for your
health
sonal issues. It takes a lot of discussion about
lifestyle, eating habits, triggers.”
PHOTODISC
Hyde advises her clients to set small goals.
“Every couple weeks, have a goal. Then celebrate meeting that goal. If you look at the big
picture, it can be really daunting.”
In addition, she says, women need to avoid
doing the same routine over and over. “Not
The feminine only do you get stuck in a rut mentally, but
physically your body begins to adapt to the
workout and the results decline,” she says.
physique Nutritional
The Canadian Foundation for Dietetic
Research reports that 88 percent of all eating
disorders are suffered by women and that
three out of four women have been on a
“diet” in the past year. Hyde says this is especially true of women working out.
Women need their own workouts “Women will focus too much on dieting,”
she says. “They’ll reduce their calories and the
frequency of their meals to the point where
IF MEN AND WOMEN are so different, goals, you should incorporate at least two they’re wreaking havoc on their metabolism.”
why do so many women approach fitness strength-training sessions into your weekly She recommends a nourishing balance of
exactly like men? This is a question posed program,” she continues. “This will help you protein and carbohydrates, and breaking up
by many fitness instructors, who feel that prevent osteoporosis, boost your metabo- meals so that women are eating more, smaller
women need to focus on different areas, lism, increase your endurance and strengthen meals during the day. She notes, “You can
take different approaches—physically and your body.” really keep your metabolism revved up.”
emotionally—and follow alternative rou- Regardless of what you do, experts agree
tines to achieve their ideal. Emotional that any exercise is better than none. According
Hyde, who began her instructing career to a study published in the latest edition of
Physical designing one-on-one sessions for her clients, Science, even a moderate-intensity activity such
“The most obvious difference is the way says the emotional approach to fitness and as walking will increase one’s metabolic rate.
men and women store fat,” says Joni Hyde, working out is different for women as well. “Someone who engages in moderate physical
Costco member and author of Workouts “Women want more than just a class. They activity will be better off than someone who
for Women. “Women have a predisposition want to set personal goals and [they] have per- does nothing,” says Hyde.—T. Foster Jones
to store fat in the lower body.”
“Women know that their trouble area lies
in their waist, hips, thighs and buttocks,”
agrees Sherry Gideons, a personal trainer
and bodybuilder in Southern California.
“Also, because women have less muscle mass,
their resting metabolism tends to be lower.”
The focus for most men, says Hyde, who
also offers online coaching on her Web site
(
www.workoutsforwomen.com), is to work on
their upper body, but a similar focus can create problems for women. “As a woman, you
don’t want to ignore your upper body,” she
explains, “but women need to focus on the
waist down.
regular antidepressant treatment had sig-
Why fish are nificant improvement in symptoms,
including anxiety, sleeping problems,
sadness, decreased sexual desire and sui-
happy cidal tendencies.
Previous studies have suggested that
depressed people have lower-than-nor-mal levels of a fatty
“A circuit-training program that incorporates weight training and aerobics is ideal
for a woman. One of the typical programs
that I would design, to help drop body fat, are
workouts that really fatigue the lower body.
Not so much heavy weight, but integrating a
burst of aerobic activity with squats or lunges,
something that really fatigues the lower body
and gets the heart rate up.”
“Absolutely, positively do some form of
strength training each week,” advises Gideons
(
www.bodybuilding.com). Because women are
more susceptible to osteoporosis, for example, “regardless of your age, background or
AS WE HEAD into acid known as EPA
the dreary winter (eicosapentaenoicacid),
months, which bring which plays an impor-with them the win- tant role in maintaining
ter blahs, it’s good normal brain function,
to look at our allies according to researchers.
in keeping those The new study
blues away. examined the effective-It may sound ness of adding various
fishy, but researchers dosages of an EPA sup-say taking a daily fish- plement to normal drug
oil supplement may therapy in 70 people with
boost the effectiveness persistent depression who
of—or even replace were not responding to
—antidepressants for treating depression in standard antidepressants.
somepeople. Researcher Malcolm Peet of
In a recent study, people who added a Swallownest Court Hospital in Sheffield,
daily dose of omega- 3 fatty acids to their England, and colleagues found that
PHOTODISC
