Sat, 26 May 2012 20:26:50 +0000WeeblyFri, 25 May 2012 08:38:35 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2012/05/measuring-the-waist-is-better-than-using-the-scales.htmlApparently, since the 1950s, waistlines have gone up from an average of 28inches then to 34inches now. This is because of labour-saving devices such as electric mowers, washing machines and supermarkets which do the cooking for you, and more of us doing jobs where we sit. More of us in offices and fewer of us doing physical work. And we eat more calories too. In the 50s rationing was still an issue.

Measuring our waistlines is a good way to check on the progress of our weight. When we go on the scales, sometimes a sort of magical thinking takes place. Even if we are not taking to try to reduce our weight, many of us still go on the scales every day, as though weighing ourselves somehow will cut down our weight. So we weigh ourselves at different times of the day, and are delighted when the 6.30pm weigh-in shows one pound less. And we get miserable when the 3pm session shows the weight going up. Our weight varies quite a bit during the day, week and month, even when our overall weight remains the same. If you use the scales, then the same time every day is more helpful.

Measuring your waist not only shows you if you are putting on weight, but helps with your general health too. The fat deposited in this area is more risky than the fat under our skin (around our backside and thighs or bingo wings). Waistline fat is associated with a risk of illness too, known as Metabolic syndrome, which includes heart problems and diabetes.

A friend of mine makes this recommendation. Never wear elasticated waistbands. ]]>Sat, 12 May 2012 08:32:27 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2012/05/why-am-i-overweight.htmlIncreased weight is a symptom. What of? Well there are lots of reasons we get heavier than we would prefer to be. Clearly we are eating more than our body needs, but why is that? The reasons could involve issues around planning, lack of information, emotional distress, our routines, the people we go out with and many more. So if the causes are many, then the solutions will be varied too.

We have learned to believe that if we are overweight, then we must go on a diet. But if your issue is that you are lonely following the loss of a partner, then how will a diet help? The emotional problems remain, so any diet is likely to fail, making you feel even worse, and back on the chocolate. If your problem is planning, and you never have the ingredients for a meal in the house, you will phone for a takeaway to deal with your genuine hunger. A diet won't help you there either.

There is a lot of pressure for us to be thin, like the models. But only 5% of us could ever achieve these heights of perfection. Trying can make us miserable. And fatter. Back to the chocolate for comfort.

And then are the dread words - Lifestyle Change. What on earth does that mean? And it sounds pretty radical. And difficult. So most of us don't fancy that idea too much.

Each of us is different. Our problems are different. Our response to our problems is different. Come and see me to find out what will work the fastest for you. You will discover that you can manage your eating, without thinking about food all the time. Straightforward, practical and automatic. ]]>Sun, 01 Apr 2012 14:27:48 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2012/04/hard-wired-to-love-fatty-foods.htmlI have blogged and banged on many times about the combination of fat and sugar and fat and salt that hits our bliss point. Just think of chocolate and crisps. They really hit the spot. And they have been engineered to do so, designed to make us want more and more. Read what David Kessler has to say. He bangs on about this too.

We have nerve endings in our mouths that mean we can sense the ‘fattiness’ of food. In the Stone Age this was really important. Fat provides the densest source of calories and living in a cave with just a sheepskin on, you needed the calories to survive. It turns out that these nerve endings activate an addictive response that promotes more fat intake. Again, in the Stone Age it meant if you managed to find something that tickled your nerve endings, you could gorge on fatty foods and thus fend off starvation.

The researchers showed that a high-fat diet results in the vigorous activation in the small intestine of endocannabinoids (cannabis-like compounds produced in the body). It does this by altering the activity of enzymes that control endocannabinoid metabolism. Endocannbinoids are well known to play an important role in regulating eating for pleasure. The sensing of fat in the mouth sends a signal to the brain, which sends a signal to the gut, which triggers an addictive neural pathway, which reinforces fat consumption.

No wonder eating just one biscuit seems impossible. Eating just one handful of crisps inevitably leads to eating the whole bag. Trying to eat just one square of chocolate doesn't work either. We are hard-wired to eat till they are all gone. In the Stone Age fat was a rare treat. Nowadays we can scarcely avoid it. But our bodies have not adapted to this abundance.

My recommendation is to not buy these fat and sugar or fat and salt treats.  Once the pack is opened you will eat the lot so buy the smallest you can find. After all, you know that in the hand is in the mouth. Do yourself a favour and reduce the risk.
]]>Wed, 29 Feb 2012 08:45:04 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2012/02/the-truth-about-exercise.htmlYesterday's Horizon programme on BBC2 talked about how most of us take up exercise to lose weight, but on its own it doesn't work. They showed that jogging for 15 minutes at 6mph uses up 16 calories. But a pound of unwanted fat is 3,500 calories. Most of us just don't have the time and the rest of us just don't want to exercise like this.

But there were some helpful suggestions. Maintaining a high calorie output just doing normal stuff can expend an extra 500 calories a day. So, if you walk instead of using the lift, stand instead of sitting, fidget instead of staying still, your body starts to use up extra calories even when you are asleep. For most of us, this seems a realistic approach. It is about being inefficient and wasting bodily energy, where most of our lives aim for efficiency (like using the remote instead of getting up to switch over).

I have blogged about these things many times. But the programme offered something new and interesting.

They showed that this kind of low level persistent activity can help us to move fat out of our bloodstream where it can clog our arteries and into our muscles where it can be used up.So it can protect against heart attacks and strokes. And that a few short bursts of high intensity exercise (HIT) is as effective as many hours on the treadmill. A Scottish researcher at Birmingham University (there was some nice footage of Glasgow in the programme!) shows that 3 minutes a week of HIT is all you need. Anything where you are working hard, for 3 shots of 20 seconds, in fact so hard that you are yelling to help you work harder, does the trick. And the trick is to get the fat stores in your muscles released so that the brain demands more energy from the fat stores around the organs. This can protect against diabetes and cardivascular disease.

The fat around our organs (fat above the waist) is the problematic fat. Hip and thigh fat on the other hand can be quite protective of good he

So after the programme I did 3 bursts on the exercise bike and will do the same 3 times a week for a month and see if I feel better.

]]>Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:47:04 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2012/02/the-psychology-of-losing-weight.htmlYou may know about Oprah Winfrey's weight loss history. It is now quite famous. She began dieting at around 10stone, after gaining about a stone, which was troubling her. That diet got her back to her previous weight, but when her weight reached 15 stone she went on a more drastic diet for 4 months and got back down to 10 stone again. But within a few years she had gained even more weight and was nearly 17 stone. She hired a team of trainers and dieticians who set her eating and exercise programmes and ensured she stuck to them. At the end, she was down to just over 11stone. But 4 years later she was over 14stone.

What does this tell us?

Firstly, it has to tell us that diets don't work. Anything that requires such radical changes to our lifestyle is unsustainable. We end up heavier than when we started. There is lots of information and evidence about why this happens. The fact that diets result in increased weight has been interesting researchers for many years.

Secondly, failing to manage our weight is not a sign of weakness. Look at Oprah's example. She clearly has loads of willpower and determination. She kept at a tight eating and exercise programme for a long time and her job requires willpower too. She is clearly a strong woman with no shortage of self-discipline or willpower.

But diets are not the only approach to managing our weight. (Well, what I really mean is manage our eating). We know about diets because they are well-advertised - there are books, magazines, diet foods, diet clubs and lots more. The diet industry is huge, worth billions.

Other approaches work better for the long-term. We can harness a whole range of psychological tools to identify what changes to make and to protect us from overwhelming urges and cravings. Setting realistic goals helps. And making small changes every so often helps too. And with hypnosis, these changes can form part of our automatic behaviour, so that we don't think about food all the time.

If you are wanting to manage your weight, then I can help you with a wide range of psychological techniques to suit your personality and eating behaviours. But in the meantime, here are some tips.

Don't go on a diet. Research shows time and again they make you fat.

Don't ban certain foods. This only makes them more desirable.

]]>Sat, 11 Feb 2012 00:43:32 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2012/02/holidays.htmlI am on holiday at the moment. I realise that my normal routines have gone out the window. I don`t really know what I am eating let alone the calorie load. And I am meeting more people than on a usual work day, with a cup of coffee or a drink, maybe a piece of cake. In the past I would have worried throughout the holiday, wanting to enjoy myself but feeling guilty and worried that I was just putting on extra weight.

But I am more relaxed these days! I am on holiday and have given myself permission to enjoy myself. None of us can do a lot of damage to our weight in just a couple of weeks. So you can enjoy your holiday meals and drinks without any guilt trips. On the other hand, it is not an opportunity to let rip!

These guilty feelings don`t help us to achieve our goals. If you are wanting to lose weight, then feeling bad about yourself doesn`t offer any practical solution. The hypnotherapy that I practice allows you to develop a new way of eating that is sustainable and easy, without any misery or anxiety.


]]>Mon, 23 Jan 2012 07:19:32 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2012/01/automatic-eating1.html_Most of what we do is automatic. If you think about it,  we could not actively consider every single action. We would be exhausted and get very little achieved in the day. Our brain is very clever at putting us on automatic pilot. Eating is no different. Our brain reminds of occasions when eating has occurred in the past and our bodies respond with hunger signals. And if our brain gets just a hint of a food cue, those hunger signals start too.

As a result, if we have been in the habit of snacking at 3pm, then our brain will be on the lookout for the time and our tums will rumble. If you have been used to eating a snack while Eastenders is on, the theme tune will get the juices going and the cupboard doors opening. Knowing this, means we can take action to avoid it.

Hypnosis works by helping you become aware of these occasions and stick to decisions you have made about ho
]]>Sat, 07 Jan 2012 10:51:49 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2012/01/hunger-is-a-powerful-driver.htmlHunger is the most powerful driver, because without it, we might forget to eat, and eating is essential. But these days most of us rarely get really hungry but the fear of hunger is powerful too.

My cat is a stray and I found her when she was scavenging in my friend’s kitchen. She was skinny and scared. After coming to stay with me she became as fat as fat because food, all of a sudden, was freely available, but starvation had been a daily risk. These are the rules my cat was following, to deal with the serious risk of lack of food and starvation:

• Always eat when food is available
• Always eat as fast as possible
• Always eat as much as possible
• Always eat anything put in front of you

We are animals too, so we can end up following these same rules, even though food is easily accessible and starvation is unlikely. Hypnotherapy can help you by embedding suggestions in your mind to help you overcome these hard-wired behaviours to avoid putting on too much weight.

We usually talk about losing weight, and I think that is a bit too abstract or most of us. We might think about a goal weight and express a desire to reach it. Again, for me, a bit too abstract. And we know that the goal is in the future, and things get a bit less urgent and a bit vaguer. To manage our weight we need to manage our eating and we can make those changes one or two at a time. Hypnosis helps by bedding those changes in, so they become automatic and sustained.

So, if you know that you just eat too much of everything, start eating half of any plate of food in front of you. Some of us were taught to eat everything on the plate, so this new behaviour might need some practice.

Before you eat anything, consult your hunger quotient. How hungry are you at the moment on a scale of 0-10? If it is less than 5, you don’t need to eat. There is always food available later. For some of us, a better question is when did you last eat anything at all? If it was less than 3 hours ago, you wil not be hungry. You might have the desire to eat and your appetite might be strong, but this is not hunger. Most of us have forgotten the difference.

When you eat, eat slowly. Completely finish one mouthful before preparing the next one. Research has shown that if you train yourself to eat slowly, and indeed, if you reduce your eating speed during the meal, you will eat less.

And that is another tip. Eat meals rather than snacks. Snacking is a new habit and since we started doing it, the average weight has increased by over 10 pounds.
]]>Sat, 17 Dec 2011 08:00:43 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2011/12/post-title-click-and-type-to-edit4.htmlWe will all put weight on over Christmas and New Year. It is inevitable. Christmas is the time for feasting. The feasting starts a week or two before Christmas and ends just after New Year. With parties and drinks, and extra food on the table and more meals each day, it is unsurprising that we will all put on a few pounds. We can deal with them in the New Year.

But over the holiday we don't need to eat everything we see. For some of us, me included, when I see a table full of so many different delicious foods, I want some of everything. Psychologists have noticed this too. When there is a lot of variety on offer, eating just one of everything means we eat much much more. So if you want to avoid some of those extra pounds, you might choose to have just one of just half of what we see.

But Christmas and New Year are the times of plenty and we want to enjoy them. When the New Year comes round, time to make a resolution to eat more helpfully during 2012! Happy Christmas.
]]>Fri, 02 Dec 2011 09:25:07 +0000http://www.glasgowhypno.co.uk/1/post/2011/12/christmas-and-the-eating-frenzy.htmlChristmas is getting closer. This is the time when friends and family gather together and enjoy the pleasure of a shared meal. And snacks, and drinks, and sweets. Sometimes the eating seems like its never-ending. We do eat more at Christmas. That's a fact. We spend longer at the table, we go to parties, we visit friends. But we still have a choice.

Hypnosis works to help you spot the chances to make a choice, and then to make it.

There will be a bit more weight around the hips after Christmas. After such festivities it is almost inevitable. Hypnosis will help you make those New Year Resolutions stick for the long term, easily and automatically.
]]>