The Weight of the Nation: Surprising Lessons About Diets, Food, and Fat from the Extraordinary Series from HBO Documentary Films
John Hoffman - 2012
So how could two-thirds of us fail to measure up when it comes to eating right and exercising? HBO and the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences have joined together to bring you the nation’s foremost experts and definitive research on weight and weight loss. The Weight of the Nation explains how we got to this unhealthy place and how we can get to a healthy weight by overcoming the forces that drive us to eat too much and move too little.Three years in the making, The Weight of the Nation answers crucial questions like:--Is there such a thing as the right diet?--Am I doomed to yo-yo for the rest of my life?--How does stress affect my weight?--Is my slow metabolism making me fat?--How does carrying too much weight affect my health?--Why do I eat junk food even though I know it’s unhealthy?--Is exercise enough to help most people maintain an ideal weight?--How can I keep weight off forever?Based on the rich research behind HBO’s documentary series, The Weight of the Nation is the only book that tells it like it is: losing weight is hard, keeping it off is even harder, and there’s no quick fix. Weight loss takes a lot of work and a lifetime commitment, but thousands have done it and this book will show you how.
The Scientific Approach to Intermittent Fasting
Michael VanDerschelden - 2016
It involves alternating cycles of fasting and eating, instead of eating all hours during the day. It isn’t a diet, but rather an eating pattern. It does not include any rules about what foods to eat, but rather when you should eat them. As noted by Time magazine, intermittent fasting is becoming so popular because of one reason – it works. It works whether you are trying to lose weight, or just improve your biomarkers to achieve optimal health. In a nutshell, it is the way we are designed to eat. It allows us to use fat as our primary fuel instead of carbohydrates by adopting the way our ancestors used to eat. Unlike so many diets out there, this is not the latest ‘fad diet’ portrayed in popular media. Dieting is a multi-billion dollar global industry, and there is not a shred of evidence people are becoming slimmer as a result. In fact, the opposite is true. The percentage of obesity keeps increasing and has now reached epidemic proportions all over the world. Intermittent fasting, however, has proven to be a safe and effective approach that promotes not just fat loss, but actually improves overall health in ways no other lifestyle modification could do. What differentiates intermittent fasting from any other diet is the extreme abundance of high-quality, peer-reviewed research to back up all of its claims and results. It also serves as the way humans were physiologically designed to eat, period. I truly believe this is the most powerful intervention out there if you’re struggling with your health, weight, or any chronic disease. In addition, the other benefits it has to offer are nothing short of spectacular. The list of health benefits includes, but are not limited to: 1. Massive fat burning and weight loss 2. Increased human growth hormone production 3. Enhanced brain function 4. Insulin sensitivity 5. Improvement of beneficial gut bacteria 6. Reduction in cancer 7. Leptin sensitivity 8. Ghrelin hormone normalization (hunger hormone) 9. Elimination of sugar cravings 10. Reduced oxidative stress 11. Increased lifespan and longevity In this book we will go over the many benefits intermittent fasting can bring to you. It is also going to cover the specific ways you can implement this fasting regimen in your life, as well as going over common questions and concerns you might have. The scientific health benefits we go over are very important. A lot of these benefits will seem exaggerated, but this is simply a review of the scientific literature and is not mere opinion on my part.
Second Nature: A Gardener's Education
Michael Pollan - 1991
A new literary classic, Second Nature has become a manifesto not just for gardeners but for environmentalists everywhere. "As delicious a meditation on one man's relationships with the Earth as any you are likely to come upon" (The New York Times Book Review), Second Nature captures the rhythms of our everyday engagement with the outdoors in all its glory and exasperation. With chapters ranging from a reconsideration of the Great American Lawn, a dispatch from one man's war with a woodchuck, to an essay about the sexual politics of roses, Pollan has created a passionate and eloquent argument for reconceiving our relationship with nature.
The Council of Dads: My Daughters, My Illness, and the Men Who Could Be Me
Bruce Feiler - 2010
He instantly worried what his daughters' lives would be like without him. "Would they wonder who I was? Would they wonder what I thought? Would they yearn for my approval, my love, my voice?" Three days later he came up with a stirring idea of how he might give them that voice. He would reach out to six men from all the passages in his life, and ask them to be present in the passages in his daughters' lives. And he would call this group "The Council of Dads." "I believe my daughters will have plenty of opportunities in their lives," he wrote to these men. "They'll have loving families. They'll have each other. But they may not have me. They may not have their dad. Will you help be their dad?" The Council of Dads is the inspiring story of what happened next. Feiler introduces the men in his Council and captures the life lesson he wants each to convey to his daughters--how to see, how to travel, how to question, how to dream. He mixes these with an intimate, highly personal chronicle of his experience battling cancer while raising young children, along with vivid portraits of his father, his two grandfathers, and various father figures in his life that explore the changing role of fathers in America. This is the work of a master storyteller confronting the most difficult experience of his life and emerging with wisdom and hope. The Council of Dads is a touching, funny, and ultimately deeply moving book on how to live life, how the human spirit can respond to adversity, and how to deepen and cherish the friendships that enrich our lives.
The Valedictorian of Being Dead: The True Story of Dying Ten Times to Live
Heather B. Armstrong - 2019
Armstrong writes about her experience as one of only a few people to participate in an experimental treatment for depression involving ten rounds of a chemically induced coma approximating brain death.For years, Heather B. Armstrong has alluded to her struggle with depression on her website. But in 2016, Heather found herself in the depths of a depression she just couldn’t shake, an episode darker and longer than anything she had previously experienced. This book recalls the torturous eighteen months of suicidal depression she endured and the month-long experimental study in which doctors used propofol anesthesia to quiet all brain activity for a full fifteen minutes before bringing her back from a flatline. Ten times. The experience wasn’t easy. Not for Heather or her family. But a switch was flipped, and Heather hasn’t experienced a single moment of suicidal depression since. The Valedictorian of Being Dead brings to light a groundbreaking new treatment for depression.
The Metabolic Approach to Cancer: Integrating Deep Nutrition, the Ketogenic Diet, and Nontoxic Bio-Individualized Therapies
Nasha Winters - 2017
Conventional treatment continues to rely on chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation to attack cancer cells. Yet research has repeatedly shown that 95 percent of cancer cases are directly linked to diet and lifestyle. The Metabolic Approach to Cancer is the book we have been waiting for--it offers an innovative, metabolic-focused nutrition protocol that actually works. Naturopathic, integrative oncologist and cancer survivor Dr. Nasha Winters and nutrition therapist Jess Higgins Kelley have identified the ten key elements of a person's "terrain" (think of it as a topographical map of our body) that are crucial to preventing and managing cancer. Each of the terrain ten elements--including epigenetics, the microbiome, the immune system, toxin exposures, and blood sugar balance--is illuminated as it relates to the cancer process, then given a heavily researched and tested, non-toxic and metabolic, focused nutrition prescription.The metabolic theory of cancer--that cancer is fueled by high carbohydrate diets, not "bad" genetics--was introduced by Nobel Prize-laureate and scientist Otto Warburg in 1931. It has been largely disregarded by conventional oncology ever since. But this theory is resurging as a result of research showing incredible clinical outcomes when cancer cells are deprived of their primary fuel source (glucose). The ketogenic diet--which relies on the body's production of ketones as fuel--is the centerpiece of The Metabolic Approach to Cancer. Further, Winters and Kelley explain how to harness the anticancer potential of phytonutrients abundant in low-glycemic plant and animal foods to address the 10 hallmarks of cancer--an approach Western medicine does with drug based therapies.Their optimized, genetically-tuned diet shuns grains, legumes, sugar, genetically modified foods, pesticides, and synthetic ingredients while emphasizing whole, wild, local, organic, fermented, heirloom, and low-glycemic foods and herbs. Other components of their approach include harm-reductive herbal therapies like mistletoe (considered the original immunotherapy and common in European cancer care centers) and cannabinoids (which shrink tumors and increase quality of life, yet are illegal in more than half of the United States). Through addressing the ten root causes of cancer and approaching the disease from a nutrition-focused standpoint, we can slow cancer's endemic spread and live optimized lives.
8 Weeks to Optimum Health
Andrew Weil - 1997
Eight Weeks to Optimum Health lays out Weil's week-by-week, step-by-step plan that will keep the body's natural healing system in peak working order. It covers diet, exercise, lifestyle, stress & environmental aspects of daily living that affect health & well-being. It includes up-to-date findings on such subjects as cholesterol, antioxidants, transfats, toxic residues, soy products, vitamins & supplements, together with a source list of information & supplies. You'll learn how to develop eating habits for well-being; start an effective exercise program based on walking & stretching; work with breathing patterns to decrease stress & improve energy; solve sleeping problems; eliminate toxins; minimize environmental hazards in daily life. Plus: programs tailored to the specific needs of pregnant women, seniors, overweight people & those at risk for cancer.If there is a heaven, sixtysomething Weil is headed there, but if he practices what he preaches, probably not for some time yet.--London TimesDr Andrew Weil is an extraordinary phenomenon.--Washington Post
The New Abs Diet Cookbook: Hundreds of Powerfood Meals That Will Flatten Your Stomach and Keep You Lean for Life
David Zinczenko - 2010
Each recipe incorporates one or more of the Abs Diet Power 12 Foods such as almonds, spinach, turkey, and olive oil that are scientifically proven to burn fat and build muscle. The meals in this book take the guesswork out of weight loss and make calorie counting unnecessary.
For beginners and seasoned cooks alike, this selection of classic and innovative meals such as Fig andProsciutto Tortilla Bites, Walk-the-Plank Grilled Salmon with Grilled Pineapple, and Blackberry Parfait Martinis makes losing weight and eating healthier both easy and delicious. Special features include speedy meals that take under five minutes to prepare, a beginner’s guide to food-prep basics, and The New Abs Diet Cheat Sheet and Portion-Distortion Decoder.
Based on cutting-edge nutrition research on how to prevent high cholesterol, diabetes, and heart disease with tasty, healthy foods, The New Abs Diet Cookbook is the perfect weight-loss guide for anyone who despises dieting and loves eating.
Breasts: The Owner's Manual: Every Woman's Guide to Reducing Cancer Risk, Making Treatment Choices, and Optimizing Outcomes
Kristi Funk - 2018
Hope for a cure abounds. Celebrities have come forward to share their experiences and raise awareness. Chances are you know someone who has had it.But did you know that you make choices every day that bring you closer to breast cancer—or move you farther away? That in the majority of cases, cancer isn’t up to fate, and there are ways to reduce your risk factors? That many of the things you’ve heard regarding the causes of breast cancer are flat-out false?There have been few solid guidelines on how to improve your breast health, lower your risk of getting cancer, optimize your outcomes if you’re faced with a diagnosis, and make informed medical choices after treatment. Until now.“Dr. Funk writes Breasts: The Owner’s Manual just like she talks: with conviction, passion, and a laser focus on you.”—DR. MEHMET OZ, Host of The Dr. Oz Show“Breasts: The Owner’s Manual will become an indispensable and valued guide for women looking to optimize health and minimize breast illness.”—DEBU TRIPATHY, MD, Professor and Chair, Department of Breast Medical Oncology, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center“Breasts: The Owner’s Manual not only provides a clear path to breast health, but a road that leads straight to your healthiest self. As someone who has faced breast cancer, I suggest you follow it.”—ROBIN ROBERTS, Coanchor, Good Morning America
Extreme Transformation: Lifelong Weight Loss in 21 Days
Chris Powell - 2015
Whether you're looking to lose the baby weight, that last ten pounds, or several hundred, this is the program that can change your life forever. They share their most effective secrets for weight loss success through diet and exercise and go into detailed focus on how to develop a powerful, sustainable mental change to keep the weight off forever. With their help, readers will "see" the hidden path of transformation; be guided through fast and fun exercises; enjoy loads of recipes (both quick and gourmet) along with advice for food shopping, preparation, and more! With an incredible expansion of the Carb-cycling core that has driven Chris's first two national bestsellers, the Powells guide you from the very first step to reach your ideal weight and transition to lifelong maintenance--high-impact results in as little as three weeks.
21-Day Ketogenic Diet Weight Loss Challenge: Recipes and Workouts for a Slimmer, Healthier You
Rachel Gregory - 2018
The 21-Day Ketogenic Diet Weight Loss Challenge combines the ketogenic diet with effective wellness strategies for a results-driven, kick-start plan to lose weight permanently.This 21-day ketogenic diet challenge tells you what to eat and when with a clear, easy-to-follow meal plan that includes more than 100 keto-friendly recipes. To complement your diet, The 21-Day Ketogenic Diet Weight Loss Challenge also offers guidance on other fundamental elements of weight loss, including exercise, sleep, and stress management.The 21-Day Ketogenic Diet Weight Loss Challenge gives you the tools to jumpstart your healthier lifestyle with:
An introduction to the ketogenic diet that teaches you about the foundations of a low-carbohydrate, ketogenic lifestyle, plus helpful advice for maintaining the lifestyle
A meal plan that maps out meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner with over 100 ketogenic diet recipes and shopping lists for each week
A wellness tracker that supports your weekly weight loss goals with exercise guidelines and advice for other healthy habits
The 21-Day Ketogenic Diet Weight Loss Challenge is an actionable plan to lose weight fast with recipes and workouts for a slimmer, healthier you.
Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight
Linda Bacon - 2008
Dieting is the problem. A society that rejects anyone whose body shape or size doesn’t match an impossible ideal is the problem. A medical establishment that equates "thin" with "healthy" is the problem. Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight by Linda Bacon, PhD, presents a well-researched, healthy-living manual that debunks the weight myths and translates the latest science into practical advice to help readers forever end their battle with weight.
The Metabolism Reset Diet: Repair Your Liver, Stop Storing Fat, and Lose Weight Naturally
Alan Christianson - 2019
Alan Christianson, top naturopathic physician and bestselling author of The Adrenal Reset Diet, introduces a four-week cleanse that heals damage to the liver, helping readers unlock the key to rapid weight loss and lower blood sugar.The path to becoming naturally thin isn't as impossible as it may seem. In The Metabolism Reset Diet, you'll unlock the key to rapid, sustained weight loss and lower blood sugar with a four-week cleanse that heals your liver and gives your metabolism new life. The hidden truth is that your liver is actually the key to a healthy metabolism. When it isn't functioning properly, it loses the ability to burn fuel. An overloaded liver can only store fuel as fat - which slows your metabolism and leads to excess weight gain. Even if you cut out sugar and carbs, you can still struggle with weight loss and high blood sugar. With Dr. Alan Christianson's clinically proven program, you'll be able to reverse damage to your liver in just four weeks. Once your liver regains its ability to manage your metabolism, you'll have fewer food cravings, steady energy levels, better digestion, and a metabolism that works optimally. This proven diet is carefully constructed to provide your liver with the nutrients it needs without over fueling, supplying your body with healthy amounts of protein, fiber, micronutrients, and phytonutrients that support liver function. Unlike so many diets that require people to stick to a difficult and restrictive plan, following a liver-friendly eating plan will ensure that your weight and energy stay steady, even if your diet changes. Complete with comprehensive guidelines, meal plans, recipes, and advice on maintenance, The Metabolism Reset Diet will help readers achieve optimal liver function to lose weight and get healthy fast.
Disease-Proof: The Remarkable Truth About What Makes Us Well
David L. Katz - 2013
In Disease-Proof, renowned preventive medicine specialist Dr. David Katz reveals that we can reduce our risk of any chronic disease by an astonishing 80 percent—more than any drug or intervention could ever hope to do. Abundant scientific evidence shows that four simple things—not smoking, eating well, being active, and maintaining a healthy weight—play an enormous role in our health. Drawing upon the latest scientific evidence and decades of clinical experience, Dr. Katz arms us with the skills to make lasting changes in each of these areas. Disease-Proof equips readers with the knowledge to manage weight, improve immune function, reprogram our genes, and prevent and reverse life-altering illnesses. Groundbreaking and timely, this book is for readers of The End of Illness by David Agus and Anticancer by David Servan-Schreiber.
The Science of Natural Healing
Erminia Guarneri - 2012
Notwithstanding the great strengths of medical science, many people now have concerns about key features of our health-care system-among them, the widespread use of medical drugs and a relative deemphasis on preventive care. But traditional Western medicine is not the only healing system rooted in science. Medical systems from other cultures, including those of India and China, have used natural treatments for centuries, some of which are now directly influencing our own health-care professions. These approaches not only emphasize healing with natural substances, but devote considerable attention to illness prevention and healthful living by considering the whole person rather than just targeting a condition. What is the most effective way to nurture your own optimal health? Are there sound alternatives to the drugs so common in our health-care system, which can carry unwanted consequences and side effects? What about the range of natural methods, such as herbal medications, micronutrients, and the use of food itself as medicine? Are these approaches valid? And, if so, can we integrate the best of Western medicine with the best natural treatments to enjoy prime health and longevity?