Slurp!

Having trouble dropping pounds? It's time to think before you drink. What you're sipping through that straw may actually be keeping the scale from budging. Beverages alone can cause gastronomical increases in calorie intake, rounding out your waistline. In fact, Americans get more than 20% of their calories from beverages - way too much for both health and weight loss. So how should you quench your thirst? Click here for more.

Conventional wisdom would tell us that it doesn't matter if you choose a 150-calorie drink or a 150-calorie snack. After all, a calorie is a calorie... right?

Unfortunately, drinks don't do much to curb appetites since the brain doesn't seem to register the calories from beverages the way it does from food. In fact, studies show that people rarely compensate for liquid calories by cutting calories at that meal or later on, whereas they would normally do that had they taken in extra calories from a food source.

Drink size is also a problem. In the last few decades, beverage portions seem better suited for thirsty horses than people. Not to mention that most popular drinks usually have a vat of sugar in them as well. The average soft drink has ballooned from 13 to nearly 20 ounces - and the average woman increased her daily caloric intake by 335 calories.

No wonder Americans are fatter than ever before - more than 57% of us are overweight.