Supplement to assist with weight loss?

[greg_atlanta]

I started taking two products by Grandma's Herbs - SuperLax, and Colon Cleanse.

Stuff like that is a bad idea since you can become dependent on them... better to do it naturally with fiber. Caffeine from coffee or tea also helps (esp. hot green tea).

Red meat is the worst, only eat it sparingly and only eat high quality red meat.

 

[T4phage]

Quote:

(prepster @ 29 Sep. 2004, 03:12) I started taking two products by Grandma's Herbs - SuperLax, and Colon Cleanse.
Stuff like that is a bad idea since you can become dependent on them... Â better to do it naturally with fiber. Â Caffeine from coffee or tea also helps (esp. hot green tea). Red meat is the worst, only eat it sparingly and only eat high quality red meat.
Caffeine is a diuretic, so it won't help. I agree that it is best to get it from natural fibres: cereals, veggies, fruits (esp. prunes). If you want it in a bad way, drink prune juice

 

[jeffgwa]

Unfortunately, ephedra has been banned in the United States since earlier this year, so good luck finding any in this country.

Ephedra has been banned, but Ephedrine is still available at every truck stop in the country being sold as a bronchiodialator. Ephedra/Ma Huang was primairly used for the ephedrine content anyway, so at least this way you know exactly how much your dosing. As someone mentioned earlier, Bill Phillips and many others, supports the use of the ECA stack (ephedrine/caffeine/aspirin). This used to be sold by basically every supplement company pre-made, and you couldn't throw a rock in a GNC without knocking over 5-6 displays of it. Post-ephedra ban, you have to concoct your own. You can order the ephedrine product Vasopro from 1fast400.com for $7.00 for 48 25mg doses (Vasopro also contains 200mg of a rather benign ingredient. It does nothing except make it a lot harder for the pill to be used in making methamphetamines). The amount of caffeine usually used is 200-300mg. No-doz (buy generic), guarana, tea and coffee are all good sources of caffeine. A cup of coffee is around 70mg. I wouldn't even bother with the aspirin. This stack is normally take 3x per day, although you may want to spend a couple days gauging tolerance. The EC stack is great in weight loss, mostly because of the appetite suppression. It makes dieting MUCH easier. Most appetite suppressants, like gacinia cambogia (the one in trimspa) and citrimax are barely more effective than placebo. In fact, in my experience, Citrimax makes me hungrier. The metabolic effects of EC are generally exaggerated. The most you can hope for is a 3-5% increase in metabolic rate which amounts to around 70 calories or so, allowing you to safely add a half can of Coke (or a whole can of C2...

) to your diet. As far as the safety issue, it was greatly blown out of proportion. If you look at the numbers, ephedra caused a negligible increase in heart attack risk for the general public (I can't remember the figure, but it was something like .01%). The big problem with it was idiots that don't read the label. If you have a heart problem, don't take ephedra, or ingest large amounts of caffeine, or run as hard as you can for an hour, or constantly cram cholesterol in your mouth. The other main cause of problems was people taking a considerable amount over the recommended dosage. After taking ephedra/ephedrine regularly for about 2-4, the stimulant effects are far less noticeable. This leads many irresponsible people to increase their dosage to well over 200mg/day. To try and put this into perspective, this would have the same stimulant effect of about 15 cups of coffee. Just about every other weight loss supplement on the market is crap, or caffeine (disguised as guarana) packed into a pill with 30-40 other herbs with cool names but do nothing so you can lose weight naturally. The only ones things I can think of on the market that actually show results, are Yohimbine and Synephrine. Yohimbine is basically useless unless you're already rather lean (<12% body fat) and on a low-carb diet. Synephrine is basically a less effective Ephedrine. Going back to the original post, if you're trying to lose weight low carb can be quite effective if done properly. The Atkins approach is rather impractical though. Unless you're under 15% body fat already, and a restricted calorie diet that did include carbs, your just depriving yourself of a good chunk of foods for no real reason. Atkins "works" (especially in heavier people) because when you take away soda, candy, potato chips, corn chips, Cheetos, ice cream, pretzels, pizza, and basically all fast food you've removed a large portion of the calories people have been eating. Emotional and triggered foods are among these. A craving for chocolate/sweets is often triggered by depression/stress. Many people eat crap like potato chips while watching TV. Foods high in protein and fat also blunt appetite more effectively than carbs, so that also causes less total caloric intake. Most people stay on Atkins because they lost weight rapidly right after the bat. Dramatically decreased carb intake, leads to rapid water loss, which usually accounts for some ungodly percentage (~85%) of the weight lost during the first 2 weeks on Atkins. Yet another problem, is it slows down kidney function, so should you ever eat carbs again, not only does your body pack on all that water you lost, but doesn't know how to handle all those carbs and metabolizes them inefficiently. My advice, is cut calorie intake to about 1800-2000 calories per day coming from fairly balanced amount of the calories coming from carbs, protein and fat. Protein is particularly important. As far as supplements, start with a good multivitamin. If appetite is/becomes a major problem, try EC. If weight loss stops for a few weeks, cut off another 150 calories. Cardiovascular exercise will help, but pace yourself, and try to get at least 30minutes in each session. Weight training can also boost your metabolism, as well as help maintain muscle mass through dieting. If you get to the point where your below 15% body fat and can't seem to shed a pound no matter what you do (or you just like torturing yourself), check out a book titled Ultimate Diet 2.0 by Lyle McDonald. If you can actually tolerate the (painful) training routine and extreme dieting, it will work. Plus, you get to spend a day each week eating basically as much as you can. Definitely not for inexperienced dieters though. Hmmm... I think that's enough for now.

 

[marc37]

l am totally stunned about the non-sense l am reading. Be careful folks. We must attempt weight loss with a balanced diet only.

Be careful of cleansing programs, most are dangerous and will lead you astray.

Be careful of what you read prepster, alot of it is uneducated tomfoolery.

l am so tempted to get started but l am so limited with my time right now. (My secretary left so l am left doing alot of in b/w jobs).

 

[marc37]

The most vital aspect to weightloss is the following: only use diet to lose the weight. lf you depend on excercise the weight loss will not be sustainable over the long term. Trust me here: you can only sustain long-term weightloss by diet and diet only. Amen.

 

[jeffgwa]

The most vital aspect to weightloss is the following: only use diet to lose the weight. lf you depend on  excercise the weight loss will not be sustainable over the long term. Trust me here: you can only sustain long-term weightloss by diet and diet only. Amen.

Right, diet is the most important part of losing weight, but foregoing exercise is ridiculous. Â Your body will breakdown muscle at a much higher ratio than it would with a diet integrating regular exercise. Â Among other things, exercise also allows you to raise your total daily calorie expenditure. Â There's a huge difference between creating a 1,000 kcal deficit by eating 1200 calories a day and no exercise, or by eating 1800 calories a day with an additional 600 calories burned during exercise. Â As soon as you start underfeeding your body makes hormonal adjustments to keep you from starving (slowed metabolic rate, fatigue, increased appetite). Exercise throttles bad hormones response, while helping to maintain good hormone levels. People that diet without exercise find that they end up dieting for months at a time and usually never succeed in looking the way they want in the mirror because muscle is breaking down at an alarmingly faster rate. Â Unless your genetically blessed with amazing nutrient partitioning (which you probably aren't if you're dieting at all) you'll never get six pack abs without diet and exercise. Â So yeah, I suppose if you want crude weight loss, diet exclusively is the way to go. Â But if you want fat loss integrate some cardio and weight training. Edit: Grammar/spelling/clarification.

 

[Bradford]

Ephedra has been banned, but Ephedrine is still available at every truck stop in the country being sold as a bronchiodialator.  

Great post - but what's a bronchiodialator?

Bradford

 

[jeffgwa]

Taken from the Vasopro product description:
&quot;Expectorant Bronchodilator. Take for the temporary relief of shortness of breath, tightness of chest, and wheezing due to bronchial asthma. Helps loosen mucus and thin bronchial secretions to drain bronchial tubes and make cough more productive. &quot;

It's really funny if you do see the truck stop versions. They're individual packaged and have names like &quot;MEGA ENERGY BOOST&quot; and &quot;SUPER BUZZ&quot; in brightly colored packaging. Then when you pick it up it says &quot;take for temporary asthma relief&quot;. The FDA is really funny sometimes.

 

[j]

Bronchodilators open up air passages. The guaifenesin that's usually included in those pills is the expectorant part; it's the main ingredient in Robitussin (sometimes found as Guai-tuss generic). It loosens up phlegm.

 

[greg_atlanta]

Trust me here: you can only sustain long-term weightloss by diet and diet only.

I'm finding that's more and more true, esp. as I get older (32 now). Exercise firms things up, but it also makes me hungry. Cutting way back on alcohol should be the first step for most guys.

 

[faustian bargain]

Quote:

(marc37 @ 30 Sep. 2004, 07:53) The most vital aspect to weightloss is the following: only use diet to lose the weight. lf you depend on  excercise the weight loss will not be sustainable over the long term. Trust me here: you can only sustain long-term weightloss by diet and diet only. Amen.
Right, diet is the most important part of losing weight, but foregoing exercise is ridiculous. Â Your body will breakdown muscle at a much higher ratio than it would using a diet integrating exercise. Â Among other things, exercise also allows you to raise your calories expenditure. Â There's a huge difference between eating 1200 calories a day and no exercise, or 1800 calories a day with an additional 600 calories burned during exercise. Â Exercise throttles bad hormones response, and does it based to maintain good hormone levels. Â As soon as you start underfeeding your body makes adjustments to keep you from starving (slowed metabolic rate, fatigue, increased appetite). Â People that diet without exercise find that they end up dieting for months at a time and usually never succeed in looking the way they want in the mirror because muscle is breaking down at an alarmingly faster rate. Â Unless your genetically blessed with amazing nutrient partitioning (which you probably aren't if you're dieting at all) you'll never get six pack abs without diet and exercise. Â So yeah, I suppose if you want crude weight loss, diet exclusively is the way to go. Â But if you want fat loss integrate some cardio/weight training.
thank you for the antidote to crackpottery. agreed with all of the above, plus one more point: since your metabolism adjusts to the lower calorie intake, you have to keep *lowering* it in order to lose weight, or even to maintain. your body only burns so many calories per day without exercise, and by consuming only that many you will have difficulty maintaining your health. basically you can spiral down into famine condition. not a good look.

 

[jeffgwa]

thank you for the antidote to crackpottery.

agreed with all of the above, plus one more point: since your metabolism adjusts to the lower calorie intake, you have to keep *lowering* it in order to lose weight, or even to maintain. your body only burns so many calories per day without exercise, and by consuming only that many you will have difficulty maintaining your health. basically you can spiral down into famine condition. not a good look.

You're welcome. I'd like to expand a little on the point you made, by noting that for this very reason, diets that include cyclical refeeds (short periods of increased caloric intake during a diet) are the ones that are the most effective. For a long time, it was thought that the weekly &quot;cheat day&quot; that some diets utilize was effective because of the psychological aspect of being to eat food that actually tastes good once a week. Turns out that you're body responds to this by increasing your metabolism.

Generally, a cheat day should not be &quot;go f'n hog wild on ice cream and potato chips for 24 hours&quot; but more in line with eating 100-150% of maintenance calories (2400-3200kcal or so for the average male). But again, only once a week and you'll notice the least side effects (bloating) if you go easy on the fat and sugars.

 

[faustian bargain]

a few years ago i read, actually printed out, an article/interview by bill phillips with some sports nutritionist doctor from scandinavia, which presented a regimen (combined with weightlifting - this was directed at bodybuilders) wherein the 'cycle' was given a period of about 3 weeks on, three weeks off. in the 'on' weeks one would do heavy bulking up, eating like crazy and doing heavy lift workouts. in the 'off' weeks one would pare back on the lifting, do much cardio, and eat a really spare diet. the result was supposed to help stimulate muscle growth by (i think) stimulating hormone levels. the theory was based in evolutionary biology. really interesting, but the level of discipline required scared me. i guess if one is a true bodybuilder already, one has the discipline aspect covered. i forget what it was called - something like the 'ABCDE' program? /andrew ****edit: found it: it's called the Anabolic Burst Cycling of Diet and Exercise (ABCDE)

 

[jeffgwa]

Okay, about a half page in this had already set off my bullshit meter twice. First, it's on MuscleMedia's website, Muscle Media prints a revolutionary new training program every month. This statement was what really got me though:

&quot;In fact, researchers have shown this relatively simple muscle-building &quot;secret&quot; has allowed healthy test subjects, who didn't even train with weights, to put on over 4.38 lbs of lean body mass and 2 lbs of fat in only 12 days.&quot;

First of all, this sounds like bullshit right off the bat, in fact I'm not even sure this is possible, and even if it is, only under certain circumstances. I'll look up the cite later, but for now let's just look at the statement. First of all, lean body mass is subjective, for all we know this could mean water weight, because its not fat. If this is how they got their numbers, I can put on 4.38 lbs of LBM in the next hour.

Secondly, if this was printed 7 years ago, and produced miracle results don't you think the body building community would be all over it? These people inject themselves with chemicals, starve themselves, torture themselves with weight training, etc.; so surely they'd be able to handle this diet. If you check out BB forums, the general consensus is &quot;not enough muscle, too much fat&quot;. Every success story I found noted major tweaks to the overfeeding/anabolic period.

Finally, Bill Phillips, is an author with a product line produced by EAS, one of the larger supplement companies. The original version of this diet has several differences, most of which encourage the sales of EAS/Body For Life products. Hmmm....

 

[faustian bargain]

heh. yeah, bill phillips is a moneymaking machine. the hype and sales pitches are pretty easy to distinguish from the useful information though. you read enough fitness magazines, and your ability to filter out salesmanship is sharpened. i have no idea about the claim with the muscle gain through dieting. seems farfetched, but it's an interesting concept nonetheless - what if you *could* stimulate an anabolic state just by manipulating the diet? the diet itself has little to do with EAS supplements. mr. phillips does interject some 'suggestions' for 'improving' the diet, if i remember correctly.

anyway, just thought i'd toss it out there, as it seemed to relate to the dieting topic.

Secondly, if this was printed 7 years ago, and produced miracle results don't you think the body building community would be all over it? Â These people inject themselves with chemicals, starve themselves, torture themselves with weight training, etc.; so surely they'd be able to handle this diet. Â If you check out BB forums, Â the general consensus is "not enough muscle, too much fat". Â Every success story I found noted major tweaks to the overfeeding/anabolic period.

good point. i stopped doing BB research some time ago, so i never really found out if that diet caught on. i wish they had a followup article. /andrew