I’m not going to the gym to lose weight,” admits the 5-foot-6 Audrina Patridge, who says she’s always weighed about 116 pounds, “but to get definition in my arms, butt and legs.”

That she did, training with Lauren Conrad and trainer Jarrett Del Bene since May. “I actually have calf muscles!” says Patridge, 22.

Diet “Before, I was a junk-food junkie,” she says. Now healthy eating (think 1,250 daily calories from fish and salads) is a habit. (more…)

Take ingredients. Put in a blender. Blend. Drink. Enjoy your new muscle. (more…)

American Idol: Great for your career, not always so great for your waistline.

During her 12 weeks on Season Five and through the three-month-long Idol tour last year, says runner-up Kellie Pickler, “I didn’t work out at all! I got really lazy and every time I’d walk by the catering table I’d grab a handful of M&Ms or some Twizzlers.

I wasn’t even hungry — I’d just eat because it was there. It was junk food heaven!” Before she knew it, the 5′1″ Pickler — who says that pre-ldol she would work out daily and run during the hour that Oprah was on TV — went from 103 lbs. to 125 lbs. (more…)

The Mediterranean Diet For centuries, the people of the Mediterranean have been eating a joyful, flavorful diet — one that happens to protect them against the chronic diseases of modern times: heart disease, adult-onset diabetes, stroke, and colon and other cancers.

In a recent Spanish study, men and women between 65 and 80 who followed the Mediterranean diet were 31 percent less likely to die over the next nine years, compared to those who did not.

The traditional diets of Greece, southern Italy, southern France, Spain, Portugal, and even Turkey and Israel are rich in bread, grains, beans, fish, vegetables, some red meat, fruits, and olive oil, but they contain little ice cream, or highly processed snack foods. (more…)

Getting breast surgery tends to improve women’s mental health, two recent studies suggest. One, published in Plastic Surgical Nursing, found a significant correlation between breast augmentation and increased self-esteem.

In the other study, focusing on breast reduction, 20 women took a series of psychological tests when they first consulted a surgeon about the operation. Twenty percent of them had been treated for depression in the past, although none were depressed at that time.

Four months after the procedure, every dimension of the patients’ quality of life that the researchers measured had improved significantly — including anxiety, ability to sleep, and attitude about appearance — and the women generally felt that their hopes and expectations for the surgery had been fulfilled. (more…)