Excess weight before and during pregnancy can have long-lasting health consequences for the offspring of such mothers later in life, according to a new research.

It has been known for some time that being overweight during pregnancy can lead to overweight children and adolescents.

Now, investigators at the Hebrew University-Hadassah Braun School of Public Health and Community Medicine and the Departments of Medicine and Epidemiology at the University of Washington, Seattle, have found a direct correlation between this maternal overweight and higher tendencies in their adult children towards overweight and other life-risking factors, such as high blood pressure and excess sugar and fat levels in the blood.

The research was based on analysis of clinical information on 1400 people who were born in Jerusalem between the years of 1974-76. The data provided information, among other things on their birth records, including the weights of their mothers before and during pregnancy and the weight of the child at birth.

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How to not lose weight!

If you’ve been adhering to a strict healthy eating and fitness plan for a while but are failing to see the results, it may be time take a look at what is sabotaging your success. From dieting blunders to physical factors, check out the top 10 reasons why you’re not losing weight.

You overcompensate for exercise

Many of us are familiar with the temptation to reward our workouts with an edible treat (well, you’ve just burned off all those calories, right?), however, it may be that by increasing your calorie intake to fuel or reward your sessions you are actually undoing all the hard work of your workout. In fact, as we often overestimate the calories we burn through exercise, you may even be taking in more than you have actually worked off, leading to weight gain rather than loss.

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Don`t allow your children to be glued to TV if you want them to eat healthy. Television viewing time is associated with lower odds of consuming fruit or vegetables daily, says a new study.

Young people ate too little of whole fruit, whole grain, legumes and dark green or orange vegetables, while taking excess of fat, sodium and added sugar that can increase the risk of obesity and chronic disease throughout a lifetime, according to a national survey.

Leah M. Lipsky and Ronald J. Iannotti from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Bethesda, surveyed the link with TV with eating behaviours in US adolescents.
They included a nationally representative group of 12,642 students in the fifth through 10th grades with a mean (average) age of 13.4 years, the journal Archives of Paediatrics & Adolescent Medicine reports.

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In a new study, scientists led by a Indian-origin researcher, have described egg as “nature`s appetite suppressant` due to its ability to make us feel fuller for longer as compared to other foods.

Previous studies have also credited the humble egg with being able to make us feel less hungry at lunchtime.

In the study, 20 healthy people ate a breakfast of two eggs that had been scrambled or a bowl of cereal every day for a week. They then switched to the other option.

Breakfast: Get the weight loss kick-start to the day

The European Congress on Obesity heard that the meals were similar in size and had the same number of calories. They also had the same amount of protein, carbohydrate and fat.

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10 hidden calorie traps that can pile on the pounds

You’ve cut back on chocolate, chucked out the biscuits and raided your nearest health food store, so why aren’t you losing those pounds? Unfortunately, even with the best intentions, you could be sabotaging your weight loss with the wrong foods. They might look and seem healthy, but that’s not always the case. Check out the top 10 diet foods that could pile on the pounds.

Juices and smoothies
When totting up our daily intake of calories, many of us forget to take into account those that come in liquid form. However, the drinks you consume throughout the day can vastly contribute to weight gain. While smoothies and juices count towards your daily intake of fruit (and swapping fry-ups for a morning smoothie would certainly do wonders for your waistline!) supplementing meals with these sugary fruit drinks could add hundreds of extra calories on to your daily intake. Smoothies and juices contain more sugar but less fibre than whole fruit, making fresh fruit a much better snacking option.

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Rice is not a popular item on most dieting charts. Does its contemporary, the roti, score more on the dieting scale? I have heard a lot of people say that they have stopped rice and switched over to eating rotis in an attempt to reduce weight. I have myself suggested stopping eating rice to effect weight loss. Most people doing so claim that they have particularly reduced the tummy with a no rice diet.

For people from South India, not eating rice is a huge sacrifice since rice is their staple. So, let us see how one can eat rice and still lose weight.

The rice vs roti battle
· Rice is eaten not with just one side dish but an entourage of dishes and this is exactly why you can end up overeating. In the south, ghee is added to the first few morsels of rice. The next few mouthfuls need sambar, and rasam and the various poriyals or dry sabjis, and finally curds. Then, again how can one eat without pappad or pickle? Thus, calories add up to make the meal complete. On the contrary rotis can be eaten with one dal and a dry sabji or a dry sabji and raita. Simple but filling.

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How to exercise and eat for your body shape

While we all come in different sizes and every body is unique, experts have identified four basic body shapes that all women fall into. Body shapes are largely determined by bone structure, genetics and age and, while lifestyle factors make a huge difference to the dimensions of your body, it can be difficult to change your basic shape. However, by identifying your body shape, you can work with it to improve your overall health and appearance. Here are the four main female body shapes and what they mean for your health.

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When pleasure motivates eating, rather than hunger, it activates chemical signals which can cause overeating and fuel obesity, says a new study.

`For example, desiring and eating a piece of cake even after a satiating meal is consumption driven by pleasure and not by energy deprivation,` said Monteleone, the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism reported.

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Researchers have offered a long-sought explanation for the beneficial fat-fighting effects of black pepper.

The research pinpoints piperine – the pungent-tasting substance that gives black pepper its characteristic taste, concluding that piperine also can block the formation of new fat cells.

Ayurveda for obesity

Soo-Jong Um, Ji-Cheon Jeong and colleagues describe previous studies indicating that piperine reduces fat levels in the bloodstream and has other beneficial health effects.

Top 10 risk factors of being overweight

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Fat loss exercise tips

If blasting body fat and burning calories is one of your exercise goals, these 10 fat loss exercise tips will ensure you get the most out of every fat burning workout minute.

Be intense with your fat burning exercise

Don’t be fooled by the so-called fat-burning zone. This is the misguided notion that working at a lower intensity is better for fat burning than working at a higher effort level (say, for example, walking instead of running.) The harder you exercise, the more calories you will burn and it is this that really counts when it comes to losing fat.

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