Archive for the ‘Nutrition’ Category
Keep the Soda in the can
Gary Foster, director of the Center for Obesity Research and Education at Temple University and colleagues completed a study at five Philadelphia elementary schools were they replaced sodas with fruit juice over the course of two years. They scaled back snacks and banished candy. They handed out raffle tickets for wise food choices. They spent hours teaching kids, their parents and teachers about good nutrition.
The results were phenomenal. The number of students who became overweight during the two-year experiment was a full 50% less than the number of kids who became overweight in schools that didn’t make these changes. The findings are published in the April, 2008, issue of the journal Pediatrics.
In the five test schools, juice, water and low-fat milk replaced sodas. Snacks had to meet limits for fat, salt and sugar. Students who ate healthy snacks got raffle tickets to win prizes such as bikes and jump ropes.
(SIDE NOTE: Although replacing soda with fruit juice is bit of an improvement, juice still has its draw backs; High in sugar content with potential to induce fungal overgrowth in the intestines. )
But the schools can’t do it all on their own – the biggest challenge to schools is that kids drink sodas and eat junk food at home – so they come to school expecting to do the same. As parents, imagine the difference we could make if all of us made these same simple changes in our homes.
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More Thoughts from Mellisa McJunkin – Health and Wellness Advocate
Question: What are you without an immune system?
Answer: You are dead.
As morbid as it may sound, it’s true. When your immune system is weak you will get sick. When your immune system completely fails you will die.
If I could show you a way to boost your Natural Killer Cells by up to 437%, would you be interested in hearing more? Of course you would.
Healthy Eating Lifestyle Myth Busters
As you may know, not fueling up right can affect how well your body performs and your overall fitness benefits. Even though healthy eating is important, there are myths that hinder your performance if you listen to them.
Below, you’ll find some myth busters on healthy eating.
1. Working out on an empty stomach.
There are benefits to working out first thing in the morning before you have anything to eat. The theory is you will actually burn more fat over the course of the day.
However…….if you wait too long to begin your workout you may start to hear a rumbling noise in your stomach. This rumbling is trying to tell you something. The first thing it could be telling you is that you are dehydrated, so be sure to drink an ample amount of water before, during and after your workout.
With that said remember your body needs fuel for a successful workout. If, while working out, you begin to feel dizzy or light headed, it would be best to stop and have a small protein packed snack like almonds or cottage cheese.
2. Relying on energy bars and drinks.
Although they are fine every once in a while, they don’t deliver the nutrients or antioxidants you need to prevent diseases such as cancer. Fruits and vegetables are your best bets, as they are loaded in vitamins, minerals, fluid, and fiber.
3. Skipping breakfast.
Skipping breakfast is never a good idea, as breakfast starts the day off right. Unless you’ve gotten up in the middle of night and raided the fridge or cupboards, you body has been fasting all night; Hence the name “BREAK FAST”. Ideally, your body needs fuel within 1 hour of waking. Many people start their day off with a pot of coffee which only suppresses the appetite. This may seem like a good thing when your are actually trying to lose weight, but you may sabotage your efforts because you may tend to binge or eat the wrong things later on in the day.
4. Extremely Low carb diets.
When you hear the word “carbs” you probably think bread, pasta, rice, sugar, etc. And yes those types of carbs can and should be curtailed for many healthy, beneficial reasons.
But let’s not forgot that your body needs carbohydrates for brain function, muscle maintenance and for storing energy. The majority of your carbs should come from fresh or frozen fruits and vegetables.
5. Eating what EVER you want.
Eating healthy “most of the time” and exercising regularly doesn’t give you an all access pass to binge eat anything you want. A little cheat snack, meal or even day is usually fine once in a while but don’t make a habit of consuming “junk” food. You will merely be undoing all the good you’ve done and send your body into a state of fat and sugar shock.
6. Not enough calories
Although losing weight involves calories, and cutting down on calories is part of the process of losing weight, losing it too quickly is not always safe. You should aim for losing 2 – 3 pounds a week by consuming no less than 1200 calories a day. Always make sure that you are getting enough calories to keep your body and brain operating smoothly.
7. Skip the coffee, soda, milk, juice and alcohol.
Water is the best thing for active, healthy people to drink. You should drink at least half of your body weight in ounces per day. By doing this you will help your body process food and release toxins quickly. And don’t rely on thirst to be an indicator of when or how much water you drink. By the time you get thirsty, your body is already in a state of dehydration.
Changing how you eat is always a great step towards healthy eating and it will affect how your body performs. The healthier you eat, you better you’ll feel. No matter how old you may be, healthy eating is something you should strive for. Once you give it a chance, you’ll see in no time at all just how much it can change your life – for the better.
More Thoughts from Mellisa McJunkin – Health and Wellness Advocate
Question: What are you without an immune system?
Answer: You are dead.
As morbid as it may sound, it’s true. When your immune system is weak you will get sick. When your immune system completely fails you will die.
If I could show you a way to boost your Natural Killer Cells by up to 437%, would you be interested in hearing more? Of course you would.
How to Cheat You Way Thin
By Dr. Becky Gillaspy
Reaching a weightloss plateau is frustrating to say the least. This article explains why dieting harder is not going to move you off the plateau and how adding a planned day of overeating is the answer to getting the scale to drop once again.
Why did your weightloss plateau?
The answer lies in your hormones. You see your body is reluctant to release body fat. It looks at body fat as stored energy which it can call on in times of emergency such as a famine for instance.
So when you start dieting and eating less your hormones, one in particular called leptin, send a red flag up to your brain that says there is not enough food coming in and we need to do something to protect against starvation.
What happens next is the exact opposite of what you want to happen on a diet.
First, your metabolism drops dramatically in order to preserve that stored energy (i.e. FAT)
Second, the hormone cortisol increases circulation which encourages the production of abdominal fat. Yep, your belly grows bigger.
Third, the hunger stimulating hormone ghrelin is activated and you become ravenously hungry.
So you can see that when you diet consistently your weightloss stops because your metabolism slows, your fat making hormones are kicked into gear and your hunger is stimulated.
No wonder traditional diets have such a dismal success rate!
To break out of the weightloss plateau you must add a day of overeating to your weekly diet. This is referred to as a “Cheat Day”
Here is why cheating works.
By following a diet for 6 days a week and then overeating on day 7 (we are talking whatever you want, pizza, burgers, fries, chips, ice cream, etc.) you convince your body that there is plenty of food available and it boosts your metabolism dramatically, and reverses the “bad” hormonal responses set up by dieting.
Do you gain weight from the cheat day?
You will retain water weight from the cheat day because you will be eating carbohydrates which cause you to retain water but what happens in your body is that your metabolism rebounds faster than your body’s ability to make fat so your fat burning potential is at its peak and it stays elevated for the rest of the week giving your a greater ability to lose week after week.
A weightloss plateau can zap your motivation, I encourage you to break through your plateau by learning more about how to add a strategic “Cheat Day” to your diet, you will be glad you did!
If you are interested in learning how to use a Cheat Day to boost your weight loss, then check out Cheat Your Way Thin here you will find before and after pictures and links to the official site where you can learn about the eating strategies talked about in this article.
Dr. Becky Gillaspy is a Doctor of Chiropractic, Certified Wellness Coach and Author helping clients reach and exceed their weight loss and fitness goals.
More Thoughts from Mellisa McJunkin – Health and Wellness Advocate
Question: What are you without an immune system?
Answer: You are dead.
As morbid as it may sound, it’s true. When your immune system is weak you will get sick. When your immune system completely fails you will die.
If I could show you a way to boost your Natural Killer Cells by up to 437%, would you be interested in hearing more? Of course you would.
Cartoon Character Ceral Tastes The BESTEST MOM!
Here’s a sad, but entirely unsurprising piece of consumer news. In a peer-reviewed study recently published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication fed the same cereal to school-aged children in different boxes. Boxes with a cartoon character earned higher tastiness ratings from the kids.
Researchers also found that the cereal’s name set up expectations of what it might taste like, and changed the subjects’ perception of the cereal. Children told that the cereal was called “Healthy Bits” rated the cereal more highly than those told it was named “Sugar Bits.” (“Hey, this doesn’t taste so bad for being healthy,” they might have said to themselves.)
Influence of Licensed Spokescharacters and Health Cues on Children’s Ratings of Cereal Taste [Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine] (via NYDN – thanks, D.!)
View the original article here
More Thoughts from Mellisa McJunkin – Health and Wellness Advocate
Question: What are you without an immune system?
Answer: You are dead.
As morbid as it may sound, it’s true. When your immune system is weak you will get sick. When your immune system completely fails you will die.
If I could show you a way to boost your Natural Killer Cells by up to 437%, would you be interested in hearing more? Of course you would.