The Eat Anything You Want Diet

It hardly seems possible, but my wife and I are losing weight while eating all of our favorite foods in satisfying portions. We love food, and eat a wide variety of great meals, ranging from Italian pasta dishes to old fashioned American barbecued ribs. A nice Spanish paella or Chinese fried rice will grace our table one day, then Mexican burritos or enchiladas the next. My wife is a wonderful cook, and has an international repertoire that would be the envy of many a fine restaurant. She doesn't stint on the olive oil out of fear of calories. She doesn't avoid frying foods for fear of fat content. We don't avoid any of our favorites because they might be fattening. Yet for the past three and half months we have been losing weight.

Our weight loss is slow, but that is one indication that it will be permanent. We are not on a temporary diet to lose weight, we have changed our lifestyle permanently. Oh, and the side-effects of our new dietary practice, besides losing some unwanted weight at the beginning, are improved health and perhaps even a longer life.

What, you might ask, have we done that can produce all these benefits? Well, we didn't try to change what we eat, or how much we eat -- we just changed WHEN we eat.

This isn't some off-the-wall idea we came up with ourselves. It is supported by good scientific evidence, and gaining in popularity among the small minority of people aware of it. It is easier to follow this diet than any weight-loss diet either of us have ever tried, including Atkins, Fit For Life, Glycemic Index, Jenny Craig, Pritikin, Scarsdale, and Weight Watchers. We feel better, look better and still have plenty of energy for exercise and our work and play.

The only problem is the name: Intermittent Fasting. See, one of our readers just fainted at just the _thought_ of fasting. That's why when Brad Pilon wrote a book on how to lose weight through intermittent fasting, he didn't use that term in the title. He just called it Eat Stop Eat. Get that ebook (it is an instant download) for a more detailed description than this brief article can give you.

Fasting really isn't as bad as it sounds. We all fast every day, typically for eight hours when we sleep. If you don't eat for a couple hours before bed-time and have breakfast late, that might be ten or twelve hours. Many people undertake longer fasts for religious or health reasons.

We eat every day, and fast part of every day. The fasting periods alternate between morning and evening, with the evening fast followed by a morning fast so that we have a total of 23 hours fasting. It is not very difficult, and it's a long way short of 'starvation.' The fast is followed by 25 hours of normal eating, so we do not feel at all deprived of food. We have our main meal at the same time each day, and a smaller meal before or after that, depending on the schedule. That main meal is either the first or last thing we eat for the day, which is why our fast is 23 hours rather than 24 -- our main meal time is the same each day.

Check out the book Eat Stop Eat and see if intermittent fasting isn't right for you. We think intermittent fasting is a better way to live, and weight-loss is just a welcomed side-effect. When we 'plateau out' -- stop losing further weight -- we will continue this diet for the other health benefits it provides.

Related Information of Interest:

Diabetes And Your Diet
If you are like me you probably thought diabetes is one of those things you have or don't have; nothing could be further from the truth because diabetes is now the biggest threat to health in the developed world and we are eating ourselves into it because of poor diet.

First question is how prevalent is diabetes?
Using Australia as an example that has a total population of around 20 million inhabitants, in the last full year official figures show 70,000 people were diagnosed with diabetes during the year. That is equal to one extra person diagnosed every seven minutes 24/7.

At present 700,000 people are diagnosed with having diabetes and a conservative figure indicate that for each person diagnosed there is another that is not diagnosed but does suffer from diabetes. that is 1.4 million sufferers out of a total population of 20 million. - More than 5% and growing by the day. The organization Diabetes Australia forecast that by the year 2010 the number of sufferers could be close to 10% of population. This rate of increase is happening throughout the developed world and is caused by lack of exercise and poor diet. We could be quite cruel here and say that people are queuing to shorten their lifespan because diabetes does reduce your lifespan.

The answer to this epidemic is in the hands of each of us. We must exercise more and be more conscious of what we eat. Attention to diet should start from a very young age; in particular we should concentrate on serving sizes and avoiding fatty foods. Yes that does include every child's favorite burger and fries. Once a month does little harm if the children are active, once a week causes damage even if they are active.

We all need to be conscious of seven servings of fruit and vegetables each day in our diet and also the need to back a good diet with reasonable exercise, like walking. People most at risk of type 2 diabetes, the most common, are overweight and do not exercise. They may have high blood pressure and/or high cholesterol, if you fit this category ask your doctor to check for diabetes next time you visit.

I saved the scariest fact for last: The total number of people in Australia with diabetes or "pre-diabetes" is 3.2 million or 15.1% of the total population. Each of these people will have a reduced lifespan.

This article is (c) copyright David McCarthy 2006.

David McCarthy writes articles on the subject of the effects of food and diet on your health. This article could be the most important he has written when you read the scary statistics. His work can be viewed at: www.recipesmania.com/articles.html

The Top 10 Benefits of Recording What You Eat in a Food Diary
1. Allows you to monitor your caloric intake. – Losing weight is a simple equation – take in fewer calories than you expend. Monitoring your caloric intake is the first step in lowering it.

2. Encourages you to focus on your food choices. – More often than not we overeat because we are focusing on something other than what we are eating. Writing down what you eat in a food diary forces you to focus on what you are doing.

3. Provides a record you can share with your health care provider. -- Your health care provider can look at your food diary and provide insight and information on what you can do to eat healthier. Also, what you are eating may be impacting your health in other ways.

4. Helps you control the urge to binge. – Knowing you are going to have to write down what you eat can stop you from reaching for the second helping of potato chips.

5. Allows you to track your progress. – A food diary can serve as evidence of how far you have come in this journey. It also feels great to look back and see you are eating better today than you did days, weeks or years ago.

6. Encourages mindful eating. – Writing down what you eat encourages you to think about what you are eating. The more you think, the less and better you eat.

7. Creates a means of evaluating the connection between what you eat and how you feel. – You can use a food diary to examine the circumstances and feelings which trigger overeating. Once you identify the causes you can begin doing something about them.

8. Helps you be sure you are getting enough of each food group. -- It is important to eat a balanced diet. A food diary can provide clues as to what foods you have been neglecting and need to add to your diet.

9. Assists you in acknowledging the reality of how much you eat. – Keeping a food diary will help you confront the truth about how much you eat. Once you stop kidding yourself about how much you eat, you can begin making the
necessary changes.

10. Reinforces your commitment to achieving and maintaining a healthy weight. – Each time you make an entry in your food diary you are expressing your
intention and desire to do what needs to be done in order to live well.

Jacqueline D. Stanley: Author, Speaker, Chief Encouragement Officer at Lettuce Is Not Enough University: The Place to Learn How to Live Well and Lose Weight. lettuceisnotenough.com

Simple Home Remedies for Gout Sufferers
Most people have heard of gout, but I suspect many don't know what it really is. Simply put, gout is a disease caused by excessive levels of uric acid in the blood-stream (hyperuricemia). Not everyone who has high levels of this acid their blood develops gout disease, but it does seem most do. Specifically, gout occurs when uric-acid crystals form around body joints like knees, fingers, elbows and especially big toes - in fact, for the vast majority of gout sufferers, the first sign of the disease is big toe pain! After salt-like crystals form, inflammation, tenderness, and even a reddish rash may occur around affected joints.

The disease has been noted and documented since the time of Hippocrates. Traditionally, it's been associated with exuberant living - eating and drinking well. And there is some indirect evidence to support this. For example, a long-term study noted that heavy consumers of meat and sea food were much more likely to develop gout. Additionally, significant alcohol consumption, especially in the form of beer, is also known to increase the risk of gout development.

Below are simple home remedies that may help to relieve pain and other symptoms linked to this sometimes debilitating disease. It's unlikely they will all work for or apply to you, so it may be worth experimenting with different remedies to find the ones that personally help alleviate your symptoms.

* An old study supported by a recent one and significant amount of anecdotal stories suggest drinking cherry juice may help alleviate pain caused by uric-acid crystal formation.

* Soaking the affected joint or joints in warm water, or having a warm bath, may also help.

* Drinking plenty of water may help eliminate uric acid from the body.

* Cutting back on alcohol and meat (especially red) consumption should reduce the level of digestive purines from which uric acid is formed.

* If you're overweight, slowly losing weight may also help.

* A recent study suggested taking vitamin C supplements may reduce the risk of gout attacks, so this is worth considering too.

These are just some simple remedies that may help curb gout attacks. Visit my website: www.gout-diet-tips.com/gout_relief/ for many more ideas.

Brad Watson is a freelance author, programmer and website-master. He loves researching and writing about simple ways to alleviate symptoms of many common disorders and diseases. To learn more about gout visit: www.gout-diet-tips.com/