OBSESSIVE WEIGHING: A SIGN YOU EAT EMOTIONALLY

You should see the weird looks I get when I tell my hCG protocol patients not to weigh themselves. And the responses I get are very predictable:  

·         “But I read on the Internet I’m supposed to weigh every day!”

·         “How am I going to know if I should do an 'apple-day' when weight-loss stalls?”

·         “If I don’t weight myself how am I supposed to know if the protocol is working?”

·         “The only reason I’m doing this is to lose weight, so what am I going to use as motivation?”

The amount of fear and anxiety people have after I suggest they not weigh is not surprising. In general, people only pay and enlist in diets because they hate how they look and are disgusted by their body fat.  Most people have physical ailments because of their obesity, such as sleep disturbance, symptoms of adrenal fatigue (tired, lack of motivation, etc.), heart burn, hair-loss, skin problems,  high blood pressure, decreased libido, hot flashes, high cholesterol, poor body-image, embarrassment in social settings, and many more issues associated with having too much fat and resulting fat hormones.

They’ll tell you these symptoms are profound reasons to lose weight, and they’ve convinced themselves these reasons are why they are enlisting in the hCG protocol. However, their main focus and source of motivation is centrally focused on watching the scale go down.  After the first week, they notice significant relief from most, if not all, of the symptoms listed above. Patients profess how amazing they feel. But if the scale doesn’t budge one day−they're discouraged, and if weight on the scale stalls more than a few days− they're irritable and frantic.  They quickly forget about how good they feel, and the incredible relief they get from their physical ailments. If weight doesn’t go down (no matter how physically theraputic the protocol is) they really don’t want to continue to restrict themselves from eating.

Once reward and motivation from the scale loses momentum, so does their desire to continue restraint, and in order to feel compensated for following the protocol, they rationalize a reward: cheating. What does this reaction to the scale tell you about their intentions? Do all of the hormonal ramifications that cause disease and early death, really have anything to do with why they are doing the hCG protocol? If so, why does the scale have such a large influence on motivation to continue the protocol or not?

You could notice the obvious improvements in energy, how much better you feel, how sleep has markedly improved, and how heart-burn and hot-flashes have disappeared, but if the scale doesn’t go down like you thought, the effort isn’t worth it. Worth what? If you’re not experiencing physical hunger, what are you giving up? Most likely, you are feeling emotionally deprived. This emotional deprivation is why people say it takes “self-discipline” to follow the protocol restraints, and why weight is used as bait or emotional reward.

Emotional delights, entertainment, fun, ego protection, and all reason we eat that have nothing to do with hunger, are what causes feelings of deprivation when dieting. People feel punished, even when there isn’t hunger, and there’s relief from hormonal ailments and symptoms that plagued their body. We’ve been confused to believe that weight is the problem, and not our emotional desires to eat.

Americans have been so misguided by the diet industry to believe that weight is a plague, and is the only reason you need to pay them to eat less. Yes, you pay a multi-billion dollar industry to eat less, to obsess over your weight, and to feel guilty about food. And you do this over and over again, even though this approach has never worked.

When did you start obsessing over weight? I bet it started with your first diet. They taught you weight defined success or failure and since then you’ve probably defined your value based on weight. Do you constantly feel guilty when you eat, and do you tend to binge eat whenever you don’t eat perfectly? The diet industry has caused major emotional problems by selling weight as the problem, and judging food emotionally.   

Because of how judgmental and extreme the diet industry is, most people feel vulnerability and guilt when they eat. When you emotionalize what you eat, you lose your ability to make rational decisions. For example, most people have enough intelligence to understand a bite of pie is very different than a piece of pie, which is very different than eating the whole pie. However, when you’ve been taught pie is bad, one bite is just as bad as a piece, and is no different than eating the whole pie. If you’re going to have a bite you might as well eat the whole thing! Sound familiar? If this is how you think, you’ve fallen victim to the diet industry, and as a result you may have an emotional eating disorder.

I suggest you stop weighing yourself so you can actually fix the cause of the problem. Monitor the profound physical relief you get when you stop eating emotionally, and how emotionally vulnerable you feel without eating. Change the definition of diet, so that success is measured in a decline in the desire and need to eat emotionally. Think about it this way: if you didn’t like eating excessively or emotionally, would you have a weight problem? Would you have to “battle your weight”? 

If you didn’t like eating for fun, for entertainment, and for emotional reasons you wouldn’t feel deprived by eating less and you wouldn’t need to weigh yourself as reward.  The goal is to eat less, because you want to, and with this−you’ll never obsess over your weight again.

THE HCG PROTOCOL AS A THERAPY FOR POLYCYSTIC OVARIAN SYNDROME (and other leptin induced hormonal imbalances)

PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome) is on the rise and it affects millions of women in the United States alone. The more fat a person has the more leptin is produced when stimulated. This magnified leptin response affects the sex hormones LH (leutinizing hormone) and FSH (follicle stimulating hormone). While this over-production of leptin in adulthood affects LH and FSH resulting in reproductive and sexual problems, in adolescence this hormonal reaction can change the way the individual looks, their hair, and resulting body-image issues.

PCOS is characterized by high testosterone levels and insulin resistance. Typical symptoms are:

·         infertility,

·         male pattern balding,

·         high blood pressure,

·         pelvic pain,

·         irregular menses,

·         acne,

·         and the development of Type 2 diabetes at a very young age,

Excessive consumption of sugar combined with obesity is probably the driving force behind PCOS. To explain, the over production of leptin (which is strongly stimulated by blood glucose) increases the levels of neuropeptide Y (NPY). NPY in the body increases in production of LH and FSH, although the effect on LH is significantly more pronounced.

As leptin levels increase in the hypothalamus there is a stimulus of the hormone galanin like peptide (GLP). GLP acts to increase the production of LH releasing hormone (LHRH) which further increases LH production from the ovaries. The combination of high LH and high blood glucose levels (insulin resistance) increases the production of a hormone called Inhibin B. Inhibin B in the brain further decrease FSH, creating a polarization between LH and FSH levels. The more LH levels rise and FSH levels decrease, the more testosterone increases over estrogen.

Having excess fat that magnifies the production of leptin, combined with excessive sugar intake, is strongly correlated to the occurrence of PCOS.  With the rise in childhood obesity and the incredible amount of sugar in the American diet, there is no doubt the occurrence of PCOS will exponentially increase. The solution? Reducing body fat and decreasing sugar intake. This is where the hCG protocol could be used as a hormonal therapy.

Because low dose hCG strongly stimulates leptin, if administered properly the patients hormonal need for food dramatically reduces. You could say because PCOS is linked to high levels of leptin that with hCG their chances of exacerbating the issue could increase, which is true. However, if the very low calorie protocol is strictly followed these risks go away. Especially if the participant only eats when there is hunger.

Hunger is the conscious signal from the brain indicating that leptin levels are decreased, which is a sign there is a need for an external stimulus (such as food) to improve leptin levels. Eating would then stimulate the production of leptin which would ultimately cause a problem if too much food is eaten. This is why pre-calculated portions of food would be contraindicative during this type of therapy. When hunger goes away, the patient needs to stop eating, and at the end of the day it may have only taken 350 calories in food to keep their leptin levels optimal. If they continue to eat even though hunger is removed, the participant would be causing a hormonal imbalance that may aggravate their hormonal symptoms.

We must keep in mind that humans eat without hunger all the time because we have the ability to ignore physical mechanisms for emotional desire. This is what makes the application of feeding behavior of mice very inappropriate for the feeding behavior of humans. Mice do not eat when their hypothalamic leptin levels are elevated and hunger is removed. Humans eat all the time with high leptin levels and without hunger. We are an emotional species that validates and justifies eating at any time and for whatever reason, even though it conflicts with the feedback from the body.  For the hCG protocol to work as a hormonal therapy, the hormone leptin must be controlled. To do this the patient must fully understand hunger and use it as there only guide for when and how much to eat (similar to how a mice would eat).

This concept requires that we stop using the outdated science of calories. That we stop using nutritional guidelines to dictate how much a person should eat. Obviously by limiting food intake to what the body needs hormonally, there is a risk of malnourishment. This is why vitamin and mineral, and electrolyte supplementation is so important during the process, and why protein is the most important food choice when hunger manifests. As fat is markedly reduced and food is only eating with hunger, the hormonal imbalances that cause symptoms such as PCOS, will go away. However, to prevent the reoccurrence of these symptoms the patient must learn from their past behavior and continue to only eat when hunger manifests and to stop eating as soon as hunger goes away.

This is a change in behavior that must be done without using the superficiality of weight as motivation. The diet industry has taken advantage of the most obvious result of the very low calorie protocol, which is weight-loss, and used it to make a quick buck as the superficial diet. It’s not longer called a protocol but a diet.

When you consider the hormonal cause of diseases in America, most of which are linked to too much leptin, using the protocol as a diet and with the same diet mentality is selling it very short. Weight is a shallow measure in comparison to the incredible hormonal therapy the protocol could provide− only if it was approached with intelligence.  The weight-driven and money hungry diet industry has made the hCG protocol another fad diet, which is sad because weight is just the beginning and only a superficial indication of how incredible the hCG protocol is.

Any self-proclaimed “expert” who continues to market and value the protocol based on weight-loss is part of the diet industry. You will never get respect from the medical community until you understand the depth of knowledge it takes to fully comprehend how the hCG protocol influences the endcrine system. There must be a standard of intelligence that applies the protocol from a hormonal point of view and this is where the medical hCG protocol industry needs to regain control.   I suggest you as "experts" understand the protocol from a hormonal perspective, and no longer tout this protocol as a diet.

HCG PROTOCOL MEDICAL EXPERT REVIEWS WEIGHT-LOSS APOCALYPSE

I’d like to start by letting you know I did not write the book I am about to suggest, I have no financial investment in this book, and if you choose to use this book in your clinic, I do not profit from its sales. However, because I own an hCG protocol clinic, I believe the more people who read this book, the more credible the hCG protocol will be, which would benefit all medical hCG clinics. With that said, I would strongly encourage every medical professional and hCG protocol patient to read Weight-Loss Apocalypse.

 I was first introduced to the hCG protocol at a medical symposium 5 years ago. After listening to a short seminar about the protocol (which didn’t provide any information that I couldn’t find myself in Dr. Simeons’ manuscript), I decided to do the hCG protocol myself. After having an incredible experience, I’ve been prescribing for others, ever since.

I’ve read just about every hCG protocol book available. All of them explain the hCG protocol in the same manner: repeating Dr. Simeons’ theories of three types of fat, “unlocking” the hypothalamus, etc. As a doctor, I’ve always known this explanation was insufficient, but no other explanation exists. Because of my own success and the success of my patients, I continued to prescribe− convinced Dr. Simeons’ theories must be correct. Until now.

When Robin Woodall asked me to read and review her manuscript of Weight-Loss Apocalypse, I really didn’t want to be bothered to read another hCG protocol book. I figured there couldn’t be anything in the book that I didn’t already know.  But because of the sub-title (Emotional Eating Rehab Through the HCG Protocol) I was intrigued to read what Robin was presenting. The biggest difficulty with patients is emotional eating, and even though the protocol gives an undeniable weight loss opportunity, people cheat all the time. If this manuscript was giving suggestions for how to deal with this, it would be worth my time to read and review. I accepted the manuscript and committed to reading it and giving Robin my honest review.

 I was not prepared for and could not have imagined, what I was about to read. As Robin explained the science of hunger, starvation, energy homeostasis, and the relationship between low dose hCG and leptin, my excitement grew. The manuscript not only gave a credible scientific hypothesis that explained why hCG prevents starvation, but it also provided great insight that would hold accountable the conflict patients have with emotional eating.  I was floored by the intelligence, integrity, and passion Robin put into her book. I’ve read the medical references used to create the hypothesis and I’ve also read her manuscript another 5 times. My conclusion: Weight-Loss Apocalypse will revolutionize the entire weight loss industry as a whole, it legitimizes the hCG protocol as a hormonal therapy that reduces diseases associated to obesity, and presents a meaningful approach that holds accountable the cause of the problem: eating without hunger.  

Now that the book is published, each patient that goes through our program gets a copy of Weight-Loss Apocalypse and we’ve added the Mind:Body Method to our program. Cheating occurs less often, patients don’t complain about weight anymore, and the new approach has been described as a “life-altering” experience.  We continue to receive emails and messages from patients, thanking us for giving them Robin’s book, expressing how much it has helped them and has permanently changed the way they eat.  Needless to say, reading Robin’s manuscript was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. Here is my review:

“I've been prescribing hCG for weight loss for over four years, and nothing I've read comes close to having this level of expertise. Without questions, this is the most informative and enlightening book about Dr. Simeons' hCG protocol available."  

−Dr. Ed Hagen, OBGyn and HCG Protocol Medical Expert

BREAKFAST ISN'T AS IMPORTANT AS WE THOUGHT

The diet industry has continued to neglect the value of hunger. Unfortunately, this has continued dysfunctional eating by focusing on rules and boundaries that have very little to do with feedback from the body. A perfect example is using caloric expenditure to determine how much a person should eat.

Science describes that our body is fueled by stored substrates (fat, muscle, glycogen, blood/cellular glucose), which is regulated hormonally. Using calories to quantify daily food intake, assumes the food you eat is immediately digested into these molecular forms, which are converted into human fuel and used the same day you eat it. If you eat strait sugar, this is accurate. But if you eat anything complex, this couldn’t be further from the truth.

Using calories to determine how much you should eat also neglects to include that your body already has stored fuel that has completed the digestive process and is ready to be used. Food is complex and must be digested and distributed among the four fueling substrates before it can be used. So there are hormones that eating stimulates that regulate the release of fuel from already stored substrates, while food is digesting. This is a cycle that ensures the body is fueled adequately, even though the food you are eating is no where close to being in a molecular substrate.

What regulates the hormones that control this fuel release? The answer is complex and requires a finite balance between other hormones, expenditure rate, oxygen, and hormonal stimulants, such as food. All food stimulates your fat to release hormones and how much hormones you get is relative to how many fat cells you have, the size of your fat cells, and the potency of the food you ate. An easy way for you to understand if you have enough of these hormones is through hunger.

If you’re not hungry, you don’t need to stimulate more of these hormones. Leptin is the hormone your fat creates that also removes the physical irritation and urgency to eat. So if you’re not hungry, your blood leptin levels are elevated, and you do not need to eat, otherwise you’ll release more leptin, which not only has over-fueling ramifications, but can cause a host of hormonal imbalances elsewhere in the endocrine system.

When made aware of the hormonal regulation of hunger and the link to fueling mechanisms, it makes sense why people who have more fat experience less hunger. They have more fat cells that create more leptin, which releases more fuel from fat, so they need weaker stimulus− less often, and they also have less need to “restock” fuel from food. The more fat you have, the less food you need! (Refer to why skinny b*tches eat more and don’t get fat.)

Here is a prime example of how messed up the diet industry is. When you wake up in the morning, are you legitimately hungry for breakfast? Probably not. The more fat you have, the less likely you are to experience hunger after you wake in the morning.

How many of you have been demanded to eat breakfast, even though you have very little hunger? I was taught at the university level that breakfast starts your metabolism.  It was described by the “thermic effect of food” which would start the calorie-burning process. That was in the year 2000.

At that point science wasn’t readily available to explain that by eating breakfast all of your fat cells would be stimulated to create the hormone leptin, which would as a reaction, release fuel into your body. If you’re not hungry and your leptin levels are already elevated (which indicates that your body is already adequately fueled by your fat) do you need to stimulate more? No! Chances are those calories you burned through the thermic effect of food didn't come close to the over fueling  from fat that causes a host of problems.

If you’re not hungry you already have enough leptin, you’re already receiving fuel from your fat and by eating anyways, you’ll be causing an over production of leptin and an over-fueling situation. In short, wait until you are hungry to eat breakfast.

BUY THE BOOK:  www.weightlossapocalypse.com

NEW HYPOTHESIS FOR WHY HCG PREVENTS STARVATION DURING THE HCG PROTOCOL

 "I have never had an opportunity of conducting the laboratory investigations which are so necessary for a theoretical understanding of clinical observations, and I can only hope that those more fortunately placed will in time be able to fill this gap.”

Dr. ATW Simeons, Pounds & Inches -privately published in 1967

Laboratory investigation requires first, that there be a hypothesis that is testable in a scientific laboratory to observe the finite mechanisms that explain molecular physiology. In the recently published book, Weight-Loss Apocalypse, Robin Woodall has composed a new hypothesis that describes why Dr. Simeons observed his clinical observations. This hypothesis will open the doors immediately for laboratory investigation.

If you, in any way, would like the hCG protocol to have credibility as a hormonal therapy, I suggest you read the book, understand the new hypothesis, and change the way you market your hCG business as well as how you explain why the hCG protocol works. Using measurements of weight to prove (or disprove) the protocol is not only naïve, but is insufficient data that directs the public towards old and outdated research that discredited Simeons' observations, with and without hCG.

The FDA continues to devalue the protocol based on this outdated research which compared double-blind studies based on weight lost, perceived hunger, and circumference measurements− all of which didn't show a statistical significance. However, to disprove or prove that hCG prevents starvation there must be laboratory investigation studying the hormone hCG and how it may influence the hormonal regulation of starvation when administered in low doses (125 iu) daily, when food is significantly reduced for weeks at a time. This laboratory research is what Dr. Simeons did not do, thus he wrote the quote at the top of this post.

Recently (2009), there has been a defined negative feedback loop between hCG and the hormone that controls energy homeostasis; leptin. Leptin is a fat derived hormone that was discovered in 1994. This very recent discovery between hCG and leptin could very well explain why Dr. Simeons observed the miracles he couldn't fully explain (nor prove) during his very low calorie protocol.

Today, we are the "more fortunately placed" and it's time to fill the scientific gap. We need to put the new hypothesis to the test and hope laboratory evidence proves we’re not all crazy and the hCG protocol isn’t too good to be true.

BUY THE BOOK www.mindbodyhcg.com

BULLSH*T THE DIET INDUSTRY TELLS YOU AND WHY YOU’RE STILL FAT

Look at all the gadgets, products, and weird diets we’ve wasted our money on because their advertisements said we’d lose weight. So far, how successful has the diet industry been at doing what they say? Has the hundreds of billions of dollars Americans spend every year made us the leanest, slimmest country in the worLd? Not yet. No matter how gimmicky the diet seems, if the website says it works, we’ll buy it. Proclaiming “weight-loss” is a cash cow! Why do we continue to believe their billshi*t? 

It’s amazing how Americans spend the most money on food and have the most gluttonous culture, but yet we spend the most money trying not to eat any of it, and we’re still the fattest society on the planet.

We’re so side-tracked by the diet industry telling us we need to lose weight, that we skip the part where we are individually accountable: excessive eating as the norm. We pay them, temporarily submit to eating less, but only because we want to lose weight. When the weight isn’t lost fast enough, restricting food isn’t worth it any more. Sound familiar?

READ THE "WHY WEIGHTING SUCKS" BLOG NEXT

Let’s get real. The problem is that our culture loves to eat emotionally and excessively as the norm and until we change this, we will continue to have growth in the obesity epidemic (no matter how much money we continue to waste on diets). The diet industry makes billions duping you into believing the only reason to eat less is to lose weight. That’s why weight is the foundation of how they measure success. They give you a temporary system that controls how you eat less and you pay them for it. YOU PAY TO EAT LESS.

This ploy keeps you from changing your personal desires to eat that have nothing to do with body fat and everything to do with emotions and cultural behavior.  This keeps your focus on their diet plan, gives them credit if you do lose weight, and makes you believe your body must have some sort of flaw when you go back to eating with our gluttonous culture and gain back the fat. Thus, you pay more and more and more until you realize their plan sucks.

The diet industry is an enabler, and you are now co-dependent. Why would they want you to eat less without them? If that was the case you wouldn’t have a weight problem and you wouldn’t want to pay or think you needed help. Instead they teach you there are secrets to losing weight. Secrets you need to pay for in order to lose fat, because fat is a mysterious growth. Fat is a plague and you need their secret remedy in order to remove it. BULLSH*T!!!

Here is an easy way to see how messed up this dysfunctional co-dependency with the diet industry is. Let’s say there was something cataclysmic that happens that completely obliterates our access to food.  How would you eat?

In this situation you’d have to ration the food you have for as long as possible. Would you eat when you were bored? Would you eat without hunger? Would you eat until you were full? Would you refuse certain food because it’s “bad” for you? No, no, no and no. Eating without hunger doesn’t make instinctual survival sense. If you were to limit eating to only when you experience true hunger, and only ate when hunger is tolerably removed, wouldn’t you lose weight easily (eating whatever you want)? Why wait for cataclysm? If our entire culture did this as the norm, obesity would be something we rarely see, the diet industry that has failed us so miserable would go away, the pharmaceutical industry would reduce to less than 90%, etc., etc., etc. You get the gist.

Eating emotionally and excessively is a cultural norm and is somehow excusable and accepted. Haven’t you excused yourself from a diet because of some form of stress or social engagement, believing emotional eating is justified and “normal”? Diets will never market solutions for emotional eating because if you stop, you’d never have a fat problem. Also, they wouldn’t make any money because you’d never pay for something you don’t want. Our culture loves eating to gratify emotions, but we detest the physical outcome. Therefore, you temporarily submit to the diet and obsessively monitor fat loss.

Why do diets suck and why are you fat? Because you have never been held accountable to change your desires to eat that have nothing to do with physical hunger.  Either you’ve never recognized that as the problem, or you don’t want to. No matter how much fat you lose with any short-lived diet, until you create a desire to eat less, you might as well accept obesity as the outcome.

In short, the focus on weight by the diet industry is the foundation for why they never work.  Until we stop believing that eating is emotionally rewarding, you’ll always feel deprived by diets and  you’ll always believe that weight-loss is the only reason to eat less. In other words, you should want to eat less whether you lose weight or not.

http://www.mindbodyhcg.com/

HCG BUSINESS'S LOOP HOLE AROUND THE FDA AND FTC

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) just announced there will be penalty for selling “homeopathic” HCG products online and in retail outlets, as oral drops pellets, and sprays. Why? Because of unsupported claims made and marketed by hCG diet businesses. Their biggest problem isn’t the hCG but rather the claims that hCG induces weight loss.  

They believe weight lost is not due to the hCG but because of the very low calorie diet the protocol suggests. In the press release David Vladick, the director of the FTC’s Beureau of Consumer Protection, says, “Deceptive advertising about weight loss products is one of the most prevalent types of fraud.”  It is the scam-like advertising they disapprove of.

Click here to read their news release: http://www.fda.gov/Drugs/ResourcesForYou/Consumers/BuyingUsingMedicineSafely/MedicationHealthFraud/ucm282465.htm

Can any of you argue the diet industry has been the biggest fraud? How many of you have spent thousands and thousands of your hard earned money on products that claim you will lose weight, have leaner bodies, and will look like the model selling it, without results? The hCG protocol has become huge business and I can see why there are red flags, especially when hCG businesses are claiming weight loss in excess of 30 pounds in less than 40 days. Seriously, didn’t you think the hCG protocol sounded like a scam when you first heard these types of claims? They sound ridiculous especially when the business implies there is no personal responsibly or need for change to the way you eat regularly. But, once you’ve done the protocol, skepticism turns into converted believer.

What weight-loss business (that has integrity and has your long term health in their best interest) would advertise this way? None. So I don’t blame the FDA and FTC for being so harsh and skeptical. However, the only way to get their attention and to let them know this is a consumer driven product is to switch things up. The hCG protocol industry needs to completely change the way they are selling the product s. We need to change our claims to something the FDA would have to do further research to disprove. And better, let’s claim something that has integrity so they look bad by disproving it.

Here’s the loop-hole: HCG protocol businesses need to abruptly change the way they advertise. Remove all ads that claim weight-loss and instead, claim the hCG protocol will help you learn to eat less. How could anyone argue with this statement? The obvious long term result of weight-loss doesn’t need to be the center of attention. As the consumer, you can blog, discuss, post, and say anything you want about how much weight you’ve lost. Weight-loss as a result of eating less is something the FDA cannot stop the consumer from claiming.

In short:  Businesses advertise eating less. Consumers post their incredible results.

The diet industry is ruthless and there are thousands of books, products, and services that have been making the same superficial claims for decades. In order for the hCG protocol to stand out we need to take a very different approach. Let’s market it in a way that the FDA will have difficulty proving us wrong.

Yes, the hCG protocol helps you eat less. It will change the way you eat so that you never go back to the dysfunctional eating that caused your fat gain in the first place.  Let’s make the protocol a way to change our gluttonous culture. The hCG protocol is an emotional eating rehab. This is a cause and a claim the FDA will want us to continue.

If you want to take control back, we need to act fast.  Post this to every hCG site you can and hope things change quickly. Find out more about the author at http://www.mindbodyhcg.com/

DOES YOUR HCG BUSINESS LOOK LIKE A SCAM?

If you sell or prescribe hCG you might want to rethink how you advertise it. The reason the hCG diet will eventually disappear like other "fad" diets is because there is very little emphasis placed on the behavioral change required to maintain weight that was lost. Without this fundamental lesson learned, participants will gain the weight back, just as all ignorant skeptics have predicted.

It's as simple as making sure all participants know that no amount of weight lost will change emotional desires to eat. So until they change their desires to eat emotionally, they might as well accept the fact that their bodies will always have extra fat, no matter how much weight they temporarily lose.

The entire diet industry needs a revolution. This revolution will only happen if we, the hCG protocol industry, make the protocol very different than any other diet. The difference: holding accountable the emotional changes that the participant must make to perminently end the mistreatment of their body with food. Fat is not a cancer, it is a force of creation cause by hormonal imbalance. For the majority, this imbalance is caused and self-inflicted by eating behavior. Until we hold our cultural emotional eating disorder accountable and stop blaming fat as the problem, no diet ever created will work perminently and nothing will heal the diseases caused by over-eating.

If you sell or prescribe hCG, I highly suggest you stand out from the crowd and start advertising something other than 30 pounds lost in 40 days. Now when you look at that advirtiesment, you are no different than the rest of the short-term, quick-fix scams that have come and gone. Don't taint the most incredible hormonal therapy with your lack of integrity. Sell vaccuums instead.

DO HCG DIET EXPERTS REALLY KNOW WHAT THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT?

There are many "experts", practitioners and businesses prescribing hCG for Dr. Simeons' protocol. But how many of them actually understand why it works and how hCG could prevent starvation? Most have no clue. They know it works, but they don't understand why, so they repeat what they read in Simeons' manuscript, Pounds & Inches.

Here are 5 questions that reveal if an hCG diet business knows why the hCG protocol works:

1) Does the hCG business discuss 3 types of fat? This is a hypothesis Simeons' created, however it has never been laboratory tested or explained. As of today, there are two different types of fat (brown or white fat). We know that larger fat cells function the same as smaller fat cells, but with a more magnified response. Meaning they do the same things small fat cells do, but in a bigger way.  Larger fat cells produce more hormones, and provide more fuel than the smaller fat cells. As for three types of fat: science hasen't discovered a third type.

2) Does the hCG diet business profess that hCG burns fat. This could not be further from the truth. HCG DOES NOT BURN FAT. However, hCG does stimulate the hormone that regulates fat metabolism; Leptin. If you are not up to date with the new science of energy homeostasis you need to start studying recent research that has summarized what we know about the hormone leptin and its regulation of the thyroid, adrenals, testicles, ovaries, etc.  Leptin is a primary regulatory hormone of the body's fueling systems. It also regulates the body's hormonal response that causes symptoms of starvation. Low dose hCG stimulates leptin, which would reduce one's hunger but also increases the fueling response from fat cells. This is the same thing food does hormonally, but with hCG- you don’t need as much food! This is described thoroughly in the newly published book, Weight-Loss Apocalypse.  (www.weightlossapocalypse.com)

3) Does the hCG diet business monitor success, only by weight?  Weight is a superficial and insufficient measure of success, and by obsessing over weight for motivation you are creating a short term diet out of an incredible hormonal therapy. For example, is the hCG diet business telling customers/patients to weigh every day and to do an “apple-day” if they plateau? Are they suggesting that you can flush out fat with apples??? Obsessive weighing creates adverse emotional consequences that could encourage emotional eating disorders. Weight is too superficial when compared to the profound hormonal healing that the hCG protocol provides when its followed.

Weight cannot compare to the rewards of better sleep, improved adrenal function, diminished heart burn, improved breathing, reduced inflammation, improved sex drive, etc. Measures that include body fat composition and an assessment of hormonal symptoms are much more telling and more valuable than a number on a scale. Weight should be the least of your concerns when considering the long term change of lifestyle it will take for you to maintain whatever weight you lose. And weight should not be responsible for the motivation it takes to eat less among gluttons.

4) Does the hCG diet business monitor calories? The measure of calories in food is old and outdated information. In fact, how the protocol works completely conflicts with the idea that we are fueled from the food we eat that day. The caloric value in food is irrelevant as it concerns the body’s hormonal response to food.  For example, we now know that artificial sweetener (zero calories) stimulates leptin and this response stimulates fat's fueling mechanism.  The reason the hCG works to prevent starvation is because it stimulates the same hormone that food stimulates (leptin). For this reason, your body doesn't respond to starvation like it would without the hCG. Calories have nothing to do with starvation because starvation is defined scientifically by a measure of hormones.  Look it up: leptin and its relationship to starvation.

5) Does the hCG diet business profess you’ll lose a pound a day or 30 pounds in 40 days? This is a sign the business is run by people who have no clue how metabolism works, they have no interest in long term results, and they are more interested in one thing: money. This same business probably sells appetite suppressants (another sign they have no idea how the protocol works and that they want more money), fat dissolving injections, meal replacements, and other means to make money. Most of these are sold to take advantage of and to prostitute the desperation of people who need to lose fat and are willing to pay anyone who promises quick results.

Unfortunately most of the hCG diet industry is run by businesses that have no clue what they are doing. These businesses know the hCG protocol works and with that, they know they can make money. But where’s the integrity? Where’s the responsibility?  Without understanding how the protocol works, it has been marketed as another quick fix diet. Without giving the patient personal responsibility – it’s a scam!

But if you’ve done the protocol properly, you know− IT’S NOT A SCAM.  Then why market it in a way that has very little integrity? Why portray it in a way that looks just as fake as the rest? The only way the hCG protocol will make a significant impact on America’s overwhelming obesity epidemic, is if the hCG diet industry rethinks how the hCG protocol is portrayed, taught, presented, and advertised.

·     If you own an hCG diet business, do you want to look credible? Then know how it works hormonally.

·     Do you want to stand apart from the hCG diet businesses that market it like another fad diet? Than market it as a hormonal therapy.

·     Do you want your patients to have long lasting results that heal both the body and the mind? Than hold your patients accountable to change the way they eat emotionally.

I believe the hCG protocol has the potential to change our culture both physically and emotionally. If we as “experts” continue to mirror the same approach as the diet industry, we will fail. It will be another diet, another fad, and another attempt at losing weight, just to gain it all back.

For more information...BUY THE BOOK TODAY:  Weight-Loss Apocalypse: Emotional Eating Rehab Through the HCG Protocol.

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WHY WEIGHING YOURSELF SUCKS (and results in fat gain)

If you think that by losing weight, your self-esteem will improve so much that your motivation to eat less will have everlasting motivation−you’re fooling yourself.

Monitoring weight is the biggest flaw in the foundation of a diet. Why: because desires to eat food have nothing to do with body fat. For example, how many of us sabotage our temporary diet in order to eat for emotional celebration?

How often have you eaten food at a party, then felt guilty about breaking your diet’s rules, as a result decided your desire to eat was bigger than your desire to lose weight at that moment, and instead of feeling guilty, you’d rather let go of that desire to lose weight, so that you could eat all that you’d like− without guilt. And because you can just “start over” the next day, you end up eating more than you actually want, which compensates for the impending diet restrictions that you don’t want in the first place. Sound familiar?

This is typical of most when attempting a weight-motivated diet. Consider the failure of the entire diet industry. Consider how much fat our country gains each year compared to how much fat we lose. How’s weight as motivation working? Not well. With all of the differences between one diet to the next, the one consistency between them all is their hyper-focus on weight. The long term result: more fat gain.

If you observe the obsession over weight-loss during the protocol (or any other diet) you’ll find that as soon as weight-loss stops, or slows down, complaints go up. Why? Because there’s emotional hardship when choosing to eat less−which is why there’s a desperate need for weight-loss as reward. We falsely believe weight is the problem and temporarily submit to a reduction in food intake−but only if weight is lost. Without holding accountable our desires to eat excessively and emotionally, fat is falsely accused as the problem.

Have you ever considered that the normal way you eat is the real challenge? Without weight loss, would you voluntarily eat less? If you continue to have desires to eat at every party, every social event, every moment you feel bored, and whenever you feel emotionally tested − your body will always be forced to accumulate fat.

Go ahead −obsess over your weight while dieting. Find out if your weight will motivate you to eat less the rest of your life. Or, decide you’re disgusted by our cultural gluttony. Recognize that you’ve stopped using your creativity, which is why you’re bored and use food for entertainment. Acknowledge that eating has become your best friend, your hobby, your crutch, and without eating at all social functions, you feel punished.  You might hate the amount of money you’ve spent to lose and gain weight over and over again−but eventually, you’ll recognize that weight isn’t the problem and that using it as motivation, will always fall short.

Without changing your desires to eat, anything less will feel punishing, and each time you restrict, that desire to eat will magnify even more. Stop kidding yourself. If you have emotional desires to eat and want to continue this dysfunctional relationship with food, you might as well accept the outcome.

If you want permanent change, consider transforming the normal way you eat

to a realistic “new normal”, that doesn’t require you eating emotionally

−whether you lose weight or not.

Motivation to eat less is profound, especially when you live in a culture that eats excessively as the norm. Especially, when the diet industry has plagued us with constant guilt about what we eat, and the food industry is continuously shoving food down our throats.

You have to understand that obesity isn’t the problem−it’s the inevitable outcome of gluttony. So if you continue to assume that losing weight will change your desires to eat, you’re fooling yourself−again.

THE HCG PROTOCOL IS NOT FOR SISSIES

Have you ever considered what it would emotionally feel like to be limited to less than 500 calories of food, while living amongst gluttons? For most, when considering the benefits versus the risks of the hCG protocol, emotional hardship isn’t well thought-out. Instead, the biggest influence when deciding to do the protocol, is potential weight-loss.

They’re tired of battling with weight, and frustrated with the diet industry’s failure to make a difference. They think, “If what thousands of people proclaim on the Internet is true-- eating such a small amount of food must be worth it.” There’s no hunger, the food is simple, and if the weight is lost as fast as everyone says, how could the protocol be difficult?

This mentality is naive. The hCG protocol requires the participant eat 500 calories in food for about a month, and when done correctly, hunger may limit eating to even less. Take a step back and observe this amount of food. Compare it against the backdrop of our normal cultural eating behavior. Notice the difference? Our culture is the most gluttonous and dysfunctional culture with food --in the Universe. 

We spend hundreds of billions of dollars on food,

and what’s ironic is that we spend billions, trying not to eat it.

The hCG protocol is the extreme opposite.The naivety is in thinking that weight-loss will perpetually motivate us to eat less, even amongst friends, family, and coworkers who eat significantly more.  And to believe that without hunger you’ll be emotionally resilient-- is crazy!

How many of you eat without hunger? When you’re bored, when you’re celebrating, when you’re drunk, have the munchies, when you’ve had a difficult day at work, to suppress negative feelings about someone, or to avoid having to talk to strangers in social settings? Anybody who thinks that hunger is why American’s eat too much, needs a reality check.

If you ask anybody who is obese how often they’re hungry (I’m talking true physical hunger), they will tell you they’re not hungry that often. However, for reasons I’m not going to explain in this blog, their hunger occurs more rapidly than others who have less fat. In general, they’re not hungry for breakfast; they could wait hours and hours before feeling that physical irritation and urgency to eat, and they don’t need as much food to reduce hunger.

This makes sense, considering the science that has proven the more fat a person has, the higher (exponentially) their blood leptin levels are. Leptin, in the brain, reduces hunger. So it makes sense that if you have more leptin, you’re going to experience hunger less often. But does lack of hunger and weight loss keep you from continually eating with the rest of our gluttonous culture? Probably not. Otherwise the first diet you ever attempted would have worked long term.

The hCG protocol is not as easy as you think. It requires you eat less than what small children eat, and for over a month. If you live in America, that means you’re going to be constantly surrounded by food commercials, surrounded by restaurants and fast food joints on every corner, and will have invitations to eat all the time-- for any reason.  Our culture is defined by eating and food, so to think any amount of fat loss would completely overhaul your desires to eat is naïve.

Before considering the hCG protocol, take into account the desire and emotional strength you’re going to have to develop to let go of excessive emotional eating. And to keep from gaining fat back, you'll have to let go of emotional eating forever. Are you ready to divorce this gluttonous way of life? Do you really want to let go of food emotionally?  Are you seeking an intrinsic desire to eat less, whether you lose weight or not? If so, the hCG protocol will change your life. Your body will heal and your relationship with food will too. With freedom from emotional eating as your goal, consider yourself anything but a sissy, and ready to take on the hCG protocol challenge.

WHY SKINNY B*TCHES EAT MORE(and don't get fat)

By the time I first meet with a client, they’ve already decided they want to do the hCG protocol. Not because they want to completely overhaul the way they eat, but because they’ve convinced themselves losing weight will improve their life.

On some level, they are absolutely correct. Fat cells are organ cells that create and stimulate all sorts of hormones, and because these clients have too many fat cells, weak stimulus results in a strong hormonal response.

Do you understand the hormonal difference between a leaner body compared to a more obese body? The more fat you have the weaker hormonal stimulus you need. On the other hand, the less fat you have the stronger hormonal stimulus you need.

Similar to hormones, food (all food) stimulates your fat cells to release hormones. As a result, in order to maintain hormonal balance, those who have more fat need significantly less food. If you continue to eat similar to others who have less fat, you’ll inevitably have hormonal problems. This is why those who are leaner (skinny b*tches) can eat more without gaining fat or having hormonal problems. And a person who has more fat, eats less, gains fat, and has hormonal problems. (This is thoroughly explained in Weight-Loss Apocalypse)

Because of this magnified hormonal response after eating, the larger you are, the more you end up feeling like crap if you eat “normal” amounts of food. You're tired, fatigued, have suppressed adrenal function which makes you less motivated to do anything, have hot flashes, daily symptoms of heart burn, erratic sex drive, inflamed joints, breathing issues, night sweats, sleep disruptions, etc. These symptoms don’t occur with people who have less fat-- unless they binge eat or have a hormonal cause, such as thyroid, ovary, or other organ problem.

As soon as clients begin the very low calorie protocol and their food intake is regimented and minimal, they notice how much better they feel. Energy for most improves. Hot flashes and heart burn disappear. The more fat they lose, the more their sleep improves, etc. However, many people look past how incredibly better they feel to instead, base all of their motivation on their weight. If they lose more weight, they want to continue. If they don’t lose enough weight, they feel burdened by the reduced food intake.

Weight on the scale is a very superficial reason to eat less. When you consider the disease and hormonal problems associated to obesity and eating’s hormonal magnification, don’t you think there are more profound motivations to eat functionally?

Unfortunately, the diet industry has plagued us with the idea that weight is the only measure of success. Why? Because you pay for it. The more you obsess over your weight, the less focus you put towards ending the reasons you eat that have nothing to do with true physical hunger, and have everything to do with why you have excess fat. Weight motivated diets don’t realistically prepare you to live in our culture of normalized gluttony.

This time, instead of enlisting for another shallow diet that judges food, causes guilt every time you eat, and encourages you to weigh obsessively-- do something very different. Choose to eat less to feel better, and to reduce your hormonal problems. If you’re never going to lose the damn weight anyways, wouldn’t you at least want to lose all the sh*tty hormonal symptoms?

For the next couple of months try this: stop judging food. Eat anything you want. HOWEVER, the boundary is that you must have true physical hunger to eat, and you must avoid fullness at all cost. Throw away your scale, and choose to eat functionally no matter what the result. You’ll notice you physically feel much better. Binging because of diet guilt will immediately stop, food isn’t such a big deal anymore, and neither is your weight.

Because you aren’t allowed to eat without hunger, you’ll have to find other things to do with your spare time. Projects you’ve started will finally get finished; you’ll try new hobbies, and have more creative drive. Emotionally, you’ll be held accountable. This is similar to a baby and a pacifier. If food is your pacifier, you’re going to have to learn to handle change and life without superstitiously thinking food will make things better. Truthfully, letting go of food emotionally will get you back to the way you used to eat as a child.

Children spend their time playing, thinking, and creating. Eating is only necessary when they get the physical irritation of hunger, which eventually can’t be ignored. They eat, but only enough for the pang to go away. Then they bolt out the door, back to the fun and creativity they only left, because of hunger. No fullness, no emotional high, no emotional guilt, no fear of gaining fat, and no caring about weight.

This is a challenge of your ability to understand what physical hunger feels like, and to understand the difference between true physical need to eat, from emotional desire. Ultimately, as you no longer need food as a pacifier, your emotional confidence will grow. Eating less won’t need motivation or feel like punishment. With hormonal balance, you’ll immediately feel better, and the obvious result will be fat loss. This immediately solves hormonal problems that created fat gain, and were caused by eating without hunger in the first place.

This is one of those win/win situations: Eat what you want, but only when there’s true physical hunger, and avoid fullness at all cost. I challenge you to try this, and let me know how it goes!

INTRODUCTION TO WEIGHT-LOSS APOCALYPSE

I first heard about the hCG protocol from my sister, a registered dietitian. She’d already finished her first week on it before she called to tell me about her experience. I’m sure she waited because she expected me to criticize what she was doing.

You could say I was skeptical, considering I’m a personal trainer, and my college degree is in exercise physiology. Obviously eating less than 500 calories in food causes weight loss, but what about muscle loss, too? Destroying your metabolism? And preparing you for what? You can’t eat 500 calories the rest of your life! Yes, I was critical.

At the time, I thought I was thoroughly informed as to how the body uses fuel, and how the body responds to starvation. Before I read Dr. Simeons’ 1967 manuscript, Pounds & Inches, I assumed it was written by a con man taking advantage of our desperation due to the obesity crises. But to my surprise, the manuscript made some sense. I could relate to his theories because his observations of fat gain and loss paralleled my own during three pregnancies, and what I’d witnessed with many clients over my ten-year career.

I’d observed, measured, and assessed body fat compositions for thousands of people. Some of those clients meticulously exercised and reduced their food intake—without results. I watched as female clients gained abdominal fat during menopause, even though they were eating less and exercising more. I observed clients before, during, and after pregnancy, and witnessed the shape of their bodies change, adding fat in some areas, and losing it in others. I knew through experience that fat gain and loss were linked to hormones.

I was excited when Simeons’ observations validated mine.

Dr. Simeons assessed scale weight for decades to deduce the strict guidelines of his protocol. He had theorized, based on his observations, that the pregnancy hormone, human Chorionic Gonadotropin (hCG), somehow prevented symptoms of starvation during a 500-calorie protocol. In 1967, he privately published his findings and hypothesis in a manuscript called Pounds & Inches: A New Approach to Obesity. Dr. Simeons’ believed the brain determines where and when fat is used for fuel. He observed that hCG redirected the brain to use abnormal fat (fat that’s difficult to lose) for energy. He observed that 1) participants felt minimal hunger, 2) their weight loss was rapid, and 3) their losses were specific to areas that regular diet and exercise didn’t influence.

Dr. Simeons was convinced that by tricking the brain with hCG, and manipulating fuel demand with the 500-calorie protocol, the brain would “re-set” its fat-burning capacity. Ultimately, this would allow the participant to eat normally without having the same susceptibility for fat gain when the protocol was over.

After understanding his protocol, and finding a doctor willing to prescribe it, I decided to present the information, as well as the opportunity to do the protocol, to appropriate clients.  They had to allow me to follow, measure, and record their progress, and in particular, compare their metabolic rate before they started, and after they finished.

Six clients agreed to participate.  Before starting the protocol, I did a battery of tests. These included a record of: metabolic testing to find out how many calories they burned in a day, a cardiovascular endurance test done on a treadmill, blood pressure, resting heart rate, flexibility testing, push-up and sit-up tests for muscular endurance, bench press to measure their estimated strength, two different body-fat composition assessments, as well as circumference measurements.

I continued to measure everything weekly during and after the 500-calorie protocol, except for the fitness testing and metabolic rates, which I measured again at the end. I wasn’t surprised by their significant fat and size loss but I was not prepared for the drastic amount of fat lost in the stomach area. Quickly I added three additional circumference measurements to that stomach area to ensure I was accurately assessing their size change.

All participants agreed they had minimal hunger, and most said their energy level was good. Completely shocking were the fitness and metabolic testing results after the protocol was completely over. Not only did the fitness tests improve, but the amount of calories their body burned in a day significantly increased.  Considering each participant ate less than 500 calories for over a month, these results were astonishing.

I knew there had to be a logical explanation. I worked with new clients on the protocol, and continued to perform all of the tests before, during, and after the protocol. After collecting data for over 40 people, a local university statistically analyzed my metabolic testing results. When the results came back they were the same as my own observations. The metabolic rates significantly increased after the protocol. At this point, I was determined to find legitimate reasons for the increase.

After all, my findings completely conflicted with everything I was taught regarding calories, fat loss, muscles, metabolism, and what’s supposed to weaken during chronic starvation.

I compiled the data, and searched for local doctors of endocrinology that specialized in organs and hormones of the body, hoping they would be interested in my findings. I assumed they’d be able to explain how the hCG could influence the body in a way that prevented typical symptoms of starvation during such drastic caloric restrictions. I wanted to know why all my participants had overall improvements, after the fact. Only one doctor was willing to meet with me. After 45 minutes of discussing what I’d been doing, and my hope for some answers, he suggested I create a hypothesis that might make sense of what I observed.  I was taken aback that he didn’t have any answers, and that I would have to do my own research to understand what I’d been witnessing.

If this endocrinologist, who had a Ph.D., and also owned his own diabetes center, couldn’t help, then I was definitely on my own. That evening I started from square one, searching for scientific explanations for the physiology of hunger, energy, fueling, and how the body regulates fat metabolism, starvation, etc. This was a huge undertaking that required the ability to read scientific journals and reports to understand the cellular physiology.

Fortunately, my degree focusing on physiology came in handy. However, I was not prepared for what I found—thousands of medical journals written since I graduated in 2000— describing new hormones, new mechanisms, and new explanations for how the body regulates metabolism, hunger, and its complex fueling systems.

For two weeks I spent 12 hours a day, cross-referencing, reading and re-reading material over and over. I created charts and my own dictionary of organs, hormones, and functions, basically teaching myself the new physiology of energy homeostasis/equilibrium. The difficulty was not in finding the answers, but in understanding the new terminology and mechanisms I was not taught in school, or with any of my certifications.

Once I understood the most influential hormones involved in hunger and metabolism during both starvation and feeding, I formed a hypothesis that made the most obvious sense to me. Based on the modern science I studied, hCG must stimulate sufficient leptin in order to prevent all symptoms of starvation.

I felt like I was about to answer a million-dollar question, because I was so confident that the link between hCG and leptin had to be the answer.  Within seconds of entering those two key hormones into a search engine, all of my hard work and focus became worth the effort. Immediately I found studies that connected hCG to leptin.  Some specifically indicated the most powerful relationship between the two hormones occurred at almost the exact amount Dr. Simeons prescribed for the hCG protocol.  My heart was racing, and I literally jumped up and down with excitement.

Not only did scientific evidence exist that could easily explain how hCG, through the stimulus of leptin, could prevent symptoms of starvation during a very low-calorie diet, but a huge body of science also explained the reason for significant metabolic increases. Any scientist involved in the new studies of the hormone leptin, as it concerns starvation, fat gain, and fat loss, would find the answer obvious. The only reason a person would have minimal hunger, increased energy, and wouldn’t experience lean tissue loss during a 500-calorie protocol, is if hCG adequately stimulated blood leptin levels.

I wrote a hypothesis, but unfortunately the doctor who suggested I find the answers never responded. I continued to collect data and be amazed at the protocol’s physical results. Today, I’ve closely monitored over 500 people through protocols, and continue to follow Simeons’ method. However, I use only modern science to explain how it works.

 I’ve met with doctor after doctor, but so far all of them have been unaware of the new science, and most haven’t a clue as to the function of leptin. The protocol “experts” on TV, or who’ve written books on “new and improved” protocols, have yet to even mention new science, and continue to reference Dr. Simeons’ outdated and insufficient theories. It’s not surprising, considering the amount of time, effort, and extensive research it took for me to educate myself to formulate an answer.

Each person I met with to discuss the protocol, continued to reference what he found on the Internet, which is based on misinformation that inaccurately explains the protocol.

But, with the lack of relevant scientific explanation, and the majority of hCG sold on the Internet by people who aren’t necessarily educated in weight loss or human physiology, it makes sense to repeat the theories found in Simeons’ manuscript. No other explanation is out there. Unfortunately, there are many people attempting the protocol don’t follow it the way Dr. Simeons intended.

Most participants are completely unaware that eating and hCG directly influence the hormonal response from all of the organs in the body, and without strict compliance to the protocol, there could be harmful consequences. It’s approached like a diet, and businesses have started to manipulate and change the protocol to increase their profits and to make it more appealing to the masses. It’s unfortunate, considering the decades of observation and work it took Dr. Simeons to deduce the specificity of protocol.   But Dr. Simeons didn’t really know how the protocol worked either, and even he admitted laboratory explanation and proof was needed.

 If he had known what was going to happen with our culture, as it concerns over-eating and obesity, and the lack of integrity in the hCG diet industry, he would have written and presented the protocol differently Dr. Simeons didn’t foresee his protocol would be used, prostituted, and misdirected as a short-term fix by the consumer. He had no idea we were going to have a massive, cultural, emotional eating disorder, and that we’d continue to blame the consequences of fat gain on everything but ourselves. Just because you have minimal hunger, doesn’t mean you won’t eat. Just because you have significant fat loss, doesn’t mean you will be motivated to change the way you eat forever.

My goal in writing this book is to start a new conversation about Dr. Simeons’ protocol that has relevance, not only as a hormonal therapy, but as a means to end our national eating disorder. Instead of continuing to apply the protocol as a short-term diet, I’d rather it be discussed as a real solution, a tool to end irrational eating for emotional fulfillment. We are dealing with a crisis that is an addiction to emotional eating, and the obvious result is the overwhelming increase in obesity.

Think about the number of people in our culture who eat without hunger. How many people eat to gratify emotions? How many eat because they’re bored? When you observe our nation’s behavior with food, it’s very clear that fat isn’t what we should be obsessed about, and weight shouldn’t be the target of the problem. We need a genuine desire to eat less, one that isn’t dependent on weight loss as a reward. This requires each of us to be accountable for our own emotions, and find happiness in life not centrally stimulated by food. 

·         Can you find a different hobby when you’re bored, instead of eating?

·         Can you deal with stress without using food as a pacifier or distraction?

·         Can you create happiness without having to eat?

If you can, then eating less would not be such a big deal, and you wouldn’t have to pay for a diet to help.  For most people, eating is almost entirely an emotional decision and behavior. If we forced the majority of our society to eat functionally, it would be torture for them, especially if you didn’t allow them to monitor their weight.

Even if someone has little hunger, and no symptoms of starvation, his or her emotional distress is far worse than the physical when it comes to eating less on the protocol.

We’ve created a society that is so emotionally connected to eating that any form of restriction feels like punishment. Shouldn’t there be some personal accountability?  Look at the overall implications that emotional eating has on medical costs, health care, and the occurrence of disease directly linked to obesity. However, the decision to find emotional strength without eating must come from an individual’s internal desire. It can’t be forced; otherwise we’ll end up with even more psychological problems.

As more and more people choose to free themselves from emotional eating, we would see a social movement with a new cultural distaste for excessive eating. Eating minimally would be sanctioned and encouraged by peer pressure, and emotional accountability and strength would be the next “big” thing.

I believe the protocol provides the ideal atmosphere for participants to rethink the role that eating and food plays in their lives, and to develop emotional strength without needing a crutch. By letting go of food, and eating a minimum amount during the protocol, your emotional strength can be tested, and you can experience a life of eating less. However, for there to be a drastic impact on a participant’s overall relationship with food, he or she has to approach the protocol with that as the ultimate goal, eliminating the need to monitor weight for motivation.

Many people falsely assume that when they lose the weight, they’ll change their relationship with food.

This makes absolutely no sense, considering the role food plays has very little to do with body fat, and everything to do with their lack of emotional security. How many people have lost a substantial amount of fat, just to gain all of the weight back when they return to their “normal” relationship with food? Most.

It’s time to set a new standard for ourselves, fulfilling ourselves emotionally without needing to eat for emotional support. We have to want to limit ourselves, eating less even though we don’t have to.  Then losing weight wouldn’t matter because you’d want to continue to eat less even without a weight problem. This would require a new approach to reducing our food consumption, an intrinsic desire that no diet could enforce or create. Eating less must be a personal decision— a life-lasting change.

One of my favorite quotes is by Albert Einstein.

“No problem can be solved from the same consciousness that created it.”

In the case of our culture, solving the cause of obesity would require us to allow ourselves to feel vulnerable when emotionally tested; the ultimate goal being an awakening to our own emotional strength without needing to eat. This confidence would remove the need to eat as a pacifier, and eventually the physical result would be fat loss or prevented fat gain.

The protocol provides the perfect environment to rehabilitate our emotional strength.   If the hCG protocol provides a hormonal environment that indeed prevents starvation while drastically reducing the need for food, then each participant has the opportunity to re-establish his or her emotional well-being independent of food.

With the right frame of mind, participants can observe their desires to eat often have nothing to do with hunger. They can redevelop a sense of true physical hunger that would help them control their functional need for food.

The hCG protocol would revolutionize our culture. Not only because of the mass reduction in obesity, but because when people are able to develop emotional strength and well-being without needing to eat, society would be healthier, happier and more productive.

Eating less—not because we have to, but because we want to.