Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

I just saw this commercial for Pepsi Throwback.

The reason why this soda is supposed to be better than normal Pepsi is because it is made with cane sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup. They aren’t saying that it’s healthier than normal Pepsi, but there are a lot of people out there who believe it is:

• WikiAnswers – Is sugar healthier than high fructose corn syrup?

Yes, sugar is made up of glucose, which is easier to digest and metabolize. High fructose corn syrup has been altered to increase the fructose and decrease the glucose. The body doesn’t metabolize fructose as easily as glucose; it metabolizes it more like fat. The natural fructose in fruit is counterbalanced by the fiber but this is generally not present in foods with high fructose corn syrup. For this reason the blood sugar level goes much higher, especially if drinking high fructose corn syrup. This can lead to obesity, diabetes and poor digestion.

Authors: Heather Basciano, Lisa Federico and Khosrow Adeli of the Clinical Biochemistry Division, Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, Hospital for Sick Children, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Published in the journal: “Nutrition & Metabolism”, February 21, 2005.

In the end, however, it all comes down to calories. There are EXACTLY the same amount of calories in a Pepsi Throwback as there are in a regular old Pepsi. Some people might think it tastes better than HCFS, but you can’t get me to believe that 100 calories of regular soda is going to make me fatter than 100 calories of cane sugar soda.

Via: Go Retro!: Throw Back Some Pepsi Throwback

Long ago, I wrote about making yourself look thinner with Photoshop techniques.

• Starling Fitness – Make Yourself Thinner With Software

Back then, I said:

In the end, there is no software that can make you look better. You have to do the work to look better. I have never had a better photo taken of me than the quick clicks of friends when I am healthy and strong.

It looks like photography websites are eagerly jumping on the bandwagon of making their subjects look thinner using this technique. Here is a video showing photographers how to make their clients look a little bit thinner in their photos using the Transform Tool in Photoshop. If you are using GIMP, use the Scale Image tool.

There is also a way to do something similar to this using the Liquify Tool. If you are using GIMP, use the iWarp tool. Here is a video tutorial showing those techniques as well.

I think that minor manipulation of photos like this is just a way for us to fool ourselves into not seeing our true selves. Until we are willing to look at our bodies and accept the way they are RIGHT NOW, it’s impossible for us to make the appropriate decisions to change it. If you accept your body the way it is and love it, that’s great! If you accept your body the way it is and want to change it, that’s great, as well. The first thing you have to do, however, is ACCEPT your body the way it is.

There is one exception to this thought and I will talk about that tomorrow.

Via: Pioneer Woman Photography – Ree Drummond

If you don’t own Photoshop and don’t want to pay the $600 price tag for it, there is a great open source program available that can do almost as much as Photoshop for FREE. You can download it here:

• GIMP – The GNU Image Manipulation Program

Update 06-25-09: I’ve found another good tutorial that really gives you a clear idea of how to do this:

This photo of a Dr. Pepper advertisement from 1939 surprised me.

The advertisement says:

When you drink a Dr. Pepper

You drink a bite to eat

It’s a surprising bit of honest advertisement. A can of Dr. Pepper is 156 calories, so it’s as much calories as an apple and a bit of cheese. Of course, if you eat the apple and cheese, you won’t be hungry again in two hours, but honestly, Dr. Pepper WANTED you to be hungry again in two hours.

In fact, they built an entire advertising campaign around it. If you notice on that advertisement, there is a clock with the numbers 10, 2 and 4 highlighted. In fact, I own a Dr. Pepper clock with those numbers highlighted as well.

Their marketing campaign suggested that at 10 am, 2 pm and 4pm, you should have a Dr. Pepper. If you were to add three cans of soda to your diet every day, that’s an extra 468 calories a day, meaning an extra 3276 calories a week. That’s a weight gain of almost a pound a week, just from soda.

Back in 1939, most people didn’t need to worry about getting fat. They were too busy trying to get enough calories to maintain weight, but now, that Dr. Pepper slogan is ominous.

Next time you’re tempted to get a Big Gulp, remember the Dr. Pepper slogan:

When you drink a soda, you drink a bite to eat.

Wouldn’t you rather just have a bite to eat?

Here is an interesting video from a college student about the Freshman Fifteen:

He takes you on a video tour of the student cafeteria at his school. The video pans over all the food and he says, “This is why I’m fat.”

I don’t like concepts like The Freshman Fifteen. It makes it seem like an inevitable outcome. Naming it like that makes it feel like it’s a natural part of growing up. I didn’t gain fifteen pounds when I started college. It took me three years to gain about twenty pounds, but I didn’t leave home to go to school. I was still living with my parents at the time. It wasn’t until I got married that my weight ballooned. Do I blame Mike for gaining that weight? No. Should students blame the cafeteria when they gain weight? Again, NO.

It’s not the food’s fault if I gain weight.

It’s possible to eat healthy and go to college. It’s possible to eat healthy and leave home for the first time. It’s possible to eat healthy and be a newlywed. Just like with every other aspect of my life, I need to be CONSCIOUS of what I’m eating, whether it’s in an attempt to avoid the Freshman Fifteen or the Middle Age Spread.

The Diet Blog posted this message from their community forums the other day:

• Why do Skinny People hate Fat People?

I am over weight and I am a very friendly, kind nice person and I notice that when I go to church or to the store people don’t seem to want to be around me. I take care of myself I have very nice clothes and I get my hair done. I just don’t get why beautiful people can’t talk to or be friends with me. I know that I am fat & maybe I am ugly, but I just don’t understand.

I have noticed this behavior with some people, but it’s very rare. Some skinny people DO hate fat people, but they are the exception, not the rule.

So what is this woman experiencing at church or at the store? Did she fall into a den of fat haters, or is there something else going on?

I don’t know, but personally, I have found that if I’m friendly with people and expect them to treat me nicely, that’s usually how they treat me. That was true when I was fat and that was true when I was at my thinnest.

When I was in high school, I suffered from the disease, Blame The Fat. Everything that went wrong in my life, I blamed on being fat. I wasn’t even fat back then, but if anything wasn’t absolutely perfect, I blamed it on my fat. Junior year, I dated a guy named Sean. I liked him and it seemed like he liked me. He was a sophomore and we were both friends with Clark. We went to a dance together, but soon afterward, he broke up with me. I immediately assumed it was because I was “fat.”

After a month of starvation dieting, I was skinnier than ever, but Sean still didn’t want anything to do with me. Finally, I asked Clark if he knew what happened. Clark said that Sean didn’t like the fact that I was older and had a car. He felt embarrassed that he couldn’t drive me to the dance and that I had to drive them.

I sat in my desk in our Literary Magazine office and didn’t say a word. I was thinner than I had ever been in high school and Clark was telling me that my old boyfriend broke up with me because I had the gall to drive us to the dance. I imagine I must have frozen up for a second or two while I absorbed the information.

It had nothing to do with my fat.

I don’t know why the people in that woman’s church are stand-offish, but I am nearly certain that it isn’t because she’s fat. I could think of a half a dozen other reasons why they don’t associate with her.

• They get new people all the time who don’t stick around, so they don’t accept new visitors into the fold until they’ve stuck around for a year or so.
• They assume that someone else has befriended them.
• There is a committee that is supposed to fellowship new members, but it isn’t doing its job. The people who weren’t picked to be on the committee are bitter and angry. They think, “It’s not my job.”
• They figure she came to the church because she knows someone there.
• They are jealous of her nice clothes and perfect hair. They think she thinks she’s too good for them.
• She seems so shy and insecure that they don’t want to make her feel even MORE uncomfortable by making her talk to strangers.

The only way to know for sure is to ASK. Back in high school, I didn’t have the balls to ask my ex boyfriend why he didn’t want to date me anymore, so I asked his buddy. Now, as a grown-up, I’m perfectly willing to ask anyone to their face. Want to know what I find out? It’s quite surprising:

• I don’t hate you. I’ve been really preoccupied because my husband got laid off…
• You think I hate you? God, I barely even know you!
• Yeah, I hate you. You’re so loud and obnoxious. I wish you would just shut the bleep up.

Most people like me. Some people hate me. Not one person has said, “I just don’t like to be seen with you because you’re so fat.” Even when I’ve been at my fattest. It’s NEVER about the fat. It’s ALWAYS about something else. There are a very small minority of people who hate fat people, but they don’t have any where near the power over your life as your own mind and attitude. The next time it feels like someone is snubbing you because you are fat, catch yourself. You’ve come face to face with the disease, Blame The Fat. Don’t let it conquer your mind. Keep being friendly and open to everyone and you will open far more doors than a skinny butt ever could.

Last week’s Sheldon had me laughing and cringing in embarrassment. Arthur, the duck, is so proud of his accomplishment. You can see the whole comic here:

• Sheldonâ„¢ Comic Strip: Daily Webcomic by Dave Kellett: May 4, 2009

What did Arthur do that was like running a marathon? I won’t ruin it for you, but just suffice it to say that even I haven’t achieved this sort of “greatness.”

The next time you are tempted to the dark side, remember Arthur and how silly he sounds when bragging about his foibles.

This postcard from PostSecret made me cringe with embarrassment.

It reads:

Tapeworms are what keep me thin.

There is a lot of questionable medicine floating around the world that recommends tapeworms for everything from stomach disorders to obesity. The concept of purposely infecting oneself with a parasite has been around for a LONG time. This advertisement doesn’t have a date printed up on it, but it’s obviously from the turn of the century.

This video talks a little about the negative effects of having a parasite within your body, but it doesn’t go into enough detail:

According to the Mayo Clinic, having a tape worm is a lot more painful than that “tapeworm expert” suggests:

Most likely, you won’t have any signs or symptoms with an intestinal infection. It’s possible you might notice segments of the adult tapeworm (proglottids) in your stool. Other possible signs and symptoms include:

• Nausea
• Weakness
• Loss of appetite
• Abdominal pain
• Diarrhea
• Weight loss and inadequate absorption of nutrients from food

Signs and symptoms of invasive infection: If tapeworm larvae have moved out of your intestines and formed cysts in other tissues, it can cause organ and tissue damage, resulting in:

• Fever
• Cystic masses or lumps
• Allergic reactions to the larvae
• Bacterial infections
• Neurological symptoms or seizures if the brain is involved

In one episode of House, a patient had a tapeworm in his brain causing trouble. That’s definitely NOT something I would want to risk just to lose weight. I’m perfectly willing to eat less and move more in order to avoid the complications of having a parasite within my body.

PostSecret‘s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.

How many people have to get sick from a product before the FDA has the right to shut them down? Apparently at least 23, including one death.

• FDA Warns Consumers to Stop Using Hydroxycut Products

The FDA has received 23 reports of serious health problems ranging from jaundice and elevated liver enzymes, an indicator of potential liver injury, to liver damage requiring liver transplant. One death due to liver failure has been reported to the FDA. Other health problems reported include seizures; cardiovascular disorders; and rhabdomyolysis, a type of muscle damage that can lead to other serious health problems such as kidney failure.

“The FDA urges consumers to discontinue use of Hydroxycut products in order to avoid any undue risk. Adverse events are rare, but exist. Consumers should consult a physician or other health care professional if they are experiencing symptoms possibly associated with these products,” said Linda Katz, M.D., interim chief medical officer of the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.

Hydroxycut is doing a recall and are pulling all of their products off the market. It gives me the impression that they are trying to make it look like there were tainted with an impurity. How long will it take before we all stop buying pills that promise to make us lose weight? Is losing a liver an acceptable risk in order to lose a few pounds? You can’t live for more than 48 hours without a liver. Are you really willing to risk that?

I am excited about this new book by Monica Seles. She was a tennis superqueen when a crazed fan stabbed her in the back in the middle of a match. Getting over the injury and her father’s painful death sent her turning to food. How many of us have had that same experience? I know I have.

She has written a book about her experience called Getting a Grip: On My Body, My Mind, My Self. Whenever I have the urge to binge, it helps to hear stories about people who have conquered it.

Here is her interview from ESPN:

• Bonnie D. Ford: Q&A with Monica Seles – ESPN

Via: Conquering Emotional Eating: Lessons from Monica Seles

Just looking at these Air Shorts makes me laugh, but then I learned that they were so popular that there were TWO companies making them. Here is the description on how they are supposed to make you slim:

Inflatable exercise shorts for men and women. Wear while doing your morning sit-ups, housework, etc. Great for exercise and for shedding body moisture. Inflate to fit. Gives support and massage at waist, hips, thighs, buttocks. One size fits all. Inflates with a simple tube.

They charged seven bucks for those ghastly things back in the 70’s, which would equate to about 38 dollars now. Would you pay forty bucks for those ugly things?!

The next time you’re tempted to buy something for weight loss, remember the Air Shorts. Save your hard earned money and let the fads fall by the wayside.

Via: Plaid Stallions : Rambling and Reflections on 70’s pop culture: Scarred Forever