Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

As if bingeing wasn’t enough, there are so many other factors that can cause us to overeat. The size of the glass can cause us to drink more high-calorie drinks. The accessibilty of treats can cause unwanted snacking. Even buying food at bulk stores can cause us to eat more than we normally would. Professor Brian Wansink is a professor of Nutritional Science, of Marketing, of Advertising, and of Agricultural and Consumer Science. He has performed many studies on Food Psychology. Here are a sampling of them:

• Why We Unknowingly Overeat

These abstracts don’t read like weight-loss magazine articles, but if you are willing to wade through the formality of them, here are a couple of things that you’ll learn:

• Studies at “Weight-loss Camps” (and with veteran bartenders) show that visual illusions unknowingly cause people to pour 32-43% more in to short wide glasses than tall narrow ones.

• Subjects ate more popcorn when they were served more, even if the popcorn was stale and didn’t taste good.

• Unknown to the participants, they used self-refilling soup bowls to show that people keep eating regardless of what they intended to eat or how full they were.

• Hidden cameras at Italian restaurants show that people who put olive oil on a piece of bread will eat more fat and calories than if they instead used butter. The good news… they eat fewer pieces of bread.

Via: CalorieLab Calorie Counter News » Archives » The more we’re served, the more we eat

I hear a lot of negative press about swimming. Bob Greene, Oprah’s Trainer, believes that swimming isn’t as good as running or even riding a stationary bicycle. Abi decided to diversify her training and her experience was the opposite.

• dreaming stream: a way to kick your own butt

The last time I tried to swim laps, we were staying at the Luxor Hotel. I didn’t want to pay the high fee to use the hotel gym, so I decided to do laps in the pool. I had been running 2-3 miles a day, so I thought swimming laps would be a relaxing “easy” day. I went out there early and found myself gasping for breath. None of the strokes were relaxing or easy, not even the breast stroke, which had been the stroke that I always used when I was just floating along. I haven’t tried since.

My gym has a pool. Maybe I’ll add one day of swimming laps into my routine and mix my workout a little bit.

This week on the Biggest Loser, Mark decided to take it up a notch. He had two weeks of big losses in a row and he was feeling ready to give it his all, so he added an extra hour of exercise a day to his routine. This is in addition to the four hours a day that the rest of his team is doing. He asked his trainer, Jillian, if she was proud of him because he was willing to do five hours a day. She was more worried about him than proud. She was worried that his body might go into shock, slowing his progress instead of speeding it up.

When he got on the scale at the end of the week, he showed a four pound loss. You could see the disappointment on his face. “Four pounds, that’s it?!” After losing seventeen pounds two weeks ago and ten pounds the previous week, he was crushed at losing four pounds.

…insert record scratch noise here…

Four pounds in a week is a FANTASTIC loss, especially since he had such big losses the previous two weeks. Normal people have an adjustment period after losing so much weight. I have to give snaps to Jillian. She told Mark that if he was going to exercise that much, he needed to eat more to compensate. She must have gotten the balance exactly right for him to still have a loss at the scale.

I am continually amazed at how much weight each of these people are losing. Andrea said it perfectly:

“In the real world, a two pound loss is great, but here it just doesn’t cut it.”

When you watch this show, and find a loss of a half a pound on the scale for yourself, don’t get discouraged. When you find yourself lying in bed, thinking about whether you should get up on time to exercise, remember Mark busting his butt on the treadmill for five hours a day. I think I can get up and do forty minutes.

Amphetamines: it’s what killed a bunch of stars in the late fifties and early sixties. The doctors would prescribe “vitamin” shots and then more “vitamins” to sleep at night. Eventually, there was an overdose. Most of the rich and famous didn’t even know they were addicted because they were told that the shots were “all natural vitamins.”

Welcome to the present, where you can die like a movie star.

• Miami Herald – Danger Lurks in Popular Pills for Dieters – by John Dorschner

It looks like there is a popular pill in the Florida area that is being brought over from Brazil. It is advertised as an “all-natural” herbal weight loss medication. Yellow pills in the morning and orange pills in the night. When taken to an independent lab, the analysis showed that the yellow pills contained amphetamines and the orange pills contained tranquilizers and generic Prozac.

This is the best quote from the article:

“Any product that says you can lose 20 or 30 pounds a month does not have legitimate ingredients, or they’re lying.”

Remember, you already have everything you need to lose weight. Don’t let companies profit by lying to you and risking your life and livelihood.

Via: Diet Blog – Brazilian Diet Pills Causing Stir

Yahoo has a healthy eating weblog. Last week, she wrote an entry about ethnic foods and received this sarcastic comment:

so basically, watch out for the stuff that tastes good…thanks!
Posted by oneluv

I saw the comment and looked at it unbelievingly. The entry had recommended staying away from tempura fried Japanese dishes and phyllo pastry in Greek dishes. All the greasy and oily stuff that makes the food too rich to eat. Hurts my stomach, too. And then I realized it had happened to me…

(more…)

Here are the easy and pat answers that you will find everywhere:

• Don’t buy it until the day of Halloween and give the rest of your bowl to the last kid.

• Buy Halloween candy that you don’t like.

• Don’t buy it period and give out small toys or Halloween pencils instead of treats. The kids don’t need the extra sugar anyway.

• Buy Halloween candy that is really low in calories so that if you DO binge, it won’t hurt you that much.

If you wanted easy and pat answers, you wouldn’t have cancelled your emails from Hungry Girl.

(more…)

Although fun-size candy bars are available all year long, you can’t beat the selection at Halloween time. My favorite candy to binge on was the bite-size Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. I still keep a bag of these in a cupboard so that I always know that I have my favorites close by. I don’t have to actually eat them to feel better. Just knowing that they are in my house is a comfort and keeps me from bingeing. These little candy bars, however, can be a double-edged sword.

They Are a Plague:

• It is easy to eat several of these candy bars in a sitting.

• They come in large packages with a total of more calories than a single candy bar.

• They come in multi-packs with several different candy bars in one package, which can cause further bingeing. When you’re sick of one type, you’re tempted move on to the next.

They Are a Godsend

• The individual bars are small, with calories between 50 and 120 apiece.

• You can have a taste of your favorite candy without risking a lot of calories.

• You can plan to have your favorite candy EVERY day with these little bars, meaning that you never have to feel deprived ever again.

One note of caution: It’s not a good idea to “stock up” during the Halloween season. I never knew this before I started eating healthy, but it’s possible for candy to go bad. After months of lying untouched in my cupboard, I decided to have a taste of my favorite only to find it gray and rotting. Before that, I had never thrown away a bag of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. They had always disappeared within hours of purchase. I discarded the bag and wrote the words “Reese’s PB Cups” on the grocery list. I felt such a strange sense of accomplishment because I had been able to keep my favorite candy in the house long enough for it to rot. It was a new first for me.

You feel stuck. You’re stuck at the weight that you have been at for so long that you are starting to think that you will never be able to weigh any less. It’s not that bad. You can run and play. You can eat healthy food and you don’t think that your health is affected THAT much. You’re better than that 500 pound man you saw on television a couple of months ago, right?

But you want more. You want to be thin. You want people to look at you instead of look through you. You’re sick of that extra flab on your body, but you feel like there is nothing you can do to escape it. Guess what, you’re wrong. You’re not stuck and here is an article from Steve Pavlina that will help you break free from the black hole you’ve found yourself in.

• Steve Pavlina – You Need People

When I was a kid, tuna fish was eaten one way: with lots of mayo on white bread. It was one of the first things that I could make on my own and I enjoyed the autonomy of being able to make my own dinner if I had to. I used to make it with so much mayonnaise that it would be slimy and slick. I haven’t eaten fish that way for years now and I don’t really miss it.

Now, I eat tuna fish in many more dishes and all more healthy than that old tuna fish sandwich:

• Tuna Fish Sandwich: I still like a tuna fish sandwich, but I usually skip the mayo and put the tuna right on the bread without mayonnaise. Sometimes I mix in a little dill relish. Other times, I include a slice of cheese and grill the sandwich with a little Pam.

• Tuna on Triscuit Crackers: I like this for a good snack. When I’m feeling tired in the afternoon, a small serving of tuna fish (100 calories worth) on 7 Triscuit crackers fills me up and gets me going again. The Olive Oil and Rosemary flavor Triscuits are particularly good with this.

• Tuna Helper: I know it’s full of preservatives and is a highly processed food, but as highly processed foods go, Tuna Helper is pretty healthy. You usually can have a serving for about 250 to 300 calories. If you bulk it up with frozen veggies, it’s a huge serving.

• Tuna Salad: Just a small amount of tuna fish can really change the flavor of your boring green salad. I usually add a 100-calorie serving and a little lemon juice. I don’t even need salad dressing.

• Alone in the can: Sometimes I need a protein fix. When I’ve had too much sugar and my hands are shaking as I come down, I can eat a couple of bites of tuna fish for an easy protein boost. Sometimes I have a whole can for a meal when I’m busy and in a hurry. This is really easy if you’re on the run. You can get the tuna in packets, a fork from the deli and you have a quick meal from the grocery within seconds.

For more ideas, here are a list of tuna recipes from FoodFit.com. They have all the nutrition facts, so you know exactly how to plan them into your healthy eating:

• FoodFit.com – Tuna Recipes

For those of you of the Jewish Faith, Yom Kippur starts at sundown tonight. Traditional practice includes fasting from sundown tonight until sundown tomorrow. Sexual activity and bathing during those hours is also refrained from. White is worn during this time.

Yom Kippur is a representation of death. For one day, believers encounter death in a very real form. All earthly pleasures are denied and suddenly the realization that we are not going to live forever is very clear in our minds. Enjoy today, for tomorrow we may die.

You don’t need to be Jewish to follow the practice of Yom Kippur. If you are anxious about the upcoming holidays of overindulgence, here is another practice that urges you to live a better life. Since so many of the major religions have a period of fasting at this time of year, it makes one believe that it is something within our physiological makeup that asks for this.

Beliefnet.com – Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement – by Rabbi David Wolpe