Tuesday, March 9, 2010, at 6:00pm, at the LGBT Community Center of New Orleans, the 2010 Weight Loss Challenge will host its second, open to the general public, Discussion Panel, and its third Contestant Weigh-In.  Remember, last month the panel was cancelled due to the Saints Parade. The guest speakers from February have been rescheduled for March. Special guest speakers for the night will include:

The Fit Gourmet, Chef Dione Duhon: Discussing the importance of having a fully stocked pantry with it comes to making diets work. Visit www.fitgourmetofneworleans.com for more information.

Executive Chef from Ralph’s on the Park, Chef Chip Flanagan: Discussing different cooking techniques to lower the calories in your meal and how to make healthy choices when dining out.

Executive Chef from Oceana Grill, Chef Louis Brown: Discussing different cooking techniques to lower the calories in your meal and how to make healthy choices when dining out.

Creator of Bayou Brew, Renee Brown: Discussing the importance of natural ingredients and the harmful effects of artificial preservatives.

From the Mind-Body Center of Louisiana, Melinda “Mindy” Milam, L.C.S.W.: Discussing staying mentally healthy when it comes to dieting and weight loss and some of the pressures that go with it.

NO/AIDS Taskforce’s Behavioral Health Therapist, Juliet Clayton, LCSW: Discussing how Good Mental Health Leads to a More Fulfilling and Happier Life.

Odyssey House’s and NO/AIDS Taskforce’s Substance Abuse Clinician, Kristin D. MacRae, MSW, GSW, DMHC, LAC: Discussing addictions and mental blocks concerning weight loss.

Salire Fitness’ Life Coach Nolan Ferraro: Discussing Keeping Your Head on Straight When Losing Weight: Maintaining Balance in Your Life.

This is really a great opportunity for people to gain some great insight and get the chance to ask experts some questions.

When: Tuesday, February 9, 2010 at 8pm
Where: LGBT Community Center of New Orleans (2114 Decatur Street)
What: Weigh in and Panel Discussion

Update: This Event was CANCELED due to the Saints Parade and will be re-scheduled. Stay tuned for details.

There is a very special event going-on tomorrow night…besides the Parade for our New Orleans Saints Super Bowl Champs – it’s the LGBT Community Center 2010 Weight Loss Challenge’s February Weigh In and Discussion Panel.

The LGBT Community Center of New Orleans’ 2010 Weight Loss Challenge kicked off on Sunday, January 10, 2010 at the Community Center on Decatur Street with the contestants’ initial weigh-in.  It was an amazing day for the contestants and included meeting all of the Weight Loss Challenge’s sponsors, the LGBT Community Center’s Board of Directors and each other.  The Challenge has officially started with a total of nine contestants.

The contenders are competing against each other for prizes all while losing weight that they have tried so hard in the past to lose and have been unsuccessful. The goal of 2010 Weight Loss Challenge is to assist each contestant to lose the most percentage of body weight in a stable and healthy manner. The Center is optimistic that it will be successful in changing the way that all involved, including the entire New Orleans Community, looks at themselves as it pertains to their health. Throughout the duration of the contest, the public will be given an opportunity to follow the contestants in their struggle to reach their individual goals.

When: Tuesday, February 9, 2010 at 8pm
Where: LGBT Community Center of New Orleans (2114 Decatur Street)
What: Weigh in and Panel Discussion

You definitely have time to make both the parade and this event – which is open and free to the public.

The panelists and items of discussions are:

Nutritionist, Ginger Bouvier: Discussing the proper dieting techniques to fit your lifestyle.

The Fit Gourmet, Chef Dione Duhon: Discussing the importance of having a fully stocked pantry with it comes to making diets work.

Executive Chef from Ralph’s on the Park, Chef Chip Flanagan: Discussing different cooking techniques to lower the calories in your meal and how to make healthy choices with dining out.

Corporate Executive Chef for Ralph Brennan Restaurant Group, Chef Haley Gabel Bittermann: Discussing different cooking techniques to lower the calories in your meal and how to make healthy choices with dining out.

The general public will be allowed to ask the panelists questions and interact with the contestants. Be Fit NOLA will be there and we hope you will too…this is such a great opportunity to discuss healthy eating habits.

Willpower After Eycken by Tim Brown

Here’s a quick recap from Part I of this series on Willpower. Studies show human beings only have a limited amount of willpower and if overtaxed…you will run out of willpower and the ability to say no to temptations or yes to things you must do but hate doing.  This means that if you’re planning to survive the Super Bowl, Mardi Gras and living in New Orleans by relying on your willpower to not over eat and over drink…you are guaranteed to eventually give in and fail.

No One Wants to Be a Failure

There nothing good or appealing about failure.  Failure is demoralizing, depressing and discouraging. We’ve all heard the saying “You don’t plan to fail – You fail to plan”.

If Not Willpower Than What!??!

If you can’t rely on your willpower to live a healthy lifestyle…than what can you reply on?  What can you do, a mere human being, to be able to withstand New Orleans and all her temptations?

Plan, Structure and Boundaries

Without a plan, structure and boundaries you have a bit of chaos and free for all.  You keep yourself open and vulnerable to every temptations and weaknesses you have.

In order to not overtaxed your willpower – you need to craft a plan, establish some structure and set boundaries in order to create an environment where you are no longer exposed to constant temptations and your weaknesses.

From within the comfort of your plan, structure, and boundaries you can strive and achieve your goal of living a healthy lifestyle.

Can you see it now!?! Starting to?  Not at all…

Willpower Meter

Have a look at that list of everything that was taxing your willpower meter in a 24 hour period.  Can you see how, if you had a plan, structure and boundaries you would forego quite a few things on your list?

Going to give you some time to think about it; we’ll pick this conversation back up next week!

Our weight-in was last Sunday; we did a virtual weight-in at home and posted our results to include how many pounds each of us have pledged.  Together we have pledged to lose more than 100 pounds – that equates to a 100 pounds of food donation to the Second Harvest Food Bank of Greater New Orleans and Acadiana.

After the weight-in, our journey to lose a pound or two before next Sunday began. Losing weight is not easy…but we’re leveraging the Be Fit NOLA Ning network and Twitter to keep each other motivated, share information, pointers and give one another support.  The first few weeks are always the hardest so it’s important for us to stick through this together.

The first couple of weeks are when the cravings are the worst and the crankiness is at an all time high.  Until the scale starts showing good downward progress and clothes get a little looser…it’s hard to find the motivation say “No’ and resist when your body craves the sugar, fat, and salty foods you’ve gotten used to.

We all know we must stick with it!  We must fight the cravings and temptations to continue to eat the same way.  We each must make the changes necessary to eat healthier and drop the extra pounds we’ve pledged to lose.

Once we start getting results, it will become all worth it and the cravings will ease up and eventually go completely away.

It’s not too late to join us.  You can pledge to lose weight at PFPChallenge.com between now – June 30, 2010.  We do our weight-in every Sunday so you can just jump in there with us.

This is a great cause, it’s free to join, and you get to lose weight, meet new people and learn lots of new things about healthy, fitness and dieting.

Many people feel they need professional help losing weight and to be honest, enlisting professional help will increase your chances of being successful and ensuring you lose the weight the right way. Here is a list of professional to consider reaching out to:

Family Physician: The first and most obvious place in New Orleans to seek assistance from is your doctor’s office. Whenever starting an exercise or weight loss program; it’s best to always make sure you get the green light from your doctor…particularly if you already have health issues.

Ask him or her about the best and safest way to lose weight. Your physician should give you a healthy diet plan to follow or one for you to use as an example to start eating better, so you can shed some pounds.  Your physician will probably be thrilled to hear that you’re ready to take your health in your own hands and lose some weight.

When it comes to losing weight, a lot of people are always looking for shortcuts. You might be tempted to ask for help losing weight in the form of diet pills and weight loss medications. This is a valid way that some people lose weight when they can’t seem to do it alone.  Ask your doctor if this is a good option for you. In most cases, starting a healthy diet and a regular exercise program is all you need.

However, your doctor will know your medical history and your current health and be able to advise you on which medications might be an option, or explain why you shouldn’t bother taking any diet pills/medicine.  Don’t be discouraged if your doctor is against the idea of prescribing weight loss medicine; millions of people have lost weight without taking pills or using other aids, and so can you.

Counselor/Psychologist: Other professional help losing weight that might be beneficial to you, besides your doctor, is a counselor or psychologist. While this isn’t an often recommended step in losing weight, for some people, it can be an important one. Quite a few people have trouble losing weight because they eat compulsively, and very often this has roots in an emotional or psychological cause. Changing your whole mindset on how you eat in New Orleans could possibly be one of the most difficult aspects of losing weight.

It’s very difficult to eat healthy or even just stop overeating if you have emotional triggers that cause this compulsive behavior.  Talking to a counselor or a psychologist can help you get to the root of what is causing your eating problems, and put you one step further down the road to healing yourself emotionally while you’re getting healthier.

Some local hospitals even have programs about nutrition and exercise. Ask about their different programs.  Most people who run such programs are happy to talk to you about them and help you get started on the right track.

Nutritionist/Dietician: If you can afford it, you might want to visit a nutritionist or dietitian because they can really offer you needed knowledge, advice and help with losing weight.  These experts on food, eating and nutrition can put together an eating plan that is designed to be right for you and the foods you eat. They will use your food choices and modify them into a healthy diet that will let you lose weight.

Personal Trainer: Also, a few visits or consultation with a personal trainer can offer you help losing weight by ensuring you’re exercising correctly.

As you have read professional help losing weight in New Orleans is a viable option for everyone who is willing to seek it out. Don’t hesitate! Get the help you need…a good place to start finding the help you need is in the Health and Fitness Directory.

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Jonas Deffes, New Orleans Exercise Specialist

Provides the therapeutic benefits of health and exercise at companies and events throughout New Orleans along with his very popular New Orleans Boot Camp for women. I am very serious about building long-term relationships, achieving positive results and upholding my commitment to excellence.

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• Fad Diets Dont Work (slideshare.net)

As I’ve mentioned in my earlier post – I need to lose 20 lbs and I actually thought (for about a week) that I could start losing the weight right now…during the Holidays.  I’ve come to realize I was attempting to do the impossible while turning myself into the Grinch who stole Christmas.

To lose weight, you have to burn more calories than you intake…to burn more calories than you intake you have to be and stay on a pretty strict, structured and specific diet plan. Exactly how do you do that during the Holidays without skipping Holiday parties, engagements and any possible interaction with friends and family where massive amount of delicious food is available?!?

Now here’s the New Orleans twist to the Holiday Season…what comes shortly after the New Year? Yep, Mardi Gras!! “Good bye” candy canes, cookies, pies, turkey, stuffing and “Hello” King Cakes!! Does the Holiday Season ever end in New Orleans?? I think we all know the answer to that is “No” but we do have short breaks between them. So…what’s the solution? The solution is to focus on losing weight between the major Holidays and work hard to maintain your weight during the actual Holidays.

Top Six Methods to Maintaining your weight during the Christmas/New Year Holiday Season?

1. Only Splurge on Absolute Favorites (in moderation): You will splurge (you know you already have). The question is: was your splurge worth it? Will your future splurge be worth it? You wouldn’t splurge your hard earned money on sub-standard quality and half-desired purchases, so why would you splurge your precious allowance for calories on anything less than your absolute favorite food? Only splurge on your favorites and in moderation.

2. Continue to Exercise: This is much easier said than done if you’re staying home and not traveling. It gets tougher if you happen to be on the road but still doable because you can still go out for a walk or jog no matter where you are. Other things you can do…chores!! Volunteer to take out the trash, clear the table, do the dishes…that will surely burn more calories than sitting on the couch. The key is to be active.

If you are staying home – stick to your usual workout routine.  You might have to shorten it to meet all your obligations and deal with the holiday gym hours, but be sure to still get in the gym.

3. Don’t Be Caught Hungry: Before you head out to any events, parties or dinners; be sure to EAT! Eating something small, preferably something with complex carbohydrates (slow burning carb/calories that keep you feeling full) will help you from reaching for anything you can find once you get to the party because you’re starving.  You’ll be able to think twice about what you eat while you’re out.

4. Don’t Fall for Peer Pressure: “Come on, just eat one” – “You’ll hurt my feelings if you don’t try this” – “What is it going to hurt to eat this?” or don’t feel like you can indulge too because everyone else around you is indulging. Stick to your guns.  You know what you can and will splurge on and stick to that plan. Firmly decline the people who are trying to fatten you up.

5. Control your Alcohol Consumption: Alcohol is a big empty calorie trap.  When you do drink, reach for the light beers or red wine. I realize telling most folks in New Orleans to keep drinking to a minimum is almost pointless…but I’m going to keep saying it – Control your Alcohol Consumption.

6. Look for and Use Healthier Alternative/Substitutions: There are ways to make your favorite foods with healthier alternatives that won’t have the same harm to your waistline. The following sites have great options what substitutions you can make while cooking and baking during the holidays:

Baking Substitutions for Healthier Holiday Recipes source About. Com

5 Easy Recipe Substitution Tips for Your Favorite Holiday Recipes source HealthCastle.com

Calories are Coming to Town source Spark.com

This is a list I’m going to stick to because there is NO WAY I’m adding another 1-7 pounds to the 20 pounds I already need to lose.

Do you have any other pointers on what you do to maintain your weight during the Holidays?

Just for fun – You can check your knowledge by taking this Holiday Calorie Quiz