Yes, the HCG diet has a specific food pyramid. The best description that I have found summarizes it very nicely. It includes pointers on how to vary the diet and still lose weight.
Eating healthy today is not as easy as it might seem and the food pyramid can be confusing for some. Combine the need to learn about the food pyramid and how the HCG diet plan works, and a dieter might want to run for the hills! Nevertheless, understanding the food pyramid is essential to your HCG weight loss success. Common sense food selections simply are not enough. Read more here.
I’ve been visiting family and doing some volunteer work in California for the past two weeks. Thanks for dropping by to check out my updates. More to come, so be sure to subscribe to my newsletter and get your free reports to keep track of what I have to say about succeeding on the HCG diet.
Take a look at this video and comment if you can help Shana. I already did so. She would clearly benefit from a steak and apple day TODAY! Share you experience with her. She needs help and has apparently lost confidence in her doctor. She has retained too much food in her system, and therefore too much water to keep it from becoming sludge. My guess is that she is also constipated. Any suggestions for her?
ok…so I went on a 4.4 mile hike yesterday and gained 3.5 pounds! How that is possible?? Have no clue. Please comment below and give me tips. Today is 6.7.2010.
The HCG diet menu will keep you slim for life. During the protocol, HCG diet foods must be low in fat. Dietary fat distracts the metabolism of abnormal body fat and leads to the storage of body fat in the presence of dietary carbohydrate. Here is how to make this protocol work to keep you slim the rest of your life.
HCG Diet Foods
The widely known four main components of the HCG diet consist of: 1) a low fat meat protein source; 2) a vegetable; 3) a fruit; and, 4) crackers or breadsticks. These four categories primarily represent two of the three food groups, i.e., protein and carbohydrate. All of them are either low fat (meat, vegetable, fruit) or no fat (crackers).
Recommended meats are obviously the sources of protein. The other three categories are sources of carbohydrates. They are allowed either as whole foods (vegetables, fruits) or in very limited amounts per meal (crackers).
Making Dietary Fat and Carbohydrate Work Together
The low carb part of this protocol is crucial for keeping the liver from becoming saturated with stored carbs. A carb-saturated liver converts excess carbs to triglycerides that go back into the bloodstream and eventually into storage in fat cells. Neither of these outcomes is healthful when excessive.
The hormone phase of the HCG diet keeps the amounts of dietary fats and carbs low so the hormone can direct the removal of stored body fat. This would not happen without low dietary fats and carbs. This also explains why cosmetics and skin products that contain oils can undermine fat metabolism.
HCG Diet Foods for Lifetime Weight Management
The food choices themselves are excellent for a lifetime of healthy eating in many respects. These foods can be consumed in sufficient quantities to meet the daily caloric needs of any Basal Metabolic Rate.
Foods that upset metabolic balance would still do so. Examples include sugars, starches, and processed carbohydrates from all sources, especially those from wheat and rice. They also include super sweet fruits such as grapes and bananas.
Staying Slim After HCG Not Guaranteed
Too many overhyped HCG diet clinics and online promotions claim that the HCG diet will keep your fat off for the rest of your life. This is poppycock. Such claims mislead people into thinking that they do not have to alter their lifestyles. Here is what I guarantee: If you get to your target weight using the HCG protocol, then go back to eating foods that made you fat in the first place, you will get fat again. It is that simple.
The Problem With Protein
This food group is routinely ignored in almost all weight loss diets, at least as far as worry about any effects on weight gain. Arguments instead revolve exclusively around the roles of fats and carbs. Protein, however, does play a role in maintaining body fat. This is a complicated topic that deserves articles by itself. However, here is what more than 50 years of research shows very clearly: You will live a long and healthy life if the amount of protein you eat constitutes as little as 5 percent of your total calories.
Excess protein is, indeed, a problem. We eat too much of it, especially from animal-based foods.
Good News For The HCG Vegetarian Diet
You do not need a dedicated protein source at all. The typical sources of protein for vegetarians (beans and grains) would not work during the protocol because of their high carb content.
However, you can get all the protein you need from spinach. The good news is that you can eat all the spinach you want and never disrupt your progress during the HCG protocol. And you will never be hungry if you eat as much as spinach as you can hold.
By the way, this advice also extends to adopting a vegan lifestyle for life. Studies have shown over and over that excess protein intake, primarily from animal-based foods, is bad for your health in many ways. Overweight is just one of those ways.
The need for protein is overrated for the HCG diet. Besides, veggies of all kinds offer plenty of it. The idea behind the meat choices is to limit dietary fat. Research is very clear on what the best diet would be, before, during, and after the HCG diet.
Just in case you are looking for a way to survive on the meat-centered HCG diet protocol without meat, here is an idea that will work perfectly: go vegan. Specifically, go vegan without grains. Here is an extreme version of how to do so at this link:
HCG Vegan Diet Protocol
My Comment
Sandy and Steve make some good points, although some of their explanations sound like voodoo science. Here is what I have found in the scientific literature: A grain-free vegan diet, raw or not, will be better for fat loss and lifelong weight management regardless of whether you go through the HCG diet protocol. Any advice that you see, including that from Sandy and Steve, about cleansing and detox is without scientific merit, even though it may sound reasonable. It may even be correct. It just has no scientific merit.
The three biggest flaws of almost all diets are: 1) too much protein; 2) too many grain-based foods, 2) too much animal-based food. I guarantee that you would not even be considering the HCG diet if you reduced those flaws. This will be a subject that I dig into with more depth later.
HCG diet phases can get a little mixed up unless you know what they mean. They are numbered, Phase I, Phase II, and Phase III, for each major component of the Simeons diet protocol. Phase III is especially crucial to follow closely, because it sets your metabolism after you stop taking the hormone. This is when people can gain back too much weight and ruin all their prior effort.
Phase III “Maintenance”–During this phase, you slowly add high glycemic foods while continuing to monitor your weight. If you begin to gain rather than maintain, you need to restrict these sugary or starchy foods.
Keep their great advice in mind for a successful protocol all the way to completion of your slimming goal.
It is just plain silly that the HCG diet can be remotely considered as controversial. This hormone-directed diet protocol was established more than 50 years ago. It continues to increase in popularity because of its effectiveness. The HCG hormone targets the reduction of abnormal fat, which is not possible by diet alone or by any combination of diet and exercise. Here are some new perspectives.
The original plan was created by a British medical doctor, Dr. A.T.W. Simeons, in his clinic at the Salvator Mutidi International Hospital in Rome in the 1950s. His book, Pounds and Inches, describes his discovery and experience with the protocol. He also outlines the protocol in sufficient detail for any reader to follow it without difficulty. This book is freely available on many websites.
The purpose of this article is to provide some updated information on the HCG diet and to puncture at least a few fallacies that have arisen regarding it.
Public Perception vs Scientific Research
As you can expect, media coverage of Dr. Simeons’ protocol has been mixed. This is to be expected because of yellow journalism, not necessarily because of the merits of the protocol itself. For this reason, using HCG for weight loss has been called controversial. This controversy has been made up out of thin air.
Most of the scientific research evaluating HCG for weight loss was published in the 1960s and 1970s. Some medical researchers confirmed Dr. Simeons’ original results in controlled clinical experiments. Other medical researchers failed to confirm these results, even when following the same experimental design. If anything, this would be a legitimate source of controversy. However, media coverage has never mentioned this body of research.
500 Calories Per Day Does Not Lead To Starvation
People from all walks of life, health professionals and the public alike, rightly observe that a 500 calorie per day diet alone would be too little food for normal metabolism. What they fail to note is that the HCG hormone changes metabolism to make up for the calorie restrictions of the Simeons protocol. This means that abnormal fat becomes a source of calories for daily living.
The statement above means that you can live off of your own fat when you are using the prescribed dosages of HCG and eating the prescribed foods in the right amounts. Explaining how the protocol works in this statement comes across to some people as pure gibberish, so all they can dwell on is the fear of living on only 500 calories per day. It doesn’t seem to matter that another 2000 calories can come from their own fat.
New Perspective On How HCG Works
Dr. Simeons astutely pointed out that HCG influences fat metabolism by signaling the hypothalamus of the brain. He was guessing that this protein hormone fit into hormone receptors of some kind that were already in the brain. The exciting aspect of his guesswork is that, in 1994, a new protein hormone was discovered to influence fat metabolism by signaling the hypothalamus, too. This hormone, called leptin, is now widely known as the master fat hormone.
Current research on laboratory animals is starting to show how HCG and leptin might interact by signaling the same receptor sites in the hypothalamus. Research on this interaction is too new to show how this works. However, HCG and leptin clearly influence one another. Furthermore, the influence of leptin on insulin also leads to an indirect response between insulin and HCG. One property that all of these protein hormones share is that overexposure to each one leads to resistance. Leptin resistance leads to storage of too much fat. Insulin resistance leads to abnormal blood sugar metabolism (and fat storage) and eventually to diabetes. HCG resistance simply stops this hormone from working completely.
Unusual Side Benefits
As weight loss proceeds on the HCG diet, skin seems to shrink up, too. The benefit is that, unlike all other weight loss diets and even weight loss surgeries, skin does not get loose and saggy while you lose weight.
Some people believe that a great benefit of HCG is that it works regardless of whether they exercise. The entire protocol is effective whether you sit on the couch the whole time or run 10 miles per day, and at the same level of effectiveness either way.
Perspective of the FDA
The FDA is not a government agency that is concerned with helping us be healthy. It is the enforcement arm of the pharmaceutical industry. The position of the FDA on HCG for weight loss is irrelevant to anything useful for the public. In fact, I predict that the FDA will ban the use of this hormone for losing weight as soon as it gets enough attention to threaten the drug industry.
Fake Scary Stuff About HCG
HCG was first called the pregnancy hormone because pregnant women produce high levels of it during the first trimester. One subunit of this complex protein is also produced by women during menstruation. Comments that imply some kind of feminization of men upon taking HCG are plain silly. Quite the contrary, since bodybuilders often use HCG to restore low testosterone levels after taking an anabolic steroid series.
HCG is not just a hormone that is produced only by women. Men have the genetic machinery to produce it, too. One of the subunits shows up in measurable quantities as a product of certain kinds of cancer. It is used clinically as a marker for testicular cancer. Keep this cause and effect straight. Testicular cancer causes a positive test for HCG, not the other way around. Comments on the Internet that invoke the fear of HCG causing cancer get this cause and effect backwards.
Maintaining Long Term Weight Loss – Really?
No. Weight loss on this protocol does not grant carte blanche to eat poorly without consequences. Ice cream and cookies will make you fat, regardless of whether you lose weight on this protocol or any other kind of diet. Claims about keeping off fat forever are true only when dieters adopt appropriate lifestyle changes that support healthy weight management. It is only logical. If you do things that made you fat in the first place, then those same things will make you fat again.
Nothing. Sometimes it is just plain fun to be a little goofy (not the Disney character!) and let out some real personality. So here goes, all you loyal visitors. The question in the title of this post arose when I got an email that an article about HCG was approved for posting on another website, which in this case is an article directory. I’m sure that it got there because I submit articles about HCG to an online article distribution service.
I kind of thought that anything I wrote about HCG would appear on directories about health or weight loss or the HCG diet. Well, in the immortal words of Gomer Pyle, USMC, “Surprise, surprise, surprise!” My article landed on this really neat website about cats:
The irony continues. I got a nice note from the website owner about posting my article. His name is Russell Clark … probably no relation. And, on top of all this, I have been a cat lover as long as I can remember. Indeed, recently I decided to start a blog about cats, too. As of today there isn’t much there, so I will have to take some time to build it up. If you just happen to be interested in how it’s going, you can visit it here:
If you happen to go there, let me know how you like my header image at the top of the page. I believe there is hardly any way to go wrong with photos of cats. I just thought those kitties at the top were too cute to pass up.
I had fun writing this silly little post about another subject that I love … in this case, cats. It’s back to the world of HCG tomorrow! Thanks for reading and putting up with my silliness today!
The HCG Diet get lots of attention despite it not being a medically approved weight loss strategy. Here is one of the fairer examples of how the media are covering this protocol. It contains some of the basic information without too many idiocies (see if you can find them).
Sugar cravings seem to be worse while on the HCG diet. That is because the HCG protocol itself does not correct the problem. It only makes things worse because sugar is taboo. The key is to treat the underlying yeast overgrowth that leads to sugar cravings. The easiest natural strategy for controlling yeast overgrowth is supplementation with probiotics.
Going crazy for sugar, or any other refined carbohydrate, comes from [tag-tec]yeast overgrowth[/tag-tec], otherwise known as Candida overgrowth. Blooms of Candida yeast occur when your friendly intestinal bacteria are no longer able to keep the Candida under control like they are supposed to.
As gross as it may seem, your health depends on an active population of friendly bacteria in your GI tract. At its optimum, this population includes more than 400 different kinds of bacteria, totaling at least 5 lbs. of bacterial cells.
One of the benefits of a healthy population of intestinal bacteria is controlling the growth of Candida, especially one called Candida albicans. Several things can damage the normal population of friendly bacteria in your GI tract, thereby providing an opportunity for the yeast to bloom.
The best and most natural solution to candida overgrowth is supplementation with dietary bacteria called probiotics. This is one reason why probiotics are a crucial component of the HCG weight loss diet. Indeed, this is also why probiotics are crucial for long-term weight management, too.
Causes of Yeast Overgrowth
Sugar and other refined carbohydrates feed Candida. However, yeast blooms first get a foothold when GI tract bacteria are damaged by any and all of the following:
It should come as no surprise that we are surrounded by synthetic chemicals and processed foods that people were not exposed to as little as a century ago. Conservative estimates are that more than 80,000 chemicals have been introduced into our environment since then. We are sensitive to them, in part, because our bacteria are harmed by them. A short list of the kinds of chemicals that are harmful to our normal microflora includes the following:
food additives (colorings, “natural flavors”)
preservatives
chlorinated and fluoridated water
herbicides
hormones
oral contraceptives
pesticides
refined carbohydrates, especially sugar
steroids
artificial sweeteners
antacids and antibiotics (more on these below)
air pollution
household cleaners
heavy metals
The health of our normal intestinal bacteria is continually challenged by these and newer chemicals that are constantly added to our foods and appear in new buildings, clothing, cars, and just about everywhere that we live and breathe. It would be nearly impossible to avoid them, so our best strategy is to maintain a healthy population of friendly bacteria by daily supplementation with probiotics.
Stress of All Kinds
We are swamped by the agents of stress. In this case stress means anything that causes our body to react defensively. Even our emotions cause stress when we react by overproducing certain hormones that cause inflammation. Dozens of kinds of internal and external factors can cause stress. A short list of common stressors includes the following:
poor diet (“malnutrition stress”)
emotions
exercise
radiation therapy and chemotherapy
anesthesia and surgery
environmental radiation
UV light
poor or insufficient sleep
Prolonged exposure to these and other stressors can damage the normal the balance of friendly bacteria. Fortunately, ongoing research shows that a healthy balance of friendly intestinal bacteria provides a shield against otherwise powerful stressors in our environment. This means that probiotics provide a stress buffer in a world that is complex and often toxic.
Nature provides us with a balanced bacterial population that helps us maintain good health. The need for probiotics, therefore, would not exist if we weren’t constantly destroying our friendly bacteria in the first place. This destruction seems almost unavoidable at times, since so many things cause harm to the microbes that we depend on.
We are drowning in a sea of antibiotics. Once called a miracle of modern medicine, these darlings in the battle against infectious diseases are now at the root of a health crisis.
Antibiotics, meaning “against life,” are chemicals that kill bacteria. Penicillin is the most famous one, since it is the best known of the “miracle drugs” that characterized the beginning of the antibiotic era in the early 1940s. Penicillin and its analogs signaled a new era in therapeutics, which was supposed to spell the end to fatal bacterial diseases. Indeed, over the decades since then, antibiotics have saved millions of lives from what used to be killer infections.
So why would the title of this section allude to a crisis? Simply put, the overuse and widespread misuse of antibiotics has become a case of too much of a good thing. One of the biggest worries in modern medicine is, in fact, the development of pathogens – microbes that cause disease – that are no longer killed by antibiotics.
Antibiotics and the Rise of the Superbugs
Here is a typical story of what has happened over time. Pneumococcal pneumonia is an infection in the lungs caused by bacteria called Streptococcus pneumoniae. Standard treatment entails antibiotics, such as penicillin, even though resistant strains of S. pneumoniae, which are not killed by antibiotics, are already widespread throughout the world. The shocker, according to Dr. Harold C. Neu of Columbia University, is that a patient in 1940 could receive a treatment of 40,000 units of penicillin per day for 4 days and be cured of pneumoccal pneumonia, whereas nowadays a patient could receive 24 million units per day and still die of pneumococcal meningitis! This is an infection caused by Streptococcus pneumoniae.
Are antibiotics the solution? Consider this: the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) estimates that S. pneumoniae causes 40,000 deaths and 500,000 cases of pneumonia annually in the United States. It is also responsible for 3,000 cases of meningitis, 50,000 cases of bacteremia (bacteria in the blood), and 7 million cases of otitis media (inner ear infection). Antibiotics are clearly not the solution. By the way, S. pneumoniae is just one example. All of the common disease-causing bacteria have developed antibiotic-resistant strains. Medical researchers have even discovered what they call “superbugs” – bacteria that are resistant to multiple antibiotics.
Judging by what antibiotics are used for these days, the existence of superbugs is only part of the problem of antibiotic overuse. Another problem is the routine use of antibiotics in animal feed. About half of the antibiotics that are made each year end up being fed to animals. This is because modern agriculture has discovered that antibiotics not only keep cattle from getting infectious diseases, they also promote growth. So now we have meat, milk, cheese, poultry, eggs and other animal products that come with a bonus: antibiotics.
What does a steady diet of antibiotics do to our health? The biggest problem is that this frequent exposure to such drugs causes our intestinal bacteria to be continually out of balance. This means that our little internal army is unable to fight for us the way it is supposed to. Lots of things can go wrong, one of which is candida overgrowth.
Although the biggest enemy of our friendly bacteria is antibiotics, modern medicine also provides several other destructive forces against our our microscopic friends. The most rampant of these is undoubtedly the use of antacids.
One of the most common health problems today is an upset stomach. Stomach upset doesn’t get a lot of notice in the media because it is not a killer, however one of the biggest sources of profits for drug companies is antacids and other treatments for digestive disorders. It is so lucrative that drug companies succeeded in getting dangerous prescription drugs out on the open shelf, so now anyone can buy them without the advice of their doctor.
Even though antacids provide temporary relief, in the long run they aggravate the original problem terribly. They upset the pH balance of the stomach by reducing the acidity that we need for digesting food, which is harmful to our good bacteria and therefore leads to further digestive problems. Such conditions even provide the opportunity for a takeover by the “bad bugs” that are constantly lurking in our stomach. One in particular, named Helicobacter pylori, causes ulcers.
The two best treatments to get yourself back on track after abusing your digestive system with antacids are simple and inexpensive: 1) drink plenty of water; and, 2) take probiotics to replenish the friendly bacteria that you have destroyed.
Focus on candida (yeasts) in regard to probiotics has become important, because this is the microbe that takes over when our bacterial defense becomes depleted. And when candida is in control in someone’s digestive system, illnesses appear that weren’t there before, and any health problems that were already there get worse. A candida bloom can make life miserable.
Just like bacteria, yeasts can be friendly or harmful. The well-known yeasts that we use for baking bread, fermenting beer, and making many other food products are obviously beneficial. However, the yeasts that live in our bodies are a different kind of microbe. They lurk around in our digestive system, waiting for an opportunity to take over, often with devastating affects on our health. Fortunately for us, a vigorous population of friendly bacteria can keep this takeover from happening.
Local Yeast Infections
In the “good old days” yeast infections were considered to be an occasional problem for women, causing vaginal itching and irritation. In addition, yeast infections were found to cause considerable pain in the breasts of lactating women. Young children also suffered from yeast overgrowth, which shows up as white patches on the tongue in a condition called thrush. Men came into the picture when yeast was named as the culprit for an itchy rash appearing in the inner thigh areas.
Yeast infections like these are termed “local” because they are isolated in one area of the body. They are well-known and easily treated with probiotics and dietary changes. Probiotics can restore the microbial balance that is important for controlling yeast overgrowth. Many studies have repeatedly shown this to be true. One example of such a study was conducted at the Long Island Jewish Medical Center in 1992. In this study, women who previously suffered frequent vaginal yeast infections ate probiotic-containing yogurt every day for 6 months. At the end of the 6-month period, the yogurt group showed a three-fold average decrease in infections in comparison with a non-yogurt group. Moreover, the study was supposed to go for another 6-month period, with each group of women switching roles. However, the probiotic treatment was so good that more than a third of the women in the yogurt group refused to quit eating yogurt when it came their turn to be in the non-yogurt group.
Whole-Body Infections
Local yeast infections seem to be a relatively minor nuisance in a health landscape that is plagued with the abundance of diseases that we are faced with these days. What is a little itchiness here and there in comparison with cancer or cardiovascular disease? These and other serious diseases have now been linked to whole-body infections of candida – that is, yeast that has escaped the GI tract and gone beyond local infections to be spread throughout the body.
We lose the internal battle to keep candida under control when antibiotics or other toxins deplete our normal microflora. This offers an opportunity for candida to bloom because, as a fungus, it is not directly affected by antibiotics. A chronic candida bloom will eventually damage the intestinal lining, which then loses its effectiveness as a defensive barrier against toxins and infectious microbes. The medical term for this condition is “leaky gut syndrome” – which just means that harmful chemicals and microbes can get through our gut wall and into our bloodstream where they do harm. Candida is quick to spread when this happens, leading to a condition called candidiasis, which can then lead to a multitude of symptoms.
From these seemingly minor beginnings, candidiasis has now become recognized to be so prevalent that millions of people suffer from a dizzying array of symptoms that are associated with it. Some of the symptoms that are linked to candidiasis include:
weight gain
depression
anxiety
irritability
fatigue
heartburn
bloating
constipation
mental fog
allergies
migraines
acne
rheumatoid arthritis
lupus
multiple sclerosis
type 1 diabetes
cancer
cardiovascular disease
Although this seems to be a long list of health problems, it is still incomplete. Indeed, many doctors are finally recognizing that many of the chronic health problems that defy diagnosis and treatment are associated with candidiasis. The pioneer for this change in medical thinking was William Crook, MD, who wrote “The Yeast Connection,” which is still the definitive book on this topic. Dr. Crook was also one of the first physicians to advocate the use of probiotics for treating candidiasis.
HCG Diet and Probiotics
More than 100 clinical conditions can improve by supplementation with probiotics. Candida is at the root of many of these disorders. It seems like a no-brainer to take these supplements daily.
Any slow down or stoppage in weight loss, whether on the HCG diet or some other program, is certainly made worse by yeast overgrowth. Sometimes controlling this microbe is the only missing link to healthy weight management.
By the way, as you might expect, some probiotic supplements are better than others. Indeed, most brands are too weak to really be of much benefit, including the newly popular yogurt products with lactobacillus (one of the strains of probiotic bacteria). My advice is to look for the following criteria when choosing a product that will help you the most: 1) how many strains of bacteria? (several — at least 5); and, 2) how many cells per dose? (at least 5 billion). Do not settle for less.
Summary Points
Since this article is pretty extensive, you may want to refer to the key points below:
Weight management (and good health in general) depends on friendly bacteria
Damage to friendly bacteria leads to yeast overgrowth
Yeast overgrowth leads to sugar cravings and weight gain
Supplementing with probiotics is the easiest natural strategy for combating yeast overgrowth and sugar cravings
The best probiotic supplements should offer a sufficient number of bacterial strains and a sufficient dose to be of optimal benefit.
The [tag-tec]HCG Weight Loss Diet[/tag-tec] entails a ‘[tag-tec]Phase 3[/tag-tec]‘ after you stop taking the hormone. It is every bit as important as the initial weight loss for long term metabolic stability. Although Dr. Simeons’ book explained this phase, his book was not especially thorough on this topic. The following article fills in the gaps very nicely.
Phase 3 of the HCG Diet The HCG diet is a weight loss program that combines a strict low-calorie diet and the use of the hormone HCG. The diet is supervised by a medical doctor and boasts weight loss in the difficult areas of the body such as the hips, stomach and thighs. The third phase of the HCG diet is the maintenance portion of the diet, when dieters are happy to add back in some of the foods that were restricted in phases 1 and 2. Read More.
Dr. Simeons commented that low thyroid does not cause of obesity. In fact, he recommended that thyroid meds NOT be taken while doing the protocol. Furthermore, a low Basal Metabolic Rate (i.e., indicated by lower body temperature first thing in the morning) gets reversed on the HCG diet. Research generally supports these points now.
Unfortunately, too many people are misdiagnosed with hypothyroidism and, as a consequence, inappropriately prescribed thyroid medication. The problem of underperforming thyroid is almost always due to iodine deficiency. The best information on this topic is the book by Dr. David Brownstein, ”
Here is a link to Amazon for this book. You can find more information about it there.
Dr. Brownsteins’s book explains how Americans have become iodine deficient and what to do about it. The key regarding the HCG weight loss diet is that iodine restores thyroid health whereas iodine drugs do not.
You will also find that thyroid meds slow down weight loss on the HCG diet. It is all tied in with the hypothalamus and the hormone receptors there for HCG and thyroid hormone. Nobody has a really good explanation for this.
One more thing that I can say, from my perspective as a biochemist, is that the best that thyroid meds can do is provide iodine. The hormones themselves, as well as the synthetic versions of them, contain iodine. The chemical structure of thyroxine, for example, shows four iodine atoms (each place where there is an “I” in this picture).
It makes sense that iodine deficiency shows up as low thyroid hormone. The body won’t make enough hormone if there isn’t enough iodine in the first place.
The bottom line for most people is simply going to be supplementing with iodine. By the way, the RDA of iodine (150 micrograms) is about one-tenth what it should be. And most people don’t even take in the RDA. Food does not offer it, unless it is seafood. And then it is only ionic iodine. Dr. Brownstein explains the importance of getting different forms of iodine and how to optimize the dosages for maximum thyroid health.
SIDENOTE: In reading about Dr. Brownstein’s research, I was also flabbergasted to see the role of iodine deficiency in breast cancer and prostate cancer. Actually, I am still flabbergasted about this!
Dr. Simeons was right on target about the role of the thyroid, or rather the lack of it, in obesity. Nevertheless, it is critical to get this gland functioning correctly for getting the best results for fat loss on the HCG diet.
The few side effects of the [tag-tec]HCG diet[/tag-tec] include [tag-tec]constipation[/tag-tec]. Many strategies are available for relieving this problem, although the type and amount of prescribed foods are limited, adding fiber is possible if it is non-caloric. Psyllium fiber would fit the bill. You may also benefit from laxatives or supplemental magnesium.
The Brian Connole at hcgdiet411.info offers the simplest advice of all:
The key to eating right in the first place is the same key to eating right after you finish an HCG diet series. I center my food choices around healthy protein and fat, with very little carb. This is what the research on obesity shows to be the best way to stop the process of storing fat. I’ll have to review that topic at another time, because so many people are deathly afraid of fat. Are you one of them?
Of course, let me say once again that the low-fat craze is the worst diet plague ever inflicted on humankind. The whole concept of low-fat anything is such dogma that doctors, nutritionists, and many others who ought to know better continue to repeat it mindlessly. It is just plain ridiculous.
Best Way to Start the Day
Here is my favorite breakfast. Yes, you are seeing straight. That is a real nice rib-eye steak, accompanied by four eggs (fried in butter!). There is absolutely nothing wrong with this meal, and everything right with it. It has no effect on my cholesterol level, the amount of fat that I store in my body, or anything else that is supposed to be harmful. And it is delicious! (Lots of garlic on it, too.)
The [TAG-TEC]HCG weight loss diet[/TAG-TEC] would be completely unnecessary, and the [TAG-TEC]obesity epidemic[/TAG-TEC] would not exist, if more people ate more food like my favorite breakfast. Hey, I know the science behind these claims. The research goes back almost 200 years, and the truth of what I am saying here is crystal clear.
I hope this shakes you up enough to dig into the research yourself. You are going to be shocked when you get to the bottom of modern dietary mythologies and see how you’ve been misinformed for so long.
Eat steak! Eat all the eggs you want! Drown your food in real butter! It is all good.
Whew! Thanks for enjoying my semi-rant. There is a lot more where that came from. What fun!
The HCG diet is turning out to be THE weight loss strategy for the 21st century, even though is first appeared in the mid-1950s. Nevertheless, because of its popularity, lots of great pointers are appearing about what to eat and how to make the food during this protocol as good as it can be.
Here is one of the better sources of this kind of information that I have found so far.
You may already know that most diet advice is bad, because so many diets themselves are bad to start with. However, the [TAG-TEC] HCG diet[/TAG-TEC] is a good one, and it has been a good one for more than 50 years. Nevertheless, lots of bad advice about this protocol is in circulation.
The internet abounds in bad advice. Doctors have bad advice. Nutritionists and fitness trainers have bad advice. Friends, relatives, colleagues, marketers (especially marketers!) – are all sources of bad advice. They can also be sources of good advice
Your challenge is to sort out which is which and do the right thing.
Getting Good Advice on the HCG Diet
This may take a little effort on your part: Start by reading “Pounds and Inches,” the 1954 book on the [TAG-TEC]HCG weight loss diet[/TAG-TEC] by its creator, Dr. A.T.W. Simeons. Then compare all other advice with what you learn there. You will find no mention in this book of cleansing, detoxing, homeopathic HCG, recommended supplements, or many other modifications of the protocol.
Is any of this new stuff any good? Some is, and some isn’t. Cleansing and detoxing are fine, just not required. Homeopathic HCG has no scientific support and may not even work (it contains no HCG at all). Supplements may be helpful if you choose the right ones. (Skip acai berry and hoodia … these are ridiculous.)
Just one more pointer: You must get the right dose of HCG on a daily basis. This can be either in the form of injections, which is the original form, or in the form of sublingual drops. Either one works, as long as you get the right amount of HCG daily.
Where to Get the Original Simeons Book for Free
The Simeons book is free on many websites. This is all you need for getting started. I have a pretty clean copy that you can get when you fill out the report request form in the righthand column of this page. It is just a little bonus thank you from me.
Dr. Simeons’ HCG+Diet Protocol takes the struggle out of weight loss for reducing fat and reshaping the body. It has been the most successful weight/fat management program for more than 50 years.
[TAG-TEC]HCG weight loss diet[/TAG-TEC] comes with additional benefits:
1. Fat Reduction
The [TAG-TEC]HCG diet[/TAG-TEC] specifically uses calories from fat as opposed to muscle. The outward evidence is body reshaping and skin tightening.
2. Healthy Cholesterol Levels
If your cholesterol is high or already starting to get stuck in arterial plaque, then plaque will break up and cholesterol will return to a normal and healthy range.
3. Maintain Normal Hormone Levels
Whether your hormone output is too high or too little, this method of dieting will help normalize the output.
4. Legal
While HCG is not FDA approved for weight loss, it is entirely legal for a doctor to prescribe it.
5. Painless
The newly available oral form is convenient and painless. Furthermore, if injected, HCG requires a small needle that is relatively painless.
6. Rapid Healthy Weight Loss
Weight lost during the diet is generally fast and steady, averaging between 0.5 to 1.5 pounds per day..
7. No Muscle Loss
Energy is taken from the fat and not the muscle. This is easily measured by a reduction in body fat percentage during the protocol.
8. Minimal Side Effects
The [TAG-TEC]HCG diet side effects[/TAG-TEC] can include an increase in the production of natural sexual hormones in both males and females. Some people have experienced back aches but rarely do any side effects show up.
9. Curb Your Appetite
Not only will the HCG diet help normalize your appetite toward healthful foods, it will also help to maintain this appetite long after you are off the diet.
10.) Aids The Glands
HCG directs your thyroid gland to return to normal and helps to rebuild your adrenal glands.
Just thought this list might be helpful as a nice summary of key benefits from Dr. Simeons’ 1954 book.
The most important dietary components of the [TAG-TEC]HCG weight loss diet[/TAG-TEC] are to stay low in fat and carbohydrates. [TAG-TEC]HCG diet foods[/TAG-TEC] depend on a low-fat source of protein, a low limit of Melba toast (or Italian breadsticks), and defined types and amounts of fruit. Technically, one of the vegetables – tomato – is also a fruit, so it is limited, too.
What About Vegetables?
I acknowledge Dr. Simeons for his genius and powers of observation in creating this protocol. However, I do not understand certain aspects of the restrictions, especially with respect to the vegetables. So, during my first experience doing the [TAG-TEC]hcg protocol[/TAG-TEC], I experimented to see what could get away with.
The result is that I created a salad that added quite a bit of flavor and volume to my meals without slowing down my weight loss. Specifically, I combined my single tomato with as much leafy greens as I could eat. Lettuce of all kinds and spinach were my favorites. I also added some sliced purple onion to really boost the flavor.
This combination of vegetables is a clear violation of the recommendation to have only one type of vegetable per meal. Nevertheless, I found this recommendation to be unnecessary. Furthermore, my wife, Eve, discovered that she could include as much cucumber as she could eat with her salad, too.
Will This Work For You?
Based ourselves as the first two data points, we have advised dozens of others to explore the super salad as part of their protocol. Everyone who has done so has experienced the same result, meaning that weight loss continued as expected in spite of this dietary violation.
My advice is always to watch your daily weight to make sure that you are on track. If so, then whatever you are doing is working. If you can also get your body fat composition measured every week or so, you can keep track of fat loss, too. This is, after all, the target of the HCG weight loss diet in the first place.
I think that the reason that adding a super salad to the diet is okay is that it does not include additional fat or carbohydrate. Onions and cucumbers, of course, contain sugars. However, the availability of calories from these ‘vegetables’ is apparently low enough to have no noticeable impact on the results of the protocol.
This is pretty entertaining stuff for all of us experienced HCGers. Here is the lead paragraph on the dangerous HCG weight loss diet that Jenni Farley did:
For some reason, ThatsFit does not equate to ThatsThoughtful!
Jersey Shore Star’s Dangerous Diet – Jenni Farley
[TAG-TEC]Jenni “JWOWW” Farley[/TAG-TEC] is one of the tan and toned star’s of MTV’s hit reality show “Jersey Shore.” As fans of the so-bad-it’s-good show can attest, JWOWW (second from the left in the blue dress) isn’t shy about showing off her body. On her Web site, Farley proclaims “HCG Drops are my key to keeping the weight off.” And if that really is her stay-slim secret, it seems to be working, considering the amount of airtime she spends in her string bikini.Read more.
[TAG-TEC]Jenny Farley weight loss[/TAG-TEC] seems to be real, based on the [TAG-TEC]HCG diet[/TAG-TEC].
The Experts?
I’d bet money that you can find at least three major flaws in this article, including one gigantic contradiction. The ‘weight loss experts’ who are supposed to bring credibility to this article are, of course, wrong regarding the [TAG-TEC]HCG Weight Loss Diet[/TAG-TEC].
Remarkable, isn’t it? At least I hope you enjoyed the irony of it like I did.
HCG Diet: 3 Food Journaling Tips for Successful Weight Loss
Keeping a food journal can be a vital key to success with the HCG diet, and with any other weight loss program. A study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine concluded that after keeping a food journal for six months, the participants who lost the most weight were the ones who recorded what they were eating in their food journal the most often. In fact, they lost about twice as much weight as those who did not keep a food journal.
A food journal might be a handy way to keep track of all of the requirements for the HCG diet. Here are three ways to leverage the power of food journaling to ensure your diet success:
Tip#1: Track your meals as you go
Use the calendar feature in your cell phone or PDA to keep track of your meals, snacks and beverages. Write down the details of each meal as you eat it so that you can record all of the details while they are fresh in your mind. This will help to establish the habit of writing down everything that goes into your mouth.
If you don’t use a cell phone, buy a small notebook that you will carry around with you at all times and write down what you eat. There are websites that offer free, printable food diary pages that you can print off and fill in as you go.
Tip#2: Measure portion sizes
This will be easy because you have to weigh your portions with the diet anyway. Keep in mind that most people underestimate both size and calorie count of food. Use a digital food scale when you can and keep an accurate count.
Tip #3 Record your slip-ups
Write down those times when you stray from your program whether it’s accidental or on purpose. You might also write why you decided to cheat and how you felt afterwards.
Food journaling makes you aware of your unconscious food habits. Once you see it written down, you can reflect on it and address it. Sometimes people tend to eat unconsciously. The simple act of writing it down brings what you are consuming into sharper focus. When you are aware of how much butter or salad dressing you’ve really been adding, you can stop and change that as you move forward.
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Here is my favorite breakfast. Yes, you are seeing straight. That is a real nice rib-eye steak, accompanied by four eggs (fried in butter!). There is absolutely nothing wrong with this meal, and everything right with it. It has no effect on my cholesterol level, the amount of fat that I store in my body, or anything else that is supposed to be harmful. And it is delicious! (Lots of garlic on it, too.)
The most important dietary components of the [TAG-TEC]HCG weight loss diet[/TAG-TEC] are to stay low in fat and carbohydrates. [TAG-TEC]HCG diet foods[/TAG-TEC] depend on a low-fat source of protein, a low limit of Melba toast (or Italian breadsticks), and defined types and amounts of fruit. Technically, one of the vegetables – tomato – is also a fruit, so it is limited, too.
This is pretty entertaining stuff for all of us experienced HCGers. Here is the lead paragraph on the dangerous HCG weight loss diet that Jenni Farley did:
Taken from: 
