What is the HCG Diet?
More specifically, what is HCG–also known as Human Chorionic Gonadotropin–anyway?
Where can I buy it?
Is it safe?
Over the next few minutes, we’re going to answer these questions. But before we do that, we want to be very clear about something. At Image Essentials, we believe in the development of healthy habits that include proper nutrition and exercise. Together, those two things make up the foundation for long-term and sustainable weight loss. Establishing this foundation first is an essential step of any reliable weight loss program.
Once the foundation of a healthy diet and exercise is established, we can begin focusing on other areas of weight loss. After we achieve our desired weight loss, it’s essential to maintain it. This is perhaps the most important thing we can do to achieve long-term health and prevent chronic disease. Therefore, our practice primarily focuses on teaching lifestyle and dietary changes essential to maintaining a normal, healthy weight.
However, before one can maintain a normal, healthy weight, one must achieve a normal, healthy weight. For many of us, this means it’s time to put down the glazed Weapons of Ab Destruction, and start making better choices. It’s time to start over and establish good, healthy habits. It’s time to begin losing weight!
Let’s be honest about something. Sometimes, diet and exercise aren’t enough. Tell me if this sounds familiar. You give up the donuts and the sugary drinks. You start drinking more water. Hey—you even start eating your vegetables! You’re working out on a regular basis, and, yet, somehow, it’s not enough. No matter how hard you try and no matter which diet you choose, nothing seems to work. You just can’t seem to reach your normal healthy body weight. You find yourself doing all the right things only to find yourself not losing the weight you desire to lose. Does any of this sound familiar?
We understand this frustration because we’ve all personally been there ourselves. That’s why we now offer a revolutionary diet program known as the HCG Diet. In addition to our standard diet program, the HCG diet is designed for patients who just can’t seem to win.
The HCG diet was actually developed many years ago before gaining popularity in the United States during the 1970s. It was the research of Dr. Albert T.W. Simeons in the 1950s and 60s that inspired this revolutionary weight loss program. You can read more about Dr. Simeons’ work in his short book titled Pounds and Inches. We strongly recommend and encourage each HCG Diet patient to read this book.
Before we get into what the HCG Diet actually is, it’s important to understand a few things first. It’s important to understand what fat is and how it works. For instance, did you know there are three distinct types of fat inside the human body? Once you understand the differences between them, you’ll understand why the HCG Diet is actually effective. Let’s go over those differences now.
First, we have the structural fat. This type of fat fills the gaps between various organs. Like packing material, it protects our insides from bumping into each other. Structural fat performs important functions, such as bedding the kidneys within soft elastic tissue. Structural fat also protects the coronary arteries and plays an important role in keeping the skin smooth and taut. In addition, structural fat provides the springy cushion of hard fat under the bones of the feet, without which we would be unable to walk.
The second type of fat is a normal reserve of fuel. Our bodies freely draw from these fuel tanks when the nutritional income from the intestinal tract is insufficient to meet demand. Localized throughout our bodies, these reserves provide fuel for normal activities, such as muscular activity and regulating body temperature. Both of these types of fats—structural and reserve—are normal. Even if the body stocks them to capacity, this can never be called obesity.
The third type of fat is entirely abnormal. It is the excessive accumulation of this abnormal fat—and of such fat only—from which the overweight patient suffers. This abnormal fat is also a potential reserve of fuel, but unlike the normal reserves it is not available to the body in a nutritional emergency.
When an obese patient tries to lose weight by starving themselves, they will first lose their normal fat reserves. When these are exhausted, the body goes after the structural fat. After this, the patient’s skin wrinkles and they look old and miserable. One of the most frustrating and depressing experiences a human being can have is to lose weight, but look and feel worse than before. Only as a last resort will the body yield its abnormal reserves. Although, by that time, the patient usually feels so weak and hungry that the diet is abandoned.
When an obese patient complains that when he “diets” he loses the wrong fat, he’s not wrong. The problem is, starving yourself is not a diet. When you starve yourself, you feel famished and tired, and your face becomes drawn and haggard. At the same time, your belly, hips, thighs, and upper arms show little improvement. The fat you have come to detest hangs on. Conversely, the fat needed to protect your bones and organs diminishes.
Human Chorionic Gonadotropin, or HCG, is a hormone produced initially by the embryo soon after conception and later by the placenta during pregnancy. After observing that pregnant women often rapidly metabolize their own fat stores to nourish the developing baby, Dr. A.T. W. Simeons theorized that HCG might be a useful adjunct in combination with a very low calorie diet to treat obesity. His observations were the first to suggest a link between HCG, obesity, and the weight regulatory center in our brain known as the hypothalamus. HCG maximizes the functional capacity of the body’s control centers in the hypothalamus. One control center in the hypothalamus, “the fat bank”, controls the movement and distribution of fat throughout the body. HCG mobilizes abnormal fat and releases it as a source of energy and nutrients.
In a nutshell, the HCG Diet is a diet consisting of 500 calories per day with the addition of HCG injections. By itself, a 500-calorie diet would quickly result in patients experiencing hunger pains and cravings. Not to mention feelings of misery and a loss of structural and normal fat, as well as a loss in muscle mass. However, with the addition of HCG, the patient typically loses up to one pound of abnormal fat per day.
Consider that each pound of fat contains 3,500 calories. Therefore, if a patient loses one pound of abnormal fat in a single day, that makes 3,500 calories available to them. This gives the patient access to adequate amounts of energy because the calories are generated by the body internally through the breakdown of the abnormal fat deposits (lipolysis) and the fat cells themselves. The net result is consistent weight loss without feeling hungry.
It is especially noteworthy to emphasize that with HCG the structural and normal fat reserves are not depleted nor is muscle mass lost. Only the abnormal fat is assimilated and used as fuel by the body, with the main by-product being water. This is evidenced by an increased urine output. Another test that can be done is to test the urine for ketone bodies (ketosis) by using ketone test strips.
Recently, the use of HCG has become popular again because of the publication of Kevin Trudeau‘s book, The Weight Loss Cure and his infomercial. Trudeau introduced a number of changes to Simeons’ original protocol. From our own research on the HCG diet, we conclude that success seems to be greatest in patients who adhere the closest to Simeons’ original protocol. Therefore, we are not advocates of Trudeau’s book or his implementation of the HCG Diet. We feel that his proposed changes may be misleading because they are costly and unnecessary. Instead, we adhere closely to Simeons’ original protocol, which uses daily HCG injections, along with a low carbohydrate, calorie restricted diet, as a component of a very successful weight loss program.
Most of our patients have previously tried alternative diets with limited success. Many of them re-gained all of their weight loss back within a few months of discontinuing treatment. Once on the HCG Diet, these same patients reported losing fat from areas of their body where they had never before been able to lose fat. Moreover, they also reported having more energy, less hunger, and an improved sense of well being that they did not experience while on other restricted calorie diets.
As an added bonus, many of our patients who have been previously diagnosed with diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol see a significant improvement in these chronic medical conditions. In some cases, they have been able to reduce or discontinue some or all of their prescription medications. Some of our patients have had their blood pressure return to normal after losing about 20 to 30 pounds in just 4 to 6 weeks!
40-Day Supply: $199.50
23-Day Supply: $149.50
We also offer extra strength as well as sublingual (cannot be made into extra strength) and nasal spray.
