Self Test Before Weight Loss

"Do You REALLY Need to Lose Fat / Weight?"

Imagine what would happen if you continue to lose fat and weight, even when you've already reached a perfect shape... instead of looking healthy and curvaceous, you might become anorexic and wreak severe damages to your body.

That's what exactly happen to some people who lose grip on their own judgment and get obsessed with losing weight. It's not worth to lose weight at the expense of your health, unless you do really need it.

To make sure you don't end up like them, let's do a quick test here.

Check yourself in front of mirror and see if you look somewhat like the man or woman on the right. If you see yourself bearing roughly the same or even larger size than them, then I strongly urge you to start losing weight now.

Overweight people of this size are particularly prone to Type 2 diabetes, dyslipidemia (excess lipids in blood), hypertension and / or cardiovascular disease. I'm betting that you are probably plagued by any, few, or all of them.

It's not too late to reverse your condition if you take action now.

Don't you want to live healthily and longer so that you can take good care of your beloved kids, spouse, family, spend more wonderful hours with them, and enjoy what you love to do?

If you answer 'yes', then get on this practical, step-by-step information-packed Vegetarian Weight Loss Guide now, and start feeling lighter, getting better shape and improving your health in as little as 7 days!

You Don't Look Much Like the Pictures Above?

Then you probably look something like them (see right). You may appear normal.

But ladies, look at your arms, thighs and hip now. Excess fat "living" in those common areas can multiply and spread all over your body over time, and eventually, poses risk to your health. Worse, damages your pretty, curvy contour.

For guys, you might look okay from the front, but your belly might stick out as if you're 7-month pregnant.

However, at this shape, I wouldn't jump to conclusion that you need to lose fat. Even if you look plumper than the pictures (on the right) or you simply are not sure whether you should lose fat or not.

Getting straight to losing fat without grounds may result in adverse effect if your overall health seems normal. For that reason, don't simply act on what you see or what people say about you. But rather, use our Health Evaluator below to assess your health condition first before you get down to any serious fat loss decision.

How to Use Our Health Evaluator?

— Select your gender and ethnic group as different gender and ethnic group can yield different results.

— Measure your waistline (aka waist girth / circumference), weight and height and key them all into the yellow boxes. Learn how to accurately measure your waistline, weight and height.

— Enter your waist in cm OR inches, weight in kg OR pounds, and height in cm OR feet-inches. Any combination will do.

— Click on the [Check Health] button and it'll generate your BMI, classify you as 'Underweight', 'Normal', 'Overweight' or 'Obese', indicate your health risk, and finally a good piece of advice to show you how to improve your health and shape.

— BMI and Health Risk Chart

— Under Recommended (Ticked) Solutions for You, for example, if you see a tick inside the small box beside the link Vegetarian Weight Loss Guide, then that's the solution I strongly recommend you to go with. If no boxes are ticked, that means I have no specific solutions for you.

Note: Though this Health Evaluator provides pretty good guidelines for the majority body types in general, you might need more specific and personal help on your "special" oversize condition. Feel free to contact me (no third party involved).

How to Accurately Measure Your Waistline, Weight and Height?

To obtain more accurate body measurements, Do NOT measure right after your meal. Best time — morning before your first meal. But if your body tends to retain water in the morning and results in swollen waist and increased weight, wait for the swell to go off to avoid adding the unwanted water mass to your actual weight and extra inches to your waist girth.

For measuring waistline, follow these steps:

1. Remove bulky clothing and loosen your belt.

2. Surround the measuring tape midway between your last rib cage and the top of your hip bone (see right image for position of waist). Make sure the tape fits snugly around your waist and not too tight.

3. Don't hold your breath while measuring. Relax and breathe out.

4. Take down measurement.

Studies have shown that your height might differ from 1 to 2.5 cm in the morning and at night. That's because your spine compresses slightly during the day with the weight pushed down on it when you stay upright and during your night's sleep it extends back again, as lying down takes the weight back off.

As such, you should take your height in the morning since that's your actual height.

Why You Need to Measure Waistline for More Precise Health Assessment?

With your weight and height we can find out your Body Mass Index (BMI).

Scientists designed BMI calculation to help people determine if they carry excess body fat which may in turn raise their health risk for Type 2 diabetes, dyslipidemia (elevation of lipids in the blood), hypertension and cardiovascular disease.

By calculating BMI, you'll know which of these 4 categories you fall into:

• 'Underweight'

• 'Normal'

• 'Overweight'

• 'Obese'

However, BMI may overestimate body fat in people with muscular build (e.g. bodybuilders and athletes) and underestimate body fat in those with less muscle (e.g older people).

For example, Jane and Mary both stand 170 cm (5-foot-7) tall and weigh 170 pounds (77.1 kg). Using BMI calculator, they both score 26.7 kg/m² (overweight!). But Jane looks more muscular with a 6-pack ab whereas Mary got a pair of thunder thighs and huge spare tire around her middle.

That means, Jane is in fact not overweight in fat but instead fit and healthy carrying a low body fat level while Mary really needs to lose her weight and fat due to her high fat composition at her thighs and waist which will bring about high health risk.

Here's another example to illustrate the inaccuracy of BMI alone.

Both 26-year-old Jack and 65-year-old Bruce stand 170 cm (5-foot-7) tall and weigh 140 pounds (63.5 kg) score 22 kg/m² in BMI. They both fall within the normal BMI range. But because Bruce is older, he tends to carry more fat and less muscle mass in his body (as you age, your muscle mass will drop and metabolism slows down which in turn, raises your body fat composition).

Thus, even though BMI shows Bruce as "normal", he needs to either shed some fat off his body or build a bit more muscle to reduce his risk for heart disease and other fat-causing health issues.

Hence, in the case of Jane & Mary / Jack & Bruce, what can you do to arrive at a more accurate diagnosis of who should lose fat to improve their health since BMI doesn't reflect true fat distribution in your abdominal area?

That calls for the inclusion of your waistline in addition to your BMI to give a more accurate picture of your health risk (for Type 2 diabetes, dyslipidemia, hypertension and cardiovascular disease) than just using BMI alone.

Note: As Asian populations generally carry higher proportion of body fat compared to Caucasians of the same age, gender and BMI, plus Asians bear higher risk for cardiovascular disease and diabetes mellitus at relatively low BMI levels, WHO (World Health Organization) has revised and set a lower BMI cut-offs to define health risk for Asians. The same holds true for waist circumference. Asians with relatively smaller waist circumference are more vulnerable to Type 2 diabetes, dyslipidemia, hypertension and cardiovascular disease.