It’s hard to lose weight if your "sweet tooth" is in control of what you eat. I think this may sound familiar to you: I ate well all day and then right after dinner I got an uncontrollable urge to eat a bowl of ice cream. I have good news for you, while this urge to eat ice cream is a tough habit to beat, it is not impossible.

The big problem with sugar is that the more you eat it, the more you want it. You should also consider that sugar is not always only in the most obvious foods. That white bread you had for lunch good be the cause of your mid-day craving for a candy bar. The pasta you have for dinner could also be to blame. Every time you give into a craving, you contribute to the habit. You can only temporarily quiet your sugar animal by caving in to your cravings. It will always want more.

There is not just one single way of solving the problem of the sweet tooth. You just must be aware of the effects of sabotaging yourself by eating too many sweets. There may be times when you think you want to eat something sweet but in actuality you don’t really want it. How many times have you indulged in sweets only to eat so much that you stop enjoying it? Chances are you could cut back with just a few tastes until you are satisfied. If you tell yourself "no, you can never have sugar" then you will only want sugar. You have to change your mindset to "I can have sugar, but I don’t want it right now" once you allow yourself to have it you are much less likely to want it.

Each time that you start a new diet you are excited and dedicated to losing weight. You’re going to be strict this time and make it through to the finish line. Then, as soon as it starts and you’re momentum is going, you want sugar right this second! You cave and then get derailed. And the cycle begins. Next time, instead of feeling guilty for an occasional small treat, learn to savor the experience and you will find that just a few bites or even half of what you normally would want is all you need.

Typically cravings only last for a couple of minutes so all you have to do is wait it out. Sometimes you will have a quick craving right after eating. You should always give yourself 15 minutes before you eat anything more after a meal because it takes that long for your body to feel full. Every craving that you learn to ignore you will become stronger, instead of caving every time you will learn that they lessen over time.

Learn to talk yourself or distract yourself out of a craving. Every time you want something sweet just tell yourself "I realize that this is my body’s reaction to stress or what I just ate and it will pass, I don’t really want something sweet" and reward yourself everyday for not eating a sugary treat. You could give yourself a dollar a day and use that money to treat yourself with a new outfit or a pedicure at the end of the month. Save your sweet indulgences to no more than once a week and you will find that you are less likely to have cravings.

Sarah Elena Elliott wants you to lose weight fast but that doesn’t mean you necessarily need Proactol diet pills. The Medifast Diet may be a much better option.

There are a number of good fat loss products in the market today. The products have different functions and can produce different results, depending on the person’s preference.

One of the more popular fat loss products are the carbohydrate blockers. While protein and fats are the building components necessary for the body, carbohydrates are the most common source of energy in living things. Some foods that are high in carbohydrates are pastas, bread, rice, beans, potatoes, and cereals. These foods are high in starch content.

Carbohydrates can also be classified into good carbohydrates and bad carbohydrates. Bad carbohydrates can make a person’s blood sugar rise and fall rapidly. This can result to diabetes, memory loss, fatigue, mood swings, and of course, weight gain. Examples of these bad carbohydrates are potatoes, white rice, pasta, white bread, cornflakes, and jelly beans. Basically, the body turns carbohydrates into energy. This means that humans generally burn off carbohydrates into energy that can make them stay up and about all day. However, excess carbohydrates that do not get burned up stay in the body and contribute to weight gain.

Over the years, people have found carbohydrate blockers to be an effective fat loss product. Carbohydrate blockers, or more popularly referred to as carb blockers interfere with the body’s natural ability to slow down the absorption of carbohydrates.

It is also called an appetite suppressant and is designed to absorb carbohydrates from different foods. The more popular carb blockers in the market are CarboRId, Citrimax, and HCA, among others. Simply put, carb blockers are a good fat loss product because dieters can eat large servings of carbs without worrying about calories. This aids weight loss a lot faster and easier. Carb blockers should be taken 10 to 15 minutes before a high carb meal. These products block the carbohydrates from being absorbed by the body, but the carbohydrate-fat conversion is reduced. When taken regularly, this may have a prolonged effect on weight loss.

Carb blockers also have significant side effects. Because the body is not able to absorb and utilize some of the calories from food, the food is not properly broken down as it moves through the digestive system. Some of the side effects include indigestion, constipation, loss of essential nutrients, diarrhea, nausea.

Carb blockers may work for a period of time, especially if combined with a healthy diet and regular exercise. However, this is only considered as a dietary supplement because the effects have not been proven effective for a long period of time. There may come a time when the food and drug authorities may be able to measure the prolonged effects of this drug.

A person who is trying to lose weight permanently should go with a balanced diet that is slightly lower in carbohydrates and lower in protein. Dieters also have to remember that eating a meal high in carbohydrates and taking pills to prevent absorption is not a natural process. Carb blockers should be taken moderately and is best consulted with a physician.

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The failure of popular low fat and low calorie diets suggested to many Americans that another culprit must be the cause of weight gain. The theory that carbohydrates cause weight gain was popularized by Dr. Robert Atkins. His high fat, high protein diet has now fallen out of favor, but there are still many diets advocating reducing or eliminating certain kinds of carbohydrates. While eliminating all carbohydrates is no longer in vogue, refined carbohydrates, particularly sugars, are still viewed as fattening.

Carbohydrates fill numerous roles in living organisms. They are involved in the storage and transportation of energy, they are used to build cartilage in animals, and they play a role in the immune system, fertilization, and blood clotting. The reason people can live on high fat diets like that devised by Dr. Atkins is because humans have the ability to make the carbohydrate glucose out of protein and fat. The brain and nervous system require this glucose for energy.

Refined Carbohydrates

Clearly, we cannot say that all carbohydrates are bad or even that all sugars are bad. The body requires sugars to survive, even manufacturing them when they are not consumed. That having been said, the carbohydrates we eat today are different from those we ate historically.

Today we are processing grains with machinery that removes the bran and germ from the whole grain. This processing, or refining, of carbohydrates has increased the speed with which food is able to raise blood sugar. Refined carbohydrates are non-whole grain foods like white bread, white rice, and pasta and baked goods made with white flour.

There are scientists who believe that, by eating more foods that quickly raise our blood sugar, we are harming our bodies’ ability to manage our blood sugar. Their theory is that weight gain is caused by the body’s reaction to these sharp changes in blood sugar, and that the key to weight loss is to avoid foods that cause rapid changes in blood sugar. While this idea is still controversial among scientists, new ideas usually are controversial. Let us examine the evidence.

Thailand

Thai meals always include rice. The Thai term for something served with rice literally means "not rice." In the 1950s, a group of researchers from Cornell University did a study of the diet of a small rice-growing village. They found that both the rich and the poor got about 80% of their calories from white rice. Despite their high consumption of this refined carbohydrate, obesity was not a health concern.

At the national level in Thailand, consumption of white rice still makes up between 70% and 80% of the calories in the diet. In the United States, calories from carbohydrates make up about 50% of the diet. The percentage of Thai adults who are obese is less than 6%. This is more than 80% less than the rate in the United States and a far lower rate than that of any European country. More interestingly since genetics can’t explain the difference, in Thailand the rate of obesity is highest in the urban areas. There nutrition is more similar to the Western diet; consumption of refined carbohydrates is lower than in the rural areas. Since obesity in Thailand is highest where consumption of refined carbohydrates is lowest, refined carbohydrates cannot be the cause of obesity in that country.

Juice

While fruit juice is filled with many nutrients, calorically it is almost pure sugar. For this reason, people who believe that sugar and other carbohydrates are responsible for weight gain discourage the drinking of fruit juice. In 2006, the Minnesota Medical Association asked the federal government to remove fruit juices from its subsidized meal program that serves about 8 million low-income Americans.

However, we should remember that juice was available long before the modern period. The Greeks fermented grapes to make wine, and certain Zoroastrian Persians ate a diet that consisted almost completely of fruit and fruit juice. Despite the fact that fruits and fruit juices have been consumed for thousands of years, until the 20th century there were no examples of societies in which even one percent of the population was overweight. Not surprisingly, in the same year the Minnesota Medical Association made its request to the federal government, a study was published showing no correlation between consumption of pure fruit juice and weight gain. Other studies have reached similar conclusions.

Wrongly Accused

So why are carbohydrates suspected of causing weight gain, if the population of a country that eats more carbohydrates can be thinner than one which eats fewer, and low carbohydrate diets haven’t resulted in long-term weight loss? Why are sugars suspected of leading to weight gain, if drinking sugar in the form of juice has not been linked to weight gain? It is because over the last forty years Americans have been getting more of their calories from sugar, a carbohydrate. During this time, the rate of Americans who are severely overweight has tripled.

While the two factors are correlated, it does not appear that one causes the other. In addition to the previous examples, a three-year study published in 2002 in Dietary Reference Intakes by the National Academy of Sciences concluded, "There is no clear and consistent association between increased intake of added sugars and [body weight]." Neither refined carbohydrates nor simple carbohydrates cause weight gain. However, despite real world examples and scientific studies, a large percentage of the public remains convinced that refined carbohydrates and sugars cause weight gain.

Copyright 2009 by Daniel Matthew Korn

Daniel Matthew Korn is the author of Why Diet and Exercise Fail: How Current Research Contradicts Conventional Wisdom about Weight Loss. For more articles like this, visit his website at
www.whydietandexercisefail.com.