Do You Want To Be Thin?

Some people believe "if I just lose a little weight, I can be thin too". Well, I never found it that easy. I guess I learned the hard way. I was always a little heavy. Even back in High School, I was what my family called chubby. After I finished school I worked as a truck driver unloading the truck by hand at every stop I made, usually about 40 stops a day. After about 5 years I changed to a construction worker. I did heavy construction, steel, and concrete for bridges and tunnels, the money was better and I had a family to think about.

Both the jobs were hard work and I lost about 10 pounds without trying. I was just burning several thousand calories a day. I was 6 foot tall and weighed about 172. After I left construction and bought a small business, I started to gain weight. I was 32 years old and the next 5 years following I gained about 30 pounds, and before I was 40, I weighed about 220 pounds.

Everyone I knew had noticed and I started to feel self-conscious.  I knew I had to lose weight. I had settled into a lifestyle of self-indulgence. Finally, I joined a Health Club. It was a complete gym with machines, running track, aerobics classes, a separate room for weight lifters, a pool, jacuzzi, steam room and expansive locker room with towels provided.

I did get plenty of exercise but I didn't lose much weight and after a few years, I stopped going. Like most people I was pretty discouraged throughout my 40's and then after I sold my business, I finally got serious about losing weight.

So the reason I'm writing about myself is because I want you to know that my battle with my weight went on for more than 20 years. But I did win the battle because I never quit. I weight 165 today after more than 30 years of trying to lose weight. I reached my goal now and just work on maintaining my weight. And even maintaining is a battle, an everyday battle of watching my calories and exercising. I have no regrets, the exercise has made me a healthier person and staying thin in my senior years lets me be active. I ride a bike, swim, walk a lot, I do yoga and weight train twice a week.

Being thin can be challenging, for some people it comes easy. They're born with the right genes and they can process food without absorbing the fat. Others like me have to work at it. But if I would have taken some advice when I was younger it might have been easier.

I always thought I could do it the easy way. "I'll diet for a few weeks and I'll be thin and ready for the summer." That was a pipe dream, it never happened. Sure, it's easy to drop 5 or 10 pounds, but in a couple weeks, it comes right back. I wasn't serious about my weight, oh sure I wanted to lose weight, but doing what was necessary never happened.

I didn't get serious until I started to feel sluggish, I was tired in the afternoon, my joints started to ache and walking became a chore. My whole adult life I was in denial about my weight and maybe that was because it didn't bother me to be overweight. Then you get older and you start to feel the effects of carrying around the extra pounds, but your still in denial and think the aches and pains are because you're getting older but it's not, it's from carrying around the extra weight and because you aren't active enough it's getting harder to carry the extra weight and your heart is starting to strain under the extra work it has to do.

I think I wrote about this before, but being a little overweight isn't going to keep you from living a healthy life. You can be just as healthy as a thin person if you do regular exercise. If you're not exercising your heart will wear down from the extra strain. Extra weight causes extra strain on your heart and at the later years of middle age your heart can start to give you trouble. So actually, if you're an overweight person, exercise is more important.

Carrying extra fat especially in the waistline is the hardest fat to lose,  and it's the most dangerous to your heart. I don't really understand why, but most of us start to put on the extra pounds in our thirties and forties. Like me, though, we don't work at losing it until it starts to cause problems. By that time, you can lose the ambition to lose fat and that's probably why you see so many seniors overweight.

If you truly want to be thin, you want to do something about it when you're young enough to have the motivation to make the hard choices and get into the exercise routine before it becomes too hard on your body. It's only recently that studies have shown us that extra inches around your waist will shorten your life. The bigger your waist, the shorter your life. Do something about your weight now, while you still have the motivation.

I know I wrote mostly about exercise today but the mistake I made was the diet. I thought exercise was all I had to do. If you don't eat the foods to lose weight, you can exercise half a day every day and nothing will happen. You can't exercise away a bad diet.

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My new ebook is in online bookstores now. You can go to Amazon.com and type the title in the search bar: How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight? The price is $3.99. I think you'll find it interesting. I write about myself and my battle with weight and all the mistakes I made and how you can avoid the mistakes and lose the unwanted body fat.

The ebook is also at http://barnesandnoble.com and they have a special introductory offer right now $2.99. Also available on iBooks, Kobo, Scribd, and others worldwide.

There's No Magic Pill

Everyone looks for the easy way to do everything. We look for the App to change the stations on the TV, you look for the App to open the garage door, the App to do your Taxes, but for losing weight, there’s no easy way. Did You ever do a search: "lose weight” and see all the different websites that have the answer for quick or fast weight loss; just buy this or eat this and the weight will melt away. It won’t happen and if you lose weight it usually comes right back.

I lost weight by changing my diet and I never went back. And if I’m on vacation or go to a family gathering and I do slip up and eat something that will add fat, if you go right back to your meal plan the next day, any extra fat you added will disappear fast. When I changed my diet and started to eat fresh, mostly vegetables and fruit for dessert or for a snack, eating more nuts and not eating that food I use to eat. Not eating that food that put the weight on in the first place. I’m not a vegetarian, I do eat meat, but I stick to white meat chicken or tuna or wild salmon.

 My trick to losing weight is to eat as little animal fat as possible. White meat chicken has some yellow fat on the outside of the meat and It’s easy to remove, so you are eating meat that’s 95% fat-free. Fat on a fish is almost the same, the fat lays outside the meat under the skin. The advantage to eating fish is you get the nutrients from the Omega-3 fatty oil in the fish and salmon and tuna are rich in Omega-3. Other seafood has fish oil and minerals but for my money, I’ll buy wild salmon and tuna. I think you get more nutrients for your money. Red meat and even pork contain animal fat marbled through the meat. Some red meat is leaner than others but all animal meat contains animal fat. It’s a good source of protein but you can’t avoid the animal fat and that’s the part your system doesn’t process very well and will turn most of it into Body fat and store it.

Yes, humans have always eaten animal meat, but throughout history, man has never had a very long lifespan. On average, we probably live longer today than humans have ever lived throughout history. Having said that, science has no idea how long humans could live if we could eliminate disease and illness. 

Now we all know the science can’t remove all disease and illness in the next century, but we can change our diet and become healthier and whether science knows that or not eating healthy is the answer to longevity. That and exercise for your body and your mind will definitely keep you fit and active for many years to come. 

It would be nice to avoid all those health problems our grandparents had. And by eating healthy, I know I’m going to live a better, longer life. 

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My new ebook is in online bookstores now. You can go to Amazon.com and type the title in the search bar: How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight? The price is $3.99. I think you'll find it interesting. I write about myself and my battle with weight and all the mistakes I made and how you can avoid the mistakes and lose the unwanted body fat.

The ebook is also at http://barnesandnoble.com and they have a special introductory offer right now $2.99. Also available on iBooks, Kobo, Scribd, and others worldwide.

About Obesity

The meaning of the word has changed some since The Affordable Care Act passed. Now we adopted the British scale or the way they calculate Obesity. They use the BMI Method. By calculating your Body Mass Index, it tells doctors your percentage of body fat. So if your BMI is 30 or more you are now Obese. If your number is between 25 and 30 you're considered to be overweight and if you're less than that your normal. You should know your number. You can find out by using the BMI Calculators that are free on fitness websites like WebMD.com

So Is it our fault we're overweight, or not. I think it’s a little of both. Some of this we can’t help, but some of the fault is ours because we haven’t been keeping pace with the times. The world has been changing right before our eyes. The food industry has made the biggest change next to medicine. Most of our food today is processed. What does that mean? Manufacturers are in the food industry today and they’re making big money. Back in the 1950’s and 60’s we bought food from a grocery store in the neighborhood, you bought meat from a butcher and we could buy fruit and vegetables from a produce stand.  We could do all of this even in the big cities.

Today, your food comes from all around the world. Many of the foods are genetically altered to make the product more resistant to drought, more resistant to insects and altered to grow faster so It can get to market quicker. All of these changes will allow the grower to grow more product each year and make more money. So, why is that bad?

Humans have found out the hard way that processed foods aren’t very good for us. We have more cases of cancer, more obesity and we don’t get the same nutrition that we would get from locally farmed products. That’s one reason you see the organic produce in the stores today. Yes, they make more money from the organic foods, but people are demanding organic produce. We want produce that was grown without chemicals sprayed on them. Small organic farmers don’t make enough money to afford pesticides and fertilizers.  

So when you look at the changes in the last 40 to 50 years, for humans, they’ve been rather dramatic. In the sense that obesity and being overweight was not nearly the problem it is now. I mean, our rate has literally doubled. That’s a huge change. So, what happens? Number one would be, our genetics were set up for a life where one, we had to move a lot more, and two, there weren’t near as many calories, salt and sugar in our foods.

 We didn’t have this constant intake of calories. And so fast-forward now, 2016, what’s different? Ok, one is, calories are everywhere. Two, you take a bite of something, there’s many more calories per bite. And three is, our portion sizing is much, much larger. And we have data to show that.

The average man and the average woman, eat clearly twice the calories per day than, say, 50 years ago. So this is a tough one and the problem is, our genetics really were set up for people who were much more active. Today, we work more with our minds than with our bodies. In other words, we have millions and billions of bacteria in our intestines that actually have genetics, to try and hang onto calories and put them into the human body as well. 

Today’s human eats much more and has much more food available then people did 50 years ago. I was growing up in the 50’s and early 60’s and if I wanted a snack after school, my mother told me to get a piece of fruit. We always had apples in the house. Today, I still keep a bowl of fruit. Apples, pears or oranges and bananas.

As consumers, if we want to stay healthy, be a normal weight and avoid a lot of health problems that being overweight causes, then we have to pay more attention to the food we eat and the amount of food we eat.

People today just go along to get along and spend most of the time on remote. They go through their daily routine without giving much thought to what going on around them. They go through life eating and drinking whatever they want regardless of the harm they might be doing to their body. 

If we want to be healthy and fit we have to pay attention to your bodies need.

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My new ebook is in online bookstores now. You can go to Amazon.com and type the title in the search bar: How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight? The price is $3.99. I think you'll find it interesting. I write about myself and my battle with weight and all the mistakes I made and how you can avoid the mistakes and lose the unwanted body fat.

The ebook is also at http://barnesandnoble.com and they have a special introductory offer right now $2.99. Also available on iBooks, Kobo, Scribd, and others worldwide.

Will Weighing Yourself Every Day Help You Lose Weight?

This approach works especially well for men, study says

I know weighing yourself every morning seems like a pain in the butt, but the idea is to remind you that you're trying to lose weight today. Some people do the same thing with one of the new fitness trackers and some of us use the bathroom scale. 

I prefer the fitness trackers. For me, it's a constant reminder that I'm overweight and I'm working to lose weight. But that's me, and you should find something that works for you. The object is that you want to remember your diet every time you look at food. This post proves that a constant reminder really works.

(HealthDay News) -- Checking your weight every day could help you slim down, researchers report.

A two-year Cornell University study found that tracking the results of daily weight checks on a chart helped people lose weight and keep it off.

"You just need a bathroom scale and an Excel spreadsheet, or even a piece of graph paper," study senior author David Levitsky, a professor of nutrition and psychology, said in a university news release.

People who lost weight with this approach in the first year maintained that weight loss throughout the second year, the researcher said. That result is significant because previous studies have shown that about 40 percent of weight loss is regained within a year, and nearly 100 percent is regained within five years, according to the study.

This approach "forces you to be aware of the connection between your eating and your weight," Levitsky explained. "It used to be taught that you shouldn't weigh yourself daily, and this is just the reverse."

While daily weight checks did help women, they had a much greater effect in men.

"It seems to work better for men than women, for reasons we cannot figure out yet," Levitsky said.

WebMD News from HealthDay
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My new ebook is in online bookstores now. You can go to Amazon.com and type the title in the search bar: How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight? The price is $3.99. I think you'll find it interesting. I write about myself and my battle with weight and all the mistakes I made and how you can avoid the mistakes and lose the unwanted body fat.

The ebook is also at http://barnesandnoble.com and they have a special introductory offer right now $2.99. Also available on iBooks, Kobo, Scribd, and others worldwide.

Understanding Why We Gain Body Fat

Have you ever noticed that no matter how hard you try, no matter how much you exercise or no matter how many calories you cut, you still can't get rid of the extra fat. There could be another reason for your size.

My friend has a twin born at the same time but one guy's bigger and still is 40 years later. The bigger brother is overweight and the smaller one is thin and fit. The overweight brother can't seem to lose the extra fat. At family, gathering, they always eat the same amount of food but the smaller one never gains weight. So what's going on is pretty normal for siblings. I've read a lot about families with some overweight members and some thin members.

Research shows that we are all different even when we're twins. So even if we look the same, we all process our food differently. It's your DNA that's different. DNA is in every gene that you were born with and siblings from the same parents won't have exactly the same DNA. So in that respect, we are all different. Science is working on this right now. If everyone at the family table eats exactly the same thing, for some of them, it's too much and for some it might not be enough, but it's not just the quantity, because of different DNA each person processes that food differently. Maybe some of those people can't eat starchy foods, for example, their system can't process that much starch so the liver turns it into fat and stores it.

That can happen with any food group, my wife can't eat beef. She can't digest it. Some people can't eat dairy products, everyone's different even though we all look the same or come from the same family. 

You can still overcome these differences by listening to your body and understanding what your limitations are. It will take some work on your part, but if you really want to slim down and get back to a healthy weight You must take your weight problem serious and do the work, investigate your behavior and find out what foods are causing your weight problem. I know guys that are seriously overweight and know that bread and other bakery goods are their problem, but they won't stop. They won't change, they're in denial. Guys are harder to convince that “they need to make the tuff choices”. Generally, they won't change until their Doctor has the big “come to Jesus” talk about their health. 

People who can't lose weight dieting, don't understand what they have to do to lose weight. Just eating less of the same foods won't help you to lose weight. That's the denial I'm talking about. If you want to lose weight you have to change what you're eating.

Personally, I think the overweight problem is mostly genetic. Because of your DNA, you who are African shouldn't be eating Chinese or even Italian. Because of your ancestry, you should be eating more like Africans. Maybe the overweight problem in China is because of the recent prosperity and the introduction of food from different parts of the world. Even American fast food is becoming popular in China. Because of the DNA of different people and the relatively new craze of eating out and eating a big verity of different foods from different cultures, this may be causing the overweight problem. 

There's another possibility, and this one your Doctor can help you with. If you seriously want to stop the cravings you have to stop eating food or drinks that spike your blood sugar. Your blood sugar will normally increase when you eat, but you want the increase to be slow and gradual. We know that sweet foods or sweet drinks will spike your blood sugar, but now science says that wheat flour also will spike your sugar levels. And what's so bad about that you might ask. 

I'll explain as if you're looking at a graph. If a normal blood sugar is below 5.6 and you eat ice cream and your blood sugar spike to 8, and your body is working normally, your blood sugar will drop rapidly to say 4 because the effects of the sugar won't last very long, but now you're below your normal level and your body will trigger another craving to get you back up to your normal level of 5.6. Now these numbers are just numbers and if you're concerned about your level you want to see your Doctor and get a blood test.      

When you're overweight it's important to have regular checkups that include blood tests. High blood sugar levels are a serious problem. 

But let's get back to cravings, people that snack a lot often don't understand why, and snacks put on the weight. It can be caused by your blood sugar or glucose levels spiking and dropping so that you keep creating the cravings for more food. So we know sugary foods will spike glucose or blood sugars levels and now science thinks that wheat flour can do the same. Wheat flour is in almost any bakery goods. Bread, cakes, donuts anything that comes from a bakery. Now you might think because you don't eat wheat bread that you're safe. All processed flour is made from wheat flour or partial wheat flour. You want to start reading the labels and avoid foods with processed flour. 

Ever wonder why gluten-free is so popular now. Gluten-free means there's no wheat flour or any wheat in that food. Read the label on gluten-free bread and you find it's made of rice flour. Gluten-free products will help you control the spike in you blood sugar which in turn help you avoid cravings. You can buy gluten-free bagels, pasta, rice cakes, cereal and bread just to name a few at any of the major grocery chains. So gluten-free will help you control your weight and avoiding sugary foods and drinks will also help cut your calories.

This is the other part of understanding the problem. Most people think that losing weight is all about dieting or all about exercising. Yes, but it's important to understand how you gained the weight. 9 out of 10 people put the weight back in a few months. If you're going thru the trouble to lose the weight and don't forget the money your spending, it's important to keep it off. Losing the weight and staying with a moderate exercise plan will make you much healthier. You're going to feel like a kid again. You don't want to return to the old you, overweight and tired all the time.  
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My new ebook is in online bookstores now. You can go to Amazon.com and type the title in the search bar: How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight? The price is $3.99. I think you'll find it interesting. I write about myself and my battle with weight and all the mistakes I made and how you can avoid the mistakes and lose the unwanted body fat.

The ebook is also at http://barnesandnoble.com and they have a special introductory offer right now $2.99. Also available on Ibooks, Kobo, Scribd, and others worldwide.

How to Lose Weight on 5 Meals a Day

I found this post on HealthNet.com and wanted to reblog it because this Chef thinks like me. This is the way I lost my weight. Read the following and believe me it works.

I'm a chef (and a mom). You might think that eating frequent meals wouldn’t be an issue.

I understand the concept: Five small meals a day takes the edge off your appetite, evens out blood sugar levels, and keeps your energy steady. But I confess: I don’t always eat this way.

Although my fitness trainer encourages me to eat healthy food every few hours, my meals usually look like this: coffee, a bit more coffee, lunch at 3 p.m., dinner at 9 p.m. I start over again the next morning. This is called "eating when you want and whatever you want".

When I decided to change this habit, I found that doing these five things helped:

1. Plan ahead. Five meals a day equals breakfast, lunch, dinner, and two snacks. To do this right, you need to plan what you’ll eat every day for each “meal.” And you need to schedule eating every 2 to 3 hours.
2. Stock up. Face it: You’re going to grab whatever food is closest. So stock up on veggies, fruit, healthy carbs, lean proteins, and low-fat dairy products such as milk, yogurt, and cottage cheese.
3. Go for taste. Choose snack foods that will sustain you and taste good. Remember, healthy food can be satisfying.
4. Whip up a smoothie. Blend fruit, milk, yogurt and a little honey for a sweet filling snack packed with vitamins, fiber, protein, and calcium.
5. Combine carbs and protein to stay full longer. Try whole wheat toast with peanut butter or a hard-boiled egg; whole-grain pasta with olive oil and cheese; or oatmeal with fruit, milk, and honey. Or make yourself a big pot of soup (like my Tuscan chicken soup) to heat up for lunches or snacks.

It's a good plan but it's a little more complicated than that. For breakfast, you want 12 grams of protein with whatever you're eating. I eat 2 eggs and toast with peanut butter or some lean meat. No processed meat, like ham or sausage. You might prefer a protein shake. I make a shake when I have no time to eat. Almond milk and a banana, a serving of the protein powder and blend it for a few seconds, pour it in a glass or commuter cup and go. Your other four meals should all be about 300 calories. Space out the other meals about 2 0r 3 hours apart and don't skip a meal. 

The idea is if you eat healthy all day you won't get hungry. After the 5th meal, it should be about 6 p.m. and that's where you want to stop eating. No late night snacks. You want to eat the last time 3 or 4 hours before bed. If you are a person who stays up late you might want to try 6 meals a day. Just stick to 300 calories per meal.

If you really want to lose the extra flab you can get help, I write 4 blogs and I’ve written two E-books. Read some of my other blog posts.

gettingtoahealthyweight.blog
idropped40pounds.wordpress.com
howbaddoyouwanttoloseweight.blogspot.com

blogonweight.blogspot.com

E-books are the easiest and cheapest way to learn about any subject without groping through hundreds of website looking for the material you want.
My first e-book is “HowBadDoYouWantToLoseWeight” and it sells for $2.99 on most online bookstores like Amazon.com, BN.com, iBook, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, and Gardner books in the U.K.

My second e-book is available in the same stores. And on smashwords.com. If you use the Smashwords' promotional code You can get my second book for $1.99 (TL96R). Just type in the search line “getting to a healthy weight”.

  

Do Protein Diets Work?

In the 90’s, protein diets were all the rage. Remember the TV ad’s with the business women in a steak house eating lunch. The idea behind all that protein is to build muscle mass. Some workout fanatics will only eat meat, vegetables, and fruit; mostly meat. And drink protein shakes, water, tea or coffee. Your body’s mass itself will burn calories, but muscle mass burns much more calories then the mass created by fat and the muscle will also burn the fat you have because you’re not eating enough fat to feed the muscle. O.K., I know that might seem a little confusing but if your body is mostly muscle, the muscle will eat the good fat your consuming. Your body really does need some fat. But there’s good fat and bad fat and it’s the bad fats that are stored and never seem to get burned up. Bad fats are what you have to avoid. 

So, the idea is to eat large amounts of protein and very little amounts of carbs or fat, which might be great for those who like to take supplements. This type of diet and there were many like this one, were labeled “Fad Diets” because you can’t stay on the diet indefinitely. You're not getting enough nutrition, it’s not a balanced diet. So you end up taking supplements and that doesn’t always work. We don’t all absorb nutrition from pills the same way, so you might not receive the same benefits that say I do. 

Food is the fuel that runs your body, and if your body isn’t running right, I first blame it on your diet. Everyone knows, I would hope, that nutrition comes from the food we eat. In the last 50 years, our diets have changed considerably. We use to be more mindful of what we ate and how we looked. Today it seems like we only have time to stuff our face. Fill our stomach with anything to get us by for a few hours and we’ll worry amount it then. And the decisions on what we eat are usually made by how much money we have to eat and how much time we have. That’s one reason fast food and ready-made or frozen prepared foods are so popular. The freezer section of my neighborhood grocery is about 4 isles. Plain frozen vegetables and frozen berries are the only things I buy in the frozen food section.

Understand that I’m not against high protein diets, I just want you to understand that it’s a quick weight loss diet that you can use to jump-start a long-term diet plan. Some people need immediate results. High protein diets are great for us who like meat, eggs and cheese, but for vegetarians, it’s a bit more challenging. This is where you might need to do some research. The internet is a good source, or the library or bookstore. Many books and articles have been written about high protein diets. If you're looking for a way to lose the first 5 pounds quick, this might be one option. Check with your doctor or trainer first. 

Recently there’s been a new type of high-protein diet that most experts are onboard with. You can find a good example of this type diet on the doctoroz.com website. The Total 10 Plan is a high-protein diet that encourages protein supplements and plant protein, fish, and chicken. The plan only recommends red meat about once a week. Low-fat Greek yogurt is the only dairy on this diet and much of the diet consists of vegetables and fruit. These type of diets will recommend protein shakes for breakfast and fresh food the rest of the day. 

I personally like the Mediterranean diet which isn’t a weight loss plan, it’s the diet of the Mediterranean people for the last several centuries. Science first discovered that Mediterranean people had fewer health problems than others in the Western World. They didn’t have as much heart disease or heart-related problems in general. And similar findings were discovered in the far east. The similarities between the two are that both eat almost no red meat; they eat more fish and poultry, vegetables, grains and fruit. They both eat fresh and both have no chemicals in their food. 

The Mediterranean diet is my favorite because I have more choices and I like the foods. You can find this diet plan on-line under Mediterranean diet. You’ll see a 

“food pyramid” that shows you the different choices and how often you should eat each food group. It’s simple to follow and this will give you all the nutrition you need without taking supplements. You can eat all you want, just stick to the food chart. There’s no calories to count and you will lose weight over time. The important thing is that you will become a healthier person and by eating a better diet and eating fresh and doing the extra walking you will lose body fat, your blood pressure will improve and your cholesterol will go down. With this diet, the end game is that you become a healthier person. Doctors love this plan because you eat more fresh foods.

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My new ebook is in online bookstores now. You can go to Amazon.com and type the title in the search bar: How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight? The price is $3.99. I think you'll find it interesting. I write about myself and my battle with weight and all the mistakes I made and how you can avoid the mistakes and lose the unwanted body fat.

The ebook is also at http://barnesandnoble.com and they have a special introductory offer right now $2.99. Also available on Ibooks, Kobo, Scribd, and others worldwide.

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