body fat, it keeps us warm, insulates our vital organs, and is a source of energy when the going gets tough.  Stress triggers hormones in our brain, which in-turn tells our body to hunker down and protect itself against rough times ahead.  That used to mean draught, famine, or attack.  Now those stressors might be work, traffic, or demanding obligations.  But the brain still activates those same S.O.S hormones, making us (literally) hold onto fat for dear life.  When you find yourself overwhelmed with modern life, find a moment for yourself to get some restorative rest.  Take deeps breaths, a quick walk, stretch, or drink some hot tea to relax.  Stop to think about what needs to get done and just do ONE thing at a time.  Plain and simple–take care of yourself. If you don’t take care of yourself in the little ways, it’s less likely that you will take care of your health and manage weight in the long term. Giving yourself some time to relax will help to melt away the pounds.

• TIP: Schedule one hour per week that is just for YOU, and do something that you love.  Once that feels comfortable, bump it up to 2 hours.

8. EAT. A LOT. Skipping meals (especially breakfast) will flip your body into famine mode so it’s super important to eat, eat, EAT!  Not getting enough calories will actually lower your metabolism. Studies show that people who eat breakfast are more likely to maintain a healthy weight.  Skipping meals causes your blood sugar to spike and crash, messing with your moods and energy levels.  Find time to sit down and eat a balanced breakfast each day.  It sets your metabolic tone for the day and protects against binge eating due to starvation later in the day.  It is vital to properly fuel your body and eat enough beneficial calories in order to have good metabolic function.  It’s just really important to make all of those calories count!  Again–your diet should primarily consist of plant-based foods, which are naturally power-packed with vital nutrients.  When your body is getting what it needs from each meal, it’s practically impossible to eat too much because whole foods just keep you more satiated from meal to meal. Pretty soon, portion control will actually because a concern of the past!

• TIP: To find the best breakfast for you do a Breakfast Experiment.  Eat something different each day for 5 days.  Notice how the different meals make you feel.  Which gives you more energy, focus, and keeps you fullest for the longest?

9.  GET PHYSICAL.

Any type of movement will amp up your metabolism, reduce stress, and aid digestion—the holy trinity of wellness.  Humans evolved with an active lifestyle.  We did NOT spend millions of years before now sitting behind desks.  Honor your roots by breaking a sweat in some small way each and every day. The single easiest way to boost your metabolism and burn some cals, while you’re just bumming around with your gals is to have muscle mass.  It is like having a high interest savings account; it does work for you when you’re not even thinking about it! The mitochondria in your muscle cells turn oxygen and calories into energy.  The more you have, the more you burn at work AND at play!  You don’t need a fancy gym membership to tone up!  You can do some sit-ups when you wake up, chair dips while watching TV, lunges while cooking dinner, or simply take a walk during your lunch break to get some fresh air.  Find something that you like to do, and get in motion.

• TIP: Get on-to, or off-of the subway a couple stops earlier and walk to where you are going.  It will help get your blood pumping in the morning, and on the flip-side will help you relax after a long stressful day.

10. EAT EVERYTHING.  Don’t avoid any major food groups. There are only 3 macronutrients in the world:  Carbohydrates, Protein and Fat.  Everything you could possibly eat is made up of some combination of those 3 things.  Avoiding any one will cause major problems.  Look at the fat-free craze that began in the 80s… Americans are 50% fatter since we stopped eating fat!  And who do you know that stayed on a no-carb diet for an extended period of time?  Diets are a four-letter word.  They never ever work because they are all about deprivation (who wants that?!?).  Hunger is your body telling you that it needs nutrients.  In fact, most people who are overweight claim that they are always hungry—and it’s true!  They could be literally starving because they are not giving their body what it needs.  Instead they are giving it empty calories. Your body needs proper fuel and balance for function at it’s maximum potential. So, eat everything, as long as it’s real food, and you can never fail.

• TIP: Weight loss is not about reducing calories. It is about increasing nutrients.  Add color to your diet especially green and orange, they are the most nutrient dense foods in nature.

Ever thought that your morning muffin or stir-fry lunch contained not just sustenance, but healing properties? Ancient Chinese medical theory has ascribed certain energetics and functions to many common foods, that still remain true today. Such properties are very different from nutritional values (vitamins, calories, fats, fiber, etc), which came later in the evolution of the nature of food. Let’s take watermelon (Xi Gua) as an example of this idea: our analytical mind knows that this delicious fruit is sweet, refreshing and nutritious with its high water content and fiber. The energetics of this food according to Chinese theory are cooling and damp draining, and therefore can prevent heat stroke on a hot summer day and promote healthy water metabolism by ridding edema. A more relevant example for the winter season would be lamb (Yang Rou), which is warming to the system and promotes optimum functioning. 

Food therapy is considered to be the number one treatment in preventative care and healing therapy. In modern China, there are special restaurants where one can go to receive tailored medicinal meals. After a visit with the Chinese medicine doctor, a pattern diagnosis is ascribed which can then be brought to the chef at such a restaurant. Food will then be prepared in accordance with individual needs – to nourish, eliminate or course any given imbalance. This notion contradicts the idea that one particular diet is best for everyone, but rather tailors nutritional choices based on individual need. What may help one person lose weight and feel energetic, may not be the right fit for someone else. I had the fortune of experiencing this model for myself at the medicinal food restaurant across from the hospital during my one-year clinical rotation in Hangzhou, China.  

Chinese herbal medicine utilizes the combination of roots, barks, leaves, stems and berries to promote health and vitality.  It only makes sense that Chinese Herbal Medicine and Food Therapy often overlap, with many herbal ingredients ending up on typical supermarket shelves. The following is a delicious trailmix you can make at home, as your own “herbal formula prescription.” In addition to curbing hunger between meals, or giving an energy boost before a work-out, this mix is high in antioxidents, essential fatty acids and protein. From the Chinese perspective, it is nourishing to the kidneys; promotes mental clarity, memory function; improves libido, energy and digestion. Enjoy!

Herbal Trail Mix – Common Names with Chinese Names and Functions           

Goji Berries/Wolfberries                                    

Gou Qi Zi -Nourishes the kidney energy, enhances fertility, memory, and sexual function

Walnut Halves                                                          

Hu Tao Ren -Promotes brain function, mental clarity

 Black Sesame Seeds                                                      

Huo Ma Ren -Nourishes blood, improves vision and sluggish digestion.  Black sesame has the additional benefit of promoting lactation in breast-feeding women.

*I like Mrs. May’s Black Sesame Crunch Squares, they are slightly sweetened with honey that provides a great flavor and also aids digestion.

This post is a proud participant in the Kathleen Show’s Prevention Not Prescriptions Blog - a great place for other resources to stay healthy.

Reduce Cravings

Improve Energy

Alleviate Joint Pain

Reduce Muscle Fatigue

Regulate Blood Sugar Levels

Jump Start Your Metabolism

Regulate Hormone Function

Detoxify the System

Reduce Stress

It is that time of year again…for making those promises to ourselves that we have been putting off through the busy holidays. One of the most common New Years Resolutions is to lose weight, and it is also the least kept. Why? The culprit may be coming from a constitutional level. There are many factors that can cause excessive weight gain and an inability to lose weight such as undetected food allergies, stress, anxiety, depression, unstable glucose levels, or inflammatory responses such as arthritis, chronic fatigue or fibromyalgia. Acupuncture and Chinese Herbal medicine offer time-tested remedies to help strengthen your individual system at the root level so that you can lose weight efficiently, and keep it off for good. Reducing cravings, improving energy, alleviating joint pain and muscle fatigue, regulating metabolism and reducing stress are just some of the added benefits of incorporating acupuncture and herbal formulas into your weight loss resolution.

Reducing Cravings & Addressing Addictions

Food provides us with an enormous amount of nutritional benefits, but also emotional benefits. Over time, dietary habits can be hard to break (mostly due to emotional ties). For this reason, typical dieting tends to lead to a common feeling of insufficiency and can ignite cravings and addictions we didn’t even know were there in the first place. Taking away food that the body (and mind) is used to enjoying often engulfs a person in a cycle of binging and obsession. Acupuncture can help on a neurological level to reduce cravings and stop addictive behavior. In fact, acupuncture is so successful at resolving addictions, many rehabilitation clinics across the country train their staff in auricular acupuncture to alleviate a variety of addictions. Although on its surface weight gain may not seem like “addictive behavior,” it most certainly can be the result of a habitual diet that the system has now become accustomed to and even physically dependent on. Trying to change our diets can be difficult, frustrating and exhausting.  Acupuncture can work at the root level to make this process positive, easy and successful.

Detoxifying the System

Carrying excess weight is often a sign that your body is not processing things efficiently or correctly.  The cause for this could be from a number of reasons, but a good place to start is a simple detoxification to cleanse the body of unwanted toxins and debris. Such a regimen would include Acupuncture to detoxify the liver, herbs to facilitate digestion and reduce inflammation and a diet modification to stabilize blood sugars and eliminate potential allergens. Although this diet modification can initially feel too limiting to maintain, that is because it is!  Detoxification is meant to provide a deep clean so that equilibrium can then be achieved.  For this purpose, our recommendations include whole foods so you feel satiated and a time-frame that is manageable based on individual assessment.

Giving Your Metabolism a Re-Boot

After a simple detoxification, we will help you continue finding the appropriate support  so your digestion can continue working at its best. Our bodies were designed to appropriately digest, distribute and eliminitate the nutrition we take in. The “storage” process that happens is the result of an ineffecient system. Whatever the root cause, acupuncture and herbs will help your digestion and metabolism get back on track and stay there – eliminating the yo-yo effect. Treatments will also help reduce your stress, which is known to cause elevated hormones (like Cortisol) in the body that cause it to hold excess weight. Once your digestion is up and running at its best, frequent acupuncture and herbs will no longer be necessary – your system has been nourished from the root up, yielding lasting benefits.

Emotional Health

Trying to lose weight under any circumstance causes stress. People handle stress in all different ways, and Acupuncture can help release tension in the body, ease feelings of depression and regulate mood swings accompanied by -or preventing you from- losing weight. Exercise will also release important endorphins in the body to help it deal with stress. However, many of the same reasons mentioned in the first paragraph of this post also inhibit many people from working out. Acupuncture and herbs can help help increase energy, promote restful sleep, and alleviate chronic muscle and joint pains that may be preventing you from keeping up with consistent exercise so you can get back on track.

Erin Hessel L.Ac offers time-tested natural remedies to help you lose weight & provide lasting health benefits.  Private, tailored treatments take place in a serene environment for optimum rejuvenation and results.   Call our office today for our 2010 Weight Loss Packages and Specials.

This post is a proud participant in the Kathleen Show’s Prevention Not Prescriptions Blog - a great place for othe resources to start your New Year off right and keep it going.