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Weight Loss Help
Weight Loss Help

Weight loss-with help or on your own?

One of the most common reasons for the failure of weight loss efforts is the sense of isolation and lack of support. People on diet are not much fun to be around when going to restaurants, pubs or bars. It is even worse at home, where they constantly try to induce the rest of the family to switch to the low calorie-high fiber diet, banning sweets and junk food from entering the house. Often, the pressure from friends and family and their lack of support result in dieters giving up and regaining even that little weight they have managed to lose. That is the reason for the increased popularity, and success, of a number of commercial weight loss programs.

People are often skeptical when asked to pay quite a high fee in order to be told what to eat, how much and how often in order to lose weight. But, scientists recently proved that commercial weight loss programs have almost ten times more success in weight loss than self-run programs.The two-year long study involving six different medical centers in the USA recently published results of the monitoring of about 300 people trying to lose weight, half of them using one of the commercial programs, and half various self-organized plans. At the end of two years, the scientists found that people using commercial programs lost in average 2.9 kg, while people who run their own diets lost only 0.2 kg.

It is interesting to note that the difference was not so big after the first year, proving that the commercial programs offer kind of support necessary in order to maintain weight loss long term, which people who try to lose weight alone do not have.

It has been evident for a long time that the only way to lose weight long term is to radically change way of life, what often means changes that require sacrifices, changes in behavior and habits that family members, coworkers and friends are not ready to support. Weight loss programs, on the other hand, offer membership in a kind of club in which everyone has the same goal, and often the same problem. Programs like Weight Watchers have chat rooms on the internet, and live meetings all over the world, in which people get together and exchange their experiences. They often find someone they can talk to when they have difficulties with their program, and can swap various recipes and information on supplements they tried.

Programs like Jenny Craig or Slim Fast offer prepackaged food for those who cannot cope with calorie-counting or who have difficulty putting together balanced meals.

According to the Consumer Search study of a number of different commercial weight loss programs, the three most successful are Weight Watchers for its overall success, Slim Fast for its prepackaged meals and Dean Ornish Eat More Weight Less for vegetarians.

Commercial weight loss programs are not the only source of help for those who are trying to lose weight. Large corporations often have informal competitions among co-workers, challenging each other to lose most weight in a certain number of months. Family doctors are also an excellent source of information. Many health centers have dietitians who are trained to help with creating balanced meals. Health clubs are, of course, an excellent support system. They often have dietitians on board, and many members are more than willing to share their 'secrets of success' with others. Unfortunately, many health clubs are pushing diet pills and supplements, to help those members who are in body building competitions or are professional athletes.

Internet offers vast source of information, in fact too much information, not all of it useful or reliable, making it difficult for dieters to chose the right one. Weight loss product manufacturers often have wonderfully looking websites attracting number of customers who do not bother to verify the information available.

Regardless of which form of support you chose, it is evident that support is needed if you expect to stick to your diet, and it even does not matter which kind of diet. It is often enough to have one friend to go through the whole process with. Ideally, it is a spouse, and it is possible to make it fun dieting together, even competing who will lose more weight or more inches at the waist. The results are ideal: whole family switching to more healthy nutrition and lifestyle.




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