Be Well: Understanding Your Weight Loss Options

<div class="block">Dr. Seun Sowemimo, surgeon and weight loss expert, joined Cheddar News to offer some professional advice on weight loss options and their pros and cons. </div>

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From fat diets to surgery to the new weight loss drugs. There's no shortage of options for people trying to lose weight. But what actually works and what will just make you gain it all back? I sat down with the doctor to find out what the science tells us. Take a look. I'm here with surgeon and obesity expert, Doctor Sean Mimo. Thank you so much for joining us and everything right now is all about weight loss. You know, a lot of people are saying, how do we do it? Weight loss drugs are big news right now, especially things like, and I know there are other ones out there but can you maybe break down some of the downsides of taking a weight loss drug? Well, thanks for having me. Um, a weight loss drug must be seen like a lifestyle change because of the way that it takes its effect. The thing is affecting just one point uh, on things that help you lose weight, also activate some counter regulatory hormones. So if you start at a low dose, it works until the counterregulatory hormones catch up, you go to a higher dose to get some weight loss, the counterregulatory hormones that will cause you to regain that weight also catch up. So when you hit your maintenance dose, the counterregulatory hormones actually catch up. Now, the last thing you wanna do at that point is then withdraw because then the higher level of the counter regulatory hormones are gonna take effect things like cortisol, the growth hormone, they would then come into play in a big way and will cause people to regain the weight. And that was shown in the studies that they did originally to show the benefit of these drugs. So maybe it's good for a short period of time if you're preparing for a wedding or, you know, a photo shoot and then after that go back to a normal weight because it's just come back on you and gain weight, just like extreme diets people are doing and then it comes back on them. Right. Exactly. If you can't maintain what got you to that weight loss, then you know that it's gonna come back, let's talk about intermittent fasting because I, I've done it before and I know that it can work in certain situations. But should everybody be doing that diet? Yes. You know, some of the intermittent fasting or what we term intermittent fasting is only sort of eating in a physiological manner in a manner that sort of chives with your circadian rhythm. You know, eating during the day while your body is metabolically active, you know saying that eight hour window and then not eating anything at night for 16 hours, for 16 hours because you sleep most of us at that time anyway. Yeah, but that's a, a normal physiological thing. You don't wanna be handing your body a plate of food. When metabolically your body is going to sleep, your body is gonna say, hey, I'm gonna put this away, stored away is fat. And then in the morning when it's ready to try and use that, then you're giving it breakfast again. So this is the thing. And so some of the things we're calling like intermittent fasting is really just eating in line with your body's physiology. So you weren't necessarily sold on the weight loss drugs like OIC, but you seem to be a little bit more inclined to do intermittent fasting. Do you recommend that to your clients? Yes, I recommend things that would generally allow you not to try and bend um you know, nature to your will, but things that will allow you to bend your will to nature. So, in this modern society, there's some things that we've kind of strayed away from the natural way, the body functions that we've normalized. But if you go back to the way the body functions, that's sort of the best and most sustainable way uh to achieve weight loss, let's say someone is tired of the way the body functions. They don't wanna bend, they wanna go ahead and break it. They wanna get surgery, talk to us about weight loss surgeries and how does one even qualify for a surgery? Right. So, weight loss surgery, you're right is we're, we're bending nature to our will. So, with the popular form of that, which is the gastric sleeve, the number one, weight loss surgery in the world. Right now, we're actually tricking our body by reducing the size of the stomach to allow us to feel full with a small amount of food. Right? And that works. Your doctor may let you know if you qualify for that or not. And you believe it's a good thing for some patients. Yes, it's a good thing for some patients because not, uh, in those patients, we found that even with the lifestyle changes that would help them to lose weight, only a small percentage of people would actually be able to successfully lose that weight. So then they need a solution, a tool like the weight loss surgery to get a greater percentage of people to be successful. And then you talk about the success and life changes that you need to make. So what are some tips you can give you to starting some type of weight loss program today? What can we do? Yes. So what you want to be doing, as I said, is bending yourself, you know, your will more towards nature. So you wanna eat foods that are whole foods, you know, as nature intended as opposed to process. A lot of people don't know the difference. Yeah. So whole foods are foods that have not been tampered with much in a sort of, uh, industrial way, you know, cooked and processed with chemicals and things, you know, textures, cholera and things like that that you would not normally find in your kitchen. Doctor Sean, he told us how we need to hear. Eat those whole foods are better for you and good for your overall weight loss. All right. Thank you, Doctor Sean. I appreciate your time. There's nothing like fresh fruit for summer, especially if you grow it yourself. That's right. And this week's garden guide, meteorologist and Garden Guru, Alex calm shows us how to grow some beautiful berries. Even if you don't have that much space. I make the most of my small garden by growing lots of different flowers and pretty plants, but nothing is better than growing food in the garden. And I wanted to talk about some plants that you only have to take care of one time. And then mother nature does the rest like blueberries. What's really cool about blueberries is that they're gonna come back year after year. This is a bush you can put in your landscape or you can keep in a pot. It's actually a pretty light pot too. That's because they love acidic soil, really porous soil as well, which means that its airy and light. This is obviously filled with unripe blueberries. Another plant that comes back year after year are strawberries, strawberries are perennials. That means they're going to come back every single year from the roots. I actually prefer to keep these in pots because the berries will rot if they get too much moisture. As far as blooms. Usually they're white. But notice these are red, there's some awesome varieties coming in. Usually these plants only bloom in the spring and that's it. And you get your berries early summer. This one will continue to produce berries for the whole summer time. What a deal. Another plant that I think a lot of us know and some of us probably hate if you're a gardener is mint. That is because mint is an out of control plant. This is what I call an unkillable. You need to make an effort to get rid of this, which isn't always a good thing. So that's why it's in a pot. I am keeping this as far away from my soil as possible. Blackberries are another plant that I have to keep in a pot. I mean, look at this, a plant that's so vigorous that even though it's on my driveway, it is trying to make roots everywhere but those shoots go. This is a plant that will fruit for you in July kind of pretty flowers. Make sure you get a thorn less variety though. Otherwise it'll be a real pain. Literally, I'm meteorologist, Alex Happy gardening. Right. Sounds great. Well, just ahead, if you sit for most of the day, today's fitness in four is just what you need to loosen up. That's right. The stretches for your calves, hamstrings and thighs are up next. This is be well helping you live life better.