Tips for Weight Loss in Your Forties & Fifties

1. Lift Weights. It's important to maintain your muscle mass and lifting weights counters the slowing metabolism that comes with midlife. Cardio alone won't do it for those of us over forty.

2. Do sit-ups. Having firm abdominal muscles help maintain the length of your spine so you don't dip forward or get a "hunch" at the top of your back.

3. Get started now -- regardless of your age! Now's the time to workout, even if you're in your 70's or 80's.

A resource to check out is Dr. Pamela Peeke's book, "Fight Fat After Forty" which can be found on her website at http://www.drpeeke.com/?FFAF. You can also be re-directed there by clicking on the title of this blog post.

More On The Reverse Diet

A quick note about Tricia Cunningham's diet plan. Tricia consumes just 1,200 to 1,400 calories per day on this plan. The benefit of eating "meatloaf in the morning" is that you'll possibly lose more weight since people tend to be the most active after breakfast. High-protein fish and poultry give you sustained energy and help you feel better physically during the early hours of the day.

Another benefit is the reduced cravings for junk food on this plan. There's simply no desire (or place) to squeeze in things like potato chips or ice cream. If you're already accustomed to eating junk food later in the evening, you can tweak the Reverse Diet a bit by having a sensible dinner in the evening instead of the suggested oatmeal and shredded wheat.

The Reverse Diet

Came across a new diet book by Tricia Cunningham who explains how she lost 115 pounds by eating dinner for breakfast. She follows what she calls a "backwards menu" in which the day's first meal is chicken. Yes….chicken for breakfast, followed by a banana for a morning snack.

Lunch is typically a 6 ounce portion of broiled grouper with asparagus….followed later with an afternoon snack of one rice cake with a tablespoon of low-fat peanut butter. Dinner of course, is actually breakfast and consists of a half-cup of shredded wheat cereal and a half cup of oatmeal with four ounces of no-sugar-added cranberry juice.

Rather than try to explain how Tricia stumbled on this unique diet plan, visit her blog for the details at http://www.diet-blog.com/archives/2005/05/25/the_reverse_diet_solution.php. Or simply click the title of this blog post to be redirected there.

A Great Workout Routine

Came across this routine and thought it worth sharing. This is just a sample routine of course and may not fit your particular schedule. Feel free to modify or slightly alter parts of the following:

1. Ride the stationary bike while watching the morning news. 15 minutes into the ride, begin drinking 64 ounces of water.
2. After an hour on the bike, watch a workout DVD and do kicks, punches, and curls. After 20 minutes do stretches for 5 minutes to cool down.
3. Switch the DVD to a high-burn program such as cardio-kickboxing and do 20 minutes of an intensive workout. Start another 64 ounce bottle of water.
4. If you're watching a live workout show on TV instead of a DVD, do situps (or run in place) during the commercials to keep your heart rate up.

From start to finish, the above routine covers one hour and 50 minutes.

Working Out Also Reduces Osteoporosis

Yes...you read that headline correctly! It's been shown that working out (and doing resistance training in particular) helps maintain bone density. In fact, resistance training can even modestly increase bone density in women in many cases.

Increasing bone density therefore actually reduces the risk of osteoporosis! There are some amazing side benefits of exercise that we're still learning about. And these benefits are often inter-connected! So what are you waiting for? Dust off that BOWFLEX in your garage and get after it!

Aerobic Exercise

A few more mind vitamins for you from BodyWiseFitness.....I need to focus on these as much as anyone.

Aerobic exercise such as a half hour of rapid walking five days a week, has been shown to cut the risk of catching a cold nearly in half in postmenopausal women.

People who workout have more energy than nonexercisers, according to researchers at the University of Georgia, based on a review of 70 studies. That boost, on average, beats the effect of stimulant drugs.

Benefits of Doing Aerobics

According to Bodywisefitness, half-hour aerobic sessions three to five times a week have been shown to cut symptoms of mild to moderate depression nearly in half. One study suggests that exercise can be as effective as drugs in treating major depressive disorders.

Brisk walking for just an hour or two a week can reduce the risk of breast cancer in postmenopausal women by nearly 20 percent. And for those who already have the disease, walking three to five hours a week may reduce the chance of dying from it by as much as 50 percent. So......anybody ready to do some aerobics?

Some Reasons To Get Off The Couch

Here's some true facts that you may already know....but swallow these little mind vitamins anyway! They're good for you!

1. Physical activity helps you lose weight by burning calories, boosting resting metabolism, and buffering you from bone and muscle loss that can result if you diet alone.

2. High levels of physical activity can decrease your risk of colon cancer by 40 to 50 percent.

3. Exercise helps you get better sleep. In one study, people who walked more than six blocks a day had 1/3 fewer insomnia problems than their less active cohorts.

4. Walking 30 minutes five days a week can increase your life span by one and a half years. Running can add up to four years according to a 2005 study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. It's never too late to increase longevity.

Starting An Exercise Club

I recently read about a great idea for not only losing weight.....but staying fit and keeping it off. A group of friends simply start (or join) a weight loss club. The idea is that 5 or 6 people agree to meet at a regularly scheduled time for an aerobic activity: swimming, ice skating, walking, etc.

The example I read about was an exercise club that called themselves the, "Vanilla Coffee Club". The six members meet every Satursday at 8:00 am at a local ice rink and take a 30-minute skating lesson together. Then they skate (aerobically) for another 35 to 45 minutes for the exercise. Afterwards, they all go to Starbucks and enjoy a "sugar-free vanilla coffee".

Could you and 6 of your friends agree to start such a club? What a great idea!!

Six Small Meals A Day

For those of you that are eating 5 or 6 small meals a day to keep your metabolism optimized to burn calories, here's some suggestions gleaned from various sources:

1. Load up on produce at the market -- especially spinach, broccoli, oranges, and grapes.
2. When purchasing meats, stick with lower-fat cuts of beef such as sirloin. Also look for organic chicken and turkey -- high in protein but low in fat.
3. When buying diary, go fat-free in your milk, yogurt, and string cheese. And don't be afraid of eggs.
4. Don't forget water-packed tuna instead of oil-packed…..and buy only fat-free salad dressings.

Sample Maintenance Routine

After dropping a lot of weight, how can you best maintain a proper weight? Here's a few good ideas pulled from various sources.

• Rise early in the morning and eat something (such as a hard-boiled egg) to kick-start your metabolism. Then ride your stationary bike for an hour or workout to Denise Austin's Fit & Lite early morning show on Lifetime.
  
• Eat fruit at lunch daily but vary the type of fruit to keep things interesting. This keeps your palate and your body intrigued.
  
• Bake or steam your dinner. Baked chicken and steamed squash (for example) is easy and can be prepared in thirty minutes or so.
  
• Purchase a food scale and place it on the kitchen counter near the stove and oven……and don't forget to use it regularly!