Diets, and Losing Weight

An informative look at recent Holistic Fitness News

DR KAPLAN'S WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

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Okay, here it is, my definitive article on obesity, being overweight and being neurotic. Let's first establish that the Western World is totally neurotic about weight. At one extreme we have anorexics and bulimics starving themselves into terrible health, a very modern tragedy. At the other end are the thousands of overweight and obese people who are desperate to lose weight. In between are most of the rest of the population, a group comprising: the slightly overweight, the potbellied, the beergut and those who think they are fat but actually have a normal body weight.

Diets come and go. At present The Atkins diet is all the range and meat eating has gone up dramatically. I have little faith that this diet will last any longer than any other fashionable diet. Why? Because all diets succeed in losing weight but hardly any are successful in getting people to keep the weight off. Any new way of eating or cutting anything out is bound to work for a while, but sooner or later our primary emotional relationship with food takes over and we return to the same old bodyweight that we don't want.

To Lose weight AND keep the weight off your best approach is a combination of exercise and nutrition, like The Bodydoctor's personal fitness training programme which you can do yourself with the fitness book and DVD.

In America this week, childhood obesity hit the news with paediatricians being called in to do something about the increase in fat kids in the States, where one in seven children is clinically obese. "Pediatricians (USA spelling) need to proactively discuss and promote healthy eating behaviors for children at an early age." read a policy statement by the American Academy of Pediatricians. The children's doctors said that the problem is serious as it can lead to diabetes, heart disease and depression. They recommend limiting children's television time to two hours a day and of course that children should exercise more etc. etc. But will this work?

My personal view is that in bringing up children we are horribly inconsistent about eating. Most parents are delighted when their babies eat well (even at the breastfeeding stage). Babies and children get praised and praised for eating well. And then? Then the praise suddenly stops and the child is told to cut down, exercise, watch less TV and never again praised for eating well. It's illogical and even slightly cruel. Psychologists have long established the powerful influence of early childhood experiences. If we were praised and received much love for eating well when we were babies, we eat again in the irrational (but totally understandable) hope of receiving that love again. Not only does it fail to arrive but we get the opposite. We get told we are fat, undesirable and need to lose weight. So what do we do about this sorry state of affairs?

My simple advice to all parents is: 'Don't ever praise your baby or child for eating.' Not even once, unless you mean to go on doing it - which you don't. No child will choose to starve. The only reasonable food controlling mechanism is to withhold sweets and treats until they have eaten something healthy. That's reasonable and easily understood by kids.

'But..' I can hear you ask, 'what if I'm fat now?' Well I've run out of space this week. So be sure to read next week's article in order to find out the optimal way to lose weight.

Homeopathic Tip

My homeopathic teacher taught me that most babies and children who seem to be born chubby can be helped constitutionally by the homeopathic remedy, Calcarea carbonica. Now this is a broad, sweeping statement indeed. As always, I recommend a visit to a professional homeopathic doctor, but giving a child or baby a single dose of Calcarea carbonica 30 is safer than most other paediatric, over-the-counter medicines and many parents have reported benefits.

Dr Kaplan's personal website is: www.drkaplan.co.uk and his practice website is www.140harleystreet.co.uk and he can be contacted on (020) 7487 3416