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Winning the teacher of the year award at Northview High School in Johns Creek, Georgia, should have been a happy day for Jordan Kohanim, but instead she felt profoundly sad after seeing a picture of her with the award. She couldn't believe how overweight she was.

I was mortified about how unhealthy I looked. It was time that I admitted that what I was doing was not working, Kohanim, 38, told TODAY via email.

While Kohanim struggled with her weight most of her life, she did occasionally work out and follow crash diets to try to be healthier. But most often, she went home and crashed on the couch.

My diet consisted of yo-yo and guilt, said the language arts and debate teacher from Atlanta. I was overweight because I believed the narrative that society taught me: I was big because I wasn't worthwhile enough not to be.

After struggling with her weight all of her life, Jordan Kohanim started tracking what she ate and exercising, starting with 15 minutes at a time. In two years, she lost 70 pounds.

These bad habits led the 5-foot-tall woman to gain weight until she reached 190 pounds. After seeing her unflattering picture, which the school shared on its social media accounts, Kohanim realized she needed to change. She asked her father, Brian Aiken, for advice and he shared the 15-minute rule.

"Go to the gym and work out for 15 minutes. If you still feel like not working out, go home. If you go home after 15 minutes, you are not allowed to beat yourself up about it. You tried. You weren't feeling it. Try again tomorrow," he told her.

Kohanim often used crash diets and sporadic exercise to try to get healthier. It wasn't until she changed how she thought of food that she was really able to lose weight.

So, she attempted the 15-minute rule. For a few weeks, she worked out 15 minutes a day, twice a week. Then, she started going to the gym three, then four, then five days a week. She discovered she enjoyed it and before she realized it, she was exercising for 60 minutes.

I vowed to do my at-least-15-minutes workout five days a week. Once the habit was made, I was able to stick to it, Kohanim said. I work out in the morning before I am exhausted from teaching and tutoring.

While exercise helped her transform her body, making better choices when it comes to food made the biggest difference. When she first started, she simply tracked her calories. Now, Kohanim follows a macros diet, where she counts macronutrients, which include carbs, protein and fat, to make healthy meals. Its a different way of tracking what you eat.

People don't realize just how much of weight loss is what you eat. The truisms are truisms because they are surprise, surprise true, she said.

When Kohanim hit plateaus during her weight-loss journey, she'd try different types of exercise.

She faced challenges when shedding pounds and transforming her life. But when she felt frustrated or hit plateaus, she asked for help.

I felt discouraged all the time, but that's when you reach out to your network. You seek out motivation, she said. People admire perseverance, and they will root for you when you feel discouraged.

In two years, Kohanim lost 70 pounds and now weighs 120 pounds, a weight she has maintained for over a year. While shes happy with her body, she is also pleased by her emotional changes.

Before this journey, I felt like my weight was all a product of my own laziness. I worked out to punish myself for that laziness. It wasn't until I started viewing my weight as a health issue, that real transformation took place, she said.

Kohanim provided tips for others hoping to shed weight and become healthier:

While Kohanim works out by doing HIIT training, cardio and weight lifting, her weight loss started simply by tracking what she ate.

It really is 80 percent kitchen, 20 percent gym, she said.

Start by realizing that you are worthwhile that any time you take for yourself: working out, food-prepping, hiking in the woods is not being selfish. It is how you ensure that you are here for a long enough time to take care of those people you constantly sacrifice yourself for, she said.

Kohanim has maintained her 70-pound weight loss.

By including more healthy foods to your diet, people are less likely to turn to junk food.

Consciously eat five cups of veggies a day add them to your diet. Then you will have less room for the other stuff, she said.

It feels frustrating when the number on the scale goes up instead of down. Or you havent lost any weight in weeks. But asking for support can help.

Don't be afraid to tell people that you are struggling. That's okay. They aren't going to condemn you for it, she said. You'll be amazed at how many people will reach out to encourage you.

After the body becomes familiar with certain activities, it slows the metabolism, Kohanim said. So, when long distance running didnt seem to have the same impact on her body, she tried different workouts.

I had to change it up. I had to cut my cardio back and scale up my weight training, she said.

For more inspirational stories, check out our My Weight-Loss Journey page.

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5 steps that helped a teacher shed 70 pounds, transform her life in 2 years - Today.com

Theres a stunning dieting statistic that has been tossed around since 1959, when the clinical study revealing this fact was conducted and its still shocking: 95% of all dieters will regain the weight they lose within one year. While we would like to believe things have changed since 1959, in this case, its only gotten worse. Currently, we have even more dieters, (approximately 45 million people dieting on any given day, in the US) and because of that, an ever growing diet industry. And thats just the people we can keep track of!

One thing we know for certain, however, is that most of these diets are not concerned with long-term weight loss because if they were we wouldnt have a 33 billion dollar diet industry. They would do their job and we would move on.

So the question we need to answer is, with so many different diets, and so many differing approaches, and so many experts and books why are we not losing weight? It turns out that the very premise of dieting works directly against our biology, psychology and our inborn need for pleasure. And its these three dimensions that can help us understand the 3 key reasons why diets dont work.

It does seem counterintuitive that when working our hardest to shed pounds, our body is working against us, but its true. This is because our body experiences dieting as a stressor. When were stressed, we produce high-levels of cortisol and adrenaline (stress hormones). These hormones cause our body to slow down the rate at which we burn calories. Our body is intentionally slowing down our weight loss efforts, because it perceives our reduced calorie intake as a threat to survival. And all our body is trying to do is keep us alive and as healthy as it can, every day, all day long.

When we cut caloric intake too much, as far as our body is concerned, we might as well be on a desert island with limited food and fuel, and so we have thousands of years of evolutionary conditioning informing our biology that its in our best interest to conserve fat, just in case were going to be in low-calorie survival-mode for a long time. The bodys job is to keep you alive.

Most of us can change our eating habits for a week or two, or sometimes even a month or two, but most often dietary induced changes are external changes eat this, and dont eat that. Of course what we eat is important, but changing the type of food we ingest alone does not necessarily create long lasting change, because it doesnt touch on theedeep rooted beliefs, patterns, and behaviors that inform our food choices and eating habits in the first place.

If a diet only focuses on food choices and doesnt touch upon why, we keep reaching for foods that diminish our energy and health, then we are likely stuck working only on the surface level. In order to make sustainable changes in our eating habits, we need to explore why we eat, how we eat and who we are as an eater.

Long-lasting change comes from making shifts on both the external level of food choices and eating behavior, as well as on the inside, which we know as the psychology of eating. The mindset that we bring to the table, consciously or unconsciously is the key to our relationship with our food and body.

All diets have an element of deprivation, and theres often a no-no list of foods that we must avoid if we want to be successful. Restrictive diets require us to have willpower and an ability to stick to the rules. But the problem with this constraining, tough-it-out attitude, is that its no fun! Theres no pleasure, and theres no joy involved in becoming healthier! Theres no ease in our eating when we are being tight-lipped and controlling around our food.

And, whenever we are in this state of tension around our food, we create an environment of stress within our body. As mentioned above, stress causes a rise in cortisol and adrenalin, which diminishes our calorie burning potential. So were creating the exact conditions that makes losing weight difficult.

If youre not willing to enjoy what you eat and how you eat, then weight loss will be like the battle so many believe it to be. Diets dont work, but stepping into pleasure and exploring the deeper psychology of eating can

By creating a positive relationship with food and body we will actually support our biology and psychology in generating the ideals conditions for reaching our natural weight. Dieting is concerned with the exterior, but eating psychology deeply addresses who we are as eaters.

Warm Regards,

The Institute for the Psychology of Eating Institute For The Psychology of Eating, All Rights Reserved, 2014

The Slow Down Diet: Eating for Pleasure, Energy, and Weight Loss

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P.S. If you havent had a chance to check out our FREE information-packed video series, The Dynamic Eating Psychology Breakthrough, you can sign up for it HERE. Its a great way to get a better sense of the work we do here at the Institute for the Psychology of Eating. If youre inspired by this work and want to learn about how you can become certified as an Eating Psychology Coach, please go HERE to learn more. And if youre interested in working on your own personal relationship with food, check out our breakthrough 8-week program designed for the public, Transform Your Relationship with Food, HERE.

About The Author

Emily Rosen

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Emily Rosen is the Director of the Institute for the Psychology of Eating, where she oversees business development strategies, student affairs, marketing and public relations in addition to her role as Senior Teacher. With an extensive and varied background in nutritional science, counseling, natural foods, the culinary arts, conscious sex education, mind body practices, business management and marketing, Emily brings a unique skill-set to her role at the Institute. She has also been a long-term director and administrator for Weight Loss Camps and Programs serving teens and adults and has held the position of Executive Chef at various retreat centers. Her passion for health and transformation has provided her the opportunity to teach, counsel, manage, and be at the forefront of the new wave of professionals who are changing the way we understand the science and psychology of eating and sexuality. Emily is also co -founder of the Institute for Conscious Sexuality and Relationship.

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3 Reasons Why Diets Dont Work | Psychology of Eating

Britt Marie Hermes is a former naturopathic doctor who now speaks out against the pseudoscientific ideology, and she just published a fascinating article about how she used to sell detox diets and how she now knows theyre a scam.

There is no such thing as a deep detox. The entire concept of detoxification in alternative medicine is bogus. There are absolutely no health benefits to be gained from detoxification diets or therapies. Our organs do not need a break from their physiological activities. Drinking special shakes or taking certain herbal supplements is not going to help any organ work better or more efficiently. Our body does not need to be supported with mega-doses of vitamins and minerals. We dont need enemas or laxatives to clean out our colons. Needless to say, The Right Detox was not based on any kind of credible scientific evidence.

Hermes points out that, consciously or not, this is all about selling products and making money. And when she was promoting the products, she knew just what her customers needed.

We were hoping to increase business by luring customers into becoming long-term patients. It worked. They would come to the practice ready to invest more time, energy, and money into their healthcare regimen. We were ready to sell them false promises and false hope in the form of supplements and naturopathic therapies like intravenous vitamin drips, enemas, and far-infrared saunas. The detox program did not help patients achieve their health goals.

Did any of that cross her mind at the time? Not at all. She believed in the products so much, she used them herself. And if her own natural diet wasnt working, she just added more treatments to her regimen.

That really shows you the problem with these diets. When it doesnt work, the blame falls entirely on the customers. Not the products. And certainly not on the people selling them to you while making unscientific claims about their efficacy. The real question is whether or not they know its all a hoax.

At least we have former detox advocates who can let everyone in on the scam. At the very least, customers should be asking better questions before putting their own health in jeopardy.

(Image via Shutterstock)

Originally posted here:
The False Promises of Detox Diets (Explained By Someone Who Sold the Products) - Patheos (blog)

Scott Kirk, Special to the Reporter-News 11:28 a.m. CT June 19, 2017

.(Photo: a_namenko, Getty Images/iStockphoto)

On a recent Sunday afternoon at the D1 fitness center, Jill Lane revealed the latest, most state-of-the-art fitness equipment to a group of high school athletes and their parents.

On the opening slide of her PowerPoint presentation was a picture of a dinner fork.

Nutrition is the most overlooked part of training, but thats changing, said Lane, a certified nutrition consultant and health fitness specialist in Dallas.

If the role that nutrition plays in athletic performance is trending up, Lane has much to do with that. In the last 10 years, her clients have included such professional luminaries as recently retired football star Demarcus Ware and former Texas Rangersstar Josh Hamilton. If we are what we eat, then Lane believes we should be putting only the best into our bodies.

To me, its the No. 1 training tool, she said. Its the gas, its the oil, its the tires.

Lanes presentation was geared toward athletes, whom she defined as people who work out at least an hour a day three to four times a week and participate in at least one athletic event a week. One of her first points was to dispel the myth that their kids could eat anything and that their metabolism would burn it off. She said the proper diet could not only increase performance, but also help them recover quicker and improve focus for school work.

Among the foods she recommended were walnuts and pumpkin seeds, grass-fed beef, free-range chicken, sweet potatoes, broccoli and Brussels sprouts, berries and coconut oil, and unsweetened coconut milk.

She said to avoid partially hydrogenated and hydrogenated oils, high fructose corn syrup, MSG, artificial sweeteners and artificial food colorings.

When it comes to hydration, she said to start with water and begin drinking the day before an event to maintain focus. Sports drinks have their place, she said, but also contain a lot of sugar.

Lane recommended organic foods, but suggested that people work them into their diets, especially if they are just starting to change the types of foods that they eat.

Another part of the equation is when to eat. For young athletes, she said, thats fairly easy to figure out.

I call that the puppy dog phase, she said. Theyre fueling growth. Start at age 8 and dont stop until theyre 18.

Specifically, she said young athletes should eat breakfast within an hour of waking up, a snack within an hour of practice and eat periodically throughout the day, particularly proteins.

Another important aspect of conditioning is sleep. She said its recommended that young athletes get 10 hours of sleep.

I havent seen anyone who gets 10 hours of sleep, she admitted. But youll see professional athletes like LeBron James get 10 hours of sleep. Professional athletes have a little more control over their time because they dont have to go to class.

Lane said that the young athletes should learn to prepare their breakfasts and snacks, calling it a life lesson that will help them when they leave home and continue to play sports.

Lane, a former college soccer player, has been advising athletes on nutrition for more than a decade and she says she runs across athletes whose diets make her wonder how they can perform.

She recounted the story of how NFL running back Marshawn Lynch would eat Skittles candy at halftime.

I wish he hadnt told that, she said. At some point, your genetics run out.

For a more positive example, Lane pointed to Tom Brady of the New England Patriots.

When someone is 39 and they win the Super Bowl and theyre talking about playing five more years, that should get your attention, she said.

However, the most powerful influences on a childs nutrition dont come from professional athletes, but from parents.

Modeling is a big thing, said Lane. Our kids have to see us doing healthy things.

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Good nutrition key for athletes - ReporterNews.com

Hometown Keto is transforming many Santa Clarita residents with an entirely new strategy toward staying healthy

I am one of the most skeptical residents in Santa Clarita. So, when my wife enrolled me to shift my eating habits by eliminating carbs and going heavy on the high fats, my skeptical alarm flew off the charts.

Just try it for 30-days, she asked.

I can try anything for 30-days and besides, my wife can be very persuasive.

My first stop was Google. I found a compelling article in Mens Health Magazine. I learned the Navy Seals had switched to a high fat diet. As did NASA as they plan for their first Mission to Mars. LeBron James upped his endurance by making the switch. Legendary Golfer Gary Player can still out putt me at the age of 81 and the list goes on and on as more and more people are discovering what Dr. Atkins revealed in 1958, with his low carbohydrate diet.

That Atkins diet was a fad that ran its course, but since then, research has discovered a different combination of ingredients with a better balance of fats, proteins and carbs is very effective. Eliminate the strict requirements of Atkins, add in a supplement such as Keto and the results are phenomenal.

One of the most famous alternative medicine proponents, Dr. Joseph Mercola is a firm believer of a high fat diet. His recent bestselling book, Fat For Fuel goes into depth on why our foods are causing our metabolism to go haywire and why a high fat diet is critical for fighting diseases, such as cancer and is the path toward good health.

I am one of those wonders who can eat as much as I want and not gain weight. Weight loss was not part of my new regimen, but I immediately noticed dramatic changes in my health. Within a week, inches dropped off my gut. I was burning up the little fat I possessed and burning it up in the places that needed burning. My other aha shift was my energy level. I was a heavy coffee drinker and I would pile up the carbs at lunch, causing many spikes in my energy throughout the day and fizzling out in the early evening. No more.

Just days into my healthy switch, my energy level also shifted as did my focus. The daily roller-coaster I had travelled on the first 64-years of my life, did a complete U-Turn. My energy now stays consistent throughout the day. No more spikes, no more fatigue, no need for coffee. That happened in the first few days of my switch. Now my memory and focus are also on high alert. Im sleeping better and need less of it. I no longer crash.

As I enrolled more friends to make the shift, many who needed to lose weight, the results were the same. Weight loss, more energy and better focus.

There are three types of fuels that run your body; carbs, proteins and fats. Each is important and each work differently in assisting your body. We all love our carbs, pizza, pasta, bread. We consume them and they give us an instant burst of energy, but that energy fizzles quickly. Proteins are critical for building strong muscles, but they also are the barrier to losing fat. Contrary to many opinions, the most effective fuel is fat. Fats produce the longest and best source of energy.

For most people, it is almost impossible to get to a state where they are burning fat. That state is called Ketosis. Why is it so hard?

Most of our habits have us eating a lot of carbs. We consume them, burn them up quickly causing a drop of energy, so we grab more. It never gives us the long-term form of energy we need. This dietary rollercoaster was my main fix for 64 years. Adding proteins will help, but it usually isnt enough to drive your body to burn fats.

Why is important to burn fat? First, burning fat eliminates fat. For me, I was not overweight, but over the years fat collected in my gut. As soon as I dropped the carbs and shifted to a high fat diet, inches dropped. In less than a week, my belt needed to tighten to two more notches.

My energy level also dramatically shifted. My daily rollercoaster disappeared. When burning pure fat, it puts your body into a state called ketosis, causing your body to release large quantities of ketones which triggers energy, focus and makes you feel incredible. And yes, it also makes the fat melt off your body because it actually burns the fat which is no longer being guarded by carbs and proteins.

So why arent we all doing it? Because its challenging which is one of the reasons the Atkins Diet and similar other high fat diets have failed. To stay in a state of constant ketosis the average person would need to work out multiple times harder to burn off the carbs and proteins before the burning of fat kicks in. This can take many weeks or months, but once achieved youre golden, perfect energy, perfect focus and perfect burning of fat.

Recently scientists discovered the perfect formula for assisting your body into a state of ketosis very quickly. Its called the Ketone Operating System, or Keto-OS for short. Within sixty minutes of taking it, your body jumps right into ketosis. The rest is a simple shift in your diet. Eliminate the breads, pasta, rice, chips and grains. Go low on the carbs. Add in the right proteins such as wild fish, organic free-range chicken and grass-fed meats. Then focus on the fats, cheeses, nuts, yogurt, cream, organic cage-free eggs, grass fed butter, so many of the items we were told not to consume. Click here for a complete list of the foods you should eat and the ones you shouldnt.

Over the next few weeks, well share many recipes and tips to assist you in making the dietary shift. The proof can only happen with a 5-day trial. Its a startling transformation. We invite you to try it. Click here and give us your contact information and a Keto consultant will answer all your questions.

Hometown Keto is a sustainable and dramatic approach to the popular, scientifically supported high fat low carb diet plan. With the addition of a Keto-Os supplement,hi fat foods are consumed by your body in nutritional ketosis, the bodys natural fat-burning state. When maintained even for a few days a hi fat low carb diet supported by Santa Clarita keto supplements produces incredible effects: rapid fat loss, sustained energy levels and increased focus. By switching to high fat low carb foods, and adding a keto supplement, your body uses fat as fuel, rather than protein or carbs. Ultimately, this scientific advancement has revolutionized the hi fat diet, making hi fat low carb foods an easy and sustainable way to reach maximum health and stay there.

Related Video: High Fat Foods Are Good For You

Websites:hometown.shopketo.com, hometown.experienceketo.com, hometown.drinkyoursample.com, http://www.hometownketo.com; http://www.loseaton.com, http://www.scvhomeshow.com

Visit our booth at the annual KHTS Home & Garden show, the last weekend in April.

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Hometown Keto High Fat, Low Carb Diet Creates Life Changing Transformation - KHTS Radio

We've all heard the promises: 10 or more pounds of weight loss in just a week or two, simply by going on the latest and greatest diet.

But healthy weight loss doesn't come via a miracle diet it comes with healthy eating, regular exercise and making small lifestyle changes that can be adopted for the long term, health experts said.

Here are four diets that may seem to work, but don't hold their heft for lasting weight loss :

1. The Dukan Diet

"The Dukan Diet" book was released today (April 19) in the United States, and is already a fad-diet phenomenon in France. The diet was devised by French doctor and nutritionist Pierre Dukan and includes four phases.

The first phase allows dieters to eat unlimited protein, the second phase allows dieters to eat protein and vegetables, the third phase lets dieters add starches, fruit, cheese and bread, and the fourth phase allows dieters anything they want, so long as they take the stairs whenever possible, set aside one day of the week as a protein-only day and eat three teaspoons of oat bran a day. Dieters are encouraged to limit intake of carbohydrates throughout the diet.

The bulk of the American diet is carbohydrates, said David Levitsky, professor of psychology and nutritional sciences at Cornell University in New York. Because they make up so much of the typical meal, it's easy to cut out carbs and reduce calorie intake.

Why the effects won't last: By cutting out carbs, a person is really losing water weight, not fat, Levitsky said. Reducing carbohydrates decreases sodium, which leads to an increase in water loss. Water loss is most evident in the face, which can make weight loss appear greater than it actually is, he said.

2. The 17 Day Diet

"The 17 Day Diet " book (Free Press, 2011) was written by California family practice physician Dr. Michael Moreno, and touts a four-stage weight loss plan that involves low carbohydrate intake.

With each 17-day stage, dieters must vary their intake of carbohydrates, fruits, vegetables and protein. Dieters are also encouraged to substitute healthy ingredients for unhealthy ones, such as mustard for mayonnaise, and can't eat certain fruits and carbohydrates after 2 p.m. Dieters must also walk for 17 minutes a day.

Like the Dukan Diet, this diet involves cutting back on carbohydrates, thereby reducing the amount a person eats in a typical meal.

Why the effects won't last: Nutrition experts say the healthy ingredient swaps are examples of small diet changes that can pay off for long-term weight loss. But other aspects such as the 17-day cycles and the rule about no fruit or carbohydrates after 2 p.m. serve no purpose for weight loss and are just "gimmicks," Levitsky said.

3. The Atkins Diet

The Atkins Diet, devised by Dr. Robert Atkins in the 1970s, is one of the most popular low-carb, high-protein fad diets on the market, and claims to help people lose up to 15 pounds in the first two weeks of the diet.

Atkins works by limiting dieters' carbohydrate intake and upping fiber intake, so that the body burns fat instead of carbohydrates. It includes four phases; the first phase has dieters limit carbohydrate intake but encourages liberal consumption of protein-rich meat and fish, eggs, cheese, salad vegetables, butter and oil. With each phase, dieters add in more carbohydrates until they find the balance where they are no longer gaining weight from their diet.

Why the effects won't last: Like other low-carb diets, water loss accounts for much of the weight loss at the beginning of the diet.

Healthy weight loss takes time and should not be drastic, said Stella Volpe, a registered dietitian and professor and chairwoman of the Department of Nutrition Sciences at Drexel University in Philadelphia.

"People need to come to terms with that if they're going to do it right, it will take time," Volpe told MyHealthNewsDaily. "So they might be frustrated, but really one to two pounds a week will mean that they're losing more fat, less muscle and less water."

4. The HCG Diet

The HCG diet involves a combination of calorie restriction consuming anywhere from 500 to 800 calories a day, which is about a quarter to a half of the recommended daily calorie intake and supplementation with human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG), a hormone that is produced during pregnancy. HCG can be injected into the body or taken via a pill supplement.

HCG is not approved by the Food and Drug Administration for weight loss purposes, but is approved to treat fertility problems, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Why the effects won't last: Weight loss comes when a person minimizes the amount of calories he or she eats and that's likely why people lose weight on this diet, the Mayo Clinic said. However, it's hard to maintain that low of a calorie intake over the long term, not to mention it's hard to get the necessary nutrition from that small amount of food to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

The HCG hormone itself isn't likely to have any effect on weight loss, research shows. Authors of a 1995 study, published in the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, reviewed the results of 24 studies on HCG and weight loss and found that HCG did not help to combat obesity, did not curb appetite or promote feelings of well-being and did not spur weight loss or fat distribution.

Pass it on: For lasting weight loss, nix the Dukan Diet, Atkins Diet, 17 Day Diet and HCG diet. Instead, opt for healthy eating, small changes and exercise, experts say.

Follow MyHealthNewsDaily staff writer Amanda Chan on Twitter @AmandaLChan.

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4 Fad Diets That Don't Really Work - livescience.com

Enlarge / Royal graves at the site of Yinxu.

beibaoke/Shutterstock

During the final two centuries of the Shang Dynasty (1600-1046 BCE) in China, thousands of people were sacrificed at the state capital Yinxu. Some were dispatched with great fanfare, buried with rich grave goods, while others appearto have been sacrificed with extreme prejudice and mutilated after death. Now, a new study sheds some light on these victims. Simon Frasier University bioarchaeologist Christina Cheung and her colleagues reconstructed these ancient peoples' lives by discovering what they ate and when, based on chemical signatures left in their bones.

Human sacrifice was a common ritual among the peoples of almost every ancient civilization, from China and Europe, to Mesopotamia and the Americas. Though archaeologists have analyzed the graves of these sacrifices, they have many questions about the victims' lives. Were they revered and celebrated before death, or outcasts? Were they prisoners from far away, or were they the sons and daughters of their executioners?

Cheung and her team answered a number of these questions with a chemical analysis of the bones of 68 sacrificial victims at Yinxu, which werecomparedwith the bones of 39 locals. All of the victims were male, and most were young.

Sacrifices were buried in the royal cemetery across the Huan River from the palace. Archaeologists have been excavating at this site for almost a century, uncovering over 3,000 sacrificial victims who appear to have been dispatched in groups of 50 to 350 at a time. In a recent paper for Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, Cheung and colleagues describe two distinct types of sacrificial victim.

In Shang, China, there were two main types of human sacrifice: rensheng () and renxun (). Rensheng literally means "human offerings," and these victims were often buried in large groups, mutilated, and with little to no grave goods. Renxun can be loosely translated as "human companions." They were often buried with elaborate grave goods, individual coffins, and even their own rensheng.

Archaeologists typically find rensheng in mass graves that they divide into "skull pits," "headless pits," and "mutilated pits." As you might guess, these are pits full of skulls, decapitated bodies, and partial bodies, respectively. Unfortunately it's often hard to tell the difference between rensheng and renxun because there's been so much looting and excavation at Yinxu. The practice of mutilating the bodies also makes it difficult for scientists to match skulls with bodies, so they relied entirely on skeletons (headless or otherwise) to identify individuals.

Map of the royal cemetery showing locations of royal tombs and sacrificial ground. Solid black enclosures are royal tombs and open rectangles are sacrificial pits. Red markers show locations of three sets of samples analyzed in this study.

Journal of Anthropological Archaeology

Knowing what people ate reveals a lot about who they were and where they lived. Cheung and her colleagues analyzed carbon, nitrogen, and sulfur isotopes in the bone collagen from each person. These isotopes give hints about the kinds of vegetables and proteins they ate, as well as where they drank water. By combining all three readings, scientists can get a unique signature that tells them where and what a person ate over an extended period of time.

The most interesting part is that different bones reveal diet and location for varied periods of time. The researchers explain:

As bone collagen turns over slowly, the carbon and nitrogen isotope values measured in bone collagen reflect the long-term averages of diet over an individuals lifetime. Small bones or those consisting mostly of trabecular bone, such as ribs, turn over faster than larger, denser bones such as femora. The general consensus is that rib turnover occurs at approximately 35year intervals, while adult femoral collagen almost never turn over completely... The differing turnover rates in different skeletal elements have enabled archaeologists to look for evidence of migration in the form of drastically changing diets over an individuals lifetime.

Cheung and colleagues analyzed two bones from each individual, looking for these longer-term signatures and shorter-term ones. What they found was that the human sacrifices were clearly not locals. Isotopic signatures in their larger bones were dramatically different from those of local people, so they had grown up in another region, eating different foods. At the same time, many of the sacrifices had similar sulfur readings, indicating that they may have come from the same region, perhaps from the same state or nation.

Smaller bones from the sacrifices show that their diets changed quite a bit in the last few years of their life, coming to resemble the diets of locals. That said, they were not eating as well as their neighbors. Their meals contained lot of millet and very little animal protein. Indeed, nitrogen isotope readings show their diets contained less meat protein than even the poorest local people. That suggests they were treated as the lowest members of the community.

Anthropologists have a long-running debate about whether these people were prisoners or actually worked as slaves in the city that surrounded the palace. Obviously we can't know this based on their diets, but it does seem unlikely that the people of Yinxu would have kept these prisoners around for years without making them work. So they probably did some labor, nourished on a diet of gruel and a few bites of deer meat.

These findings fit what we know from written records from Shang Dynasty, which suggest that human sacrifices weren't made simply wheneverprisoners were captured. Instead, there seems to have been a pool of potential sacrifices that nobles could draw upon on request. Cheung and her colleagues explain:

The early Shang scholar Yang reported that on more than one occasion, Shang nobles and vassals had to ask for the kings permission to offer captives to the king for sacrifice, and only after consulting an oracle would the king demand a specific date for the delivery of such captives. Yang thus argued that war captives were offered for sacrifice upon request, not upon availability.

Shang Dynasty writings also say that human sacrifices were prisoners of war. Many records mention sacrificing people from a group called Qiang, though researchers are uncertain whether this was a specific group or just referred to all enemies west of Yinxu. Regardless of who the Qiang were, there is a remarkable homogeneity to the chemical signatures in the bones of Yinxu sacrifices the researchers examined. They were clearly from the same general region.

We can't say for sure what was happening in Yinxu that made human sacrifice seem appealing. Were these early leaders of China trying to build a new state, based on their ruthless strength? Or were they worried that their control was slipping, and offering sacrifices to regain an earlier greatness?

All we know is that the Shang Dynasty kept a prison full of outcasts readily available, so that at any time the public could be witness to the public sacrifices of people their leaders called foes.

Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, 2017. DOI: 10.1016/j.jaa.2017.05.006

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The human sacrifice diet - Ars Technica

WESTFORD -- Allen Campbell looked out over the sea of smiling students at Nashoba Valley Technical High School's graduation, certain there was at least one among them feeling the way he did when he was that age: alone, hopeless, despairing.

And then he recounted his story: how he went from Nashoba Tech's culinary arts program to college to the restaurant world, how he struggled with depression and addiction, how he got sober and became interested in a sustainable plant-based diet, how his ideas landed him as the personal chef for a certain New England Patriots quarterback.

"I wanted to reach out to that person in the crowd feeling like I was and let them know, 'You have a shot at this,'" Campbell recounted last week. "This school really gave me a foundation to stand on."

Now 36, Campbell has co-authored the "TB12 Nutrition Manual" with Tom Brady, will deliver a TEDx Talk this month and will release another cookbook with Julie Loria, owner of the Miami Marlins, later this year.

And that whole journey, he said, started out in the kitchen at Nashoba Tech.

Born in Somerville, Campbell grew up in Chelmsford and started at Nashoba Tech as a freshman. Steve Whiting, the school's now-retired culinary arts instructor, said Campbell was "a serious kid" at first who began to develop a passion in the kitchen.

"The more he got excited about cooking, the more I got excited about cooking," Whiting said.

Whiting played an important role in the budding student's journey.

"I was so distant," Campbell recalled. "I had a very thick wall around me and I was not letting anybody in. He just saw through it. He was one of those teachers that saw through it. Some people are born to be teachers and born to help kids. I think he was one of them."

After graduating, Campbell went through Newbury College and then began working in Boston. But he was suffering from addiction and depression, and he was experiencing health problems, so he could not hold down a job in a kitchen.

He got sober in rehab, and then moved to Miami where "everything started to transform."

Campbell began exploring side work as a personal chef -- just for a few friends at first -- and became interested in developing a healthier, plant-based diet, focusing on "healing with food." He soon turned down a restaurant job so he could devote himself full-time to fleshing out his new cooking philosophy.

"I could not find a restaurant or hotel in Miami that was cooking the kind of food I wanted to cook," he said.

After spending some time building his reputation, a confluence of events landed Campbell in talks with model Gisele Bundchen, who is Brady's wife, and the quarterback. Because of a shared interest in healthy cooking, Campbell said, "it was love at first sight."

The duo asked Campbell to move back to New England to become their family's personal chef. For two and a half years, he would visit their home a few times a day, prepare meals and offer diet suggestions.

Last year, he helped Brady compile 89 recipes for the cookbook, focusing on seasonal ingredients and emphasizing plants whenever possible.

"It was incredible," Campbell said. "It was all based on this philosophy that I created."

Campbell left his job as Brady and Bundchen's chef in April 2016, looking again to branch out on his own further. He does consulting work about his diet and speaking arrangements about his journey, and he said he will deliver a TEDx talk this summer.

Later this year, Campbell's second cookbook contribution will be released. He said Loria, who owns the Marlins along with her husband Jeffrey, contacted him after reading some of his writing about the diet.

Loria did interviews with 20 Major League Baseball players, asking their favorite meals and how they shape their diets during the season. Based on that information, Campbell came up with 125 recipes ranging from dinners to smoothies.The book does not yet have a name, but Campbell said they signed a deal last week for it to come out later this year.

Despite his journeys around the country and his work with high-profile celebrities, Campbell never forgot his roots at Nashoba Tech. He kept in touch with Whiting, calling him at least once a year to catch up or stopping by the school whenever he was in town.

"I couldn't be more proud of Allen," Whiting said. "The fact that he's kept a relationship with me as far as a friend goes, not just as a mentor, but hearing how he's doing, really warms my heart, to be honest with you."

Campbell used his graduation address on June 3 to praise Whiting, the man who had been an encouraging paternal figure for so long.

"Some people are born to be teachers and born to help kids," Campbell said in an interview. "I think he was one of them."

Follow Chris on Twitter @ChrisLisinski.

Brady's playbook

* 80 percent vegetables and whole grains, and 20 percent fish and lean meats, such as some steak and duck.

* No sugar or white flour.

* No nightshade fruits and vegetables, (tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, potatoes).

* No MSG, iodized salt, coffee, or dairy.

Wife Gisele Bndchen, follows the same diet, though their two children eat a less-restrictive version.

Some nutritionists have questioned whether the diet has real health benefits.

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Chelmsford native helped develop QB's diet plan - Lowell Sun Online - Lowell Sun

Count your steps. Hit the gym. Bike to work. If you've tried to lose weight, you know it's important to get moving. But with all our emphasis on working out to "burn off" what we eat, experts say we've missed the real problem: What we eat.

"There's a persistent myth that you can exercise your calories away," Andy Bellatti , a registered dietitian and the cofounder of Dietitians for Professional Integrity , told Business Insider.

In reality, while getting active is important for your mood and overall wellbeing, it generally does not result in rapid weight loss. On the other hand, successfully changing your diet might.

Dietary changes are especially important at the beginning of any new weight loss plan, Bellatti said, since people who are trying to lose weight by dedicating hours each day to exercise may get discouraged when the pounds don't magically melt off. Instead, it's better to focus on making gradual changes to your diet, such as eating more vegetables and cutting back on refined carbohydrates.

A large recent review of studies involving more than 3,000 obese adults who'd lost weight on a low-calorie diet compared how well they were able to keep it off after they either stuck to a new eating plan or began exercising regularly. While permanently tweaking their diets appeared to help maintain weight loss , "no significant improvements were seen for ... exercise," they wrote.

One reason diet may play such a strong role in weight loss is that exercise burns off far fewer calories than most people think, said Philip Stanforth , a professor of exercise science at the University of Texas and the executive director of the Fitness Institute of Texas. This holds especially true when compared to the high caloric content of many processed and fast foods like burgers, fries, and milkshakes. Many classic fast food meals can add up to thousands of calories , sometimes exceeding the amount most adults need in a day.

"Thinking practically, keep in mind you'd have to walk 35 miles [roughly 2.6 times the length of Manhattan] to burn 3,500 calories," Stanforth said. "That's a lot of walking."

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Another large review of studies that included more than 1,000 adults suggested that in the long-term (a year or more), providing people with a weight loss plan that combines a healthy eating regimen and regular exercise helped people lose more weight than either diet or exercise alone.

A wealth of recent research also suggests that when it comes to the brain, aerobic exercise may be the wonder drug we've long been looking for. Not only have sweaty workouts been linked with boosting your mood; they've also been found to protect against age-related decline and may even improve memory.

"While exercise might not be the key to weight loss, it is important for health overall, especially for mental health," Bellatti said.

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We should never have told people they could 'burn off' calories - Business Insider India

How drastically have new advances in science changed what we know about nutrition? This week, just a little. Were looking at three studies on potatoes, coconut oil, and vegetarian diets.

The headline: Coconut Oil Is as Bad for You as Beef Fat and Butter

The story: Coconut oil is high in saturated fat, just like lard and butter, but it has a better reputation. It just seems healthier, you know? It makes your baked goods fluffy and your hair shiny. It may even have a small fat-burning effect (maybe, I repeat, maybe), but its also a big pile of calories just like any other fat or oil. So if you were thinking of it as a totally free, wholesome health food, you were already a little too optimistic.

Todays news is an advisory from the American Heart Association that says we should quit eating so much saturated fat. That includes coconut oil. But their studies dont specifically link coconut oil with heart disease, except to say that coconut oil raises LDL (bad) cholesterol as much as butter.

Cholesterol levels arent the same as disease risk, and we cant ignore previous studies that say saturated fat may not be so bad for you. Dietary fat is actually a really tricky subject, and we still dont have clear answers on whether butter or coconut oil is harmful. Its fine if you want to back away from the coconut oil. But we dont have the evidence to say if that will make a real difference to your health.

Who doesnt love logging on to the good old net on a Friday morning to the headline Coconut oil

The take-away: Coconut oil is full of calories and saturated fat, so please dont think its totally cool to eat in large quantities. If you use a lot of it in your diet (or butter or lard, for that matter), you might want to err on the side of caution and replace some of that with olive oil.

The headline: Eating French Fries Twice a Week Could Lead to Early Death, Study Says

The story: This actually comes from a study of people at risk of getting arthritis in their knees. To be included, they had to be overweight or have another reason to be especially likely to develop arthritis. When they signed up for the study, they answered a questionnaire about how often they ate different food groups in the past year.

The researchers dont say in their study whether they started off looking for data on the risks of potatoes, or whether they ran the analysis for every food in this study (and maybe other studies too?) and decided to report the one thing that turned up positive. If thats the case, the results become a lot less valid: if you look long enough, youll almost always find something that seems significant. Either way, this study cant say whether eating fries is bad for you; it just says that people who ate a lot of fries had a higher mortality rate than people who didnt. This PopSci article explains the problems in a bit more detail.

There are two really important caveats here. The researchers didnt control for two very important factors: whether people who ate fries happened to have a less healthy diet or lifestyle in total; and whether people who ate fries were lower income, which is definitely associated with worse health. And those are two big, big things to miss.

The take-away: This study does not support the idea that fries are deadly. But if you eat healthy, you probably wont have a ton of fries in your diet anyway.

The headline: Science Finds a Vegetarian Diet Is Twice as Effective in Reducing Body Weight

The story: A vegetarian diet outperformed an omnivorous diet in one recent weight loss study...sort of.

The study involved 74 people who were all overweight and had type 2 diabetes. Half of them ate a diet that was vegan except for a serving of yogurt. The other half got a pretty standard diabetes management diet. The people on the near-vegan diet lost more weight, and were more likely to stick to the diet.

Theres already reason to be skeptical: the study is small, and it was specific enough that if youre not diabetic, or if your idea of a vegetarian diet involves eggs and cheese, these results probably dont apply to you. Heres a more in-depth explanation of the studys limitations.

Another big caveat: the people on the vegetarian diet were also more likely to lose muscle, even though they were exercising.

The take-away: A very specific vegetarian diet worked well for some people, but the study is too small and limited to be generalized to all vegetarian diets for all human beings. There are a lot of different diets that work, but to find the right one for you, youll just have to try and see.

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What to Worry About This Week: Coconut Oil, Fries, and Everything Else You're Eating - Lifehacker

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