There is a connection between cinnamon and weight loss, which is good news for those that love the taste of cinnamon and also have to lose weight. In fact, cinnamon can be used to help you to lose weight in a healthy way that will compromise neither your immune system nor your cardiovascular system.

Cinnamon is known to have positive medicinal properties in that it is believed to help improve your memory and general brain function, and also possesses antibacterial properties. Add to that the fact that it appears to be effective in reducing the LDL (bad) cholesterol levels in your blood, then cinnamon is a very useful spice to use in your cooking. I find apple and cinnamon pie absolutely divine!

However, one proven property of cinnamon is that it reduces the amount of glucose in your blood (i.e. blood sugar) and also increase insulin levels, which is of benefit to diabetics (Refs 1-2 below). Ingestion of just one gram of cinnamon has been found to lower blood sugar in Type 2 diabetics, and also reduce the levels of LDL cholesterol and triglycerides in their blood.

It is this effect that cinnamon has on blood sugar that enables it to help you to reduce weight. The proanthocyanadin contained in cinnamon activates the insulin receptors on your body cells which enables these cells to make use of glucose to generate energy. Thus, your blood sugar (glucose) is used for energy and not to generate fat.

Without these insulin receptors being activated, your cells cannot enable glucose to enter the cellular mitochondria where it is used in the Krebs Cycle to generate ATP energy. The only other option for it is then to be metabolized into fat, used as an emergency energy source that is stored in your fat cells. Hence, you tend to put on weight. The function of insulin is to enable the cells of your body to absorb glucose so that it can used, together with oxygen, in cellular respiration to generate energy.

Cinnamon promotes this, and its use in promoting good health was known by the Romans who would burn the tree bark (which cinnamon is) in their homes because it was believed to clean the air and keep them healthy. The Romans did not know why, but they knew that it did. This is one more example of ancient remedies and usage of herbs and spices for which modern science is able to provide a reason.

Give them credit; these old civilizations sure knew what was good for them – and bad. They were masters of both health-promoting natural substances and poisons which they used a lot. In fact, was it not for their prolific use of poisons the world would likely now be overpopulated!

Cinnamon and weight loss go hand in hand in that cinnamon helps your fat cells to react to insulin levels, and burns fat when needed to generate energy. By enabling your body to metabolize carbohydrates more readily into glucose and then energy, cinnamon and weight loss are very tightly connected in terms of your metabolism.

There is much more to it than just that, but for now it is enough to understand that cinnamon and weight loss both have a connection with the metabolism of carbohydrates to glucose, the glycolysis of glucose to pyruvate and the cellular oxidation of pyruvate to energy. The more efficient that process, the more fat you will burn and convert to energy.

Cinnamon is more than just a flavoring for cookies and apple pie (Mmmm…) – Cinnamon and weight loss are interconnected in a way that you may not fully understand, but that will make you lose weight quicker by reducing the fat stored within your fat cells. So get that apple pie out and send me some!

Note: Check with your physician before taking any supplement that can affect insulin or your cardiovascular system. Cinnamon and fat loss supplements are usually fine, but let your doctor know what you are doing if you are already on medication.

References:

1. Khan A, Safdar M, Ali Khan MM, Khattak KN, Anderson RA (December 2003). “Cinnamon improves glucose and lipids of people with type 2 diabetes”. Diabetes Care 26 (12): 3215-8.

2. Verspohl, Eugen J. et al.; Bauer, K; Neddermann, E (2005). “Antidiabetic effect of Cinnamomum cassia and Cinnamomum zeylanicum In vivo and In vitro”. Phytotherapy Research 19 (3): 203-206.

About the Author

For more details of how fabulous apple pie is connected to cinnamon and weight loss, check out Pete the Apple Pie Lover’s web page Cinnamon and Weight Loss where you will also find out many more Slimming Tips and the science behind them.

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The HCG Diet is next in my weight loss tips articles. I am amazed at how gullible people are and how they will talk about ‘diets’ without really understanding what they are. The Atkins Diet is one: although it works in the short term, if you continue with a high carbohydrate diet over the longer term you will suffer bad breath (halitosis) due to ketosis, constipation due to a lack of fiber and potentially serious damage to your cardiovascular system due to a lack of phytochemicals and antioxidants.

In order to avoid these you must take the supplements recommended by Dr. Atkins: up to 63 of them if my mind is correct, and many that he marketed himself. That kind of throws the ‘impartiality’ aspect of his recommendations out the window.

However, the point I am making is that diets such as Atkins and HCG are rarely properly researched by their adherents before they use them. That would be one of my major weight loss tips: check out the diet before you blindly take it. Take HCG: it isn’t even a diet!!

The HCG Diet: What is it?

The so-called ‘HCG diet’ is a series of injections introduced hypodermically directly into your muscles. HCG is correctly known as Human Chorionic Gonadotropin, a substance produced by the placenta of pregnant women. Its function is to convert fat stored in the mother’s fat cells into energy for the growing fetus.

Fat is a carbohydrate, and can be used by your metabolism to generate energy once the carbohydrate in your diet has been used up. By injecting it directly into your muscle tissue, HCG can break down your fatty tissue into energy. Or so it was believed until recently.

It is now believed that HCG tells your brain that you are full, and need eat no more. In doing that, your metabolism will rapidly use up your carbohydrate stores, and when no more are available because you are not eating as much as normal, your metabolism turns to your fat stores for energy. In other words, the HCG diet is not a diet at all but a series of injections that work as an appetite suppressant.

Now you might think it doesn’t matter how it works so long as you lose weight, and frequently this assertion is correct. In fact, as far as I know there have been no reported side effects of the HCG diet, as we refer to it for the meantime, and so there appear to be no reason why you should not use it. So should I include it among my weight loss tips? If not, what would be the reasons?

One I can think of is that by having your appetite suppressed, you may also be eating too few nutrients, not only reducing your carbohydrate content but you may also suffer problems associated with your cardiovascular system – a common result with poor nutrition and a low antioxidant content in your diet. Nevertheless, nothing appears to have been reported although it is early days yet.

Quite frankly, I would not take these injections myself because using a hypodermic needle to lose weight seems extreme to me. I could not realistically include hypodermic treatment as one of my weight loss tips.

It is said to enable you to lose up to 5 lb a day – this is an unhealthy rate of weight loss, and your weight is one example of fastest isn’t best. 3 -4 pounds a week is OK, or even up to one pound a day, but 5 lb – that is equivalent to 20 sticks of margarine. Is it really healthy to lose that much every day – 140 a week?

Absolutely not, as far as I am concerned. However, while it appears to work it cannot be denied that the HCG diet should possibly be included in my range of slimming tips. It may be, but I do not recommend using HCG injections (or the so-called HCG diet) as a regular weight loss treatment. Decide for yourself.

About the Author

More information on the so-called HCG Diet can be found on Pete’s website Slimming Tips where you will also find his weight loss tips that can help you lose weight quickly and healthily.

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