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Sticking to a diet is easier said than done. The success of any diet plan depends whether you can stick to it long term or not.

With so many temptations that surround you including restaurant meals, hot fudge sundaes and dinner with friends, it can be very challenging to adhere in a diet.

With this, it’s important to know and practice some techniques on how to stay on a diet.

8 Tricks to Make You Stick on Your Diet

1. Set realistic diet goals

Setting the right goal is the first thing to do if you’re planning to follow a diet plan. This means that your goals must be realistic and attainable in order to achieve success.

Likewise, you should also plan sensible eating strategies and focus on your health. This way it will be a lot easier to follow and stay on your diet.

2. Go slow

Diet isn’t all about foods, it also involves lifestyle changes. It follows that success doesn’t happen overnight. If you want to succeed in your quest to lose weight, the best thing to do is to go slow.

Starving yourself isn’t a good idea as it will only make you irritable. Never think to cut back calories that is beyond your capability because it will lead you to frustration.

3. Expect drawbacks

No matter how determined you are to stick to your diet, there’s always a time that you’ll be tempted to binge out. It’s normal, but you should not allow temptations to ruin your weight loss goals.

4. Allow imperfections

Thinking like a perfectionist won’t do good to your weight loss efforts. You may slip up to a 100-calorie indulgence once, but you should not perceive it as a failure.

Allowing yourself to take in calories more than what is required shouldn’t be the reason to give up. If you have enjoyed indulgence today, then make sure that tomorrow is a healthier day.

Read: How To Avoid Holiday Weight Gain

5. Gather a troop

Making major lifestyle changes can be difficult particularly if you’re doing it alone. If you want to lose weight successfully you should gather a troop. Look for other people who have the same goals as you.

Keep in mind that healthy habits are contagious. It will be easier to follow a diet and obtain success if there are people around and who support your efforts.

Your troop members can be from your family or anyone from your local gym. This way you won’t be bored to follow your diet.

6. Be patient

Experiencing a weight loss plateau is the biggest hindrance to success. If you’re eating well and doing everything right, but your weight remains the same or doesn’t change for several days, you have nothing to worry about because it’s a normal part of the process.

As mentioned above, losing weight isn’t an overnight process. You need to be extra patient even if the result isn’t good at first. If you think that you’re backsliding with your diet, act once so you be back on course soon. You can try The 3 Day Military Diet.

7. Give yourself a reward

Diet and losing weight takes hard work. In fact, it’s never fun all the time that may pull you to give up. With this, giving yourself a reward can motivate you to keep going and stay with your diet.

However, the reward should not be food-related. You can treat yourself on a hot bubble bath or pamper yourself in a spa. Recognizing your diet’s success will give you the courage to continue.

8. Keep a maintenance plan

Losing weight is a lifelong goal for many people. If this is the case, you should create a maintenance strategy to achieve diet success. You can seek advice from an expert to rule out a diet plan that will work for you.

Likewise, professional advice can help you start right and even after you have reached your goals.

Knowing and practicing those above-listed motivation tips will keep on the right track of your diet and weight loss efforts.

Energy drinks are considered as magic potion that improves vitality. But, these drinks are also dangerous elixirs.

The main ingredient of most energy drinks is caffeine and other non-nutritional ingredients that have nothing to do for your health. In spite of the buzz about the dangers of energy drinks, sheer volume of these products are still available and accessible in the marketplace.

The common customers of energy drinks are younger people. It’s because these drinks are easy to drink and heavily sweetened.  Thus, the dangerous side effects are seen to younger demographics as they consume too much.

Energy Drink Ingredients

To rule out how energy drinks negatively impacts your health, the first thing to do is to know the ingredients.

• Taurine

Your body can produce the amino acid Taurine that is essential in many biological roles.  Healthy individuals can produce the necessary level of taurine needed. A regular 8-ounce energy drink contains 1,000 mg of taurine that is deemed to be safe.

• Ginseng

This medicinal herb is also present in many energy drinks. A meta-analysis presented that Ginseng offers positive effect in regulating the blood glucose. However, make sure that the Ginseng content is lower and you should not consume the energy drink frequently.

• Guarana

Guarana can be found in Brazil and it grows in the Amazon. The indigenous people of Amazon have been using the seeds of Guarana plant for centuries to enhance alertness and energy. According to research, this plant contains more caffeine than any other plant.

The good thing is that a recent study showed that Guarana content in energy drinks has no serious effect on your psychological well-being.

• B Vitamins

If you will check the label of most energy drinks, you’ll notice that it contains B Vitamins including vitamin B6, B3, B5 and B12. Vitamin B can provide extra energy, but it’s not recommended ingesting more as it will just get lost in no time in your urine.

Aside from those ingredients listed above, energy drinks also contain sugar, which when consumed in high amount is very unhealthy. You may choose drinks with artificial sweeteners, but you should anticipate that it may affect your body.

The Effects of Consuming Energy Drinks for Long-Term

Energy drinks are categorized as stimulants and ingesting them in large quantities may impact your cardiovascular health and mental health.

Researchers revealed that caffeine is a prominent ingredient that isn’t healthy to all energy drinkers.

Energy Drinks	Product Size	Caffeine Content
5-Hour Energy	1.93 oz (57 ml)	200 mg
Full Throttle	16 oz (473 ml)	160 mg
NOS	16 oz (473 ml)	160 mg
Rockstar	16 oz (473 ml)	160 mg
Monster	16 oz (473 ml)	160 mg
AMP	16 oz (473 ml)	142 mg
Red Bull	8.4 oz (250 ml)	80 mg

Habitual consumption of caffeine will make you dependent to it. However, caffeine withdrawal shows various symptoms such as restlessness, nervousness, gastrointestinal disturbance and tachycardia.

FDA have concluded multiple cases about the adverse effects of consuming too much energy drinks. In fact, deaths may be associated to them.

Bottom Line

Consumption of energy drink must be in moderation. To avoid adverse effects, you should choose energy drink that contain healthy ingredients and must carry the FDA approval.

Make sure that the amount of caffeine and sugar is minimal. Likewise, you should check the serving size and each can must contain 8 fluid ounces.

There are other ways to keep you awake, rather than consuming energy drink. Having a nap or a good night sleep can be healthy options.

Energy drinks may just be fine for short-term consumption, but not for long-term use.

Reference:

1. Health effects of energy drinks on children, adolescents, and young adults
2. Drinking patterns and risk behaviors associated with combined alcohol and energy drink consumption in college drinkers
3. Do energy drinks contain active components other than caffeine?

Vitamin A deficiency is one of the health conditions that many people have been experiencing. To maintain optimum health, your body needs the right amount of vitamins.

There are vitamins that your body can produce on its own, but vitamin A is an exception. This is the reason why you should need to take supplement to suffice the dietary requirement.

What is Vitamin A Deficiency?

Vitamin A plays big roles to promote healthy eyes and better vision, helps fight infections and makes your skin healthy. This vitamin is also called retinol.

Deficiency in vitamin A happens when your body is unable to get the daily requirement. This health problem is usually apparent in developing countries. Vitamin A deficiency may result to loss of vision and worse death.

That’s why it’s important to eat foods that are great source of vitamin A like fish-liver oils, eggs and milks. Beta-carotene can be converted into vitamin A, thus you should also consume yellow fruits and vegetables as well as green leafy vegetables. Your body will convert the beta-carotene into vitamin A.

There are cases in which deficiency in vitamin A increases to pregnant women during the third trimester. It’s because the nutritional demands of both the unborn child and the mother is higher. It can also cause the inability of your body to fight infections.

Mild vitamin A deficiency is treatable to prevent blindness, but if the condition is severe it can lead to visual impairment. It’s important for children to have sufficient amount of vitamin A in their body to prevent illnesses like respiratory infection, extreme diarrhea and measles.

Vitamin A Deficiency Symptoms

Just like any other health conditions, vitamin A deficiency shows many symptoms including the following:

• Poor vision at night or in dim light –  If you’ re experiencing difficulty in distinguishing images in low illumination. This symptom may aggravate into night blindness and worse to its severe form.
• Dry eyes –  A person with severe deficiency in vitamin A may also experience dry eyes that can lead to xeropthalmia. This vision condition may result when the eye’s outer membrane loses its goblet cells, thus unable to produce tears.

The dead cells can build up on the conjunctiva and resembles like debris that may cause blindness or other infection.

• Eye inflammation – Another symptom of vitamin A deficiency is eye inflammation. The inflammation can affect the surrounding tissues and the eyelids. It may also cause corneal inflammation.
• Growth gap – If your child’s growth or development is not normal, you must seek immediate medical intervention before the condition gets worse.
• Skin dryness – Vitamin A deficiency may also show up in your skin texture. You may notice that your skin may get dry or rough.

What Are the Causes of Vitamin A Deficiency?

Identifying the cause of vitamin A deficiency is the best way to stop or prevent the condition. As discussed above, insufficient amount of vitamin A in your body can cause serious health problems. That’s why it’s important to everyone to know what triggers deficiency.

• Malnutrition is one of the biggest reasons why many people specifically children suffers vitamin A deficiency. Insufficient intake of animal food products and vegetables rich in vitamin A won’t only lead to malnutrition but also the risk of deficiency.
• Breast feeding is important to prevent developing deficiency in vitamin A. It’s because the breast milk contains vitamin A. That’s why mothers are encouraged to breast feed their children.
• If the body is unable to absorb well vitamin A, then deficiency is possible. Mal-absorption can be the result of celiac disease, cirrhosis, obstructive jaundice, cystic fibrosis or over use of laxative.
• Massive urine excretion can also cause vitamin A deficiency. People with UTI, tuberculosis, nephritis, pneumonia and cancer may result to urine over excretion.
• Hepatic patients may also develop deficiency in vitamin A due to the inability of the body to store vitamin A.

Can Vitamin A Deficiency Be Prevented?

Vitamin A deficiency can be prevented by eating foods that are rich source of vitamin A. Some of the foods that you can include in your diet are beef, liver, chicken, whole milk, eggs, fortified milk, mangoes, carrots, sweet potatoes, kale, spinach and green vegetables.

You can also consume foods fortified with vitamin A like pastries, breakfast cereals, crackers, breads and cereal grain bars.

People who are at high risk of developing vitamin A deficiency are required to take supplements to reduce the symptoms of the condition.

What Is the Treatment for Vitamin A Deficiency?

It is important to consult a doctor immediately once you notice the symptoms of deficiency in vitamin A. Early treatment can reduce the possibility of worsening the condition.

• The initial treatment for mild deficiency is to follow a diet that is rich in vitamin A.  Likewise, you should also eat dark green vegetables as they contain good amount of carotene that helps your body to fully absorb vitamin A.
• Foods that are fortified with vitamin A can also help to prevent or treat the deficiency. However, when buying fortified foods, you should check the ingredients used such as retinol acetates, retinal esters and retinylpalmitate. Margarine and cooking oil are usually fortified.
• If taking foods rich in vitamin A is not sufficient, you can take supplements orally. However, those who are suffering severe deficiency are given aqueous I.V. supplement or vitamin A solution I.M. Read best vitamins for women.

You can consult your doctor for the right treatment appropriate to your condition. Never try any treatment without the supervision of your health care provider.

How Much Vitamin A Do I Need?

Usually the daily recommended amount of vitamin A for adults is 0.6mg for women and 0.7mg for men. For healthy adults, eating the foods listed above is enough to suffice the daily requirement. In fact, there are cases in which healthy adults are not required to take supplements.

Can I Take Too Much Vitamin A?

Your body needs vitamin A, but taking more than the recommended dosage can also cause health issues. Thus, you should take the right amount to avoid conditions like enlarged liver, dry hair and rough skin.

Pregnant women should avoid taking high dosage of vitamin A as it can cause birth defects to the unborn baby.

References:

• Johnson, L. Vitamin A. Merck Manual. 2014.
• Micronutrient deficiencies: Vitamin a deficiency. World Health Organization. 2014.
• β-Carotene Conversion into Vitamin A

Do you know how much creatine do you need to take in order to build muscles?

Creatine is composed of 3 amino acids including glycine, methionine and arginine. This nutrient is responsible in providing energy to the muscles in order to do explosive and quick movements.

ATP or adenosine-triphosphate enables the muscles to contract. However, the ATP stored in your body isn’t enough or can’t sustain your system to continue. This is the reason why body builders and athletes creatine supplements.

Pork and beef are great sources of creatine. But, consuming red meat alone can’t guarantee that you’ll get the required quantity of creatine.

Creatine Dose Table

Body Weight	Loading Dose/Day	Maintenance Dose/Day
155 lbs. below	12-16 grams	4-8 grams
156 to 175 lbs.	13-17 grams	5-9 grams
176 to 199 lbs.	14-18 grams	6-10 grams
200 to 225 lbs.	15-19 grams	7-11 grams
225 lbs. above	16-20 grams	8-12 grams

Is It Safe to Take Creatine?

As you want to know how much creatine should you take, you must always keep in mind DO NOT over supplement. Although it can fuel up your body, the truth is the dose that you can take depends on various factors.

This makes sense of knowing the right dosage appropriate to your needs. Likewise, you should also choose the type of creatine that will work best for you.

In general Creatine is safe, although when it is taken at high doses there is the possible for serious side effects, such as kidney damage (1).

Correct calculation of your creatine dose

When you are taking creatine you should know how much creatine you need to consume, the first thing to do is to understand the three stages of creatine supplementation.

• Loading stage

During the loading phase, creatine is quickly stored in your muscles. The recommended intake of creatine in this stage is maximum of 0.3 grams per kilogram of your body weight. Divide the dose into four and take one part four hours apart.

Dividing the dose will protect your liver and kidney from potential negative impact. Research showed that your body can absorb maximum of 10 grams of creatine or it depends on the total amount of your muscle mass.

It is not recommended to load within five consecutive days. It is during this phase that your muscles store creatine. Thus, once your muscular stores are loaded, your muscles won’t be able to absorb extra creatine.

• Maintenance stage

Maintaining your creatine requires taking at least 0.03 grams per kilogram of your body weight daily within a month. The goal of taking the maintenance is to replenish the degraded amount of creatine every day.

• Wash out stage

The last stage of taking creatine is the wash out phase. It is recommended as a precautionary measure to let your body recover after supplementation.  Wash out should also be done in case you’re experiencing side effects of using creatine.

Creatine can help build your muscle. But, to achieve muscle mass you should perform intensity training workout. Likewise, intense lifting helps in recycling the ATP necessary to endure workout.

Prior of taking creatine supplementation, make sure to consult your health care provider. This is necessary especially if you are under medication or experiencing health issues.

Many people believed that cholesterol is bad and can cause serious health problems. The truth is, there are two types of cholesterol, the HDL or good cholesterol and LDL or bad cholesterol.

What Is HDL?

HDL full form is High-density lipoproteins which are one of the five major groups of lipoproteins.

Having high level of HDL reduces the risk of potential health problems such as heart disease. Thus, it makes sense to increase the level of good cholesterol. An ideal HDL level is 60 milligrams/deciliter (mg/dL) or above.

Apparently, the key to boost the level of HDL is to practice healthy lifestyle. This means that you should modify or change your habits not only to increase HDL, but also to lessen the risk of health problems. Here are some ways to increase the good cholesterol level.

How to Increase HDL Cholesterol Naturally

1. Stop smoking

Smoking is the culprit of various serious health problems. In fact, studies revealed that cigarette smoking greatly affects the HDL level. It lowers the good cholesterol making you vulnerable to developing serious illnesses like coronary heart disease and other heart problems. (1)

Quitting to smoke can improve your HDL metabolism and synthesis to its natural levels. Thus, if you want to avoid the possibility of developing heart problems, you must quit smoking.

2. Exercise

Exercising isn’t only to achieve or maintain good physique, but also to live a healthy life. Performing exercise program will also increase your HDL level. Engaging in physical activity helps in enhancing your HDL cholesterol.

You can do aerobic exercises like swimming, biking and running along with weight training to boost your good cholesterol level. (2)

3. Loss weight

Dropping excess pounds can also help to increase HDL cholesterol. Research revealed that obese or overweight people most likely have higher level of LDL or bad cholesterol. (3)

Fats build up around the waist or abdominal obesity is highly associated to heart disease and lower level of LDL. Thus, to increase the HDL level, you must consider losing weight. You can also eat fat burning metabolism boosting foods to lose weight.

4. Eat healthy fats

Another way to boost your HDL level is to consume healthy fats. As much as possible, you must avoid consuming foods that contain trans fats such as baked goods, fried fast foods and hard margarines.

Instead, you should consume healthy fa­­ts found in olive oil, avocado, salmon and nuts. It’s because healthy fats increase the level of HDL cholesterol and eventually promotes healthier heart. (4)

5. Eat more fish

Research showed that eating more fish can increase the HDL cholesterol level through the omega-3 fatty acids (5). Fish like salmon, albacore tuna and mackerel have great amount of omega-3 fatty acids.

Likewise, you can also find this fatty acid from mixed greens, walnuts and flaxseeds.

6. Reduce intake of refined carbs

Too much intake of refined carbohydrates like sugar, white bread and the likes can adversely impact your HDL level. Experts suggest reducing intake of refined carbs to boost your HDL level. (6)

Instead, you should consider consuming healthier carbs from fruits and sprouted breads.

7. Keep moderate consumption of alcohol

Apparently, over consumption of alcohol can do no good to anyone’s health. Research revealed that moderate consumption of alcohol can help a lot in improving the good cholesterol level. (7)

It is recommended for healthy women to drink one alcoholic drink a day and two drinks for men 65 and below.

You can try organic red wine, but make sure not to overdo drinking otherwise it will do harm than good. It won’t only lower the cholesterol level but also affect your overall health. Drinking alcohol in moderation can reduce triglycerides level or the fats in blood.

8. Increase Intake of Niacin

Niacin is good for the eyes, hair, skin, nervous system and digestive system. You can get Niacin from foods, but some people are taking Niacin as prescription to increase HDL levels. Taking Niacin supplements can improve about 30% of good cholesterol level in your body. (8)

Make sure to follow the prescription, otherwise taking higher dosage of niacin supplements can cause adverse effects. Negative effects include uncomfortable feeling of flushing, itching and tingling sensation. The worse thing is that taking higher dosage of Niacin supplement can lead to muscle, liver and gastrointestinal problems.

The safer way is to obtain niacin naturally from foods such as chicken breast, liver, mushroom, green peas, tuna, turkey, avocado and sunflower seeds. This is the natural way to boost HDL cholesterol.

9. Reduce sugar intake

Too much intake of sugary foods does not only cause metabolic disorders but also decreases the HDL levels. Thus, instead of earing cakes and the likes, you should consider fruits and vegetables.

10. Use healthy oils when cooking

Soybean and olive oil are good in increasing the HDL cholesterol level due to its unsaturated fat content. Some research shows that olive oil can increase in HDL cholesterol. (9, 10, 11, 12).

11. Consume foods that are rich in antioxidant

According to a study, foods rich in antioxidant are great help in improving the HDL cholesterol levels and triglycerides. Thus, risks related to heart failure, inflammatory biomarkers and stroke are at bay. It is recommended to consume avocado, berries, spinach, beets, kale and dark chocolate.

12. Talk to your physician

Aside from implementing other ways to increase the level of good cholesterol, you should not forget to talk to your physician. This way you’ll be well-informed about your cholesterol level.

Foods That Reduce Cholesterol Infographic

Indeed, following those tips above can make your good cholesterol go up. Make it a habit to check your cholesterol regularly and live a healthy lifestyle.

In this age and time there is high emphasis on physical appearances of people. Therefore, to remain fit is on everyone’s agenda. Weight loss programs, diets and supplements are at their peak.

A study of the pros and cons of the varying weight loss methods should be carefully analyzed to help you choose the right one.

Garcinia Cambogia and Raspberry Ketone are two popular weight loss supplements. The following discussion of their pros and cons respectively will help you choose the best one as per your requirements.

Pros of Garcinia Cambogia

Garcinia Cambogia is a weight loss supplement derived from a fruit found in the tropical regions of Asia and India.

The tropical fruit itself is called Garcinia Cambogia or the ‘Malabar tamarind’. The main compound found in Garcinia Cambogia used for weight loss is the naturally occurring chemical called Hydroxycitric acid. This active ingredient helps:

• Burn fat in human bodies by inhibiting an enzyme called Citrate Lyase which is responsible for synthesizing fat from sugars and starches. Therefore, with a decrease in this hormone, carbohydrates are used mostly for energy which leaves less fat stored.
• In decreasing appetite and food cravings.
• Promote the secretion of the ‘happiness hormone’, Seratonin, to ultimately improve the emotional well being of an individual and prevent emotional eating.

Additional Advantages

• May improve the body’s ability to absorb glucose, which can be helpful to diabetic individuals.

• Can improve cholesterol levels by decreasing the ‘bad cholesterol’ – LDL and increasing the good HDL cholesterol.

Cons of Garcinia Cambogia

When taking Garcinia Cambogia supplements, one has to be careful about possible side effects such as:

• Headache
• Digestive issues such as Diarrhea
• Dry mouth
• Lightheadedness

Furthermore, if you are also interested in the additional benefits of this supplement regarding blood glucose levels and cholesterol levels, make sure you are not already on diabetic medications or cholesterol medications.

Pros of Raspberry Ketone

Raspberry Ketone is another popular weight loss supplement. This naturally occurring compound is found in trace amounts in raspberries and produces two major benefits to individuals seeking weight loss:

• Improves fat break down in cells by making cells more susceptible to a hormone called Norepinephrine which helps in fat burning.

• Revs up metabolism.This is done via a protein hormone called Adiponectin. Raspberry Ketone promotes the production of this hormone which is found in fat cells. Adiponectin determines how efficiently these cells are broken down for energy. Therefore, playing an important role in regulating metabolism and blood glucose levels.

In brief, the increase of adiponectin levels improves metabolism as the body continues to burn fat even when an individual is not exercising or is on a low calorie diet.

Additional Advantages

Increased levels of the hormone Adiponectin can also help in decreasing the factors mentioned below:

• Risks of heart disease
• Risks of Obesity
• Development of fatty liver
• Risks of type 2 diabetes
• Hair loss and skin elasticity problems

Cons of Raspberry Ketone

Although the effects of Raspberry Ketone are beneficial for burning of fat and speeding up metabolism, studies show that a massive dosage is needed for an optimum result.

Additionally, there has not been enough research done on the effect of Raspberry Ketone supplements on humans, to decide the dosage needed for the best results.

Some of the side effects which are believed to arise from improper dosage or prolonged use in individuals using this supplement are:

• Palpitations and Jitteriness which can be brought about by the increased heart beat caused by Raspberry Ketone.

• Increased blood pressure which can be due to increase in the levels of the hormone Norepinephrine

	UltraMax Garcinia	Raspberry Ketone Plus
How it works?	Helps suppress hunger and boost energy levels.	Balance stress hormones and dramatically reduces cortisol levels.
Main compound	Adiponectin	HCA (Hydroxycitric acid)
Possible side effects	Minor	Minor
Our Rating
Made In	USA	UK
	Buy Now	Buy Now

Combining Raspberry Ketones with Garcinia Cambogia

One rewarding thing about both the weight loss supplements is that both are naturally occurring. Therefore, if carefully used both can be administered without major side effects. If you are planning to combine raspberry ketones with garcinia cambogia you can get faster results.

Furthermore, the mechanism by which both help in weight loss are quite effective. The difference lies in the extent to which both are studied. While Raspberry Ketone has not been studied as extensively as Garcinia Cambogia, there still do exist satisfied customers who have seen weight loss results.

Whether you choose Garcinia Combogia or Rasperry Ketone, both are surely perfect for your weight loss program!