Kimkins Controversy - Kimkins Scam

A Very Public Weight Loss Journey

I was checking out YouTube for anything related to Kimkins just now. There wasn’t anything new on that front. I noticed that the surveillance video of Heidi has surpassed 10,000 views without any fanfare.

A few diet vLoggers have started adding kimkins as a keyword to unrelated videos, which is fine. This is how I discovered YvesMetamorphosis. Her weight loss journey is not a remarkable success or failure. She is not selling anything. What makes her channel worth mentioning is just the fact that it is a very public accounting of her 10 week effort. I wish her well.

Reaching Out

Blogs serve various purposes for various people. I became a bit upset when I recently saw a blog that was being used by someone with a serious eating disorder, possibly bulimia. Her profile information sounded positive and hopeful with regard to recovering, but her journal style entries were shocking details of an unhealthy relationship with food. The shield of anonymity prevents me from trying to help this person in any substantial way. If any of my readers think they have enough life experience and empathy to reach out to a binge and purge blogger, go to Egocidal.blogspot.com.

Check out ‘Normal Eating’

I am not promoting the school of thought that is being referred to as Normal Eating. It interests me and I haven’t heard or read anything about it that I found discouraging. The basic idea is that our bodies know how to regulate weight properly and that teaching ourselves to eat based on physiological cues and to ignore emotional and societal cues will result in healthy weight loss. I recommend that you all read up on it. The only criticism that I have is that many people are so entrenched in a culture that overeats that calling this ‘normal eating’ will sound elitist to their family and friends. In a society, normal is what everyone decides to call normal. I could be wrong.

Which Presidential Hopeful is a Weight Loss Success Story?

In my mind, the act of taking control of your personal health and losing 100 pounds seems like a pretty good talking point for a political candidate. I am a bit out of the loop, but I am still surprised that I didn’t see this bit of trivia in the news coverage during all these months of campaigning. I would like all my regular commentators to let me know if they already knew. Also, if you don’t know, take a guess. I’ll give you one hint. It’s not Obama.

The Biggest Losers

These girls from Diet.com were cheering on the losing team. There are some nasty comments on this video, but they are predominantly about football for a change. I tend to jump in and defend YouTube personalities against the horrible personal attacks that they typically endure, and I don’t make an exception for these women, but I do find them kind of annoying. I personally don’t think that creating pale imitations of the high calorie snacks that we should just give up on is a very good WOE either. That’s just my opinion. I an unbiased when it comes to the SuperBowl. I’m am glad that it was exciting in comparison to some past years.

A New Weightloss Device

I tagged this post with the term weight loss surgery, but this device is actually put in place without surgery. It is a very simple idea. The Endobarrier is a liner for the first 24 inches of a patients lower intestine. It is put in place endoscopically and is easily reversible.

Right now, the trial procedures are being done on people who are scheduled for gastric bypass. There is already some data showing that it works. I assume that patients need to supplement some nutrients and vitamins. I had a misconception corrected while fact checking. I had assumed that there was some amount of absorption of simple sugars in the stomach, but most sources say that water and alcohol are the only things that are absorbed in significant amounts by the stomach.

Good News about Weight Loss

There is good news this morning. A medical study has concluded that moderate weight loss in overweight adults improves heart health. It further indicated that the benefit was there whether you chose diet, exercise or a combination. The best part of this is that benefits are immediate and apparent. People who know that they need to lose several pounds do not seem to take late onset diabetes and high blood pressure as a call to action. If you are conclusively told that you will feel younger if you lose weight, is that enough motivation?

The Biggest Winner

Belated congratulations go out to Tracie, the 2007 winner of YouTube’s Weight Loss Challenge.

This year, contestants have a weekly chance at winning a new video camera. The Diet.com Video Weight Loss Challenge starts soon. It’s interesting to see how many success stories happen with a community that is weighted more towards support and inspiration than it is towards focused strategies. It could be that it is just a numbers game.

Anti-Kimkins Blogs of Note: Jimmy

I’m guessing that about 0.2% of the people that end up reading my title will react by thinking to themselves Jimmy who?

Jimmy is a low carb weight loss success story who went on to become a pro blogger and the host of a vibrant free low carb community. He has a lot of personality.

Jimmy spent months as a Kimkins affiliate and drew harsh criticism for a part of that time. His audio interview with Kimmer (who at that time was not admitting to her identity as Heidi Diaz) was a defining moment of this saga. I think you can pinpoint the moment when he stopped giving Kimmer the benefit of the doubt. He asked her if the picture of the woman in the red dress was, in fact, her. She said it was, in a tone of voice very much like the one that Heidi Diaz would later use to say No Comment to Chip Yost. The popularity of the audio interview with Jimmy Moore meant that thousands of people had absolutely no doubt that Heidi Diaz was Kimmer as soon as she spoke on camera. Surprisingly, Kimmer continued to deny being Heidi Diaz for some time after that.

Weightless Workouts

I just finished reading through a post about weightless workouts over at www.weightloss-hq.biz and I was so inspired that I actually tried a few exercises right on the spot. Just to be practical, I used laundry folding as my warmup. The weightless workouts described by Kenny aim to achieve muscle overload rather than muscle exhaustion. If I had exhausted my chest muscles rather than overloading them, I might not be typing this post right now. As it is I am feeling the heat, and I am almost but not quite sore.

Exercise that does not require special equipment or trips to the gym are a great way for dieters to maintain or increase muscle mass.

WeightLoss-HQ.biz has a lot of information about various weight loss strategies and from what I have seen they appear to be well balanced reviews. For example, when there are pharmaceuticals for which weight loss is an off-label use that has not been FDA approved the reviewer was very forthright about it. Personally, I wouldn’t be interested in going that route.