Meal replacement shakes

Absolutely Aka.

A large friend of mine has told me she just is just eating salads and I know she much prefers hearty meat meals. She is doomed for failure but does she does not want to know that she can fill up on delicious soups, meat and mounds of veg and never feel deprived. Plus low fat desserts.

I also notice she drinks large quantities of fruit drinks that are loaded with sugar, if only she would water them down.

I feel like bashing my head against the wall as I know she will give up soon and accept the diabetes that the doctor says she is heading for.

Freda I noticed you mentioned you are due to see an endocrinologist next month because of an underactive thyroid.

As long as you have depressed thyroid function you will tend to gain weight, because your metabolic rate will be low.
I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism in 2005. My weight had been gradually creeping up for years, partly due to this.

Eventually I have lost 10 kg, I'm 5'8" and size 12, but it's taken me 2.5 years and I've done it mainly as Nankate and Aka suggest.

I've never investigated meal replacement shakes - I find the idea of artificial food repellent, and they can't be a long-term solution.

You can lose weight, but it will be easier once your thyroid is sorted out, and the only healthy way to do it is to eat properly, exercise more and above all accept that it's going to take years, not months, there will be times when you put a bit back on, but you'll get there in the end if you persevere.
Good luck

I know someone who has done it several times over the last 10 years and each time she loses masses but as soon as she starts eating again she whacks the weight back on in record time. I am sure I read also that it affects your metabolism so you burn off slower once you start eating. I am sure it can't be healthy and doesn't re-educate eating habits

Jane I too have an under active thyroid, it makes it harder for us to lose weight but it is possible and I agree with you it is a long term aim.

I found that once I got through the first couple of weeks it got a lot easier.

Elegran have you not gone grey?, me neither, only a few hairs are grey and I am a bit surprised because I thought that everyone went grey, I am a bit younger than 75 but was happy to read that your hair is still dark and un dyed!

Although I don't mind going grey, am quite looking forward to it

Nine years ago mine was starting to get pepper-and-salt in some places, and I was expecting it to go grey over the next couple of years. Then I was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a date for it to be removed. I took a lot of vitamin C beforehand so as to have my cells in good order to heal well (that worked OK) and after the surgery I had Tamoxifen. No chemo so I did not lose any hair.

After about a year I noticed that the pepper-and-salt had become only a few grey hairs, and had not increased at all. That was eight years ago and it is much the same now. My two daughters are much greyer than I am.

The only outside influences could have been the vitamin C and the anti-oestrogen drugs. The internal influence could be my genes - my mother and grandmother were not grey until they reached about 70. I have passed them!

Not everyone goes grey tchcherry believe it or not !

I haven't , my brothers Have not , my Mother & Father Did not.

Yeah there may have been the odd grey hair here and there , but nothing to speak of.

Just the way things go !

Elegran

Elegran, I'd have thought the anti-oestrogen drugs would have the opposite effect, i.e. hastening the greying process?

So would I, Ana. The only connection I can think of is that the cancer was causing the greyness, and it eased off after it had been removed, but it was only a tiny lump. It wasn't stress, because the greying process started before I knew the lump was there.

I di find a theory (maybe it was more than that, it was eight years ago when I found it) that losing hair colour is affected by the accumulation of hydrogen peroxide in the hair follicles. Not from bleaching the hair, just a natural by-product of time.

If you add to that the way vitamin C is an anti-oxidant which mops up free radicals in cells, using up the extra oxygen molecule which makes up the peroxide, perhaps the 1000 mg a day I was taking cleared out the peroxide and let the colour gradually back in? I don't know enough chemistry to back this up.

If it is true, possibly those of us who don't want to go grey should take vitamin C, possibly at the point just before the hair would naturally fade - I am not sure it would reverse the process. Maybe those follicles which had not been completely bleached could produce coloured hair again. You lose hairs all the time and new ones grow.

I haven't gone grey!
I'm SILVER!

I like my combination of blonde light and dark and silver hair.

I used to pay good money to have highlights now I get them for free.

I've just had two months sat under a blanket because I cut all the bleach bits out of my hair and it was very short as a result. Now it's got to a decent length and it's lightened up from my normal yucky brown colour with streaks of silver running through. I wanted to see what I looked like underneath the bleach and roots look so awful when they are too long. My hair now is in great condition, lovely and soft and I am enjoying seeing the real me for the first time in many years.

Salt and Pepper here- it was a real relief to go natural and stop colour and highlights.

My daughter in law has lost a lot of weight on the Cambridge diet. Not sure if it is healthy but she looks really good.

That's a very drastic diet littleflo

We are on hols looking after our son's house and went into Brighton today. I was saddened to see how many obese women ( and men) walking about, often with a burger or very large drink in their hands. I noticed how if the mother was big the children were too.

Many of the foreign women looked far slimmer.

It has really spurred me on not to over indulge because it is so easy to slip into a bad eating routine.