The Diet is Working

Well, I lost two pounds yesterday, although I tinkered with the diet somewhat.

Here's my new rules:
1. Instead of skipping breakfast, as Lewis suggests, I'm eating a normal breakfast (I eat breakfast with my hubby and I don't want to look obsessive!).
2. I eat 5 bites at lunch and dinner, not including negative calorie/low calorie foods like vegetables.
3. As for the bites, I eyeball it. I take extremeley small bites and I would starve to death if I only had five bites at lunch and dinner.
4. Lewis says you can have all the "diet" beverages you want. I am letting myself have all the beverages I want, within reason. I don't drink soda, but I have juice with breakfast and I'm not cutting that out.

After counting up what I ate yesterday, it added up to 1200 calories. A perfectly reasonable diet! I always take a multi vitamin anyway, so I'm sticking to that aspect of his diet.

Overall, I would say this is a great diet and I plan on sticking with it, though I wouldn't follow his guidelines to the letter.

Anna Wintour's Diet

Vogue's famed editor-in-chief, Anna Wintour, is said to maintain her figure through a power lunch consisting of rare red meat and a salad (no dressing). She orders her meat every day from Royalton Hotel. She also never stays at a party for more than the first 15 minutes, which probably helps limit her snacking on canapes.

Although Wintour claims in this month's edition of Vogue that she wants to bring a new, more athletic look to the pages of Vogue, don't hold your breath.

Vogue's editor at large, Leon Talley, once said of Wintour: "Most of the Vogue girls are so thin, tremendously thin, because Miss Anna (Wintour) don't like fat people."

Welcome to Slim Luxe

Real luxury means living healthy. You may have noticed that most celebrities are in great shape. That's because they spend significantly on taking care of their bodies. Generally, people with higher incomes are the most healthy, slim, and active. More than half of all Americans are overweight or obese and the percentages are highest among low income groups. They simply are not getting enough activity and are eating poorly.

The stress of life at low educational and socioeconomic levels is considered a direct cause of obesity. However, if you can help reduce some of these stresses and take time out for yourself, you can help to avoid these problems and improve your quality of life.

I created this blog in order to address some of these issues and provide tips for healthy living that are accessible to almost everyone.

Five Bite Diet

Have you heard of the five bite diet? In his book Why Weight Around, Dr. Alwin C. Lewis promotes a simple crash diet he argues will make the pounds fall off and make your stomach shrink. I'm going to try it out! It sounds rather unhealthy in the long term, but I don't think it will hurt to follow it for one week.

Here's the rules:
1. Eat a regular, well-balanced breakfast
2. Eat five bites of food for lunch
3. Five bites for dinner
4. Have as many zero calories beverages as you want
5. Eat at least 1 bite of protein
You can see Lewis describe his diet on Extra. He claims that after 3 days, you won't feel hungry any longer.

IMHO this is a wretched crash diet with a decidedly tabloid touch, but I'll do my best to reserve judgement. However, despite the negatives, it has a few benefits that are likely to make it successful:
1. Easy to follow. People get confused by complex diets and this is about as simple as it gets.
2. Heavy restriction means that your stomach will shrink (one of Dr. Alwin C. Lewis main arguments--he calls it a "surgery-free gastric bypass").
3. Cravings are satisfied. In small amounts. This keeps you from bingeing.
Dr. Alwin C. Lewis claims that people will lose as much as 15 pounds per week. I am going with a more conservative 5 pounds (I'm not sure how I will be able to justify all this to my husband. I'm sure I can do it at lunch, but dinner may be another story).

Celebrity BMIs

Would you like your body to look like one of your favourite celebrities? One of the best ways to start is to find a celebrity whose body type is similar to your own and is of a similar height. Then take a look at their BMI, or Body Mass Index. Body mass index (BMI) is a measure of body fat based on height and weight that applies to both adult men and women.

Try to get your own BMI to the same level, work out consistantly, and your bodies will look alike. This is better than going by weight alone, because if you are 5'10 and want to look like say, Audrey Hepburn, (who was 5'6")you don't need to weigh what Audrey does in order to look the same--you can add a few pounds to her weight in order to be the same size. BMI is the most accurate way to do this.

Here are a few celebrities BMI's:
Eva Longoria
Height: 5ft 2in
BMI: 17.4
Eva Longoria keeps in shape by kickboxing two or three times a week, adding, 'The rest of the time I do yoga, stairs and a little weight training. But I'm lucky because I don't put on weight very easily.'

Victoria Beckham
Height: 5ft 6in
BMI: 15.3 (rather underweight)
Reports have suggested that Victoria Beckham eats steamed fish, vegetables and salad a day to maintain her slim figure. Victoria insists that her stick-thin physique is down to watching what she eats and working out: 'I eat really healthy, and love Japanese food, lots of fish, any sort of fish, any sort of vegetable, lots of fruit, that kind of thing. Every now and then I go out and eat what I like.'


Lindsay Lohan
Height: 5ft 6in
BMI: 18
Lindsay denies that lost weight because of pressure to look thin. She maintains that she "wanted to get rid of a few pounds, that's all. Image is important, but that's not why I lost weight. I just like to look good and be healthy.'

Beyoncé Knowles
Height: 5ft 6in
BMI: 23.1

Beyoncé went on a crash maple syrup diet to lose a staggering 20lbs in just 10 days for the 'Dreamgirls' movie. She literally existed on glasses of lemon and maple syrup with cayenne pepper for the entire diet.

Angelina Jolie
Height: 5ft 7in
BMI: 15.3 - underweight
While preparing for the role of Lara Croft in 'Tomb Raider', Angelina used kickboxing, canoeing, yoga and even street fighting to really get herself into the role. She ate steamed beef, sea bass and vegetables, cut out sugar and drank only soya milk.

Jessica Alba
Height: 5ft 6in
BMI: 17.8
Jessica admits that she has to work hard to maintain her slim figure. According to 'Us Weekly', Jessica works out five times a week and has followed a healthy eating plan since she was just 12 years old.

Jennifer Lopez
Height: 5ft 6in
BMI: 20 - healthy
Jennifer Lopez is proud of her voluptuous frame. 'I couldn't ever be a size zero. I just don't see how I could get down to that size and still be healthy. I have a butt, I have boobs, I have a woman's curves; there is no way I would see them go to size zero.' Still, she works out for hours each day to preserve her celebrated figure!

BMI source: Handbag

Dieting Basics--10 Important Facts to Keep in Mind

1. A pound of fat equals 3500 calories, so most diets that claim to cause extremely rapid weight loss are lying to you. You may lose more weight in water (up to ten pounds) at the beginning of a diet, but after that, your weight loss will slow considerably, so don't get discouraged!

2. To lose 1 pound of fat a week, cut 500 calories from your diet each day. To lose 2 pounds, cut 1000 calories, and so on.

3. Burning another 500 calories per day through exercise will also help you lose a pound. Walking is one of the best ways to do this, because you can be sure you're losing fat rather than muscle, since running and other intense cardio activities force your body to access its glycogen stores (more on this in the next point).

4. Have you ever been doing great on a diet, eaten a slice of cake and then stepped on the scale the next day to see that you've gained 3 pounds? How could you gain 3 pounds from a slice of cake? It's simple: You can't. Our bodies have something called a glycogen storage. Our bodies store extra energy as glycogen. Think of glycogen as "a fuel tank full of stored carbohydrate. Some glycogen is stored in the liver and some is stored the muscles themselves. This energy weighs more than a pound and it’s packaged with 3-4 pounds of water when it’s stored. Your glycogen supply will shrink during the day if you fail to take in enough carbohydrates." for more info on water retention, check out this site

So, basically, if you overdo the carbs, your body will "save them" for the near future in your glycogen storage tank. If you don't use up that storage, it will turn to fat.

5. If you restrict calories excessively, your metabolism will slow down and you might even gain weight.

What can you do about this? Exercise. It's an amazing way to boost your metabolism. Also, exercising ensures that you will be losing fat, not muscle. If you lose too much muscle, you will be burning calories because muscle uses calories even when your sitting. Fat tissue, sadly, burns no calories and is pretty much totally useless.

6. A calorie is a calorie, is a calorie. Sort of. You should try to eat well, but remember, if you eat a low or non-fat diet and consume 3000 calories a day, you are going to gain weight, even if you don't eat a gram of fat. Portion control is absolutely essential.

7. It doesn't matter what time of day you eat! Obviously it's best to spread your calories out--you'll feel less hungry. But if you have a big event in the evening that you "save up" calories for, you'll still lose weight. If you want a drink in the evening, it's okay to cut out a soda in the afternoon, etc.

8. Related issue: It doesn't really matter how many times you eat each day! Eating 6 mini meals may keep you from getting hungry, but it's not a recipe for automatic weight loss. If you have social occassions where you need to eat, save your calories for those occassions!

9. There should be no "forbidden foods" you may have an occassion where you must eat, say, chocolate cake or you'll look antisocial. Just determine how much you'll be eating ahead of time and stick to it.

10. People seem to think that models and actresses are thin because they get lipo and have personal trainers. That's what the tabloids say because they want to make jealous people happy. Sorry--it's simply not true. While some celebrities may take advantage of lipo, it can't make you look amazing. Celebs look awesome because they work incredibly hard and they are MOTIVATED. Everyone can look like a model or actress. It is no lie. It's about determination and dedication. Do you have it in you? Then you'll succeed.