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Different types of body thermometers and how to use them

January 9, 2009 by Joyce Priddy  
Filed under Healthy Living

There are four different types of body thermometers that are popular. They are the standard mercury, the digital thermometers, strip thermometers and ear thermometers. All are very useful when taking your body temperature.

The standard mercury thermometer requires that you shake it prior to use. You then place the silver end under the tongue, under the arm pit or in the rear.

The strip thermometer is a thin strip with the numbers on it. There is a heat sensor on the back. You place this on the forehead to get a reading.

The digital thermometers are usually plastic or rubber. You place the thin end under the tongue, under the arm pit or in the rear. You wait for it to beep to get a reading. If you use the arm pit method, add a degree to the final temperature.

The ear thermometer you place in the ear and wait for it to beep. You should get an accurate temperature reading.

How physical and mental health affect each other in older adults

January 9, 2009 by Joyce Priddy  
Filed under Healthy Living

Happiness helps the body to heal. The power of positive attitude greatly affects the well being of the body. The spirit, body and mind are all connected with one another. It is through this connection that the body can heal faster and the mind can stay alert and active throughout the senior years.

Depression makes you get sick easier. You feel badly. You notice your aches and pains more. Then you are less active. You are less social. The end result is the body can get sick while it is depressed. Making sure that older adults aren’t depressed helps with the physical health.

Loneliness can make you get sick easier too. Keeping your social life and creativity up will help with the physical health. They are all intertwined with each other. It is important to keep up the social life and the creativity to make a better quality life for older adults as they reach the senior years and beyond.

Herbs that stop the flow of breast milk

Swollen breasts full of milk are very painful. All you want is relief. Hearing a baby cry on the television can make your milk drop. Seeing a baby commercial can make it drop. Shoot thinking about it can make it drop. There is some relief though that you can get from herbs to help stop the flow of breast milk.

One popular herb for helping your breast milk stop is jasmine. You can burn jasmine incense sticks and candles. You can apply wet jasmine leaves to your breasts. You can even drink some jasmine tea several times a day.

Another popular herb for helping your breast milk stop is sage. Just as with jasmine you can burn sage incense sticks and candles. You can apply wet sage leaves to the breasts. You can also use sage in food and in teas.

The third one that I recommend is peppermint. You want to breathe peppermint incense stick smoke. Also, you can take peppermint oil and add it to warm bath water or make warm water compresses with it. If you rub peppermint oil in the breast nipples it will help them with tenderness and help to stop the flow of breast milk.

Some popular herbs to use to stop breast milk flow are jasmine, sage and peppermint. Remember that everything should be done in moderation.

Teriyaki Dinner, made healthy

January 8, 2009 by Esperanza Dodge  
Filed under Healthy Living

You COULD go to a Japanese restaurant and order a Teriyaki chicken dinner full of sugar, sodium, carbs and fat. Or you can stay home and make a healthier version yourself. Here’s how:

In a skillet of extra virgin olive oil, cook cut up cubes of tofu and chicken. You probably should cook the chicken first, then add the tofu. Use extra firm. When both are thoroughly cooked and browned, add in some more olive oil and marinate it with low-sodium teriyaki sauce. While that is simmering, work on the rest of the meal.

In the microwave or stovetop, make some brown rice Minute rice. It takes about 10 minutes. Steam some carrots and broccolli while you are at it. When everything is cooked, put brown rice in a bowl, then top with the marinated tofu and chicken. Top with steamed veggies. You can drizzle some more of that sauce on top.

I always like to finish with slivered almonds or crunchy cashews, but it’s up to you.

Lose Belly Fat in 30 Days with Circuit Training

January 6, 2009 by somnath chougule  
Filed under Healthy Living

Have you tried lot and are still not successful to lose belly fat? Do you want to know how to get rid of belly fat more quickly? Cardio is a good method for melting the fat of your body including your belly. But just doing the cardio is not enough. If you are serious about melting the fat on your abs, you should give up the regular and dull exercise habits. For losing the fat you could run miles and miles or you could chose to workout in a smart way. Though you are trying lot and are not getting reasonable results, then it may be the case that you might be committing some basic mistakes. If you are serious about it, and want to lose belly fat in 30 days, the answer is circuit training. If you desire to lose belly fat rapidly here’s a circuit training structure that should be performed correctly to lose fat in 30 days.

Total Body strength training workouts

By doing this you can lose belly fat from your body by increasing metabolism of your body and simultaneously gaining muscle.

More calories will burn if you work more muscle. The important thing to note while exercise, is that the muscle is by which the fats are burned. Strength training will help to lose fat on stomach because having more muscle implies that you burn more calories.

You may in general make mistake such as making sets of workouts on strength machine and taking rest between each set. You will be benefited more if you follow as circuit training structure. An example of a structure is given below. It is just and example, you will get an idea about total body workout be referring it. However it serves the basic purpose to lose belly fat.

After doing a 5 to 10 minutes of warm-up follow the below given steps.
a. Pushups-10 repetitions
b. One arm DB row-10 reps per arm
c. DB squats-12 reps
d. Side planks-5 to 15 seconds per side
e. Hyperextensions-12 reps
f. Leg curls on stability ball 10 to 12 reps
g. Standing DB overhead press-10 reps
h. Abs crunches on stability ball-10 to 15 reps

Do the above mentioned steps from start to end. You may take rest about 30 to 45 seconds after performing each step. Try to do all the steps 2-3 times. Depending on your rest time this entire process may take 20 to 30 minutes.

If the above mentioned total body workout if followed, you will exercise to gain strength as well as lose belly fat. After completing total body workouts on first day, you should always wait a day before performing the second round as it gives time for your muscles to rest and recover.

Cardio with intervals

Instead of regular cardio routine that have same speed, if an interval training is adopted it makes a lot of difference as it is quicker and not boring. As you toggle between low and high intensities during the entire workout, it becomes a good way to exercise to lose belly fat.

Here’s an example:
1. For the first five minutes warm-up yourself.
2. Next 2 minutes slow, next 30 sec to 1 minutes fast as hard as you can.
3. Repeat the step 2 for 4 to 8 times.
4. Last five minutes- cool down.

By following the above routing you can make you workout time shorter but more effective. You can lose belly fat, while increasing your metabolism. The above mentioned cardio can be done after the total body strength training workouts, for a frequency of 2 to 3 times per week.

But in the want of losing the fats quickly, one may forgot to take care of heart rate. So the better way is to check with a doctor and make sure that the exercise you are doing for losing the fat is safe for your heart.

With this structure for exercise to lose belly fat you are sure that your efforts for losing the fat will not be slow and frustrating. But at the same time taking food which contains proper nutrients is also very necessary in the process of losing fat. If the exercise is correctly done and care of right diet is taken, you should be able to lose belly fat by a considerable amount in 30 days.

Tofu Salad Sandwich

January 5, 2009 by Esperanza Dodge  
Filed under Healthy Living

Here’s another yummy vegetarian meal I made today, this time for dinner. I toasted two pieces of sourdough wheat bread and melted some cheddar cheese on top. On the skillet I warmed some olive oil then tossed in extra firm tofu slices, about the width of spam sandwiches slices.

When the tofu was done, I sprinkled with paprika and lite salt. In my sandwich I added baby spinich and the tofu. Then you drizzle some lite mayo over the tofu and spinich. That is your tofu salad sandwich.

On the side, put some large grape tomatoes in a dish with lite ranch in a small bowl for dipping. Add some kettle cooked chips with natural sea salt and there’s your delicious and healthy meal! It is very good too! Oh, and filling.

How to Lose Belly Fat in 30 Days

January 5, 2009 by somnath chougule  
Filed under Healthy Living

Are you one of the persons who are struggling to lose belly fat and trying to find out the best way to lose fat quickly? Accumulation of the fat in you belly may result due to many reasons. While you try to lose the belly fat by doing exercises, you must simultaneously consider the type and amount of intake of food that will add to your body fat. It has been proven by the science that your metabolic rate accounts to burning of fat. Increasing the metabolic rate can greatly help in losing belly fat or any other fat on your body. Here are some the best ways to lose belly fat quickly and effectively in 30 days.

Sit up’s: Doing sit up’s can be an easiest and less time consuming way to lose belly fat for achieving good results. Belly fat is nothing but a stored energy. If you want to lose the fat you have to burn excess calories than your actual consumption. For getting fast results and lose fat, sit up’s can be considered as an effective exercise for every type of body.

One of the most common reasons for increasing the fat is the intake of fried food. Fried food contains less nutrient value and mostly empty calories, which finally add up in increasing fat in your body. Hence in order to stop the increase in body fat or to lose belly fat, stay away from taking fried food as far as possible.

Usually people have habits to take late night snacks. This habit mostly adds up in increasing the fat especially the belly fat. Because after taking late night snacks people usually do nothing that will be considered as physical activity that helps in burning fats. So if you are one of the people having such habit of taking late night snack, avoid taking late night snacks which will help to lose belly fat.

Often people starve to lose belly fat, thinking that starving will help in burning calories in the body. It is wrong thing to starve yourself and exercising with a great effort, since it will not help in burning the fat but on the contrary you will find yourself hungry and drained.

On the other hand many people adopt the strategy to take little food but do no exercise. This will also not help to lose belly fat because with insufficient food intake your body metabolism is slowed down to compensate the lack of food and the rate of burning fat is also slowed down. Instead, if you avoid taking food that is rich in calories and make a habit of regular exercise, it will help a lot and you will get desired results in losing the fats. At the same time, try to intake protein rich diet which helps in developing muscle mass with no superfluous fat, which will help in burning more calories. Drinking lots of water can also be considered as an important factor in burning calories, since hydration helps in burning more calories along with developing muscle mass.

A similar way to lose fat is to take food in reduced portions and doing exercise daily. As long as the food that you eat is nutritious and its amount is smaller, you can eat what you like. As you are eating in smaller portion you can enjoy all the tastes that you like and since you are eating less and doing optimum exercise, your body will burn fats without having any side effect as in the case of starvation.

Another effective method to lose belly fat is to perform full body exercise. Your metabolic rate can be increased up to 48 hours by doing multi-joint exercises that include legs, back and chest. In this process the fat burning hormones in your body are released which prevent the fat from accumulating.

Once your plan for right workouts to lose belly fat is ready and you are daily going on accordingly it, you should also take care to eat right. When you feed your body with right food that contains more nutrients and fewer calories, you will be sure that you will lose belly fat in 30 days. Also the energy required by your body in doing exercise can be provided from this type of food.

5 Top Tips to Lose Stomach Fat

January 5, 2009 by somnath chougule  
Filed under Healthy Living

Yes, you have to lose stomach fat as fat belly is regarded as an additional health risk. Fatty tissue which is stored around the stomach and abdomen (visceral fat) carries a greater health risk than fat located in the lower body around the butt and thighs. Belly fat or visceral is the kind of fat that is found deeper in the body as compared to subcutaneous fat which is located just under the skin. According to recent survey maximum people around the world are being diagnosed each day with high levels of cholesterol, diabetes, heart diseases and so on. The reason is quite simple, belly fat as it collects around the organs in the abdomen. Keep on reading, as you’re about to discover the most powerful methods to lose stomach fat forever. If you are looking for safe permanent weight loss without using pills, special foods, or gimmicks of any sort, then you simply must bear with me.

Lose belly fat by eating foods that burn fat and without stress:

The first and most important tip to lose stomach fat is by eating 5-6 small meals each day. Consuming small but healthy meals prevents you from overeating, plus it also helps in boosting the metabolism, since the body requires energy to digest the food. It’s a good idea to keep heaviest meals at the start of day and reduce the amount as the day progresses. Foods that are high in protein and low in carbohydrates, sugar and saturated fats are the best to lose stomach fat. You can prefer eggs, fish, lean meats, complex carbohydrates like vegetables, whole grains and a variety of fresh natural fruits. Avoid simple, refined carbohydrates that contain white sugar or white flour. Fatty acids are essential for process of burning belly fat, hence include good healthy fats such as fish fats, seeds and nuts, olive oil etc.

Lose belly fat by drinking the right fluids:

Liver is mainly responsible for burning the fat. If you do not drink enough water liver function suffers and process of burning fat is affected. You should drink enough water and you should avoid drinking canned fruit juices, chocolate drinks, and soft drinks, since their sugar content is very high. If you are doing heavy abs exercise to lose stomach fat fast, you need to drink plenty of water after 30 minutes of workout. The simple fact is when you are dehydrated, the organs in the body work harder in order to retain the water reserve of the body.

Lose belly fat by lifting weights:

Exercises for your stomach are really crucial to lose stomach fat. If decrease body fat quickly is your aim, you should do weight training and cardio exercises. Exercises like chest presses, lat pull downs, free weight squats, and dumbbell rows are good exercises for quick belly fat lose. This abdominal exercise stabilizes the core muscles but they alone are not good enough for overall body fat reduction.

Lose belly fat by getting a cardio workout:

In order to lose stomach fat, calories need to be burnt. Running, jogging, brisk walking, swimming, tennis, dancing, and cycling are top exercises for burning fat and boost metabolism because these exercises creates calorie deficiency within the body. To get maximum benefits, you need to do cardio workouts at least 30 to 45 minutes and you should do it about three times a week.

Lose belly fat by not overdoing the crunches:

There has been some controversy over abs crunches. Do they work or not? My answer is it depends as you cannot tone your stomach without an overall change in your diet and full body exercise. You can’t keep the weight you’ve gained in one area of your body and still expect to get a six pack. This does not mean that the abs should not be worked out at all as there are muscles in the abdomen which need to be worked out. Also, make sure that your abs crunches are done in small quantities of controlled movements with short rests in between.

Remember the weight gain didn’t happen overnight, it happened slowly over time, the same is with proper healthy weight loss plan to lose stomach fat, and you can’t have miracles over night. Be patient and remember one fact, some health studies show that abdominal fat can develop as a result of stress. This is because the hormone cortical is released during stress, and a high level of cortical in the body appears to stimulate the storage of fat around the belly and abdomen. Remain cool and follow my 5 tips to get fast results.

5 Must Do Abs Crunches for a Killer Six Pack

January 5, 2009 by somnath chougule  
Filed under Healthy Living

There are two contrary opinions among the people, about abs crunches. One group of people say that it works in developing a killer six pack, while other group says that it doesn’t work. The genuine answer to it is that it depends upon many factors such as genetics, stress, slow metabolism, improper digestion, eating late night, poor posture. If you do not give optimum attention towards these factors and try to exercise your abs for a killer six pack, you will hardly get any noticeable results. If you have a habit to eat late night, it will result in growth of fat over your abdomen. Still if you try to shape your abdomen by doing abs crunches, then how can you expect to get desired results?

Here are some types of abs crunches, if done regularly along with proper diet, will surely help you in developing a killer six pack.

The Basic Crunch:

The basic crunch is helpful for upper area of the abdomen and abs. The procedure to do the basic abs crunch is as under.

1. First of all lye down on you back.

2. Bend your knees and place your feet’s on the floor such that toes come near to your hips. This provides support to lower back. Now place your right hand on your left shoulder and left hand on your right shoulder such that both the hands make cross over your chest.

3. Now slowly try to rise up your upper half part of the body, simultaneously pressing your lower back against the floor. Exhale slowly, when you reach the peak of the crunch and when you start to inhale lower your back down slowly.

4. Repeat the above step No. 3 for about 20 to 25 times and take rest for about 1 minute. Then perform the crunches for about 3 to 4 sets by taking rest of 1 minute after every set, this will be sufficient for the day. But remember not to try to do excessive abs crunches in want of quick results, because after doing first 25 to 30 repetitions you will feel lack of energy and most probably you will not perform the crunches correctly.

Initially after doing 20 to 25 controlled and perfect movements you will feel you abs muscles working. If this is not the case then surely you are not performing the movements as ideally required. Your movements should be focused on your middle section, alternatively if your neck feels worked, then you should note that you are not performing the abs crunches properly.

The Reverse Crunch:

Lower portion of abdominal is worked by this exercise.

1. Firstly lie down on your back, place your hand straight along your body, touching the floor and palms facing towards floor.

2. Keep your back and head straight and slowly raise your legs up in the air, slightly bend your knees and cross your legs.

3. Now try to raise your hips off the floor for about 2 inches and try to keep this position without falling down. Stay in this position for 3-4 seconds and perform abs crunches, while keeping your hands, back and neck on the floor.

4. Lastly lower your hips slowly back and try more repetitions, don’t forget to take rest of 60 seconds between each set of 20 to 25 abs crunches.

Cable side crunch:

Get the cable to highest position, now grab handle with one hand and rest the other hand on the grabbing hand. Perform crunch only between waist and lower chest, while keeping your arm stationary. The movement caused will be very small. Perform three sets of 10-15 repetitions.

Oblique Decline Crunches:

On a decline bench, lock your feet at the top and lie down inclined. Keep your left hand over left ear and right hand on your right hip. Now slowly raise upper part of your body and twist towards the right. Keep your abs tight and your movement should be controlled and slow. Try to touch your left elbow to your right knee. After that, slowly release your body to the starting position. Now perform similar set on right side.

Oblique Crunches:

Lie down on the floor, bend you knees and keep your feet flat on the floor. Keep you’re both hands on the back of head and elbows must be projecting outwards. Now perform abs crunches in oblique direction trying to touch your left elbow to your right knee. Slowly come to initial position and repeat.

You can get killer six packs by doing above five abs crunches. But remember if you won’t take care of diet, merely doing abs crunches will not give you noticeable results. Also, don’t expect the results by tomorrow as it is difficult to burn your well earned belly fat in single day. Just concentrate hard and the day will come when you will have the sexy flat stomach.

Must Do Thigh Exercises For Head Turning Legs!

January 5, 2009 by somnath chougule  
Filed under Healthy Living

There are distinctive kinds of thigh exercises, which if performed sincerely can give exclusive results. It is really challenging to choose between them as you don’t know your ultimate goal. If you ask me I would definitely recommend you to perform exercises that not only tone, firm and strengthen your thighs, but at the same time burn the fat. I say so because burning fat is very essential as you’ll never be able to see your thigh muscles if they are hiding behind the fat.

For women, shaping the muscles of the thighs is an important fitness goal. They typically carry excess fat on their thighs and hips. As a result they get confused when it comes to lose weight, though they try different types of thigh exercises with no results.

Don’t Make This Mistake with Thigh Exercises

Generally majority of women don’t want to perform thigh exercises that will make their thighs big and bulky like a man or like a big female bodybuilder. This is a very big mistake. They desire to become slim with a flat stomach and bulky thighs without performing upper leg exercises and tend to use lighter weights. Performing with lighter weights will not burn fat, better to perform with heavier weights with moderate repetitions. (8-12reps). so listen and read carefully, you will never get big and bulky thighs if you keep on doing common mistakes.

The reason is simple - Testosterone.

The main reason why women cannot get big and bulky thighs from any of the thigh exercises like men is amount of testosterone. Women don’t have anywhere near the amount of testosterone that a man has.

I see a lot of women think aerobic exercises are better than Any thigh exercises. You need to include exercises for your thigh muscles and weight training as aerobic training doesn’t increase or tone muscle and lean muscle.

After the age of 25, the average woman will gain one pond of body fat and at the same time lose muscle tissue which results in decrease of metabolism. Proper thigh exercises can increase your metabolism by restoring muscle tissue that you lost over the years.

Effective thigh exercises will work all the major thigh muscle groups, including your hamstrings, groin muscles, quadriceps at the front of your thighs, and hip flexors at the front of your pelvis. The more effective upper leg exercises will work all the above muscles at once resulting in much better fat burning, toning and firming.

Thigh Exercises That Simple And Easy To Do!

Below you will find a list of exercises for your thigh muscles to use in your lower body workout. A combination of the best thigh exercises, cardiovascular exercise and good nutrition is the most effective for fat loss and toning and shaping your muscles.

(1) Multi muscle leg exercises- Dumbbell Lunges:

This thigh exercises are good for working your gluts, quads, inner and outer thighs and hamstrings. This exercise can be done with either Dumbbells or Barbell.

STANCE: A feet together stance is recommended.

STEPS:

Grab hold of a pair of dumbbells and stand upright.

Keeping your back straight take a step forward bending your knees and getting them as close to the floor as possible.

Push yourself back to the starting position and repeat with the other foot.

(2) Multi muscle leg exercises- Leg Extensions:

This thigh exercises will help to define and shape the front of your thighs, known as your quads.

STEPS:

Sit on the leg extension machine (adjust the seat according to your body). Hook your feet beneath the roller pads and grasp the handles at the sides of the machine for support.

Straighten your legs and lift the weight up. Pause at the top for a second or two to enhance the peak contraction in the quads. Lower the weight slowly to the starting position. Repeat.

(3) Multi muscle leg exercises- Leg Press:

This movement works the quads, hamstrings, and gluts. The leg press allows you to work your legs hard without putting extra stress on your back.

STEPS:

Sit in the leg press machine with your back on the angled seat and your feet on the footplate about shoulder width apart with your toes pointed forward or just slightly out to the sides. Straighten your legs and release the bars at the sides of the machine. There is usually a handle on each side for you to hold on to and stabilize yourself.

Bend your legs and slowly lower the weight until your knees are at a 90-degree angle. Straighten your legs and lift the weight back up to the starting position. Repeat.

(4) Multi muscle leg exercises- Hack Squats:

This movement works the quads, hamstrings, and gluts.

STEPS:

Position yourself on the machine with your feet just wider the shoulder width apart with your toes pointed just slightly out to the sides. Straighten your legs and release the bars at the sides of the machine. Bend your knees and squat down until your knees are just less then a 90-degree angle. Straighten your legs and lift the weight back up to the starting position. Repeat.

(5) Multi muscle leg exercises- Straight Leg Dead-lifts:

These variations of the dead lift work the hamstrings, gluts, and lower back. It also works the forearms because you have to grip the barbell.

STEPS:

Stand in front a barbell with your feet placed shoulder width apart. Bend your legs and grasp the barbell with your hands just wider then shoulder width. Using your back and legs stand up with the barbell at arms length in front of you.

Keep a slight bend in your knees and bend over as if you were going to touch your toes. Keep your head up and you’re back flat as you bend down. Straighten up to the starting position. Repeat.

Along with multi muscle leg exercises you can also try single muscle leg exercises. The thigh exercises for your thigh muscles listed above will indeed do the job for you. These upper leg exercises will tone, firm and burn a tremendous amount of fat cells. With the one mentioned above you’ll define and separate your thigh muscles, creating the sexiest thighs you could imagine.

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