'wellness' posts

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step,” and the same goes for your health. Sometimes the process of improving or maintaining health may seem difficult, if not impossible. It may seem like a journey of more than just a thousand miles even. But keep in mind, there are little things—baby steps—that you can do every day to make that journey to health an achievable and enjoyable one.

The key is to think small and realistically. Ask yourself, what is your overall goal? Do you want to manage diabetes? Do you want to be able to run a 5k? Do you want to quit smoking? Whatever your goal, even if you don’t have a map, it helps to know your destination and have your shoes strapped on before you head out on the journey.

To figure out if you’re ready to take steps towards your health goals:

• Make a list of pros and cons, such as “pro: eating more vegetables will help me lose weight, con: I don’t know how to cook vegetables that I like."

• Get a journal or find a friend and walk through all the pros you listed. They don’t just have to be health-related. For instance, will increasing the amount of sleep you get each night help you do better at work?

• Try to imagine how you will handle the cons that come with change and make a plan. For example, if your goal is to exercise at least thirty minutes a day but you find it difficult to make time, physically block out time on your calendar (at work, on your phone, etc.) If you miss a day, what will you do to make up for it?

When the pros outweigh the cons, you’ll have a better chance at successfully making that change. Just remember that the larger journey is the product of many smaller steps and often some wrong turns or setbacks. Thinking ahead about what you will do when you take a wrong turn and breaking down your goal into small steps will help you achieve the bigger health goals you set for yourself. If you want to cut down on the number of sweets you eat, cutting them out all at once (trying to leap ahead a thousand miles) is going to be much harder than choosing to eat one cookie after dinner instead of five (taking a single step).

Here are some tricks to help take the baby steps that will move you forward on your journey to better health:

 (Read part 1 of this ‘Spring Cleanse' series here for more on how many calories you actually need, how to track your intake, and what you need to know about fluids.)

The Cleanse…

There are thousands of books out there, everything from an intensive fasting period to a detailed 21+ day program. Pick one that seems like it would yield the highest degree of success for you, but remember these basic parameters of all detoxes and cleanses:

• Don’t go less than 1200 calories a day. (Doing so stimulates a decrease in your metabolism, which unfortunately won’t immediately correct once the cleanse is completed. )
• Don’t expect more than 2 pounds of weight loss per week. If you see this on the scale, it means you are losing lean muscle mass (not a brilliant idea since this tissue is most metabolically active = your best friend in the battle of the bulge) or you are under-hydrated. The goal is gradual fat loss, hydration maintenance, and preservation of lean muscle mass if you want your results to last.
• Avoid junk (caffeine, alcohol, sodium, artificial sweeteners, refined sugars and refined grains). You want to get the biggest bang for your caloric buck, so opt for whole grains, fruits and vegetables rather than processed food.
• Assess your tendency for withdrawal. This can be from caffeine, alcohol, salt, refined grains/sugars, or simply the habit of heading for frozen yogurt on weekends.

What you should know about….

• Caffeine:

Spring is finally here! Finally, the opportunity to congratulate Seattle for behaving according to season, and enjoy tulips that Dougie in the spring breeze, and the first panic wave reminds you that you’ve got only a few weeks before bikini season (you get the point). Your innocent neurons automatically fire “detox diet’ and “cleanse”. Well, let me warn you that I am not a fan of the “drink maple syrup and eat lemon wedges” diet. Not because nutritionally they are a joke, but if you follow one, you morph into a mix of Tasmanian devil and Garfield, a creature with a short temper, little patience, an appetite with no boundaries, yet profound laziness.

Instead, how about something realistic with sustainable results? Here are tips to clean up your eating behaviors and make sure you are on track to tackle your goals.

Track Your Intake:

Do you know how much calories, fat, sugar, fiber, fluids, etc. you are concerned about, that you are consuming these days? This is where you need to start...

We currently have a pertussis (whooping cough) epidemic occurring in Washington State. Infants under 6 months of age are particularly vulnerable but anyone, even if you are fully vaccinated, could potentially contract the disease and spread it.

(Is it really an epidemic? Yes: an epidemic (of a disease) affects many persons at the same time, and spreading from person to person in a locality where the disease is not permanently prevalent.)

Pertussis (whooping cough) is a very contagious disease caused by a type of bacteria called Bordetella pertussis. Among vaccine-preventable diseases, pertussis is one of the most commonly occurring ones in the United States (CDC).

What are the symptoms of whooping cough?

The early signs for pertussis are ...

You hear the diagnosis multiple sclerosis (MS) and your world stops. You don’t know what to think, who to tell, or what to do about your future.

In this video, four people living with MS tell their stories:

But even if you aren’t diagnosed with MS, here are some things you should know:

Did you know that MyPyramid is out and MyPlate is in? I love this new graphic that was adopted by the USDA last June. Dietitians have been advocating this way of eating for a long time and consumers tend to find it easier to understand. I mean, we typically eat off of plates not pyramids, right?

The Academy of Nutrition & Dietetics (formerly the American Dietetic Association) is on board with MyPlate as well. This March, in honor of National Nutrition Month, the Academy’s theme is “Get Your Plate in Shape”.

Here are a few tips for shaping up your plate:

• First of all, the size of your plate does matter and this is one instance where bigger is not necessarily better. Think “plate” not “platter” and aim for a 9” diameter.
• Make half of your plate colorful fruits and/or vegetables. Plan to vary your fruits and vegetables so that you get a rainbow of color over your week or month, which then provides you with a range of different phytochemicals (beneficial plant chemicals).
  
• Sometimes it is not practical to have all 5 food groups in one meal and it certainly is not recommended to overconsume just to get in all 5 groups. Instead, aim for at least 3 food groups per meal while maintaining appropriate portion control ...