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Is Coconut Water Weight Loss A Reality?
No wonder Tom Hanks looked so slim after being stranded on the island in the movie Cast Away. He was drinking plenty of coconut water! It seems coconut water is something you should seriously consider if you’re trying to reach your ideal weight.
Now, right away you should know that coconut water, in and of itself, is not going to cause you to get thin. There’s really no ONE thing you can add to your diet that’s going to help you magically melt away pounds (if someone tells you otherwise, they’re lying). However, there are many benefits of coconut water. It is an incredibly healthy drink that will, when added to a healthy, balanced diet, help you slim down easier and faster.
What Is Coconut Water?
Coconut water is the liquid that’s extracted from a young, green coconut. It is NOT coconut milk. Coconut milk comes from the processed “meat” of the coconut. Coconut water is a very nutrient dense liquid that provides quite a wide array of healthy benefits such as: vitamins, electrolytes, minerals and macronutrients. Some experts say that coconut water is even better for athletes than sports/energy drinks because of the sodium, healhty sugars, and potassium that it contains.
Coconut liquid hydrates your body which makes it an ideal natural drink to consume after a workout. Because of the level of electrolytes it contains it helps regulate the oxygen and fluid levels in your blood. It’s also very low in calories and fat calories (which is one of the reasons why coconut water weight loss makes sense) and it contains almost no cholesterol.
Nutritional Value Of Coconut Water
Coconut water is LOADED with good stuff for your body.
Vitamins, Minerals And Sugars:
- Vitamin C
- Riboflavin
- Thiamine
- Vitamin B6
- Calcium
- Magnesium
- Potassium
- Sodium
- Fructose/Glucose (these sugars help to refuel your muscles)
A single cup of coconut water contains only 45 calories, 9 grams of carbs and 2 grams of protein. If you’re eating 2000 calories then it translates into 3% of the recommended amount of carbs and protein and 11% of the recommended daily amount of fiber that your body requires daily.
How It Works
Coconut water can help you lose weight if you use it as an addition to a healthy, balanced diet. How? Coconut water helps with hydration and contains fiber, potassium, protein and vitamin C. All essential nutrients for anyone trying to slim down and reach an ideal weight.
Hydration
As I mentioned before, coconut water is full of electrolytes. So much so that it’s similar to your body’s plasma. When your body’s hydrated it keeps you fuller longer so you’re less likely to eat more. Also, the feeling of being dehydrated is often very similar to hunger and so people tend to eat when they really should be drinking water.
Protein
Protein helps with weight loss in several ways. It acts as an appetite suppressant so you consume fewer calories during the day and also helps build muscle–the more muscle you have the more calories you burn.
WebMD says that when you eat protein you release a hormone known as PYY and this hormone reduces hunger. “We’ve now found that increasing the protein content of the diet augments the body’s own PYY, helping to reduce hunger and aid weight loss,” says Rachel L Batterham, MD, of University College in London.
Vitamin C
A recent study at Arizona State University stated that people with too little vitamin C in their blood stream were more likely to be overweight:
Before beginning a strictly controlled, calorie reduced diet, 20 obese men and women were randomized by gender and body weight into either a vitamin C group that took a 500 mg vitamin C capsule daily or a control group that took a placebo. Neither participants nor researchers knew who was receiving which capsule until the study was over.
All participants consumed the same experimental diet that the researchers adjusted individually to promote slow weight loss, about two pounds per week. The low-fat diet contained 67 percent of the USRDA (recommended daily allowance) for vitamin C, about 40 mg daily.
At baseline, participants with the lowest concentrations of vitamin C in their blood had the highest body fat mass and tended not to oxidize fat well, compared to their less obese counterparts.
After four weeks of diet adherence, blood vitamin C concentrations increased 30 percent in those taking vitamins and fell 27 percent in the control group whose only vitamin C intake was the 40 mg contained in the calorie reduced diet.
“We found that as vitamin C blood concentrations fell, so did the participants’ ability to oxidize fat (an 11 percent reduction),” says Johnston.
Also, when you drink coconut water, the vitamin C from it produces a hormone in your body called carnitine. Carnitine’s function is to carry energy to all of the cells in your body. When you don’t have enough Carnitine in your system it causes your body to store the extra fat instead of turning it into energy and this leads to weight gain.
Fiber
A single cup of coconut water contains 3 grams of fiber which is more than any other natural beverage. This is one of the most powerful coconut water weight loss factors. When you consume fiber it slows down the digestion of your food and that means you stay fuller, longer. Also, fiber from coconut water helps eliminate sugar cravings and crashes so that your sugar cravings are much less powerful.
Bottom Line
When it comes to coconut water weight loss, the bottom line is that it can certainly help you slim down. Of course if you want to reach your weight loss goals you’ll need to include it in a healthy, balanced diet with plenty of regular exercise. Make sure you talk to your doctor before you start drinking coconut water to lose weight.
What do you think about coconut water? Are you currently drinking it? Do you plan on drinking it? Add your comments below.
