3 Daily Practices That Will Cause You Gain Weight Fast

Sep 8, 2010 by Emilia

Eating processed foods

You are more likely to develop diabetes type 2 if you are overweight and exercise less than 3 times a week. I agree that if you have a genetic predisposition for obesity and diabetes type 2, it may be too late to change your parents.

But you definitely can change some of your daily habits that cause you gain weight fast while promoting high levels of cholesterol and triglycerides, two factors that will only make things worse for you. Let us see if any of these three practices are part of your daily life and which ones you can remove for good.

You gain weight fast if you purchase and consume too many processed foods

You basically know what you eat when you buy an apple, an orange, a piece of fish or a cereal that has only one ingredient. But when you eat a processed food that comes in a package or a can, do you know what you are eating? If you have decided that cooking is not for you and you are buying most of your meals already prepared, chances are you diet is not a healthy one and you are running into the following problems:

You are getting too much fat and I dare to guarantee you it is not the healthy type. Chances are you are getting your share of saturated fat and trans fats. These two fats are the ones that get stuck in your blood vessels and your waist, two major risks for heart disease. In addition, trans fats will also damage your arteries, a factor that promotes the buildup of plaque.
Your food will probably be filled with hidden sugars. Read the label to be aware of the different names manufactures use to camouflage sugar in their products. Hidden sugar is used by manufacturers of processed foods and medications and if you get into the habit of reading food labels, you will see that almost all processed foods contain sugar. This explains why although direct consumption of sugar tends to decrease, consumption of hidden sugars keeps going up.
You are getting too much salt. Too much salt and little potassium causes high blood pressure. Read my article on the causes of hypertension.
You drink too many sodas and fruit drinks. Sodas have a lot of sugar and even if you drink diet sodas, still are no good for you. And if you think fruit juices are any better, you are due for a big surprise. Most of the times, these drinks have a lot of sugar and very little fruit.Even if the drink is 100% fruit, that fruit has been pasteurized at high temperatures and has lost almost all its vitamins and minerals. If you want a fruit juice, make it at home. Add 50% water to your juice to prevent too much sugar going into your system in one sitting. And don’t forget to replace sodas with water or herbal tea.

You gain weight fast if you buy the larger sizes at fast food restaurants

You may think you are getting “a good deal” by ordering the larger size, but think about the prize you and your family will pay for those extra calories. Avoid super-size orders or the ones that indicate “25% more”. Look for regular size orders or children’s portions.

20 years ago, the hamburger and french fries now sold as the children’s meal at McDonald’s was actually the normal size meal that most customers ordered. Fast food restaurants determined that Americans were more interested in quantity and value than anything else, and began supersizing everything. Get the small portion to prove them wrong.

Remember that there are a lot of calories and a lot of fat when you order the supersize. In fact, the only winner when you buy these super sizes is the vendor. Sign up for the list of calories and sodium at fast food restaurants.

You gain weight fast if you exercise less than 3 times a week

Maybe some of these foods will not have such an impact in your weight if you were using the energy they provide with some type of exercise. Exercising not only causes you to burn calories while you are moving but it also causes your metabolism to work faster even when you are not exercising which results in more calories used.

Walking is an excellent exercise not only to lose weight but to prevent or control diabetes type 2, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure. Just as an anecdote I will tell you that although I do not have high cholesterol, my readings for total cholesterol are in the 170 number, every time I spend time in Spain, my country of origin, my cholesterol drops 20 points. The reason? Over there I use public transportation and since the bus or the subway train doesn’t come to my door to pick me up, I have to walk to where they are.

Final thoughts

How about making time to walk and cooking more at home? Dancing will also be a wonderful way to exercise and have fun. If your daily hours at work during the week are kind of hectic and by the time you get home you don’t feel like spending too much time in the kitchen, how about cooking during the weekend and freezing part of that food in small containers? I do that and it really works for me.

I cannot say I am a fanatic of cooking, but I came to the realization that the only way I have control of what I eat is by buying fresh foods and cooking them myself. This way I know how much salt, fat and sugar my meals have. For sure, they have no preservatives.

To Your Healthy Cooking!

Emilia Klapp, RD, BS
www.TheDiabetesClub.com