On the Edge of Overweight

One young woman is on the border of being normal weight and overweight as far as the BMI measurement is concerned. She says she has lost a lot of muscle mass and replaced it with fat and that her weight has been creeping up over the last couple of years and she is determined to do something about it. She wants to lose 25 pounds but she will be happy with fifteen. She just went out and bought a Weight Watchers cookbook and has started to count points. See her weight loss story here.

Losing Muscle Mass While Dieting

Losing muscle mass is one of the problems of aging. Our bodies start losing muscle when we get to about thirty years old. By 50 years, the typical person has lost about 10% of their muscle mass. By age 80 we are shrivelled up and have lost 40% of our muscle mass.

Tom Valeo explains that if we lose 20 pounds while dieting but not exercising, about 8 of those pounds will be muscle. If we then gain the weight back and then diet again we will lose more muscle. See how to avoid this muscle loss while dieting here.

A Virtual Model for Weight Loss

Would you like to see what you might look like if you achieved your goal weight? Jacqueline has discovered another neat virtual model online where you can plug in your current weight and goal weight. This virtual model shown here was created by NutriSystem.

Also check out the free weight loss virtual model at Cosmetic Makeovers as well as the version called My Virtual Model that is used used by retailers such as Lands End for visualizing what clothes may look like on you at your current size and goal weight.

The Not So Macho Diet

Battlerocker has been successful in losing thirty pounds over the last three or four months. He is losing weight the 'non-masculine' way. Here's a funny passage from his blog;

As part of a general lifestyle change I began earlier this year, I’ve been counting calories. It sucks. Not because it isn’t working, or because I’m having a hard time with it; between dieting and working out I’ve lost about thirty pounds in three months while putting on a lot of muscle mass in the process. What I hate about it is that it’s so boring. It doesn’t have a name, for example. Atkins, South Beach, The Zone; they all seem so modern. “Hi, I’m Science and I’m here to help,” that sort of thing. Not counting calories. It’s the stone wheel of the diet world.

It’s also not very masculine. The great thing about the low-carb type diets is that when you go out with friends, you can be macho and order the 48 ounce T-bone if you want to. No one suspects its part of your “diet.” Not so with calorie counting. Any time you start asking whether or not the “dressing” is fat free, you just know the guys are going to be impressed. So impressed, in fact, that they’ll probably keep bringing it up the rest of the night, with some congratulatory arm punches thrown in for good measure.

The completely unrelated image above is a fridge magnet for sale at AllPosters.com

Pregnant and Gaining Lots of Weight

Here's a photo of the beautiful Salma Hayek. She is pregnant and expecting her first child at the age of forty. It looks like she will be gaining more than the recommended 35 pounds during this pregnancy. Hayek has never been overweight in her life but she is known for her big boobs. She is a famous actress and the executive producer of the TV hit Ugly Betty. Here's a short video clip of her from just a few months ago on Ugly Betty where she shows off her bra and her very fit 40 year old figure to the world.

Down with the Pepperoni Sticks

DANIGIRL is doing well on her diet but she writes an entertaining story about how she fell off the wagon last week with pepperoni sticks. She notes that a single ten inch pepperoni stick has 187% of the daily recommended amount of sodium and 202% of recommended daily saturated fat intake.

I was doing so well on watching what I was eating, until the week I ate FOUR ENTIRE PEPPERONI STICKS. And not just those little ones, either, but the ones as long as your forearm. What the hell causes a normal person to eat FOUR pepperoni sticks in a week (cough cough four days cough), you ask? My brother has this totally amazing butcher near his house, and he makes spicy pepperoni to die for. My folks visited one weekend and brought no less than six pepperoni sticks home for me.

I'm telling you, that stuff is meat mixed with crack. I'd cut myself a small piece and put it back in the fridge, intentionally hiding it behind other stuff so I couldn't see it. I'd finish the bite I'd cut and start smacking my lips, salivating for more. Okay, I'd think, just another little piece, just a tiny bite. I'll eat less at dinner. And after cutting off some more, I'd put the pepperoni away and the knife in the dishwasher and I'd still be back in the fridge five minutes later looking for more. And once it was half gone, well, there's no sense in leaving it around for me to agonize over all night, right? Might as well polish it off. And at about the 3/4 mark, with my mouth tingling from the spiciness, I'd start to think that maybe I should stop now, but I wouldn't be able to stop and so I'd just eat the whole damn thing. And then I'd have a righteous bellyache, because that's really a disgusting amount of meat and fat(*) to consume as a snack. And yet, the next day I'd be right back at it, cutting myself just the tiniest sliver of the next one, just for a taste.

Watch Valerie Go from Size 14 to a Size 8

Valerie Bertinelli wants to lose thirty pounds. She's not telling anyone how much she weighs (she is 5'2" tall) but she says she is a size 14 and wants to be a size 8 by September.

Bertinelli is featured on the cover of People Magazine this week. The other photo here is Bertinelli when she was at least 20 years younger and very slim.

Bertinelli is 47 years old and says that by becoming the new spokesperson for Jenny Craig (together with Kirstie Alley), she will be very motivated to lose the weight especially as millions of people will be watching.