Dieting and Losing Weight over 40

If you are over 40 years of age all the old tricks of fasting, crash diets of all kinds, walking or running miles and miles might not work anymore to stay in shape for a variety of reasons because your body likely is moving into a whole new paradigm. So, staying in shape and losing weight is much different than before you were 40 or more.

The first thing to be aware of is that most people are actually protein starved in their diets and conversely most people are also carboloaders which means that people are literally addicted to bread, pasta, potatoes, rice, and all the things that likely will prevent someone over 40 from losing weight. So, all the crash diets and extreme fasting over 40 are not going to work unless you get enough protein. If your body thinks it is starving for protein no amount of crash dieting will release weight from your body. So, for example some people over 40 (if they could survive this) might not eat anything for 30 or 40 days and not lose a pound of weight because the body is saying, "I'm not going to give up this weight because I'm starving for protein."

However, if you get up in the morning and have some kind of whey protein or soy protein in a drink, first of all you won't be putting your blood sugar for the day at risk by not starting out with enough protein, so you likely won't go into a low blood sugar cascade of hypoglycemia because of not enough protein in the morning over 40. By taking in enough protein in small amounts during the day you can trick your body to begin to release the weight. Yes. I know this isn't as easy as losing weight before you were 40 or 50 but being healthy and surviving your life is important isn't  it?

One method is to give up all carbohydrates like pizza, pasta, bread, butter, rice and potatoes for the first month and instead eat only lean meats and dairy products like Buffalo, turkey, or even Elk which is the leanest meat of all if you can get that. And most vegetables can be eaten in large amounts as long as there isn't a lot of butter or other fattening things on it. There are also soups you can make that are all vegetable soups that are literally no calorie soups that can be helpful. So something like a no calorie vegetable soup with a couple of scoops of cottage cheese might be helpful. In between meals you also need to keep up your protein input by buying something like ultra lean protein bars. Eating something with protein in it about once every 2 hours from the time you get up until about 6 pm at night will keep your apostat (your hunger in control). Also, make it a rule not to eat anything in front of the Television while you are watching because this leads to unconscious eating which is almost always harmful to your ongoing health. Next, you need to journal about every single thing you put into your mouth. This is one way to be more conscious about every single thing you eat. The motto has to become "I don't live to eat, I eat to live". Food cannot be looked upon as a pleasure while you are dieting if you want to be successful. It is something you do to keep your body alive and healthy, nothing else. If you can impress upon yourself that food is not for pleasure, food is for survival then you put food in a survival context and take it out of a pleasure context and then you can be a successful dieter in being just as healthy as you want to be. It is necessary to be very very disciplined about all this for the first month so you begin to see the results. Once you begin to see the results it is much easier to justify this discipline to yourself ongoing.
Good Luck and Long life!

My doctor was telling me that he was a 180 pound man in a 300 pound man's body. And then he proceeded to tell me that he recently had given up all cream in his coffee because he realized that the cream was an extra 2500 calories per week. So, even though he preferred his coffee with cream he just had given cream up to reduce his calories. So now he only puts one sugar in his coffee and no cream at all.

And so he was telling me just how disciplined he has to be to stay at a good weight for him and he is around 60 like myself.

So, as long as you know that basically lean protein is your friend and that basically carbohydrates are your basic enemy in losing weight you likely are on your way to where you want to be going. Like I said most of the extreme things you used to do to stay at your perfect weight before 40 won't work after 40 or 50 so it is important not to think you can just magically stay perfect after 40. That just doesn't work for most people. So, be patient with yourself and know that protein and vegetables are your friend. And within moderation so is fruit as long as you understand that fruit becomes fructose which is a natural sugar in the body. So, too much fruit becomes the same problem to a lesser degree as too much candy after a while. (Even though fruit is usually much healthier in every way). Another useful thing to know is mental acuity (mental clearness) is helped with things like Blueberries and berries of most kinds. So, even though they tend to be expensive (if they are organic) blueberries and other berries especially anything blue or purple tends to help mental clearness over 40.

Another thought is the old addage, "An Apple a day keeps the doctor away". And I would add to that "especially if it is organically grown". So, any food you can buy organically grown just means that your body will have less problems eliminating pesticides or herbicides from itself over time. Because once fruit and vegetables are sprayed you really can't get all of it off. So organic is best if you can afford it. So, a long life starts with being clear enough in your decisions about food to make good decisions ongoing. Have a healthy long life if that is what you wish!