Why be Healthy?

When I was really good at writing in a journal I did it because I thought that one day my kids would benefit from reading it and realizing that I wasn't always this cool, I had to work on it. That got me to thinking, is it easier for you to do things for yourself because you want to, or to do things for yourself because it will benefit someone else.

For instance, there was research that was done on hospital sanitation practices regarding those hand wash gels hanging on every wall. They wanted to know what the best way to help people use it. They kept data on how often they were used and discovered that doctors were more likely to use them if a sign was posted next to them saying something regarding how we are helping patients versus protecting themselves. So doctors were more likely to use hand gel when they thought they were helping someone else.

How does this relate to nutrition and more importantly, how does this relate to you?

Sometimes we need to look at something a new way for a reason for us to change. If the reason you want to be healthier is for your kids or so you can see your grand kids so be it. If it is to ride a boogie board or to run a road race that's cool too. If it's too not get sick from chronic illness that's good too. However, it's always to better to do something because you love it rather than you are afraid of the consequences if you don't do it. We all have our reasons for why we are who we are and some are more conscious than others. Don't try to lose weight, try to be healthy and if losing weight happens so be it. 

There is a famous quote from Hippocrates that says, "Let food be thy medicine and medicine be they food." We have become pretty good at letting medicine become our food, but what about food being our medicine?

Nutrition was meant to be a preventative medicine, that's when it work. Rarely can you treat a chronic disease with nutrition. When that happens, you are managing. With insulin dependent diabetes (when you need insulin shots for your body to use the carbohydrates you eat) what you eat isn't fixing the diabetes if it has come to that point. What you eat simply makes it easier to manage the illness. With Celiac Disease (you have problems with gluten) or Irritable Bowel Syndrome, nothing you eat fixes it, it just doesn't make it worse. That's why in nutrition they try to work with kids. But in working with kids parents usually tag along.  For the most part kids don't by groceries, kids don't cook, and kids don't pack lunches.

I was always told it doesn't matter how fast you're going, it matters your direction. If you get off on a detour, just get back to heading the right direction. You will have set backs in life, but the great thing is that those set backs don't have to be break downs.

Let me know why you want to be healthy.

- Eat Wise

Clean Plate Club

I have talked a little bit about focusing on what you eat because of the connection you have between your food. Some people however are members of the "clean plate club." Those of us that have been inducted into this club may have been raised in a home where you had to finish your food before you could leave the table. You may feel that food cost money, and money is tight, so not eating that food is like throwing money in the trash. You could also have grown up in a culture where food is a way of showing love and friendship so you must eat to be polite.

Here are some simple ways to deal with the clean plate club.

1.) Use smaller plates, bowls, silverware, straws, and so on.

    When you go to drink a milkshake you have experienced the small straw that the crushed oreo cookie can't fit through and you get ticked. Perhaps you have gone to an event where there was professed to be food only to find they had the mini plates you can only fit 6 grapes and a croissant on without stacking and "looking greedy." This was all done on purpose.

    If it takes you longer to eat you will eat less. When you eat your body starts digesting in the mouth (a reason crackers turn to mush), there's more to saliva than just water.  It takes time however for your body to send those signals to your brain and if you are eating too fast to pay attention to your body it won't matter if you get the signal anyway. This will prevent you from loading a plate and then "having" to eat the rest of the food even if you're full.

2.) Start with smaller portions.

    This goes along with the first tip but some of us don't want to go out and buy new plates etc. There is research to show that their are visual cues that help you to check in and think about whether you are hungry or not. Leaving wrappers or shells of eaten foods visible is a great way to see what you've already eaten.

3.) Don't be a greedy eater.

  If you are full and you don't want to finish but that food "needs" to be eaten, offer a spouse, kid, or parent.

4.) Get a to go box.

  Granted this doesn't always work because some food is just not good reheated, but its a tool to keep in your box. If you won't eat reheated salmon, but reheated mashed potatoes are okay, eat what "can't" be reheated first.

What tactics do you use to get away from the clean plate club?

-Eat Wise

What if?

I just wanted to get a few perspectives on what you would do if you were "skinny"...

Would you wear your favorite outfit?

Go go-karting?

Run a marathon shirtless?


You can comment on this and leave it as anonymous if you'd like.

Let me know what you think!

-Eat Wise

Let's Get Sensual

Now don't go judging me, this may not be what you're thinking.  

In what everyday scenarios are all five of your senses stimulated for the experience?

We don't really think about nutrition being a sensual experience but that is exactly what it is. We have a connection to food that can come from smells, sounds, and so on. 

With sight you see how a food is plated, and it's art. You have a bias before the food even touches your lips. This is also present in your perception of how the food will taste, whether it will be juicy, rich, dense, flaky and onward. This bias is furthered by the smell of the food.  French fries, watermelons, and chocolate bring different memories and offer different experiences. Restaurants now send scents outside of their buildings to invoke this senses to increase cravings and drive customers to purchase. 

The feel, the hands on feel, has changed with the use of silverware. I am reminded of an African friend when asked about silverware he said, "I've got a spoon" touching each individual figure spelling S, P, O, O, N. Think back to how you ate as a kid or the difference between eating at home versus a restaurant. Then think of eating a steak versus eating hamburgers at a cook out. 

The hardest scenario to link to eating is sound. How does this connect to what I eat? Think about when you are sitting in class and someone crinkles the wrapper of a food item. Automatically you are stimulated to think of what that food is and may start to salivate.  How about ordering a sizzling fajita plate?

Obviously taste is essential to food. If you have something that looks delicious but tastes pungent and repulsive you will not go back for seconds.

Let's this be a reminder to you, that taking the time to increase your awareness of the food you're eating may increase the pleasure we draw from food. This is called mindful eating.

Let me know how your food experience is impacted by your senses!

- Eat Wise

Fountain of Youth

  Throughout history there have been a mystical location, where magical powers enable individuals to live forever and gain immortality. Kings have sent explorers around the world to gain gold, power, and health.  
  The fountain of youth is no longer a place explorers set out for in the name of their king and queen. We have become more self centered and now the fountain of youth has now become a foreign fruit full of antioxidants, high in carotenoids and beneficial to those suffering from depression, fatigue, exhaustion, wrinkles, or a lack of having your dreams come true. 
  Acai berries nor spinach will make you drop weight faster than eating cucumber or blueberries. They have different nutrient components, it's true, but they are still all good for you. When someone wants to know THE BEST fruit to eat, I tell them the one they like. If you don't like the food you eat you won't continue eating it. Now, there are differences between fruits and vegetables and certain medications interact with various vegetables (if you take these your doctor should have made you aware). 
   The bottom line is you will not continue to eat food you don't like no matter how healthy it is. We have become a society of martyrs and self mutilators. In order to be healthy we have to be at our "ideal" weight and in order to do that we have to eat food we don't like. One of the most pleasurable experiences in life comes from eating food.
  The fountain of youth is a mindset and the underlying desire for finding it is a fear of death.  There is nothing to fear about death. If we worry too much that prevents us from living the life we want and what is the point in living if we think about dying the whole time?  We need to find peace in ourselves, in whatever non-self mutilating way we can. You are amazing, you've lived however long you have and done with you life what you've been able to, now you're just going to make it better.


Let me know what you think!

-Eat Wise

5 Tips to Lose Weight Fast!

Now that I've put out some propaganda let's see how many fall for the trap!

Don't tell me you haven't seen this set up before. I mean we see the woman in her sports bra parading some ROCK HARD ABS and the 15 secrets on how to lose 20 pounds in a month are hidden inside the magazine. It is intriguing when you spent time walking through the grocery store feeling guilty for spending a little more time in the chip aisle than the produce section.

I mean who wouldn't want ROCK HARD ABS?!?  The truth is there is no real secret to getting rock hard abs. We all know how to get them, we just have to do the work to have it.

There are these words called persistence and patience that we as a society seem to have forgotten about.  We want results and we want them now. But we didn't get unhealthy or overweight immediately... did we?

We forget that we have control over our choices. Here is a quote which applies to nutrition because nutrition isn't just facts about foods. Nutrition is interactions, emotions, histories, fears, desires, perceptions and practices.

“Your beliefs become your thoughts,
Your thoughts become your words,
Your words become your actions,
Your actions become your habits,
Your habits become your values,
Your values become your destiny.”

- Mahatma Ghandi

How you see yourself determines how you treat yourself and that can become a vicious cycle if not reflected upon.

Here are my 5 tips to lose weight fast!
1.) Set a better goal than just to lose weight.
   - You can lose weight by cutting your hair or peeing before you get on the scale.

     - Buy less potato chips, learn one new recipe a week, be outside more

-Learn to ice skate, play with your kids

2.) Stop judging yourself
   -  It is okay to eat food you like.

3.) Be honest with yourself.
   - It's time to talk turkey.

4.) Make a change you don't think is big, then be consistent.
   - This can and should be repeated.

5.) Like yourself, you're pretty stinky sweet.
   - If you don't like yourself now you won't like yourself when you're "skinny"


Let me know what you think!

- Eat Wise

What's Up With Fad?

You asked for it and you got it!

Fad Diets

What are they, where are they, who are they, why are they, and do they work?

By definition they are diets that are "cool," and "hip," and "in." Historically they have been diets that focus on short term weight loss without regard to long term health effects.
 
A good way to spot a fad diet are by using this criteria:

1. You are asked to cut out a major food group (carbohydrates, fats, or proteins)
2. A particular food or food group is exaggerated and/or purported to cure specific diseases.
3. Foods are eliminated from an individual’s diet because they are viewed as harmful.
4. An emphasis is placed on eating certain foods to express a particular lifestyle.
5. The diet is based on drastically cutting back calories.  
6. You are using meal replacement shakes, bars, or pills.

Let's get down to it. First, what are some examples of a fad diet? The cabbage soup diet, chicken soup diet, lemonade diet/master cleanse diet, the "pasta, popcorn, chocolate diet," the Hollywood diet.

I will let you know why these work. There is this thing called a calorie that is what is used by the body as energy. If you eat a 2000 calories and use the 2000 calories/energy you stay the same weight. If you eat more than you use you gain. If you eat less than you use you lose. This is simple and mostly common knowledge. So looking at a fad diet you are vastly restricting your calories using the same amount so you lose.

This is why fad diets work, because you lower the amount of calories you are eating AND you are limited in your food choices. If you have to eat one food all day everyday you will eventually get tired of it and not want to eat it anymore.
If you continue this pathway, where you are eating vastly below what your body needs to function, your body enters starvation mode. That means your body starts using less energy (calories). This happens because your body doesn't want to waste away so it makes some changes to help you live (nice isn't it). So when your body limits the energy it is using, because it limits the energy it is getting you don't lose weight anymore. I am sure many of us have experienced this and been frustrated because we are not eating so we can lose weight, but we are not losing weight.... So why are we not eating?!?!?!?!?! Then we get frustrated and give up until the next time we are fed up with ourselves.

So fad diets lead to "yo-yo dieting." You get one on and get off and look into new tricks and things that have never been used before. The trick to living healthy is being healthy. Take a step in the right direction and when you feel good and like the direction of that step, take another.

What good is losing 50 pounds in a month if you gain 60 back the next month? Don't look for tricks, just trying something simple. If you want to take a step to be healthier, go on a walk after dinner. Setting goals that apply to you affect you.

If you must have dessert with your dinner look up a healthier version of your favorite treat. If you love chocolate try enjoying the chocolate melting in your mouth rather than chewing it. If you must have your soda with you meals limit your liquids to water between meals.

Let me know what you think!

- Eat Wise

Judging the Book

I have seen a couple of things lately that bother me. I am not sure what to do about it but wanted to voice some thoughts.

Some of you may have seen this before but for those who haven't it is worth it to watch. This is a company I am interested in because of their approach to alter the stigma around mental and physical impairments.

Not the normal beauty

On a different note. More related to nutrition and health perceptions. The media is a force to be reckoned with. Girls, you are beautiful. Regardless of what you look like. When you understand that thought you don't hate the people that say it.  I know sometimes the world gets crazy and encroaches in your lives and what you think about yourself. But just because someone looks a certain way doesn't make them more effective at what they do. The feeling that you get when watching that video, that's beauty. I don't know the man making those manikins but I know he is good looking.

To my nutritional point of this blog.

Being thin doesn't necessarily make you healthy. Some people have a higher basal metabolic rate (metabolism) and they burn energy while doing nothing. Not fair, true.  Most of you can increase your basal metabolic rate by increasing lean muscle mass (because muscle burns more energy).  Something I have a problem with is someone who complains but doesn't take action.  If you have the energy to complain about something use that energy to do something about it.

I wanted to also say that there is a fault to loving yourself too much. Sometimes in love we hide things we think may hurt the others feelings. But really, that never works. You need to be honest with yourself. If you are "skinny" and not healthy you need to be honest with yourself. If you are "heavy" and not healthy you need to be honest with yourself. If you are "skinny/heavy" and healthy you need to be honest with yourself.

Where do you draw the line between being obsessed with a goal (losing weight, having more muscle, getting a new job) and where you currently are?


Get honest! Share your thoughts!

- Eat Wise