The Revolving Diet

The Lighterlife Diet

During my research for the next diet, new exercise equipment or diets in other parts of the world I do come across one (or more) that I would like to try.  I found the Lighterlife Diet through a news site in the UK.  Article that peaked my interest and further research:  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1186869/Its-based-Third-World-rations-called-organised-starvation-So-safe-LighterLife-diet.html

I am sharing this with you as this now falls under the "Diets I Will Not Be Doing", not by choice though....just because I can't.

It interested me because of FAST RESULTS....

Fast Results is always the key for me!  Anyway - I contacted them to see if I could purchase or if they would be so kind to send me their products to try and blog about.  They responded very nicely and advised that they are only located in the UK and Ireland and they can not provide (whether I pay for it myself or they give to me) any products as part of their program is meetings and of course the commute from the US to thier locations would cost me more than I make in a lifetime. 

So now, you are probably thinking they are a Jenny Craig/Nutrisystem type place....MAYBE (more like a Medifast)...as far as meeting go.  Here is the clincher, the calories you will eat are 530 calories per day.  NOW you are thinking, of course I am going to lose weight, I have very little going in. Per the article the 530 calories were determined based on rations pack during a war. If the rations were to keep people going at that time, then I guess the feeling was,why wouldn't it work for a diet.  They took what was included in rations and had them analyize to break down calories, etc to come up with thier own diet.

LighterLife dieters are encouraged to follow the core program, a 14-week marathon of specially provided shakes, bars and soups which replace food and cost £66 a week  (About $105 US), interlaced with weekly group meetings with counselors. Total cost for the 14 week marathon....$1,470.00.

Just in case you are interested in reading a little more about the diet itself....

Link to their site: http://www.lighterlife.com/default.aspx

One side of the spectrum to the other...

Being heavy, fat, plump, etc.....can be a health issue.

But there is another side of weight watching that is seriously life threatening.  It happens to teenagers, men and woman.

I personally thought only teenage girls and woman were the only ones who became anorexic, I was surpirsed to see that men also can suffer from this.

Interesting Information.

 Surge Desk offers five facts about anorexia

Link to Full Article: http://www.aolnews.com/2010/12/30/isabelle-caro-dies-at-28-5-facts-about-anorexia-nervosa/

1. Symptoms of anorexia
According to the National Eating Disorder Association, the four primary symptoms of anorexia nervosa are:

• Resistance to maintaining normal body weight based on age and height
• Intense fear of weight gain or becoming "fat" despite already unhealthy body weight
• "Disturbance in the experience of body weight and shape"
• Loss of menstrual periods in females

 2. Men are affected as well
It's a common misconception that only women suffer from eating disorders. According to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, men account for one in 10 cases of the disorder, meaning that hundreds of thousands of males suffer from anorexia and related eating disorders.

3. Anorexia mortality rates are frighteningly high
Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any mental disorder, with anorexia nervosa holding a death rate 12 times higher than all other causes of death in females ages 15 to 24, according to the South Carolina Department of Mental Health.

4. Care for anorexia patients is expensive
The New York Times reported that the cost of care for anorexia patients can be as much as $30,000. Many patients require a team of specialists, including a psychiatrist, a physician and a nutritionist.

5. Anorexia treatment research is drastically underfunded
Although approximately 10 million anorexia cases exist in the United States alone, in 2005 the National Institutes of Health provided only $12 million in funding to help fight eating disorders, compared with the $647 million the NIH spent on Alzheimer's, which had 4.5 million cases, according to the National Eating Disorder Association.

 

Day 262 ~ 10/8/10 *** HCG DIet *** Pregnant Woman Urine Diet ***

(Below information was pulled from  a couple of articles outlining the HCG Diet)

 

HCG is human chorionic gonadotropin, a hormone produced during pregnancy. As a prescription medication, HCG is used mainly to treat fertility issues.

 

In Layman terms The Pregnant Woman Urine Diet. 

 

HCG is produced by a woman early in her pregnancy, and levels of HCG in the bloodstream peak at around 14 weeks. After that, levels gradually decrease. HCG's presence in a pregnant woman seems to occur in the timeframe when a woman would be least likely to know she is pregnant, and therefore least likely to be consciously trying to secure nutrients to sustain a pregnancy.

 

It was during research in the 1950's when one doctor, A.T.W. Simeons, noticed that boys being treated with HCG for underdeveloped gonads were also able to lose excess weight by eating much less without any accompanying hunger pangs. His interest in HCG soon shifted to its potential as a diet aid, and he published a paper touting its effects, as well as developing a dietary regimen for use of the drug as a weight-loss tool.

 

Each round of treatment lasts a minimum of 26 days, and 23 of those days require a daily injection of HCG. Treatment may last as long as 43 days (with 40 injections), unless a patient loses 34 to 40 pounds (15 to 18 kilograms) before the allotted time has passed. Patients don't receive HCG injections for the last three days of any treatment period so that it can cycle completely out of their bodies before they resume a normal diet. (It also takes about three days for hCG's effects to "kick in.")

 

Why stop after 40 days? Test subjects seemed to develop immunity to HCG after 40 days and required a six-week break from the diet to fully re sensitize to it. It was recommended no more than four total treatments, separated by breaks.

 

In addition to receiving shots, dieters are instructed to cut their daily intake of calories to 500 a day, but not until after the third shot. Once the HCG is active in a dieter's body, its release of long-stored fat provides the body with the calories it needs to burn to get through a day (a day, it should be noted, without much exercise). As long as fat deposits are being released for use, the 500 daily calories being ingested is supposed to be enough to sustain the dieter without the crazy hunger pangs one would normally experience on a 500-calorie diet. Once a dieter drops the excess weight, the treatment must stop, because HCG only affects stored fat. Once that's used up, the body will quickly reject a self-imposed limit of 500 total daily calories.

 

What little food can be consumed is supposed to be high in protein and low in starches, carbohydrates and high-fat foods. Alcohol is forbidden, and updated versions of the diet sometimes include additional appetite suppressants, such as daily injections of phentermine or other stimulants.

The HCG diet is typically offered through weight-loss clinics that say they will provide medical supervision.

 

Once you stop the HCG diet, you're likely to regain any weight you lost.

 

So why do this diet??  Why subject yourself to having "pee" - SOMEONE ELSE'S PEE injected into you and still have to stick to a very low calorie diet??  

 

My vote is - I'll do the low calorie diet, keep the pee to yourself!!!

Day 259 ~ 10/5/10 *** TAPEWORM DIET ***

(Below information was pulled from  a couple of articles outlining the Tapeworm Diet)

 

On the road to weight loss insanity. The Tapeworm Diet is an example of such a dangerous step.

 

The tapeworm diet first states in the 1920's and quickly found followers the concept is simple the worms work from the inside out feeding on the food the host and just they are thereby reducing the amount of calories the host absorbs, but in recent years the tapeworm has been outlawed and if this is something you want to try you must turn to the black market. It isn't just illegal in the United States it has mostly been banished in all developed countries, to get your hands on one of these little suckers you must go to some impoverished countries where the beef tapeworm is still legal, the problem is that conditions in which you obtain the tape worm are very unsanitary conditions and they don't typically have access to medicines.

Once inside the body the worms quickly get to work your completely unaware that they're there you do start to lose weight. Dieters can become total gluttons and still lose the weight, you're looking at about four or five weeks before you really start to see changes but many people report they will lose 10 to 12 pounds within a few months well eating whatever they like.

Tapeworm hosts may look fabulous on the outside but what the tapeworm does and the inside is another story altogether. Once ingested and they start to grow tapeworms will break off and they migrate through your digestive system having a food frenzy within your intestines, then they will grow so large and migrate out your anus. People report that this has an extreme psychological and physical effect on them, and report that you should kill them before it gets to this point. You can kill the tapeworm with medication and it said that you can feel the dosage hitting the water is the tapeworm will start to convulse, and that's if it passes very quickly and the next time you go to the bathroom the tapeworm is gone.

 

The Tapeworm inside your gut damages the digestive process. It simply reduces your ability to digest food properly so you can eat more but it won't turn to fat or get stored in your body. This seems like a dream come true, but just remember the risk.

Tapeworm related weight loss products have been banned by the FDA.

SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO   GROSS!!!! 

I was completey nauseated after reading this - I apologize if you are too. 

This is not the way to lose weight!!  I would rather do a MILLION CRAZY Diets before voluntarily putting something in me like this!!!

Day 258 ~ 10/4/10 *** Martha's Vineyard Diet Detox ***

 Tagline of book : Lose 21 Pounds in 21 Days

That will DEFINATELY grab your attention.  What will put you off (it put me off entirely)  afer reading this book is that COLON CLEANSING is part of the diet.

I do not kow about you - but my BUTT is an EXIT ONLY area.  I understand the argument that "stuff" will be exiting...BUT and it's a BIG BUT.....they have to stick something in your BUTT in order to get the "stuff" out. 

I am all for detoxing but through juice fasting or some other means.  I am not looking for invasive assistance.

Colon Cleansing (from Wikipedia)

Colon cleansing (also known as colon therapy) encompasses a number of alternative medical therapies intended to remove feces and nonspecific toxins from the colon and intestinal tract. Colon cleansing may take the form of colon hydrotherapy (also called a colonic or colonic irrigation) or oral cleansing regimens such as dietary supplements. During the 2000s internet marketing and infomercial's of colon supplements increased.

Some forms of colon hydrotherapy use enemas to inject water, sometimes mixed with herbs or with other liquids, into the colon via the rectum using special equipment. Oral cleaning regimes use dietary fiber, herbs, dietary supplements, or laxatives. Practitioners believe that accumulations of putrefied feces line the walls of the large intestine and that these accumulations harbor parasites or pathogenic gut flora, causing nonspecific symptoms and general ill-health. This "auto-intoxication" hypothesis is based on medical beliefs of the Ancient Egyptians and Greeks and was discredited in the early 20th century.

No scientific evidence supports the alleged benefits of colon cleansing. The bowel itself is not dirty and barring drugs, disease or mechanical blockage, cleans itself naturally without assistance. Certain enema preparations have been associated with heart attacks and electrolyte imbalances, and improperly prepared or used equipment can cause infection or damage to the bowel. Frequent colon cleansing can lead to dependence on enemas to defecate and some herbs may reduce the effectiveness of prescription drugs.

The diet talks about food combining and what you can experience (or look forward to) in the first week of doing this diet: Headaches, Nausea, Acne, Fatigue, Sleeplessness, Constipation, Diarrhea, Runny Nose and earaches.  If you are having your colon cleansed - why would you be constipated?  I can see the diarrhea (tube up butt to make that happen)....???

Overall the Martha's Vineyard Diet Detox program is a fruit and vegetable fast, with the addition of enzymes and colon cleansing. On the program dieters have three choices: a 2 day plan, a 7 day option or the full 21 day detox. The daily schedule for all three is the same:

Breakfast - high-density antioxidant berry drink, an herbal cleansing formula, a cup of hot herbal tea and eight ounces of water.
Midmorning Snack -  eight ounces of water and eight ounces herbal tea.
Lunch consists of either one cup of fresh vegetable juice, eight ounces of water, the herbal cleansing formula and an enzyme capsule.
Mid-afternoon Snack - repeat of the midmorning snack.
Late-afternoon Snack -   either a high-density antioxidant or berry drink.
Dinner -  one cup of homemade cleansing soup, one cup of broth, one cup of herbal tea, some more herbal cleansing formula, eight ounces of water and another enzyme capsule.
Evening Snack - either eight ounces of water or tea.
At bedtime, dieters take an Aloe Vera supplement.

For exercise, followers of the Martha's Vineyard Diet Detox are to walk one mile a day or other exercise for 20 minutes. Those following the 21 day plan are also advised to have one colonic and one coffee enema each week. Dieters using the 7 day or 2 day version should skip the colonic, but still should have one coffee enema to detoxify.

COMPLETELY PASSING ON this one!!  Again, I would consider a juice fast...but not this!!