Move It Monday – Weekend Eating Habits Can Sabotage a Diet

How was your eating this past weekend?

Weekends tend to wreak havoc on even the most dedicated dieter’s plans. If it’s not your son’s soccer tournament, then it’s the dinner party, or the fast food you grabbed while our running errands on Saturday. But, it’s just one day, right?

Well, unfortunately, no.

Yes, it’s just one day on the calendar, but you can undo a week’s worth of work with one day of indulgences.

Let’s look at a few healthy food items that you might grab on the go, and see where they could fit in:

McDonald’s Grilled Chicken Sandwich. 420 calories. With the small fries, you are now up to 650 calories.
McDonald’s Premium Southwest Salad with Grilled Chicken. 320 cals.  (swap out for crispy  … read more

Eating for Creativity and Productivity

Did you know that changing your eating habits can improve your creativity and productivity?

It can.

For many people, the word Sustenance means food. But, the definition is actually MUCH more broad, and is defined by terms such as: support from below; maintain; encourage.

Read my 5 healthy eating tips specifically designed to make you tremendously creative, ridiculously productive, insanely rich, and absolutely irresistible over at Jen’s Gems … for the Healthy Writer.

(OK, I made up the rich and sexy part, but with the new tools I’ve given you there is no reason why you can’t use those power for good, and work on rich and sexy!)

Also posted in Jen's Gems

Move It Monday – Do you know what a serving size is?

Pre-packaged muffins: 2 servings per muffin

Pint of ice cream: 4 servings

Double-stuff Oreos: ~2 cookies

Did you have ANY idea that that is the FDA-approved serving size for those items? I mean really, who stops at half a muffin? Or two Oreos?

While the US is making huge strides in its nutritional labeling, it still has a long way to go. It’s really easy to quickly glance at a label, note that the calories “aren’t too bad” and rip open the package or throw it in the shopping cart. What fewer people do is bother to see how many servings are in that same package and then consider how it’s likely to be eaten in their household.

Serving sizes came about in the  … read more

Also posted in Move It Monday

Chips as a Healthy Snack???

The other night I was trying to figure out what to do with a couple of sweet potatoes I’d gotten in my CSA produce bin, and immediately “sweet potatoes fries” came to mind.

Since I don’t have a good potato slicer or a deep fryer, I had to move on to Plan B. What about chips made of sweet potatoes? This seemed easy enough.

As always Google to the rescue — it quickly told me exactly what I would need and how to go about it. A skillet filled with veg oil heated to 375, a veg slicer, a HUGE stack of paper towels to absorb the grease, and some seasoning, and I was all set.

But, of course, being a health coach,  … read more

Geek Fit Friday – iPhone App Lose It (Part 2)

A couple of months ago I reviewed my favorite iPhone diet and exercise logging application — Lose It!

Since that time, the people at FitNow have added in a whole lot more accountability in to the application, and made it a whole lot harder to “forget” to track your food intake.

Facebook and Twitter updates. Clearly not for the faint of heart, but you can post your exercise logging, your weight gain/loss, or when you hit your goal.
Mealtime logging reminders. Now that the iPhone has push capability, LoseIt! has taken advantage of it, and you can configured reminders to go off up to 4 times a day to ping you to enter your food and exercise. Personally, a HUGE win in terms  … read more

Also posted in Geek Fit Friday

Geek Fit Friday – the price of supersizing

When Less is…Less

Everyone loves a bargain — and in this economy even moreso.

But, getting a great deal on today’s food is not always in your best long-term interest. You already know this, so I’m not going to belabor the point. Instead, because this is Geek Fit Friday, and I’m all about data, I’m going to talk about what supersizing at some fast food joints actually gets you.

7-Eleven: Gulp to Double Gulp Coca-Cola Classic: 37 cents extra buys 450 more calories.
Cinnabon: Minibon to Classic Cinnabon: 48 more cents buys 370 more calories.
Movie theater: Small to medium unbuttered popcorn: 71 additional cents buys you 500 more calories.
Convenience store: Regular to “The Big One” Snickers: 33 more cents packs on 230 more calories.
McDonald’s:  … read more

Also posted in Geek Fit Friday

Avoid becoming a holiday weight gain statistic

Yesterday my new column went up on WriteOn! Online, where I talk about how to avoid becoming a holiday weight gain statistic, and a better way to track your food intake that actually allows for having a life.

Then today, this article shows up in my Twitter stream: This Is Why You’re Fat: Thanksgiving Meals Average 2,200 Calories Per Serving

Wow!

That is far more than the 1400-1800 that those who have succeeded at long-term weight loss eat in a day. With diabetes rates set to double and costs set to triple in the next 25 years, I really hope that Thanksgiving is the exception rather than the rule for virtually everyone.

As I talk about in my article, one day isn’t make or  … read more

Also posted in Jen's Gems, Z-Health & the Nervous System

More on Gluten Sensitivity

I loved hearing from a bunch of you about how you’ve reacted to gluten, and the impact it has had (or not had) on your life.

That makes the article I got in the mail yesterday from Precision Nutrition even more timely. I encourage you to read the entire article, but it turns out that if you are in the 35-40% of the population that has gluten issues, it can affect mood disorders, your metabolism, increase bone loss, increase the likelihood of pregnancy complications, and increase the likelihood of diabetes.

I know a lot of you are either thinking, “I’ve never had a problem” or “we’ve eaten wheat for thousands of years, what gives.”  Well, a few things. First, our bodies change  … read more

The thyroid / gluten connection

About 10 years ago I was diagnosed as hypothyroid, which in a nutshell means that my thyroid doesn’t function optimally.  Since the thyroid is the body’s governor and regulates our metabolism (heart rate, circulation, cognitive function, etc), having one work well is important. While you can treat it with medication, I don’t know anyone on thryoid meds who doesn’t have some sort of chronic issues and susceptibilities as a result. It’s an autoimmune disease — so there are going to be consequences. As far as immune diseases go, it’s not the end of the world, but it doesn’t make it any less annoying!

Two to three years ago I realized that I wasn’t doing well with processed wheat, and more or  … read more

Geek Fit Friday – Lose It!

Conceptually, weight loss is an easy idea. Take in less calories than we expend. From there, the wheels tend to come off.

Anyone (or anything) that can tell you they know exactly how many calories you burn in any activity is flat-out lying to you. The best anyone can do is make an educated guessed based on the “average” person — however you define that. Current weight, muscle mass, metabolism, and how hard you are working all get factored in.

So, the only thing we can REALLY do is count our intake. The National Weight Control Registry shows that individuals that manage to lose 30+ pounds and keep it off 5+ years eat between 1400 and 1800 calories per day. That is  … read more

Also posted in Geek Fit Friday