My Weight Loss Blog

A skilled UK citizen was denied a visa to work in New Zealand. Reason? He is too fat. The Welshman, a submarine cable specialist, was hunting for a job in the country. But to his surprise his weight prevented him from gaining a work visa. New Zealand has introduced new immigration laws that could prevent individuals who fail a Body Mass Index test from working in the country. Obese people are potentially a burden on the New Zealand health service. Comments on an on-line forum indicate that quite a few people have had the same problem. The funny thing is, is that there currently is a shortage of skilled workers, especially in the information technology sector. New Zealand companies are forced to attract talent from other countries, yet this immigration policy apparently makes it hard for them to do so. Richie Trezise, the Welshman, underwent a crash diet to lose weight and has now passed the BMI test.

submarine cable specialist headhunted for a job in New Zealand was forced to slim down before this country’s immigration service would let him in.

Welshman Richie Trezise was denied an employer-backed talent visa when he failed the Body Mass Index test (BMI), a fat measurement using a person’s weight and height.

His BMI was 42, making him morbidly obese and a potential burden on the health service under New Zealand immigration policy.

“My doctor laughed at me. He said he’d never seen anything more ridiculous in his whole life. He said not every overweight person is unhealthy or unfit,” said Mr Trezise, who plays rugby and used to be in the army.

The 35 year-old went on a crash diet to lose many kilos and two inches from his waist.

He passed the BMI to begin work for Telecom here in September.

Mr Trezise is one of four highly qualified specialist technicians working on the upgrade of the Southern Cross submarine cable.

CLICK HERE for the full article.

Sounds too good to be true, right? Apparently some bosses will gladly pay their overweight employees some money to lose weight. My boss will probably not be one of them.. correction : definitely not be one of them. Everyone knows money motivates people, and a new study confirms it yet again – this time as a tool to get people to lose weight. I suppose you could see the financial compensation as an investment of a company in their employees. Healthy, fit people will usually be more productive. Me personally, I do give myself some presents if I reach a certain weight loss target. It does work, I suggest you try it!

George.

“Lots of companies are experimenting with rewarding people for weight loss, and this study provides evidence that paying people to lose weight works,” says Eric Finkelstein, a health economist with RTI International, a non-profit research organization in Research Triangle Park, N.C.

He teamed with researchers at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill to recruit more than 200 overweight or obese employees in North Carolina. A third were given no financial reward for their weight loss after three months; a third were given $7 for every 1% drop in their body weight; a third were given $14 for every 1% decrease. The participants were not given a structured diet and fitness program.

Click here for the full article.

You know, my wish is to lose a decent amount of weight. I really don’t have to look like the Hulk to feel comfortable. But the video below shows that through weight training you can lose weight and build muscles. I don’t remember my wife ever mentioning whether she likes muscular men… but I’d bet she’d love to see me in great shape. So I’ll be following some of the videos on Youtube and put them on here for you guys to view as well. My wife has been viewing gardening videos on YouTube for a year now, and finally showed me the unbelievable amount of videos on there. I am hooked!

Speak to you later.

George.

It has happened to me many times. I lose a nice amount of kilograms and then 2 years later it’s all back! It’s got to be the most frustrating thing ever. You know you worked hard to lose that weight. Most dieters will recognize this problem. What is interesting is that new research shows our brain plays a crucial part in keeping the excess weight away from our body.

Here is part of the article:

In the battle against fat, the heroes achieve what most of us only long for — lasting weight loss. They’re so unusual, they’ve become the subjects of ongoing research by scientists trying to finger just what it is that makes them stand out from the rest of dieting humanity.
art.in.mind.jpg

The project is called the National Weight Control Registry (NWCR) and was created in 1993 by researchers at Brown University and the University of Colorado in the face of the well-known and defeating statistic: Ninety-five percent of dieters gain their weight back.

Registrants — some 4,500 — must have dropped at least 30 pounds and kept them off for a year or more, though the average member has lost twice that much and maintained it for about five years.

In one of the latest studies, Inga Treitler, Ph.D., a cultural anthropologist, and a fellow researcher intensely interviewed and observed 10 of the registrants, focusing not on what they ate or did for exercise but on how they lived — the books they read, the photos they kept, their pets, careers, friends and hobbies — before and after the weight loss. The question, again, was basic: What had enabled them to triumph where so many others falter?

Click here for the FULL ARTICLE.

A newly published study in the respectable Nature Medicine looked at the effects of stress on weight gain in mice.
It says that a chemical messenger called neuropeptide Y is turned on by stress. This “messenger” can be found in human fat. It increases appetite, causing you to eat more, resulting in an increase in weight. Sounds pretty simple, doesn’t it? Neuropeptide Y appears to be a very important factor in weight gain, as researches were able to disable it and noticed a dramatic decrease in fat generation even under stress. We are all under stress at times, it’s definitely good to try to “cheer up” – not just for psychological reasons as the article notes.

Does emotional stress make you fatter or thinner? Both. It appears that short-term, acute stresses may help you lose weight, whereas chronic stresses cause you to put on pounds, especially around your belly, where it’s most harmful.

A new study published this week in the prestigious journal Nature Medicine looked at the effects of stress on weight gain in mice. Investigators reported that chronic emotional stress turns on a peptide (chemical messenger) called neuropeptide Y, which is found in body fat. This hormone increases appetite, especially for carbohydrate-rich foods. It also causes your body to convert these calories into belly fat, a double whammy.

What’s especially interesting is that chronic stress alone didn’t have much effect on weight gain in only two weeks, nor did a high-fat, high-sugar diet. However, combining both together was especially toxic and markedly increased abdominal fat deposits in only two weeks.

CLICK HERE for the full article.