Michele Maroldo

You need to exercise and work out but you just don’t have the time to leave the house and drive to a gym to get in a thirty minute work out.  Why not stay home and exercise?  There are plenty of things you can do at home to get in a good work out in a short amount of time.

If money is not an issue and you have available space in your home you can invest in a universal type of exercise equipment.  Examples of these would be a Bowflex, Soloflex, or similar type apparatus in which you can train your entire body with one machine.  Another option is to purchase a set of dumbbells at a local department store and use them to target each muscle group.  And last but not least, you can always substitute dumbbells by using cans of food or by filling up empty milk gallon containers with water or sand.  Use these as you would dumbbells and you can effectively train each muscle group.  Furniture also comes in handy as an apparatus.  Use a chair or a bench, even a bed as place to lean or lay on while using dumbbells or a dumbbell substitute.

For cardiovascular training, you can run in place, do jumping jacks, or go for a walk outside.  You can also purchase an aerobic video or DVD that you can do at home.  Again, if money is not an issue and you have available space, consider purchasing a stationary bicycle or treadmill.  These provide an excellent way to get your aerobic exercise done.

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If dieting seems easy at first and slowly becomes more and more difficult, you may have reached the “dieting doldrums”. Learn how to stay on your weight loss track and avoid the common dieting pitfalls.

Each year millions of Americans begin some sort of weight loss program in an attempt to lose weight. While some may prove to be successful, a mere 20% will be able to maintain their loss. And to make matters worse, some will have regained all the weight they’ve lost plus additional weight leaving them fatter.

Losing weight is a tough battle in and of itself but keeping it off is even tougher. Here are 7 tips and tricks to combat the known pitfalls that can sabatoge your weight loss goal and help you successfully lose the weight and keep it off.

1) Scrap Your Scale: If you must weigh yourself, limit it to once a month or once a week if necessary. There may be meals that contain more salt than others and you may be carrying more water weight that day. Your body may be in a neutral mode and not be showing a loss that day. Whatever the case may be, weighing yourself every day can wreak havoc with your mind. You may become so depressed and angry that you immediately run to the kitchen and start consuming the first thing you get your hands on and it will almost always be the seven-layer chocolate cake you’ve hidden in the freezer for a special occasion. I’ve had clients who have weighed themselves every day, one girl weighed herself every hour! While that may be an obsessive person with a borderline eating disorder, we all need to be careful not to obsess about the numbers on the scale. Add to the fact that if you’re weight training as part of a weight loss program, muscle weighs more than fat and so the scale may be deceiving you.

2) Progress Past a Plateau: If you’ve reached a plateau and you find that you’ve stopped losing weight after weeks of dieting, don’t get discouraged and give up, you may just need a change in your routine. I like to refer to this as “shock training”. If you’re just dieting and not exercising, add some form of aerobic and/or weight training to your regime. If you have been exercising try changing your exercise routine, add more aerobic training or change the type of aerobic training you are currently doing. You may also need to make a change in what you’re eating. The idea is to shock your body by doing something out of your normal routine and then it will get back on the weight loss track.

3) Don’t Bail for a Binge: It may be a bad day, it may be a temporary loss of control, maybe it’s a special occasion, whatever the case may be, if you’ve gone off track don’t just give up for the rest of the day just because you’ve eaten something you shouldn’t have. You can still do a lot more damage during the remaining hours of the day if you continue eating whatever you want. A temporary slip is not going to sabatoge your entire dieting goal so don’t beat yourself up over it just get back on track the minute it’s over.

4) Help for Hunger Pains: When you’re between meals and you feel the urge to snack, try drinking an entire glass of water. It may sound funny but often times our bodies are just thirsty when we feel we are hungry. If you still feel hungry after drinking the water, choose your snacks wisely. Go for something with a lot of fiber, that way you’ll feel fuller faster. I always keep a bag of baby carrots or carrot chips in the refrigerator. They’re already washed, cut, and ready to eat. They’re even easy to grab a handful and take with you. Other vegetables and fruits work just as well, just wash and cut them up and have them ready to grab when you need a snack.

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Weight training is an excellent way to get and stay in shape, build muscle, build strength and get an overall sense of well being. But I bet some of you are thinking that if I build muscle, I will weigh more. Muscle does weigh more than fat so my first answer would be to throw away your scale! If you are going to embark on a good weight training program, you will build muscle but there are a few key issues you must remember.

1) Weight training is a two-fold calorie burner. To build muscle you must first tear it down. This occurs in the gym or at home, where ever you are performing your weight training exercise. The building process does not happen when you are exercising it happens when you’ve completed your exercise program for the day and you are at rest. Your body begins to build that muscle that you just tore down even while you’re sleeping. So I refer to it as a two-fold calorie burner because you’re burning calories while you are actually performing the weight training exercises but you are also burning calories to rebuild the muscle while resting.

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