Eat Healthy for Life
J Bowler

Lets not talk about diets. Diets are punishment like being
sent to bed without dinner. Diets take some of the fun out of
living. Many diets or supplements are harmful to your health
or even dangerous, if you have certain risk factors.

Forget any past diet failures and push aside any guilt or shame
you harbor about your weight. Its time to look forward; not
back. You have the whole future in front of you to get better
every day. It’s time to eat healthy.

This is not a short term fix. Isnt your health more important
than your weight? Lets be sensible and talk about eating healthy
for life.

Dont get me wrong diets do help many people lose weight for
a time. Almost any restrictive diet can give one a jump start
on weight loss; and many people are so encouraged by the rapid
weight loss that they are motivated to stay on the diet.

Studies have shown that the only diets that work are the ones
you stick to. That why the majority of people who successfully
lose weight on a restrictive diet run into trouble when they
move to the maintenance phase. So again I say, you need a plan
to eat healthy for life.

As with most things in life, theres no ONE solution that
suits everyone. When choosing to eat healthy, a plan for the
rest of your life, you want to find one that YOU can live
with.

If your choice of plan starts with an initial (less than
nutritious) restrictive phase, consider what supplements you ought
to take during that phase. Also be sure that the maintenance part
of the program meets generally accepted nutritional guidelines or
that you can make it do so with minor adjustments or
supplementation. You definitely need to think long term when
choosing to eat healthy.

What Weve Known All Along

With all the diet programs, books, ads and fads these days, its
easy to lose sight of some really basic facts of some very
convincing long term health studies that can guide us to healthier
eating.

1.Calories In vs. Calories Expended

The human body is a marvelous machine. It can be pushed to great
lengths, like pre-exam all-nighters, or to perform amazing feats,
like running marathons or scaling mountains. But it is a machine.
It needs to be cared for and properly maintained.

The more it is abused or pushed to the max, the greater the chance
that parts will break down prematurely or beyond natures ability to
repair them. Like any machine, it needs fuel to operate. Give it
improper or insufficient fuel and it wont run as well, if at all.
Give it too much fuel and that will gum up the works. Now heres
where the analogy breaks down.

With a man made machine, excess fuel simply overflows and makes a
big mess. Unfortunately, the human machine has the amazing capacity
to create unlimited new storage tanks for excess fuel even to the
point of death. Further, once that excess fuel is stored, it is
difficult to dislodge but not impossible. Thats the
Calories In part of the equation.

The fuel you take in is burned by every single movement you make:
breathing smiling, kissing, walking, dancing, chewing and even
digesting your food. The more you move, the more fuel (calories) you
burn.

The part of your body that has the ability to move other parts is
muscle. Ergo the more muscles you have and the more you use them, the
more calories you burn. In fact, every ounce of muscle you add
increases your basal metabolism the rate at which your body burns
fuel.

One pound of fat contains 3500 calories. If you cut 250 calories from
your daily diet and burn another 250 calories with exercise, you
can lose one pound in a week!

The most efficient way to eat healthy operates on both sides of the
equation. Monitor your fuel intake of course; but just as importantly,
get moving to burn that fuel. And better yet, build new muscle to boost
your metabolism the rate at which YOUR body burns fuel. This
way youll burn more calories every hour of every day for the rest of
your life.

2.Secrets of the Worlds Healthiest Populations

Global epidemiological studies have identified some unusually healthy
populations and linked their health to diets that differ in significant
ways from the typical Western diet.

Japan, which has some of the world’s lowest rates of obesity, heart
disease, cancer and diabetes has a diet which is very rich in
carbohydrates. The Japanese enjoy rice, vegetables, beans, and fruits
at most meals.

They have a diet that is very low in saturated fat and red meats, but
high in fish which contain protective omega-3 fatty acids.

Other recent and very interesting studies lead to more healthful eating
tips. The Mediterranean food pyramid is based on research showing low
rates of heart and other chronic disease in certain countries bordering
the Mediterranean Sea compared to the West.

Research has isolated key dietary habits that are believed to account for
the difference. (Monounsaturated) olive oil is the preferred fat and
fat consumption (at 40% of total calories) exceeds the American Heart
Associations recommended max of 30%.

Whole grains and pastas form the base of the pyramid, so this is not a
low carb eating style.

The choice of proteins in order of preference is cheese and yogurt, fish,
poultry, eggs and (last and least) red meat. Further, proteins are grouped
at the top of the pyramid so they account for only about 15% of daily
caloric intake.

Its also important to note that the Mediterranean lifestyle incorporates
more natural physical activity as distinct from the Western variety of
mandatory exercise. You know, the I just gotta get to the gym today
or I have to miss my weekly tennis game Saturday. Now what can I do?!
variety.

If youre interested in following any low carb plan, limit the time you
follow the restrictive phase and take the information above into account
when you plan your maintenance program.

3.Health Risks of Long Term Restrictive Diets

In choosing to eat healthy for life, be sure to consider well-founded
dietary advice such as recommended by the American Cancer Society for
optimal cancer prevention:

Eat five or more (optimally nine) servings of fruits and vegetables
daily; include fruits and vegetables at every meal and for snacks.
Aside from the fact that many fruits and vegetables are good diet food
because they have low calorie density (high water and fiber content),
these foods are loaded with phytochemicals which work to prevent illness,
cancer, and other diseases.

Choose whole grains in preference to processed grains and sugars. Choose
bran, whole wheat bread, brown rice, oats, and whole grain cereals as
well as beans and legumes.

Limit consumption of red meats, especially processed meats and those high
in fat.

Current estimates are that nearly 33-50% of cancers can be prevented
through a eat healthy diet. The recommendations above come from hundreds
of research studies which show a link between cancer prevention and a high
intake of fruits, vegetables, whole grains and legumes. Hundreds of studies
also support the link between a high fat diet, high intake of red meats and
increased incidence of cancer

4.Magic Pills

Dont be taken in by some of the full page ads you see with before and after
pictures that promise weight loss just by taking some magic pill. In some of
them you can even tell that the same head has been pasted onto the fatter
body or the faces look dissimilar enough that you think, Thats NOT the
same person.

If youve read this far you know about the calories in, calories out
equation. Sorry, but its simple math and simple physics. A pill alone will
never do it.

However, that doesnt mean that there are no little magic pills that can
help you lose weight in the context of a healthy eating and
exercise plan. There is a lot of exciting research showing that certain
supplements can boost and sustain your metabolic rate as you age, increase
muscle tone and even help the body develop more muscle, such as Green
Tea Extraxt or DHEA.

Weight loss often results when people switch their focus from dieting in order
to get thin to choosing foods for health. This is especially true if they
also pay heed to the other side of the calories in, calories out
equation and get moving.

Common sense strategies, yes, but these are the only ones proven to work
long-term. Now, are you ready to Eat Healthy for Life?

This article is for informational purposes only. It does not purport to offer
medical advice.

About the Author

Jean Bowler is a life long fitness freak. She was a ballet dancer and teacher, a private fitness trainer and more. Visit her site, http://www.ageless-beauty.com for advice on diet and nutrition, skin care and more.

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A Healthy Diet For Life
Namita Nayyar

Having established that your body needs a well balanced diet, with a good supply of carbohydrates, especially high – fiber foods, water vitamins and minerals, and a certain amount of protein, fat and bacteria, you need to know how to put it into practice.
Much media attention is focused on foods that one should not have, yet there has been very little to tell women how they can use food to enhance their life rather than make it more difficult. Forget the labels; every figure is relative and food manufacturers are frequently very selective about what they tell you, making your task of deciding what is right for you an impossible one. Instead build your choices on the following guidelines.

RESPECT YOUR MOUTH AND BODY: GET INTO THE HABIT OF ONLY EATING THINGS YOU LIKE AND NEED

Before you put anything in your mouth, ask yourself three questions: Do I want it/ Do I like it/ Do I need it?

If you want it and like it then go ahead and enjoy it, if you dont why bother wasting the eating experience? Throw all the boring, unnecessary eating out of your life.

The worst thing you can do with food is to feel guilty about eating it. If you have eaten something that you know is not the healthier but you really fancied it or were in a situation where you didnt have any choice, enjoy it an forget about it. Dont beat yourself up with guilt. Guilt is a negative emotion, which is likely to lead you to bingeing on comfort foods. This can then get you into a negative sugar or salt cycle in which you eat more of these foods, which in turn makes you feel even more guilty. You might then decide its not worth continuing with you healthy eating lifestyle. It is always worth persevering. Remember that life is for living and food is there to help us, not hinder us.

AIM TO EAT FIVE PORTIONS OF FRESH FRUITS AND VEGETABLES EVERY DAY

This provides your body with a good source of vitamins, minerals and fiber, to maintain your body in peak condition to fight diseases. Fiber helps your food to move effectively through the body, keeps you feeling pleasantly full and satisfied and in control of your eating habits, and your energy levels steady.

EAT THREE MEALS A DAY

This is usually made up of one main meal, a smaller snack or lunch-type meal and breakfast. You may, however, feel that you need two smaller snacks, such as a piece of fruit, a small sandwich or a piece of cake, in between two smaller meals. It all depends on your body rhythms. Meals should be based on carbohydrates, such as pasta, whole-meal bread, wholegrain cereals, rice or potatoes, along with fruits and/or vegetables. The main meal should include a source of lean protein, along with carbohydrate and plenty of vegetables and fruits.

CHOOSE LEAN SOURCES OF PROTEIN

Fish, shellfish, lean red meat, game, poultry, eggs or pulses meet your bodys protein requirements without overloading on fats.

TRY TO GET INTO THE HABIT OF USING JUST A SMALL AMOUNT OF FAT

You can use butter, olive oil, sesame oil or walnut oil to enhance the flavor of your food or for cooking, but do try to keep the quantity low.

KEEP YOUR INTAKE OF REFINED SUGAR FOODS LOW

Too much sugar disrupts your natural energy balance, and can cause headaches; mood swings and if eaten in large quantities sugar sensitivity problems such as hypoglycemia and diabetes mellitus. It is much better to get into the habit of using the natural sugars in fruits to provide sweetness.

INCLUDE SOME DAIRY PRODUCTS OR ANOTHER SIGNIFICANT SOURCE OF CALCIUM IN YOUR DAILY DIET

This has far reaching benefits for all women of all age group .

DRINK TWO THREE LITERS (FOUR TO FIVE PINTS) OF WATER EVERY DAY

Water helps the fiber in your food to swell and perform its duties. It also helps to metabolize other nutrients from your food, keep your skin and hair healthy and prevent your body from becoming dehydrated.

TRY NOT TO DRINK MORE THAN THREE CUPS OF COFFEE, TEA OR COLA .

All such drinks contain caffeine, which inhibit the absorption of vitamins and minerals from the gut, causes your body to excrete vital nutrients and interferes with the fluid and energy balance mechanisms in your body. Caffeine also causes your body to be stimulated in an artificial way, which in the long run has the opposite effect of supressing your performance and general feeling of well

INCLUDES SOME GOOD BACTERIA IN YOUR DAILY DIET, IN THE FORM OF LIVE YOGURT CONTAINING BIFIDUS AND ACIDOPHILUS

A small pot of bio yogurt a day should help to keep a healthy balance of good and bad bacteria in your gut. If you dont like or are unable to eat live yogurt, seek the advice of your dietician

TRY TO EAT REGULARLY AND IDEALLY NOT LEAVE YOUR STOMACH EMPTY FOR MORE THAN FOUR TO FIVE HOUR

This helps to keep your gut functioning effectively. Regular eating helps your gut maintain a steady supply of digestive enzymes, protects it from excess acid secretion and enables it to metabolize food in the most efficient way, to keep your energy level and moods on an even keel

KEEP YOUR ALCOHOL INTAKE MODERATE

Some drinks, especially young red wines such as Beaujolais, contain anti-oxidant vitamins and minerals, which can help to reduce the risk of heart disease and some cancers. Beers and Champagnes can also provide beneficial nutrients. Drinking can be a very pleasurable part of a healthy lifestyle, but drinking to excess can cause liver damage, mood and energy-balance problems. Try not to drink on an empty stomach as this can cause your blood sugar levels to crash.

FOOD COMBINING/SEPARATING

The issue of whether you should eat proteins and carbohydrates at the same meal is one that regularly crops up in the media. Some diet consultants feel strongly that proteins and carbohydrates should be separated, and advocate that proteins should be eaten only with vegetables and fruit, not mixed with carbohydrates. Many people feel that their body functions better if they out this into practice; it is commonly known as food combining.
From the physiological and nutritional viewpoint, proteins (meat, chicken, fish, eggs, cheese, nuts, pulses) provide the body with amino acids, used as building blocks within muscles and other tissues. Carbohydrates provide energy and fiber. If you eat proteins on their own, without carbohydrate present, the protein can be broken down into energy, rather than used for building body tissue. Proteins also have other important functions to perform in maintaining body health and carbohydrates protect proteins, enabling them to fulfill these functions.

The choice is yours, but there is no physiological reasoning behind food combining. I believe that food is there to be enjoyed. Women should not have to agonize over whether they are allowed to eat certain things at certain times.

To know more on how to make healthy choices of food while eating ,log on to www.womenfitness.net,a complete resource for healthy living .

About the Author

Ms Namita Nayyar is a gold medalist in M Sc (Child development)and a fitness trainer with a sound knowledge of normal & therapeutic nutrition . She is the founder of Women Fitness (www.womenfitness.net)

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Weight watchers is a great way to lose weight. It also costs about $40 a month. Some might think that $40 a month is no big deal and maybe it isn’t but in this sluggish economy that $40 could easily go to so many other places in your budget. Weight watchers, or a really close imitation, could easily be accomplished with a little research and dedication for free at home.

There are plenty of resources out there that will help you figure out how many points you are allowed each day and how to attach point values to the food you eat, just like weight wathcers. So, get out your calculator and start figuring. It really is pretty easy, just follow some simple steps to arrive at the numbers you need.

You might need to go out and get a book with calorie counts for food that doesn’t have labels like fresh fruits and vegetables or find a free one online. I am sure they are out there, you just have to look.

Weight watchers does work, I lost my first 16 pounds with weight watchers. The problem lies in being able to afford the monthly payment throughout the whole time you need to lose weight. I could only make it about 3 months. I wish I could have gone longer and maybe I could have just continued the program on my own. They give you everything you need to continue to lose weight even if you have to quit going to the meetings. I should have had the motivation to continue but I didn’t and I am still overweight.

When you know that that $40 per month could benefit you in so many other ways it is hard to justify using it for what amounts to purely selfish reasons. Not that losing weight is selfish but it only benefits you. Of course, you want to lose weight and be healthier and that can benefit your family, as well, but as a mother, I have felt the guilt of wanting something all for myself when my children needed or wanted something else.

Anyway, if you do have the money to afford weight watchers then I would highly recommend using it to get thin and fit. With the weekly meetings and monthly weigh-ins you are held to a higher standard than you would be if you were trying to lose weight on your own. There is an accountability with weight watchers that keeps you on your toes and moving keeps you moving forward and the numbers on the scale moving downward.

You realize, when going to the meetings or even doing the program they have online that you are not the only person in the world who has to lose weight, no matter how much you have to lose. Whether it is 20 pounds, or 120 pounds, or more the people at weight wathcers are there for you and they have great supplements and snack foods that will help you stay on track and not go running back to all the bad carbs and calories that you have been used to.

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Eureka! We’ve finally made it, now we really can eat candy and lose weight thanks to hoodia power pops. The wonderful little lollipops are infused with genuine hoodia to help suppress your appetite between meals while also allowing you to indulge your sweet tooth in a guilt free way.

For those of you who aren’t really sure what hoodia is, here is an overview:

1. Hoodia is a plant that grows exclusively in the Kalahari desert in South Africa. The plant has been known for centuries by the native bushmen as an effective appetite and thirst suppressant.

2. Hoodia is thought to work by tricking the brain into thinking that the body is full, thus effectively shutting down the appetite. If you don’t feel hungry, you won’t eat as much in between meals as well as during your meals and less food intake will result in weight loss.

3. When purchasing a supplement containing hoodia you must make sure that it’s the hoodia gordonii variety that has been added and not some other form of hoodia (there are over 20 different varieties but only the gordonii has been shown to have the P57 compound which scientists have isolated as the compound that provides the appetite suppressant.)

4. The P57 compound is not in the roots or skins of the hoodia plant, only in the core. Therefore make sure that the supplements you purchase are made up with only core hoodia powder and not whole powder since whole powder will have a much lower concentration of P57 and won’t work as effectively (though it will be considerably less expensive).

5. While there has been no documentation of any dangerous side effects from hoodia the one thing that you do need to be careful about is not eating or drinking enough. Even though you are dieting you don’t want to starve your body and the appetite suppressant can be powerful enough so that many people forget to eat. Hoodia is also a thirst suppressant so be very careful to drink plenty of water throughout your day when taking the supplement.

6. Make sure that you enter into your diet program with the right frame of mind. Hoodia has millions of loyal fans who swear by it’s effectiveness but you still have to alter your lifestyle and eat plenty of low fat, high nutrient food and get a lot of exercise if you want to see the full effects… and keep those changes permanently.

The power pop diet recommends that you have one sucker along with 8 ounces of water 30 minutes prior to each meal during the day to help you eat less and feel sated more quickly.

While hoodia power pops may sound like a dieters dream come true, it’s important to remember that they aren’t magic. When it comes to losing weight and maintaining a safe weight for life you have to remember that it’s all about what you eat, drink and how much exercise you get. Using supplements to help you stay on course is a great idea, but don’t enter into a diet thinking that your old habits can continue, that approach won’t work for the long run and you’ll only end up failing.

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