Archive for the ‘Healthy Foods’ Category
TALKING TO KIDS ABOUT WEIGHT
Friday, December 16th, 2011“But it’s so yummy, mummy…” begins an article by Eleanor Mills on the daunting task of steering kids toward healthy food and weight. Mills explores, in the London Sunday Times and on her Fat Kittens blog (http://www.fattkittens.wordpress.com/2011/12/12/), how best to “tame your child’s weight.” We’re pressed lately to halt the obesity epidemic among children, yet there’s little practical guidance on what parents can actually do in real life with kids.
On the one hand, we know mothers who’ll militate against birthday cupcakes in school. At the same time, we still see an awful lot of Doritos and Sponge Bob Roll-Ups in the lunch kits. Sometimes, you’re reluctant to admit that your kids refuse any whole wheat version of anything. Other times, you feel rigid and bossy saying “no” to more cookies. You don’t want to damage your child’s self-esteem by mentioning the chubbiness. Yet you don’t want health or social problems to result. What’s a parent to do? (more…)
Why You Should Cook More to Weigh Less
Wednesday, November 2nd, 2011Look for Dr. Katz’ articles, and more on staying fit, at http://www.hivehealthmedia.com Check out the front page, guest posts, and weight loss entries.
COOKING TO EAT MORE SANELY
Friday, October 21st, 2011Yes, it would be great to adopt all those habits that lead to better weight loss and health. But here’s one to tackle that you might underestimate in your search for diet solutions. Simply put: Cook more often.
Cooking can check weight and improve health even if you’re no expert low-cal chef. When we cook at home, we can avoid the added salt, sugar, and fats contained in take-out, fast-food, or restaurant fare. We can control portions better. We can up the vegetables, shrink the starches, make more of those foods we don’t gorge on. We can make extras for dinner to bring for lunch and thereby avoid the cafeteria. We can get used to, and develop preferences for, real fresh foods that are good for us and our waistlines.
Two myths can stand in the way of our cooking more, however: (more…)
IF SELF-CONTROL’S A MUSCLE, WHY CAN’T I EXERCISE IT?
Friday, September 9th, 2011A new book on willpower asserts that it’s a muscle. That is, you can strengthen it with practice, and you can exhaust it with stress and overuse. This makes sense, and years of research back the idea. For those trying to eat differently—to lose weight or simply to choose more wisely—the strength of this muscle can determine whether change occurs or not. As with physical exercise, many of us struggle to start and stick with it. However, even those who can flex the muscle in other situations can find it too weak to budge when it comes to food. So if self-control’s a muscle, why can’t you exercise it here, too?
The book Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength, by Roy F. Baumeister and John Tierney, draws on Baumeister’s work on self-control. The benefits of self-control have been documented for decades. And studies have established that practice indeed bolsters self-control (even if people vary genetically in that trait). Baumeister’s work goes farther, finding that self-control can fizzle out—when people’s minds are taxed and fatigued, when they’ve been struggling at self-control for too long a stretch at once. Here is more solid evidence against restrictive dieting. And here is support for the idea that small, persistent efforts will become habits. That’s all good news, and helpful for those working to lose weight.
It can be hard to see, though, how this applies to those who say “It feels like a force comes over me”, as they head for the ice cream. Or: “I just wasn’t thinking,” as they pull into KFC. “I knew I was doing it but didn’t care,” as they attack the brownies.
And what’s going on when a person’s done well for months, then suddenly finds herself slipping into old ways, regaining every lost pound? These are the stories of many, maybe most, overeaters. (more…)
FALL CHANGES
Monday, August 29th, 2011Sometimes I think we should make resolutions in September instead of January. After all, this is when we’re shifting anyway—returning to work or school, getting kids ready for new routines, adjusting to cooler weather and shorter days. It’s a time of transition, usually to busier days that are nevertheless more structured and predictable than in the looser summer months.
By resolutions, I’m not referring to grand declarations of sweeping change once and for all. I’m thinking more of those smaller, much more realistic adjustments–changes or additions to a routine, say– that may not sound dramatic but lead to solid results that tend to last over time. These are the kinds of changes that can join your new, or reestablished, fall routines without too much pain.
For example, we often return to more predictable mealtimes in the fall—even if schedules vary from day to day with kids’ activities or work meetings. Busy as we may be, we can at least look at the week ahead and know where we’ll be when. Healthy weight maintenance and sane dealings with food relate directly to how we approach mealtimes. To move closer to those goals, pick one mealtime to improve on a regular basis. Try the change for a week, fine-tune and problem-solve as you go along, then try it a second week. If you veer off your plan for any reason, resume as soon as you can and go from there. (more…)
Sane Eating – Part 3: A Road Map
Wednesday, May 11th, 2011Many thousands of entries pop up when you enter “diet” on amazon.com or any search engine. At the very least, this confirms the fact that what works for one person may not work for the next. But if you’re asking yourself how to manage weight and eat more sanely, you can come up with a few rules of thumb to follow, no matter who you are.
To start with, keep in mind that any eating issues exist in a complicated social, biological, and psychological environment. If you’ve reached a point of discouragement because of repeated weight loss failures, this will hopefully feel at least a little freeing to you. It’s not your fault, and you can learn some new ways.
So, first, you must figure out what is the best way for you to eat. Many healthy diets exist (and of course the books to explain them). Each and every one of us must learn what foods, in what quantities, contribute to our maintaining a healthy weight. This must be a pattern of eating and food choice that you can live with forever, period. Anything that is short-term will likely lead to regain and a return to diet craziness. Furthermore, diets that require special foodstuffs and odd concoctions won’t last for the long run.
Finding a diet pattern you can live with usually takes some trial-and-error, paying attention to how you feel physically, whether or not you feel satisfied, how the plan fits with your lifestyle and preferences. Many people need help with this part of their plan—for example, from a coach, nutritionist, or doctor. On the other hand, many, maybe most, former dieters know what works for them and feel that what they really need are better skills for sticking with it.
Then, you get started, with the intention of creating a path and a chain of habits that can survive a lifetime. How do you prepare yourself to get started? Do you start all-at-once or in baby steps? Understanding how change happens, and what helps you to change, can help. (more…)
NEWS FOR SANE EATING
Friday, May 6th, 2011 Every day, the media serves up something about food or diets or weight. Some of it can support our efforts to eat sanely, and some not so much. In either case, these items often spark my blogpost comments In the last two weeks I’ve culled quite a few of these flashes. I share them here in hopes that one or more might catch your interest, or spur you to make or keep wanted changes.
-research supports the idea that “stealth vegetables” can help you reduce your overall caloric intake while keeping you feeling fuller. The idea is to add pureed vegetables to meals like soup or casseroles, making them heartier, more filling, and more nutritious as they curb your appetite. This same body of research suggests that cayenne pepper might act as an appetite suppressant, particularly for people who don’t regularly eat spicy foods.
-the April 11, 2011 New York Times Magazine features a cover story about sugar as a toxin. I’m still hearing people talk about this one. Read it for a jolt—and possibly some aversion therapy if you’re trying to reduce your sugar intake. Generally speaking, reducing sugar can help you eat more sanely, whether you’ve got a lot of weight to lose or not. (more…)
NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS THAT STICK….AND TEN SMALL CHANGES THAT COUNT
Friday, January 7th, 2011It’s a fresh start….it feels great….but I’m afraid I won’t keep it up…. I’ve heard these words, or something like them, a lot this week. So, I start this new year with thoughts on our resolutions to eat well, lose weight, or otherwise improve our diet habits.
New Year’s diet resolutions usually fizzle quickly. The goals we set may be too broad and sweeping, too out of touch with reality to last. They don’t factor in the inevitable complications and challenges. They don’t consider whether or not we’re really prepared or ready. Grand resolutions—say, to eat every day in a way that keeps weight down, for good, forever, period—require understanding and preparation. I’ll return to those in my next blog. Here, I offer some ideas for smaller resolutions.
Those who follow my blogs will know that I believe in the power of small changes (related blogs listed below). Changing one or two specific habits may or may not lead immediately to lost pounds. They open the door to other and bigger changes, though. And they usually have value in themselves, however they affect the scale in the short run. Perhaps most important now, they’re likely to stick. They’re less likely to fizzle out in two weeks. So they’ll leave you feeling confident about your ability to make future changes.
Previous blogs, like those listed here and others, offer plenty of ideas for small changes to integrate into your life right now. Here are ten additional ones, most gleaned from recent studies on weight management. The idea is to start doing this one thing. Assess (more…)
THE BEST DIET: MORE FINDINGS TO FACTOR IN
Monday, September 20th, 2010There’s no one best diet for everyone. Looking at how much people lose and keep off, research tells us a little about which diets might slightly outdo the competitors. A few constants emerge, nevertheless, from the many studies carried out over the years. Most of these rules of thumb not only help manage weight, as it happens, but also minimize cancer, cardiac, and other major disease risks. Put in very short form, the best diets usually include lots of vegetables, along with fruits, lean protein, healthy oils, whole grains and legumes. The best diets keep sugar and refined carbohydrates to a minimum. And they are consumed within a lifestyle that includes exercise.
Different diets prescribe these food categories in different proportions and amounts, and that’s where individual needs and choices—and outcomes—enter the picture. It’s proving true that people with a lot of weight to lose (nearing 100 pounds, say) often do better on diets that emphasize protein, rather than those that emphasize complex carbohydrates. (Let me say here, though, that the adage “the best diet is the one you’ll stick with” often applies even in these cases). (more…)
MAD ABOUT LUCKY CHARMS & FROOT LOOPS?: How that helps sane eating
Thursday, August 12th, 2010The following foods carry a “healthy” label from the manufacturers: Lucky Charms, Froot Loops, Cocoa Pebbles, McDonald’s Happy Meals, Burger King Kids Meals, certain frozen corn-dog-and-fries dinners, and…..you get the picture. As people push to get more fruits and vegetables onto their plates, food companies have added just enough of something—maybe increased whole wheat, for example–to justify the “healthy” claim. In part, the claim on the label attracts people to these foods, which aren’t really so healthy. Also, it allows the food companies to keep on advertising the foods to children—otherwise, new laws would try to stop them.
How can knowing this help you eat more sanely? Or lose weight? Several recent books and movies have drawn our attention to alarming food company practices (see below). These practices keep us eating foods that are fattening, possibly harmful to health, and definitely appetite-stimulating. That means they’re hard to not overeat. Once aware of this, we hope to start making better choices. We may consider how to minimize or avoid processed, sugar-added foods. By definition, though, this is easier said than done. If a food is indeed engineered to make you want more, then you’re probably going to have to struggle to eat less of it. (more…)
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