Louisa's Weight Loss Blog

Jonny is my lovely boyfriend. Jonny and I are trying to lose a bit of weight but Jonny likes beer. We have realised that this is more problematic than we originally thought.

Beer is hugely popular but not good for calories counters

Bless him, he gave up beer for only a couple of weeks and he lost 7lbs with no extra effort. Unfortunately, he’s put the weight back on and this makes him sad which in turn makes me sad. I don’t like being sad so I’m on a fact-finding mission…

Anyway, I’ve found a website called Aleuminati  (I’m waiting for my membership to be confirmed) but once I get on the forums, I’m hoping to be able to source the best beers for dieters. After all, we should all get to enjoy a little of what we fancy as long as we don’t take it too far and get ‘rat-arsed’ every night and drink 1000 calories in the process!

Watch this space – I’m hoping to find out what the tastiest beers are that are diet-friendly too!

Will surgery really help you to lose weight?

Going under the knife seems like a drastic method to lose weight, after all, anaesthetic can be deadly and things could go wrong if you pick the wrong doctor…

Z-list celebrity Kerry Katona infamously put herself through thousands of pounds worth of cosmetic surgery to acheive her ideal body after having four children understandably took its toll.

The trouble with Kerry was that she wasn’t willing to put in the hard work to keep the weight off, so she piled on the lbs as her life continued to spiral out of control.

Are you thinking about liposuction?

There is no shame in turning to a surgeon for help when it comes to losing weight. If you have turned to diet and exercise and lost a lot of weight but the last few lbs are tough to shift then lipo really could be for you. The only problem is if you don’t change your diet and exercise programme accordingly, you are likely to put weight back on and waste your time and money.

There are two types of liposuction:

• There is a more aggressive form where a tube (called a cannula) is inserted into the fatty area and pushed in and out whilst a vacuum literally pumps out all the fat in the required area. This is done under a general anaesthetic and can be painful. Patients are required to wear structured underwear for a few weeks otherwise remaining fat could become lumpy and uneven.
• Tumescent Liposuction is much simpler and more for those who can’t shift stubborn pockets of fat. A solution is injected into the problem area and over time the fat dissolves. There are less side effects and the recovery time is considerably quicker than traditional liposuction.

Do I approve of people who choose liposuction as a weight loss method? I don’t approve of liposuction for people who need to lose a lot of weight and have not tried other options first, however, I am practical enough to understand that these treatments are available and are the right choice for some people.

Cosmetic treatments like this aren’t the easy way out as keeping the weight off is YOUR job, not the surgeon’s. If you are contemplating a treatment like liposuction, ask yourself the following questions first, the correct answer should be obvious:

1. Can I achieve the same results without treatment?
2. Is the doctor I’ve chosen fully qualified and experienced?
3. Do I like and trust my doctor?
4. Is this my decision or am I under pressure from someone else?
5. What are the risks involved?
6. How long until I can resume normal activities?
7. Will I be reviewed after the treatment?
8. Will I need pain relief?
9. How frequently does the doctor I have chosen carry this procedure out?
10. Will there be any added costs?

Last week, I was sat watching the TV minding my own business when an advert came up through the TV and smacked me right in the face. Well, obviously not literally but I was surprised all the same.

The advert was for a cd box set of 5 cds that is purely songs to go running too. 101 of them to be precise.

Now, a lot of them clearly are not my taste in music but my biggest problem is how the b****y hell are you meant to run to The Fray’s ‘how to save a life‘? It’s hardly upbeat and positive and if anything, the line “I would have stayed up with you all night had I known how to save a life” catches me in the throat every time as we spent 2 days by my grandmother’s hospital bed watching her slowly slip away back in 2006. P!nk’s ‘Who Knew‘ still gets me with the line ‘If someone said three years from now, you’d be long gone, I’d stand up and punch them out, cos they’re all wrong. I know better, cos you said for ever.’ Anyway, I digress but my point was that songs like that are hardly running songs.

If I am running, I like to listen to very noisy rock or even metal music with the exact intention of drowning out my thoughts because sometimes they can be rather loud. ‘Meds‘ by Placebo has a bit that just sounds like noise and it clears any bad thoughts from my head so I love running to it.

Why should you run to music?

• Music can help lower your perception about the amount of effort you’re putting into your workout. It’s almost as if your mind and body separate, and if you’re into your music enough, you can ignore the niggling aches that would have bothered you when you weren’t listening to anything at all.
• Listening to music as you run can help you develop a more effective running technique i.e. how your foot hits the floor and the follow through (take notice of the beats per minute)
• If you match the tempo of the music to your pace, you can reduce the amount of oxygen you need by 6%! (source: www.runtothebeat.co.uk)

I don’t rate this CD very highly as I believe that you should create your own playlists that match your pace and ability perfectly. If you’re more of a placid jogger, running to house music isn’t going to help! Digital music players make creating your own playlists a doddle but if you really can’t live without this 5 cd boxset, you can get it from Amazon

Netball can be a great social activity as well as a means to lose weight

I was meant to be going to a Netball club this evening but as it’s at a school and it’s half term this week, it was off until next week. Jonny has been trying to get me to do this since I moved up to Nottingham as I haven’t made any of my own friends. Obviously this is hard was hard with no income but also no confidence. I always hated admitting I was unemployed too. Now that I’m working and I’m settling into the job, I’ve found myself yet again in quite a male environment. The few girls who are there are nice enough but I don’t see us sat on my bed wearing pajamas, drinking wine and plaiting each others hair!

I was disappointed about waiting for another week but I persevered and did a fitness DVD instead this evening. Exercise DVDs are great, every celebrity that has ever lost more than half a stone in weight has one.

The fitness DVD that I did this evening was a Ministry of Sound one with Deanne Berry. I found the outfits rather off-putting as Deanne was wearing some leotard with the sides cut out and the people to the side of her were all in shiny boxing shorts, boots and bikinis. Weird…. Other than that, the DVD itself is excellent if you’re quite coordinated. Unfortunately, I am not in the slightest bit coordinated which means that I trip up in normal aerobics classes and today on my own was no exception. I’m very glad that no one was watching me wave my arms and legs about like a loony! You can create your own workout in an interactive mode so you can make it as intense or relatively low impact as you need to. You do need a good level of fitness to complete the DVD but I see this as a good challenge to work towards rather than being sad that I can’t do it straight off.

You are quite likely to associate knee-high boots with hookers and Julia Roberts in the film Pretty Woman but this autumn, knee-high boots are an oh-so-stylish must have item. What people don’t realise it that knee-high boots don’t HAVE to look slutty. They will of course look tacky if you wear them with a mini skirt and  have a vast amount of cleavage on display but they can look quite classy if you are smart about what you wear them with.

Knee high boots can be stylish

Try wearing them to work with a mid-length pencil skirt. Not only will they keep your legs warm on cold winter days, you don’t have to shave your legs!

They can also be worn with skinny  or straight leg jeans for a more casual look. The great thing is that they can be dressed up and dressed down depending on the situation. In a recession, the more wear you can get out of your shoes, the better!

I speak to many dieters over my days and a common complaint about knee high boots is that they don’t fit around a person’s calf muscles. I am very lucky as no matter how large I have been, my calves are relatively skinny. My twin sister has trouble finding boots as her calves are a different shape to mine as she’s built up muscle at the gym. Thus, walking into a shoe shop is a NIGHTMARE if she wants boots. Never fear, I have discovered a way for ladies with larger calves to wear fashionable boots. Yay!

Duo Boots offer their boots in 21 (yes, twenty one) calf sizes. They have ditched the traditional ‘one size fits all feet’ approach and embraced the concept of High Street price couture. The boots aren’t cheap-cheap (between £120-£250) but the boots are effectively made to your measurements which you will never get in a traditional high street shop and certainly not normally for this price range. The female shopping theory is, the more you wear an item, the better value it is!

Just because you’re in the process of losing weight it doesn’t mean a love of fashion should go out the window! Even Coleen Rooney is apparently a fan! Remember, even slim women can have chunky calves!!

I sometimes appear a bit aggressive and hard-nosed at times. Having been raised in a family of strong women who won’t stand for any messing, I am very confident in asserting my beliefs and opinions whether they are requested or not. Underneath this no-nonsense exterior, I am an absolute sucker for looking after the vulnerable and one of the things that makes me really sad is elderly people alone in the world with no one to look after them. After all, nobody actually sets out in life to be Eleanor Rigby!

I set out this morning intending to review Innocent smoothies but something else on their website caught my eye…

Innocent have launched a campaign called ‘The Big Knit’. Basically, Innocent and Sainsbury’s have teamed up with the intention of donating 35p per bottle of smoothie sold to Age Concern and Help the Aged. They want to raise £250,000 so that these charities can fund projects and advice centres that enable older people to cook nourishing and yummy food, even living on just a state pension. It is a crime that 10% of the UK population over the age of 65 is malnourished. It doesn’t have to be that way and with better education and information made available to our more vulnerable citizens, this can be turned around and it is everyone’s responsibility to get involved.

How do you know that you are buying a special pack? This is the fun bit, the bottle will be wearing a knitted hat!

Behatted Innocent Smoothie - look out for and buy these!

Innocent are even having a competition, asking people to knit little hats and to send pictures of their designs to their Flickr page. They are doing a ‘hat of the week’ contest that starts this month. If you want to enter your own knitted designs, the closing date is 16th October. (For more information, click on the picture to your left.)

I’m not making any money from this, so why am I raving about The Big Knit and asking that you buy little bottles of smoothies with the cute hats on?

Nutrition is not just an issue that effects the elderly. People who are malnourished are more likely to become ill in the old winter months. This includes dieters who are trying to lose weight but not taking into consideration the value of the fewer calories that they eat.

It is so easy to become carried away with dieting, you cut the ‘naughty’ foods out of your diet or you reduce your consumption massively. When dieting, the biggest thing to remember is: EAT FOR NUTRITIONAL VALUE. Foods like rice cakes are low in calories but they have a very high Glycemic Index (or GI) and they are not filling and have as much nutritional value as paper. Empty calories are worthless and you should make the calories you eat count. Your body needs fibre, fat, carbohydrate, protein etc and this is never going to change. If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a million times: there is no point in being thin if you are not healthy. Your health is reflected in your skin, your hair, your nails and even your eyes and smile. Losing weight is meant to improve your life and your health, if this is not your aim then maybe you should reconsider your motives for weight loss.

Yesterday I went to the supermarket especially to buy Jonny some beer. This is because I love him very much so when he is happy, I am happy. Women tend to automatically come to this conclusion about happiness whereas Homer Simpson in the Simpsons movie had to have what appeared to be an LSD trip. I suspect there are lots of men out there who probably need a similar experience to come to the same conclusion about the happiness of their loved-ones!

Anyhoo, whilst I was playing the dutiful girlfriend, I was intending to be naughty and buy some orange juice for me… until I happened across a 2 for £4 offer on the 1 litre Innocent smoothies at Tesco. They were the ‘super foods’ ones and I decided to treat myself to smoothies and review them on the website. Of course, anything in the name of research for my beloved TotalChunk!

When I got home, I tried the pomegranate, blueberry and acai first with a low expectation. I have had Innocent smoothies before and whilst they are nice enough, I’ve thought them rather expensive for what they were… until now. The pomegranate, blueberry and acai smoothie was fecking amazing!! I am not a woman who is easily impressed but a small 250ml glass made my stomach feel satisfied as if I’d eaten a hearty snack and the taste was incredible.

What is in this ‘wonder drink’?

• 76 red and white grapes
• 2 1/2 mashed bananas
• 1 1/2 crushed pomegranate
• 2 squeezed oranges
• 160 crushed blueberries
• 100 acai berries
• a squeeze of fresh lemon juice

Innocent Pomegranate, Blueberry and Acai Smoothie is yummy!

A 250ml glass (or quarter of the carton) is worth 2 of your five recommended fruit and veg portions in a day. I would suggest however that you limit yourself to one glass a day because of the high sugar content. Even though the sugar content is naturally occurring in the fruit, you should be aware that sugar ought to be limited by people on calorie controlled diets. Saying this, Innocent do not add sugar to their smoothies and the benefits far outweigh this negative aspect if you stick to one 250ml glass per day.

I am yet to try the guava, mango and goji berry smoothie but this one has almost 10% more fibre than the acai, blueberry and pomegranate one so I am very much looking forward to opening the bottle! If you are on a diet and trying to get antioxidants and other good vitamins into your body, this is a good way to do it. I highly recommend this product and if I see it on offer at the supermarket, I will DEFINITELY buy it again.

9/10 – I love the taste and a 250ml glass is beautifully filling, particularly at 10am but it should be drunk in moderation and this makes me sad because I can’t get enough of the yumminess!

I have been using wii fit to weigh myself for this weight loss experiment, partly because I have convinced myself that bathroom scales are evil and inaccurate! It is also partly because I can use it to do light exercise on the days when I might not want to brave the elements.

When wii fit was released, it was unlike any other ‘game’ released before as you can’t use it like a traditional console game – sat down and staring at the screen like a zombie! To play the game, you have to move and the wii balance board detects your movements, genius!

When wii fit first came out I was a nightmare! My free time revolved around trying to get my hot, sweaty mitts on one. I remember when I finally secured one… I was meant to be working but I dashed outside to make the vital phone call. It wasn’t as cheap as I had hoped, I bought it in a bundle with wii play, mario kart and other games for the princely sum of £150. It was a lot of money for a hard-up receptionist to part with but at the time and even now, I still believe it was worth it!

Despite my intense desire to own a wii fit, I have only used it sporadically. A bit contribution to that is because I didn’t have much room to use it and ‘the crocodile’ was hard to do in my living room! The yoga and the muscle exercises wer very helpful last year when I was training to ‘run 10k’ for Cancer Research as it was great for warming up and cooling down.

A muscle exercise on wii fit

I love wii fit, I cannot deny it is fun, it is innovative and it is exciting. Watching my sister’s father in law play the hula hoop was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen! The penguin slide is so sweet and Jonny is brilliant at heading the footballs! However, it doesn’t offer enough by way of aerobic exercise which is the best way to burn fat. I think Step is alright and Hula Hoop is brilliant for comic value and getting your heart working harder but jogging leaves a lot to be desired. I find that my calf muscles become very tense as you’re just bouncing on the spot and it’s easy to cheat just by swinging your arm! I do like boxing but I struggle with the foot coordination! I am still baffled by Zazen because the high score list is just me x10 scoring 180 for it. How hard is it to sit still for three minutes? Do school children no longer spend an hour in assembly sat on the floor with their legs crossed rendering them incapable of sitting perfectly still?!

I expect wii fit will soon be eclipsed by something better Nintendo has on the drawing board, but so far, the extra motion sensors and other fitness related games such as Winter Resort appear to be doing nothing to hinder the popularity of wii fit. I can’t wait to see what they bring out next.

My final problem with wii fit is that it places a high emphasis on a person’s BMI, as I intend to show in later advice posts, a person’s body mass index is not a reliable indicator of a person’s health. It fulfils a purpose but I think wii fit could be enhanced with a diet section as it is hard to lose weight if you are not putting the right fuel into your body.

Ultimately, wii fit is a brilliant product, it has arrived just in time and I really believe it has revolutionised console gaming, I simply wish they had fine-tuned some of the activities like ‘jogging’ and included an advice bit on diet. I give wii fit an 8/10 rating. Wii fit is not a substitute for exercise but for those who are not used to exercise, it is an excellent starting point.