November 2009

My mom made the most luscious cheesecake for Thanksgiving that I couldn’t help but bring home leftovers.  The cheesecake is gone now and is now living somewhere around my middle.  After four days of fun, family, and far too much food, I need to find my way back to a normal, healthy diet.

Here are some simple ways to help rid yourself of that bloated, overfed feeling we all get after a long, holiday weekend:

Step it up:  Exercise will help you get your energy back, burn off those extra calories, and stimulate digestion.

Hydrate:  Chances are that after eating salty turkey and stuffing, you’re retaining water.  Drink lots of extra water today — at least 64 ounces, but some experts believe that drinking half your “weight” in water is more appropriate.  So if you weight 150 pounds, drink 75 ounces of water a day to encourage water loss.

Add fiber:  Insoluble fiber — the stuff found in foods like oatmeal, carrots, and apple (skin on) — helps move food through the digestive tract faster.  Load up on fruits (keep those skins on!), veggies, and whole grains.

In a few days, you’ll be right back on track!  Just in time for the next holiday meal to roll around!

Want to slim down?  Then slow down.  A new study out of Greece proved a popular belief true:  When you eat too fast, your body doesn’t have time to register that “I’m full” feeling.

When researchers fed volunteers ice cream, they discovered that those who took an entire half hour to finish their serving had higher levels of certain “gut hormones” that regulate a person’s hunger.  They also tended to rate themselves as more full than those who ate quickly.

Think about it:  When’s the last time you took 30 minutes to eat a bowl of ice cream?   That’s the point, lead study author Alexander Kokkinos, MD, PhD, told Science Daily.

“Our findings give some insight into an aspect of modern-day food over-consumption, namely the fact that many people, pressed by demanding working and living conditions, eat faster and in greater amounts than in the past,” said Kokkinos. “The warning we were given as children that ‘wolfing down your food will make you fat,’ may in fact have a physiological explanation.”

It’s not easy to spread a snack out over a half hour — who has time for that?  But we can all be more mindful of what and how we’re eating.  Planning family dinners around the table, passing up the drive-thru, and putting down your fork to just stop and enjoy your food for a moment are all ways that you can slow down the pace of eating … and your life.

The turkey is stuffed, and in a few hours the rest of the family will be, too.

Resist the temptation to pile on the couch to watch football.  Instead, use the time to make fun family memories while burning off that extra serving of Grandma’s mashed potatoes.  Then you can go hit the couch for some football!

Here are some ideas to get you moving:

• Show your pro-bowler uncle who’s boss with a game of Wii bowling.
• Gather everyone up for a family hike in the crisp fall air.
• Light a fire — but first chop your own wood!  Or head out into the woods to cut your own Christmas tree.
• Rake Grandma’s yard for her, then get a family football game going while you’re out there.
• Gather up the kids and go for an outdoor scavenger hunt or a game of hide-n-seek.
• Use up the last of those pumpkins (you know the squirrels are going to eat them anyway) with a game of pumpkin bowling.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Just four more days until Thanksgiving and the official kick-off the of the holiday season.  A friend of mine, who also happens to be a very successful personal trainer, has great advice for anyone hoping to make it through the holiday without any extra “baggage”:  “Thanksgiving is one day,” she says.  “Christmas and Hanukkah?  One day.  New Years … ONE DAY.”

Her point is that instead of spending the entire season loading up on extra food and alcohol, we should allow ourselves those three or four days to have fun, but eat regular, healthy meals in between.

Alliance for a Healthier Generation has some great tips for making your Thanksgiving a little healthier.  Their top three include:

To see their full list of 10 ways to a healthier turkey (or tofurkey!) day, visit their website.

October was Breast Cancer Awareness Month, but breast cancer is a disease we should be thinking about twelve months a year.  And the new, controversial, and confusing advice from the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force regarding breast cancer screening for women under 50, recently thrust the issue of breast cancer back into the national spotlight.

Though the task force says that younger women should skip their yearly mammograms and breast self-exams and that women over 50 only need them every two years, the American Cancer Society said that it will continue to encourage women to take young women’s preventative care seriously.  This isn’t an issue that will be settled any time soon, so in the mean time, the best advice regarding your own personal situation will come from your own doctor.

What do you think about the task force’s findings?

I found myself frustrated last winter when, day after day, my 5-year-old came home telling me about yet another indoor recess.  “Mrs. X says that if one kid doesn’t bring boots and snow pants, the whole class stays inside.”

It was an annoying rule that quickly got challenged, and soon the kids were back out playing in the snow.  But a recent U.S. study found that it’s not unusual for kids to be stuck inside due to inappropriate clothing choices.

From Forbes:

Clothing that limited or prevented outdoor activity included: inadequate weather protection, such as a lack of coats and gloves in the winter; unsuitable footwear, such as flip flops; and “nice” or expensive outfits that had to be treated with care.

Though a large school may be able to provide alternatives for kids who aren’t dressed to play outside, day care centers and preschools often have supervision rules they must follow.  That can mean that if one child can’t go outside, the whole class stays in.

Outdoor play is an important part of any child’s day. It provides exercise, fresh air, sunlight, as well as social and creative play and a chance to interact with nature.  I cope with my own forgetful nature by buying a second set of snow pants, boots, mittens, and a hat to keep at school, and we donate all of our outgrown winter clothing to Coats for Kids to help out families who might not be able to afford warm winter clothing.

Have your kids ever been kept inside due to clothing choices?

Photo: tienvijftien, Flickr

The days are shorter now, the nights cooler.  Though it’s safe to exercise outside in the cold (as long as you don’t have chronic health conditions), it can be tempting to settle in on the couch when the evenings are cold and dark.

Don’t settle in for winter just yet, though, especially with the holidays on their way.  There are plenty of fun ways to burn calories in autumn.  Here are a few ideas:

• raking leaves: 293 calories per hour
• a brisk walking color tour on a nearby nature trail: 204 per hour
• apple picking:  200 calories per hour
• fall gardening: 272 calories per hour
• chopping wood: 408 calories per hour

Want to see how many calories you’re burning this fall?  Here’s a handy calculator to help you add them up.

Did you ever notice how after a really demanding day, you just don’t feel like working out?  Sometimes, though, when stress levels get high, working out is exactly what you need.  So what’s the deal?

According to a small study, when the brain is tired it can affect exercise  … even though the body isn’t exhausted at all.  When researchers asked subjects to work out after either doing a strenuous mental task for 90 minutes or sit on the couch, the group who’d performed the mental taxed stopped sooner and complained they were tired, even though tests showed their bodies weren’t any more worn out than the group who rested on the couch.

The You Docs suggest that this has to do with the “reptilian brain,” which operates on instinct.  But as powerful as the reptilian brain is, it can be overridden with a little tough self-talk.  If you find yourself ready to quit, say the Docs, ask yourself if it’s really your body that’s tired or if it’s your brain.  If your body feels ready to keep working, try playing some mental tricks with yourself to keep going.  My favorite?  “I’ll walk to the next corner, then I’ll quit.”  Play it enough times, and your workout is over!

H1N1 vaccines are finally rolling in to health departments and doctor’s offices around the country.  If you’re interested in being vaccinated against the swine flu, here are a few facts that might make the process a little smoother:

There are two kinds of H1N1 vaccine – the shot and the spray.  The spray is live, weakened version of the virus that can be used by healthy people (no underlying health conditions) between the ages of 2 and 49.  The shot is for everyone else.

Many health departments are limiting the vaccine to priority groups only right now.  Those include:

• pregnant women
• household contacts and caregivers of infants under 6 months
• healthcare workers and emergency medical personnel
• children and adults ages six months to 24 years
• people aged 25 to 64 with underlying health conditions

Supply is increasing every week, however, and authorities say there should be ample supply for everyone who wants a shot soon.

Children nine and under will need two doses of the vaccine, three to four weeks apart.  Adults, older children, and pregnant women need just one shot.

Though there’s a delay in the delivery of seasonal vaccines, health experts say that it’s safe to get both the seasonal flu shot and the H1N1 shot at the same time, as long as both are not in the live vaccine (spray) form.

For more information about H1N1 and the vaccine, visit Flu.gov.  If you can’t get or don’t want the vaccine, you can protect your health by:

• washing your hands regularly during the day.
• staying away from those who are know to be or visably ill.
• strengthening your immune system by eating plenty of fruits and vegetables, sleeping at least eight hours a night, and stopping smoking.

As we age, we lose strength and aerobic capacity says science (and common sense).  But while in the past most experts have agreed that the these things fade gradually over time, a new study found that after age 45, fitness fades fast.  And if you add in smoking, a sedentary lifestyle, or obesity, it goes down hill even faster.

From Forbes:

“We’ve known that, as you age, your aerobic capacity goes down, and the exercise physiology literature indicates it’s a linear relationship. We found that this is not the case,” said Jackson, who is professor emeritus of health and human performance at the University of Houston. “It makes sense to me. When things aren’t working right, we tend to go down at faster rates. This was true for both men and women [although the rate of decline was faster for men than for women].”

Forty five is the new 35 in my book, so no one wants to hear that their fitness levels are getting set to plummet.  There are things you can do to stop the drop, so to speak.  And they’re the same things you’ve always been doing to stay healthy:

• Exercise.  It’s no longer negotiable, it’s a must.  But 30 minutes moderate exercise a day is enough for most people.
• Eat a diet rich in fruits and vegetables, whole grains, lean proteins, nuts and legumes.
• Stop smoking.
• Get enough sleep, and do what needs to be done to keep stress at bay.

These rules apply whether your 25, 45, or 60.  Taking care of yourself never goes out of style.