Successful Weight Loss in 6 Easy Steps

Successful weight loss could be achieved as long as you adhere to these sure-fire strategies. Once you do, your weight loss objectives will become a reality. Do know that there are tons of fad diets and weight loss scams proliferating the market. However, the best and definite way to achieve success weight loss is by living a healthy lifestyle and engaging in regular exercise. For long term success weight loss, changes must be made permanently in your daily habits. The question now is how?

Commit To Success

First things first, commitment is key. For a success weight loss program to take effect, time and effort must be expended. Your commitment must not merely last for a month, two months or a week. Changes need to be incorporated in one’s lifestyle regularly and for a whole lifetime.

Staying focused is similarly critical. Being focused helps you stay committed. Remember that it takes tons of energy – both physically and mentally – to alter your habits. Therefore, if you are planning to adhere to a success weight loss systems, make sure you have a plan to resolve any stresses in your life which would make your goal difficult to achieve. For instance, if you purchase ice cream regularly, stop buying these tasty treats! Though it might be difficult, it is definitely worth making especially if you value your health. Once you feel prepared to follow your success weight loss systems, schedule a start date and stick to it.

What Motivates You?

Take note that no one in the world could make you lose weight unless you want to. You must similarly go through a diet and exercise regimen that you personally find enjoyable. Think about it. What would make you stay keenly motivated to lose weight? Is it the idea of sharing your success weight loss stories? Is it because you want to look good in a bikini? Once you know what will keep you motivated, call in all your inner strength the instance you feel tempted to grab that chocolate bar.

Once you own up and start to be responsible for your behavior, opportunities open up to help you gain the support you need to achieve successful weight loss. If you can, do select people who you feel will positively encourage you to lose weight. As much as possible, these people must not be judgmental about your weight loss efforts. Seek out people who will freely listen to your feelings and weight loss issues.

Set Goals

It is always best to set weight-loss goals which are realistic. For instance, you need not aim to have your body look like Angelina Jolie’s after six months. It is more realistic and therefore feasible to lose a pound or two after a week. In order to lose a pound or two a week, you have to burn as much as 500 calories to 1,000 calories more than what you consume daily.

Eat Healthy and Love It

It is not enough to eat healthy foods. If you want your weight loss efforts to last a lifetime, you need to love to eat healthy foods too as doing so is an effortless and fun way to shed off those fats. You need not give up delicious food items by consuming solely plant-based items. You can learn to enjoy what you’re eating whilst being healthy at the same time. Aim for variety without sacrificing nutrition.

For starters, consume a healthy breakfast each day. If you can, eat a minimum of four servings of green leafy veggies daily. You could also use healthy fats, reduce your intake of sugar, opt for low-fat products and minimize your consumption of meat.

Be Active

Remember that the secret to success weight loss stories for women and men is burning more calories compared to the amount you consume. Since 3,500 calories is equal to a pound of fat, you have to burn at least 3,500 calories more than you eat in order to lose a pound.

Though you could essentially lose weight by not exercising, restricting your intake of calories will further give you that edge you need. Exercise helps burn any excess calories you cannot remove solely through diet. Similarly, exercise provides a slew of benefits such as boosting your mood, decreasing your blood pressure and strengthening your heart.

Be aware that the quantity of calories you expend is dependent on the intensity and duration of your physical activity. One of the excellent ways to decrease your body fat is by doing regular aerobic exercise for a minimum of thirty minutes at least three times per week.

Shift Your Point Of View

It is best to practice all these not just for a mere month. In order to see authentic weight loss, these habits must be part of your daily life. Be honest with yourself and see how much you consume daily. Then, work out a plan to make your goals a reality. You need to have a strategy to be able to lose weight permanently.

All in all, weight loss is possible as long as you are willing to do what it takes to achieve your goals.

http://creativebioscience.com/blog/successful-weight-loss-in-6-easy-steps/

Speed Counts in Losing Post-Pregnancy Weight

If you do not return to pre-pregnancy weight in six months, chances are you will keep those pounds, explains Dr. Judith Reichman

Q: I’m pregnant with my first child, and I’m worried that pregnancy will permanently — and badly — affect my body and how much I weigh. Can you tell me what it will do?

A: One of the biggest worries of my pregnant patients — after their concern about the well-being of their baby and the potential trauma of delivery — is post-pregnancy weight.

If you gain more than the recommended 20 to 25 pounds during pregnancy, or if you don’t lose the extra weight within six months of delivery, you are statistically likely to carry an extra 20 pounds, 10 years later. If you are overweight to begin with, that number is even higher. The six-month window for losing pregnancy weight seems to be critical.

During pregnancy, placental hormones increase your appetite and foster fat accumulation. This fat provides calories for the developing baby and later for the production of breast milk, which is 50 percent fat.

Once the baby is born, you must stop eating for two and start exercising. Most women can safely exercise — even swim — within four to six weeks. Obviously, if you have had an episiotomy, wait to get on a bicycle seat or exercise equipment that applies too much pressure until it has healed, usually within six weeks.

Breastfeeding expends about 500 calories a day (and is the healthiest way to nourish the baby for the first year). So breastfeeding will give you a weight advantage over bottle-feeding.

Breasts: That brings up another big concern — breast firmness. In general, firmness does diminish postpartum.

If you are breastfeeding, it is hard to assess what your breasts will look like when you stop. They will almost certainly become smaller. It is unclear whether breastfeeding — in addition to pregnancy — changes the contour of the breast or promotes droopiness.

Tummy: Then there is abdominal laxity (looseness). This depends on several factors — the size of the baby, how much weight you gained, whether you are prone to abdominal obesity.

This is another reason to lose weight in that six-month postpartum period. If you don’t, fat will stay in the abdominal area, possibly increasing your future risk for insulin resistance, diabetes and coronary disease.

The loss of abdominal elasticity and the presence of stretch marks depend on the degree of abdominal distention during the pregnancy. A big baby or multiple babies will take a greater toll.

As for that “poochy” abdominal roll that makes you look pregnant despite the fact that you now have a baby, it should go away with appropriate diet and exercise. For women who still retain belly fat after a year, liposuction or abdominoplasty are options — but only for those who don't want to bear more children.

Stretch marks: There is also a genetic component to stretch marks. They can arise from hormonal changes that occur fairly early in the pregnancy. If your mother or sister developed stretch marks, you are also likely to. Unfortunately, creams and moisturizers don’t prevent these marks. Postpartum stretch marks are usually permanent, though some data suggests that retinoids, or Vitamin-A-derivative creams or gels, soften their appearance. Laser treatments can also help.

Other effects: There are also other temporary bodily changes that accompany pregnancy. Increased pigmentation down the center of the abdomen creates a darkened “linea nigra.” It will fade.

Some women get varicose veins, caused by a combination of pregnancy hormones and pressure from the enlarged uterus and baby in the pelvis. The severity of these varicosities will decrease after the hormones and pressure are gone, but some degree of venous expansion usually remains. If this remains bothersome and you won't be having more children, you can consult a dermatologist or vein specialist about possible laser treatments or “collapsing” vein injections.

Women often notice hair loss within two to six months after giving birth. Handfuls of hair come out in their comb or brush as their hair follicles adapt to the fall in hormones. The hair will grow back.

Dr. Reichman’s Bottom Line: Re-establishing good eating and exercise habits in the six months after delivery is critical for your ultimate weight and health. There are some residual bodily changes from pregnancy, but these come with the territory and are definitely worth it.

http://www.today.com/id/6114200/ns/today-today_health/t/speed-counts-losing-post-pregnancy-weight/#.UiZBGTZwqSo

A Slimming Programme that Works for You

Getting Started

To start, keep a food diary based on what you usually eat and simply record every single mouthful that passes your lips for a week. It might sound tedious, but it will make you realise just how much you’re eating and help to identify any areas where you can make little changes to shift those pounds.

You may also find it helpful to keep a note of how you felt before eating. Was it because you were hungry? Was it to satisfy boredom, tiredness, unhappiness or another emotion? Or did you simply eat out of habit?

Identifying those times when you eat when you’re not really hungry will give you the opportunity to find other ways to deal with these situations rather than reaching for food. For example, if your food diary helps you realise that you eat when you’re bored, you can work towards beating boredom without using food, such as having a bath, going for a walk or phoning a friend for a gossip. Similarly, if your food diary reveals that you often eat out of habit, for example, by going straight to the fridge when you get home from work, you can look at ways to break or change those habits, for example, by heading straight for the fruit bowl!

Keeping on track

The key to continuing to lose weight is to keep your slimming and exercise programme fresh. If you eat the same foods day in and day out and only ever do the same activities, boredom will quickly set in with the result that you’ll be tempted to give up. When it comes to food, this might mean investing in a recipe book to try some new dishes or experimenting with different foods. For example, you could make it your weekly mission to buy a fruit or vegetable you’ve never tried before, or cook vegetables in different ways, such as roasting carrots with a little spray oil rather than steaming them, or adding fresh coriander, chopped peppers and spring onions to your usual salad of lettuce, tomato and cucumber! There are lots of different ways to keep meals interesting – it’s simply a case of experimenting.

The same goes for exercise. It’s natural that you’ll get bored if you only ever do the same activities – and on top of this, you’re unlikely to get the most out of your workout. Your body needs to be continuously pushed in order to burn fat and tone muscle so it’s important that you keep pushing yourself. This might mean trying some different cardiovascular machines if you go to the gym, or increasing the intensity of your workout, such as walking for a longer distance in the same amount of time. Keep an eye out for new activities too, such as dance classes at your local community centre or a new aqua aerobics class at the swimming pool.

It’s also essential to keep yourself motivated. In the early stages of your plan, friends and family will probably keep telling you how well you’re doing and how great you look, but compliments may gradually start to slow down, especially as people get used to seeing a slimmer you. That’s why it’s essential for you to keep reminding yourself of your slimming successes to date – that might mean trying on an old item of clothing that’s now too big for you, comparing pictures of yourself when you were bigger with ones of yourself now or simply totting up how many pounds and inches you’ve lost in total. You may also find it helpful to give yourself non-food treats such as a new haircut, a nail varnish or a massage, every time you reach a new goal.

Reaching a plateau

It’s also important to avoid getting disheartened if you reach a plateau where your weight seems to stick for a couple of weeks at a time, despite all your best efforts. This is common, but the good news is it’s usually only a temporary problem. In the meantime, there are several things you can do to help get those pounds shifting again. Start by checking your portion sizes. After weeks of following a slimming programme, many of us feel confident enough to ditch the kitchen scales and start putting cereal into a bowl rather than weighing it, or pouring dressing onto salad straight from the bottle rather than measuring out 1tbsp. Simply going back to weighing out servings of foods like cereals, rice, pasta, meat, poultry and fish may be all that it takes to get those pounds shifting again.

You may also find it helpful to keep a notebook with you for a week detailing every single mouthful you eat each day. In the same way that portions can increase over time, you might find you’ve allowed more treats to creep into your programme which you’ve been forgetting to add to your food diary, such as having the odd cake in the office, treating yourself to a bar of chocolate once a week, nibbling on sweets while you’re driving or pouring yourself a larger drink than normal.

So now you’re armed with all the information you need, what are you waiting for? All you have to lose is those extra pounds – for the very last time!

https://www.weightlossresources.co.uk/slimming/programme.htm

The New Atkins for a New You Diet

The New Atkins for a New You Diet: What It Is

Ever since it was introduced in the 1970s, the Atkins diet has been controversial. Critics say there's too little evidence that a low-carb diet is effective, and that a diet so high in fat is unhealthy. Still, the diet has survived through several revisions, including the latest, The New Atkins for a New You.   

This new Atkins diet is a more flexible approach that includes more vegetables, plus limited amounts of healthy carbs in its final phases. But it's still basically a low-carb, high-protein, high-fat diet. This version includes more than 50 research papers that shed a positive light on the safety of low-carb diets (some of these studies were funded by the Atkins Foundation).

Refined carbs -- and too many carbs -- may be to blame for our national weight problem, says co-author Jeff Volek, PhD, researcher and associate professor at University of Connecticut.  Fats, on the other hand, are your friend, he says.

He explains:  Fat is a more stable energy source than carbs. Carbs increase the production of insulin, which shuts down your body’s ability to burn fat, he says. So when you limit carbs, you reduce insulin levels and allow for more fat-burning. 

"Studies show that a low-carb, high-fat plan can help you lose weight and reduce the risk for diabetes, heart disease, and metabolic syndrome along with improving triglycerides, insulin, glucose and HDL ('good' cholesterol),"  says Volek.

The New Atkins for a New You Diet: What You Can Eat

On the New Atkins for a New You diet, you can forget most carbs. Butter, bacon, cream, meat, seafood, eggs, cheese, avocados, olives, olive oil, greens, and non-starchy vegetables make up the majority of your daily meals. 

Here's a sample menu for the Induction phase of the diet:

·         Breakfast: 2 eggs, sausages, steamed spinach

·         Snack: String cheese, half an avocado

·         Lunch: Roast beef on 4 cups mixed salad, 1/2 cup mung bean sprouts, 5 black olives, onions and 2 tablespoons vinaigrette

·         Snack: 10 green olives, 1 slice cheddar cheese

·         Dinner: Salmon with 2 tablespoons garlic  mayonnaise, 6 asparagus spears, 2 cups arugula, 5 cherry tomatoes, 1/2 cup sliced cucumbers, 2 tablespoons Italian dressing

You eat mostly monounsaturated fats (olive oil, olives, avocado and salad dressings) but saturated fats from animal products are fine, too.  Approximately 65% of your daily calories will come from fat (the Institute of Medicine's Dietary Reference Intake recommends 20%-35%).

For protein, you choose from a variety of animal foods, like eggs, meat, fish, poultry, shellfish, and cheese - and there's no need to worry about choosing lean cuts, trimming the fat, or removing the skin.  Some low-carb yogurts, nuts, and seeds are allowed in the second phase.

The book states that the new Atkins diet is not a high-protein diet. But it advises that the average woman get 16 ounces of protein (112 grams, equal to a pound of meat) each day, and the average man get 18 ounces (126 grams). (The Dietary Reference Intake recommendations are far lower -- 46 grams for women and 56 grams for men.)

Instead of counting total carbs on this diet, you count "net carbs," which you compute by subtracting the grams of fiber from the grams of carbs. Net carbs are the important number, the book says, because fiber doesn’t affect blood sugar levels.   

Initially, most carbs in this diet come from high-fiber vegetables (you eat 2 cups cooked non-starchy vegetables plus 6 cups of leafy greens per day).In later phases, you can gradually increase net carbs from a list that includes low-sugar fruits, tomato juice, high-carb vegetables, and legumes.

Forbidden on the New Atkins for a New You diet are most grains, dried fruits, foods with added sugar, refined carbs, juices, most snacks and sweets. Carb-free snacks, like pork rinds, are allowed.

Dieters avoid alcohol during the first phase, but a cocktail (without juice or sweetened mixers) or glass of wine can be added in later phases.

The book recommends taking a daily multivitamin and mineral with an omega-3 fatty acid supplement.

The New Atkins for a New You Diet: How It Works

The plan has four phases -- induction, ongoing weight loss, pre-maintenance, and lifetime maintenance.  Dieters' intake of fats and protein remains relatively steady during all these phases. But carb intakes vary from a low of 20 grams per day during induction to roughly 70 grams in the final phases.

Most dieters will follow the induction phase -- the most restrictive -- for at least two weeks. (You can skip this phase if you don’t have much weight to lose.)

As carbs are slowly increased in the later phases, dieters use their weight, energy level, and the absence or presence of cravings to determine whether they're at the right carb threshold.

The book suggests that women get 1,500-1,800 calories per day and men 1,800-2,200 calories. Eating too much protein and fat could lead to excess calorie intake and thwart weight loss.

Dieters are urged to drink plenty of fluids because a low-carb diet acts like a diuretic, releasing cellular fluids that contain the essential minerals sodium and potassium.

No exercise is required, at least initially. Since your body will be adapting to burning fat for fuel, the authors suggest you wait to engage in regular physical activity until the later phases.

And during the adaptation to fat burning, the book warns, you should be prepared for unpleasant symptoms such as tiredness, leg cramps, and weakness.

The New Atkins for a New You Diet: What the Experts Say

The new Atkins diet's warnings of dizziness, tiredness, leg cramps, and more should be a red flag, says American Dietetic Association spokesperson Joan Salge Blake, MS, RD.

Protein and high-fiber vegetables are important components of any healthy weight loss plan, she says, but eliminating healthy carbs goes against a wealth of scientific evidence. 

"This plan is a drastic departure from a healthy diet and chances are it will be so monotonous that dieters won’t be able to sustain it," she says.

At the end of the day, calories count, no matter where they come from.  When you eat a low-carb, high-fat diet, experts say, it suppresses appetite. And weight loss on the new Atkins diet could simply be the result of getting fewer calories because you're less hungry, says Salge Blake, an assistant professor at Boston University.

She recommends diets that don't eliminate any healthy food groups.  A healthy diet, she says, includes satisfying foods like lean and low-fat protein (not high-fat protein) as well as high-fiber whole grains, healthy fats, fruits, vegetables, legumes, and low-fat dairy. Not only will such a diet help with weight loss, it's also heart-healthy and helps protect against chronic disease.

The New Atkins for a New You Diet: Food for Thought

While scientific evidence has shown that successful weight loss diets can vary widely - and the jury may still be out on saturated fat's role in the diet -- many experts still believe that a high-fat diet is contradictory to good health.

Following a low-carb diet like Atkins may be an option for people who have not been successful on traditional calorie-cutting, moderate-carb plans. The diet may be suited for people who don’t metabolize or tolerate carbs well, such as those with metabolic syndrome and insulin resistance, says Volek. 

http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/new-atkins-new-you-diet Low Carb Atkins Diet

The 9 Most Nutritious (And Filling) Breakfast Foods

I know you’ve heard it a thousand times before, but breakfast really is the most important meal of the day. This is especially true for dieters who will find it easier to manage their weight and stay on track with a start to the morning that’s high in nutrition. The trick, however, is making smart choices.

A healthy breakfast should be a variety of foods like whole grains, low-fat protein or dairy sources, and fruit.  All these food groups provide complex carbohydrates, protein, and a small amount of fat. This combination of nutrients can delay hunger symptoms and keep you feeling full throughout the day. Here are some ideas to get your day started right:

1. Build on a healthy cereal. Top a high-fiber cereal with a sprinkle of granola, bananas, and low-fat milk or plain yogurt. This combination provides good fiber and protein intake, plus calcium and potassium.

2. Get off to a berry good start. Another possibility for breakfast is berries and low-fat Greek-style yogurt with a drizzle of honey and a sprinkle of toasted sliced almonds. These foods are high in protein and volume, which can help you feel full longer.

3. Take your nutrition to go. Smoothies are another smart choice when made with Greek-style low-fat yogurt, berries, and a touch of sugar. It’s a meal that’s high in protein, dairy, and volume, and it’s very portable if you’re in a hurry.

4. Get a good “warm-up.” Start with hot cereal: Microwave 1/4 cup each of instant oatmeal and coarse wheat bran with a cup of 1 percent milk. Served with berries and a little maple syrup, it’s the perfect start to the day with plenty of fiber and volume.

5. Don’t skip the eggs. Hot breakfasts extend the range of possibilities. Scrambled eggs — one whole egg and one egg white — along with a piece of whole-wheat toast, lightly buttered, and some fruit on the side are high in protein and volume and make a great combination.

6. Wrap up some burritos. Breakfast burritos can spice up your morning meal. Use the same scrambled egg recipe as in No. 5 as the filling for a low-carb, whole- wheat (for extra fiber) wrap along with some salsa, low-fat sour cream, and a sprinkle of cheese.

7. Ham it up. Even ham and eggs can be healthy when using one whole egg and one egg white in the scramble and two slices of lean Canadian bacon. Add half a grapefruit on the side and it’s a meal full of protein, fiber, and vitamin C.

8. Don’t rule out a.m. vegetables. You can enjoy veggies with breakfast if you add them to some eggs. Cook one and a half cups of sliced button mushrooms or one cup of lightly steamed vegetables (like broccoli or spinach), two beaten eggs, salt, and freshly ground pepper in a non-stick pan with one-half teaspoon of tub margarine. Add a dollop of ketchup, if desired.

9. Think whole grain. Whole-grain English muffins with peanut butter or another nut butter and sliced fruit like apples or pears, along with a glass of milk, can be filling while providing protein and calcium.

http://blackdoctor.org/2382/the-9-most-nutritious-and-filling-breakfast-foods/

Health Benefits of Spinach

The health benefits of spinach are numerous and its ability to help prevent disease is well known. Spinach is at the top of many super food lists.

 

Spinach Nutrition

Spinach and other dark leafy greens like kale, collards, Swiss chard, turnip greens and bok choy are loaded with calcium, folic acid, vitamin K and iron.

Spinach is also rich in vitamin C, fiber and carotenoids. Add its lutein and bioflavanoids and spinach is a nutritional powerhouse.
 

Why Eat Spinach?

Spinach nutrition is amazing. The calcium content in spinach and the other dark leafy greens mentioned above strengthens bones.

The A and C vitamins in spinach plus the fiber, folic acid, magnesium and other nutrients help control cancer, especially colon, lung and breast cancers. Folate also lowers the blood levels of something called homocysteine, a protein that damages arteries. So spinach also helps protect against heart disease.

The flavonoids in spinach help protect against age related memory loss.

Spinach’s secret weapon, lutein, makes it one of the best foods in the world to prevent cataracts, as well as age related macular degeneration, the leading cause of preventable blindness in the elderly. Foods rich in lutein are also thought to help prevent cancer.

As you can see, the health benefits of spinach are numerous. The vitamins and calcium in spinach, combined with the overall nutritional value of spinach, make this vegetable and its dark leafy green cousins top picks for healthy food choices.

Fresh or frozen, add these greens to your food menu as often as you can.
 

How to Get More Spinach in your Diet:

Add chopped fresh or frozen spinach to lasagna to up the nutrient content of this tasty comfort food.

Add chopped or frozen spinach to your favorite vegetable soup recipe.

Sauté spinach with a bit of garlic for a tasty super food combination. Try it on top of a baked potato.

Make quick and easy spinach dips to eat with crunchy raw vegetables and whole grain breads like pumpernickel, and enjoy the health benefits of spinach while you nibble on your favorite veggies.

Use fresh spinach instead of lettuce to add a twist to your favorite sandwiches.

Add chopped fresh or frozen spinach to omelets and frittatas. Make sure frozen spinach is thawed and well drained.

http://www.cookingnook.com/10-healthiest-foods/health-benefits-of-spinach/

Does Coffee Perk You Up or Is it Better to Quit?

·     Scientists differ on the effects of caffeine, but a new study reveals that...

·     Coffee-drinkers aren't more alert than their caffeine-free counterparts

·     What's more, regular consumption of tea and coffee leads

      to dependency

Coffee Health Concerns Reactions

Every morning, millions of people perform an essential daily ritual - having their first cup of tea or coffee. It concentrates the mind and acts as a pick-me-up. 

Or does it? The latest research suggests that familiar buzz doesn't so much as give us a lift, but fights the caffeine withdrawal symptoms - fatigue, mental fogginess and a dull headache - that have kicked in since our last cup.

Indeed, experts suggest that this morning ritual is actually a sign of mass drug dependency. 

'People who consume caffeine regularly will become dependent on it - if you take caffeine away from them, they will function below par,' says Peter Rogers, professor of biological psychology at Bristol University and a leading expert on caffeine. 

'They just don't function normally without the drug on board. If it's your first tea or coffee of the day, it gets you back to normal, but beyond that you don't get much more of a kick.'

Professor Rogers has studied coffee and its effects for more than 20 years and, as a result, he and other members of his team have given up caffeine.

'On balance, caffeine is not particularly helpful. It triggers withdrawal and increases your blood pressure, which is not a good thing,' he says.

'I sometimes think one of the biggest effects of my research work has been on my department. Four or five colleagues have given up caffeine, and we're all on decaf.'

WHY COFFEE DOESN'T GIVE YOU A BOOST

The idea that caffeine doesn't perk up your brain might sound absurd, but that's what Professor Roger's research shows. 

In one key study, around 300 volunteers - half had a moderate to high caffeine intake, the others had a low intake - were asked to stop drinking coffee for 16 hours before undergoing tests. 

The volunteers were randomly split into two groups and given a placebo or coffee. The results, in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology, were intriguing. 

Though the regular coffee drinkers did have an increase in alertness following the coffee, this only made them as alert as non-coffee drinkers who had the placebo. 

In other words, drinking coffee doesn't make us any  more alert than non-coffee drinkers.

...BUT WHY YOU THINK IT DOES

Caffeine stops a brain chemical known as adenosine having an effect. 

Normally, adenosine helps slow down reactions in the body. As caffeine effectively stops adenosine latching onto cells, it means that when we drink it our body is constantly on the accelerator, not the brake.

Then within a few hours of stopping drinking coffee, the withdrawal effects start to kick in. In some cases, they can even cause flu-like symptoms. 

Our body experiences a flood of adenosine, leading to fatigue. Many will also experience a dull headache. 

This is because caffeine narrows blood vessels in the brain, says Professor Rogers, so when we stop drinking it, there is an increase in blood flow, which triggers a headache.

'On the rare occasions I have drunk coffee for a few days, when I stop I start to feel under the weather and think I am coming down with a cold,' says Professor Rogers. 

'But then I remember - this is what caffeine withdrawal feels like.'

IT WON'T IMPROVE CONCENTRATION

Another recent study by Professor Rogers involving 300 volunteers found coffee doesn't increase alertness, concentration or reaction time, but it will keep you awake.  

'I have coffee when I'm driving across Europe, as I know it will keep me awake.  But it wouldn't be helpful if I was trying to write a scientific paper late at night as it doesn't help focus or thinking.'

IS CAFFEINE GOOD OR BAD FOR THE HEART?

Aside from triggering a physical dependency, what other effects does caffeine have on our health?

One week we read a report showing caffeine is good for us; the next that it is bad. The experts are fiercely divided. 

'It is a well-established and reliable fact that caffeine increases blood pressure,' says caffeine researcher Jack James, professor of psychology at Reykjavik University. 

'The increase is modest, but likely to be clinically significant over the course of a lifetime of consuming caffeine.  

'I'm confident that in time caffeine consumption will be regarded as a risk to cardiovascular health.' 

One paper by Professor James, who is also editor of the Journal of Caffeine Research, suggests regular caffeine may account for 14  per cent of premature deaths due to coronary heart disease and 20 per cent of premature deaths due to stroke. 

And in a study published just a few weeks ago, Australian researchers suggested a chemical in coffee called chlorogenic acid may increase the risk of diabetes and even lead to the body storing excess fat. 

The study, published in the Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry, showed that when mice were given high amounts of this compound, the equivalent of drinking five or six cups a day, their bodies struggled to control blood sugar and they developed insulin resistance. They were also less likely to lose weight. 

However, other research has shown that regular coffee and tea intake reduces the risk of stroke and heart disease, as well as neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's.

Indeed, one large study undertaken by Harvard researchers, and published last year in the journal Circulation, suggested that moderate coffee intake (four cups a day) reduced the risk of heart failure.
The team looked at research from five studies, involving more than 140,000 people.

'There is a growing body of research suggesting coffee is beneficial and this paper added to this,' says Dr Elizabeth Mostofsky, a post-doctoral research fellow and lead researcher of the paper.

Coffee consumption has also been linked to a lower risk of type 2 diabetes and some forms of cancer. 

However, as with everything, moderation is best.  Drinking more than ten cups a day 'may be harmful', says  Dr Mostofsky.

She suggests that patients who are at risk of stroke and not regular coffee drinkers may want to consider avoiding it. Some of her earlier research suggests the peak in blood pressure immediately after having coffee may briefly increase stroke risk (the effect was not seen for tea). 

But, overall, Dr Mostofsky believes the effects are positive. 'It's nice to know there may be health benefits from the number one drug consumed,' she says.

SHOULD YOU SWITCH TO DECAF?

So what are we to make of this wealth of apparently conflicting evidence? 

Professor Rogers suggests that, in fact, the benefits of coffee and tea lie in the antioxidants that they contain - compounds that work to lower inflammation in the body. 

Inflammation has been linked to a host of diseases such as stroke, cardiovascular disease and cancer, and so antioxidants consumed in tea and coffee may reduce the risk of these diseases. 

This is why he still drinks decaffeinated tea and coffee (five cups of tea and one cup of coffee a day). 

But he says the effect would not be seen with caffeine-filled energy drinks.

'Compounds in tea and coffee may be producing beneficial effects, but in other drinks, such as energy drinks, there aren't these naturally occurring compounds to balance out the effect of caffeine.' 

And he believes that the rise in caffeine products will only fuel our dependency.

'I suspect caffeine intake will increase, and on balance that's not a good thing,' he adds.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2343424/If-coffee-perks-you-need-STOP-drinking-it.html Coffee Health Concerns Reactions