Have you been thinking about using laxatives to lose weight?

I’ll tell you right now – stop thinking about it. Not only is using laxatives for weight loss dangerous, it also does not help one bit.

I’ll tell you why.

Laxatives and their Real Use

Before I tell you why laxatives are ineffective in helping you lose weight, lets first take a look at the real use of laxatives.

Laxatives, as you may already know, are designed to aid in getting bowel movements ie. when you’re constipated. They may be natural (certain foods) or in drug form and works by softening the stool so that it can be easily released from the large intestines and colon.

Overusing or abusing laxatives can result in diarrhea, irritable bowel syndrome and sometimes kidney failure. They are only meant to be used as an immediate solution to a short termed problem. Always follow the directions on the package or consult a doctor in the case appears to be more serious.

This may not apply to you since you’re not necessarily constipated but just want to lose some weight with this method.

Laxatives and Weight Loss

So how will laxatives affect you if you use it for the purpose of weight loss?

When you use laxatives, stored waste is expelled from the bowels along with water from the body. It may appear as though you have lost weight but that weight is only from the expelled waste and some water loss. True weight loss only burns fat from your body which clearly doesn’t happen here.

You are only going to damage your body by taking laxatives. In the absence of waste the laxatives drain you of water and overworks your empty bowels. You end up becoming dehydrated and lose whatever nutrients your body might need. To add insult to injury, you haven’t lost any real weight.

What now?

You need to ask yourself the real reason you considered using laxatives to lose weight.

Is it that you’ve tried everything and need a faster solution? A shortcut, maybe? Is it that nothing else that you’ve tried works?

The truth is there are no shortcuts to healthy and efficient weight loss. A healthy diet and lifestyle changes work and if you commit to doing something everyday to reach a set goal then you can lose weight. Not only that, you can also keep it off.

Laxatives are ineffective and very dangerous if you’re going to use it for the purpose of weight loss.

Thanksgiving dinner, a time for showing appreciation and giving thanks for the wonderful things in life.

Its also a time where you can really mess up your goal of losing weight. The average American packs on some pounds from the rich holiday food available at the table and as much as it may be instantly gratifying, some actually regret that they had indulge as much.

However, if you’re going to be preparing the meals yourself, there are some things you could do to have a skinnier Thanksgiving dinner. Some of these tips are outlined in the video below.

Happy Thanksgiving.

The Engine 2 diet is a plant based diet created by Rip Esselstyn. The Texan firefighter was featured today on the Today Show promoting the diet named after the Austin, TX fire station where he works.

Watch video of Rip’s appearance on the Today Show below.

The Engine 2 Diet book which goes by the full name “The Engine 2 Diet: The Texas Firefighter’s 28-Day Save-Your-Life Plan that Lowers Cholesterol and Burns Away the Pounds” is available on Amazon.

Just in case you didn’t see it, “This is Why You’re Fat” looks really interesting.

No its not a new, overhyped fad diet but rather a blog filled with a collection of all types of weird food that might just be your enemy.

It will make you think if anything, and the pictures are very entertaining. You can even submit your ‘deliciously gross’ food pic.

Take a look.

This is Why You’re Fat.

I think its interesting that some slim women with healthy weights seem to think that they’re fat. They will throw a fit if the scale only moves a half a pound.They don’t consider how lucky they are to have such good genes.

Believe it or not, there are things you can do to look like you’ve lost weight. Some fashion tips may just be what you’re looking for.

Here’s a cool video with some tips on how you can make yourself look like you’ve lost weight.

The Morning Banana Diet is a rather new diet craze thats going on in Japan. The diet was created in Osaka, by a pharmacist named Sumiko Watanabe who wanted her husband to lose weight and increase his metabolism.

The Morning Banana Diet which is very easy to follow goes like this:

1. Have one or more bananas in the morning for breakfast with room temperature water.

2. For lunch you can have anything

3. Eat dinner before 8pm and you can also have anything.

4. You can have a snack in between lunch and dinner but no dessert after meals and you must to go to bed before midnight.

Simple enough to follow.

Sumiko’s husband lost an amazing 37 lbs using the Morning Banana Diet and popularized it on a large Japanese social network.

Dangers of the Morning Banana Diet

Like all fad diets you can actually lose weight but not without paying a price. There are always hidden dangers to diets like the Morning Banana Diet.

A Japanese Professor at the Niigata University School of Medicine, Masahiko Okada pulled the Morning Banana diet apart.

In any diet you need three essential nutrients daily for the human body to function. Carbohydrates, fat and protein need to be balanced with a daily calorie intake. This is the golden rule of dieting.

Once you understand how dieting works you will see that diets such as the Morning Banana diet are actually no good as a long term weight loss regiment.

The Kimkins diet is one of those truly dangerous fad diets that surface, gets really popular and then scores some bad publicity and fizzles out.

If you haven’t heard about this diet, heres the skinny on what the Kimkins diet is…er…was!

The Kimkins diet became popular in mid 2007 when Heidi Kimberly Diaz who then went by the name “Kimmer” claimed that she had followed a certain low carb diet resulting in 200 lbs in weight loss. The diet was featured in Women’s World magazine and people ate it up.

“Kimmer” who wasn’t even qualified as a nutritionist or doctor seem to be following a variation of another popular fad diet – the Atkins Diet. But her variation seemed to be basically a starvation diet which resulted in health issues which later developed in some of the members who was paying for a subsciption at her membership site.

“Kimmer” herself gained back 100 lbs but said that it had nothing to do with how the Kimkins diet worked. Personal issues was quoted as the cause.

As said before, the Kimkins diet is very dangerous since it is very low in calories, essential fatty acids, low in fiber and a whole lot of other nutrients. This is not the type of diet you want to do as it is medically unsound and potentially fatal.

Flat Belly Diet! is just the latest diet craze to hit and was first featured on the ABC show Good Morning America. The diet comes from the editors at Prevention Magazine.

It is centered around the fact that some foods that are known to contain MUFAs or monounsaturated fatty acids can cause you to lose stubborn fat especially around the middle ie. belly fat. There are 5 kinds of MUFAs – oils, nuts and seeds, avocado, chocolate and olives.

The Flat belly diet supposedly works by eating 4 meals a day containing 400 calories each and including a food from any of the MUFA categories. This way you get the 1600 calories per day recommended for most weight loss diets.

The Flat Belly diet is hardly a breakthrough and like most popular fad diets there are some things that you should be aware of. While MUFAs are generally a very healthy recommendation studies have shown that they can promote insulin resistance which may lead to type II diabetes. To be completely fair there are studies that show how MUFAs can promote healthy weight loss over a period of time.

In addition to the diet foods and food plans, the Flat Belly diet also suggests optional exercise such as squats, lunges or walking. The outcome they claim should have you losing “up to 15 lbs in 32 days”, trimming “up to 12 inches of fat”, “tighten, trim and flatten your tummy” and “feel and look sexier”.

The Flat Belly Diet book is available for $31.95 and there is also an online program.