No Failing

Some of my clients are facing new weight loss challenges and the dreaded plateau, but you can actually be on a successful weight loss track, and because you don’t KNOW what a successful track looks like, it may feel like you are failing.

Once you believe that you have screwed up, it is easy to say “screw it” and really screw up. I am good at that! If only you knew how well you were doing! While success does depend on your specific goals, starting point, body type and exercise routine, there are a few things that are consistent across the board. Here are some things to consider:

1. Weight loss does NOT come in the form of losing two pounds every week until you reach your goal, no matter how well you’ve stuck to your food and exercise plan.

When you gain weight, you don’t gain two pounds every single week in a measured fashion. You’re not going to lose it in a measured fashion no matter how well you stick to your plan. You might lose two pounds one week. You might even lose three pounds in a week. Then, you might lose one pound the next week.

Some weeks you might lose zero, and there are weeks you even gain. These weeks are the most frustrating, and we all have these kinds of weeks where we feel like we’re doing everything right and the scale doesn’t give us what we want.

Keep track of the weekly weigh-ins but take a look at the month and see the overall trend. You might have gained a 1/2 pound one of the weeks but take note if you lost 4 pounds overall for the month. If the month is trending downwards, you are in the right place.

2. Nobody is perfect 100% of the time.

Just because you went out drinking and ate all the bread, stuffed yourself with fried food and had two desserts, and then woke up and had eggs Benedict the next day does not mean you have failed.

Everyone does this.

We all make a commitment and we all slip up. I ate an entire chocolate cake the other day. You fell. So what? Learn what will work for you to get back on track. You can fall and still be on a successful weight loss track by simply making the decision to get back there.

Real life weight loss is like a marathon, some miles are effortless, some are excruciating and the only way you really fail is if you quit.

Something New

Hi.  I am trying a different blog format, so for now I have put this blog on hold.  Please check out my new format at musclemommy.net

PRE and POST … EAT!

When it comes to nourishing your body before and after a workout, many people think about three big meals a day. However, one of the best things that you can do for your body is to provide it with more immediate nutrition. Try timing your workout so that it is in between meals with a nutrient and protein-packed snack to bookend it on either side. There is a key 90 minute period in which you want to work out; eating a meal 90 minutes before you exercise, a quick energy and “fuel” meal right before your workout, again right after your workout, and another meal 90 minutes later.

Remember, the point of your pre-workout meal or snack is to provide your body with the materials it needs to fuel your workout. Any time you are increasing strength and building up your body, you need to provide your body with the nutrients it needs to carry it through the workout– otherwise, your body will consume reserve resources in the body, which are much harder to replace.

The point of eating after your workout is to provide your muscles with the materials that they need to build themselves back up. When you do any kind of weight training, your muscles actually break themselves down in the form of small tears in the muscle fibers and then rebuild themselves even stronger in the hours and days that follow your workout. In order to successfully rebuild themselves, your muscles must replenish their resources. Providing your body with the raw materials it needs to rebuild and refuel itself is the entire point of your post-nutrition meals.

Drinking smoothies is one of the best ways to quickly get easily absorbable nutrients into your body after a workout.  Time is truly of the essence when refueling your body post-workout– and using a smoothie, which is liquid and therefore more easily broken down, is a great way to go.  If I have somewhere to go right after the gym, I will pre-make my smoothie and carry it with me to the gym in a thermos or insulated coffee mug to keep it cold and fresh.
Green Power Smoothie:
1 cup liquid- water, juice, or soy/rice milk
1 scoop protein powder
1 serving greens product (Greens+ is a highly recommended option)
1 frozen banana
1/4 cup frozen blueberries

Almond Butter Fruit Smoothie:
1 cup liquid- water, juice, or soy/rice milk
1 scoop protein powder
2 tablespoons almond butter
1 frozen banana
1/4 cup strawberries
1/4 cup frozen blueberries

By using frozen banana, you eliminate the need for ice, and by freezing the blueberries you increase their antioxidant power. Whey or hemp proteins are especially easy for the body to digest, so look for a protein powder based on that criteria. You can use any kind of fruit in your smoothie, so choose your favorites and drink up!

Light Bulb Moment : Fat v.s. Sugar

 
It is interesting how one little bit of information can lead to more little bits that take you
to a light bulb moment.  When I was writing my 5 part article, one of the parts was about burning
fat instead of sugar.  I know that sugar is poison, but this was a new way of looking at it for me. 
I don’t eat a lot of sugar though, so I was glad I had a deeper understanding of the whole “sugar thing”, 
but I didn’t think about it too much more.

There is a lot of info out now about doing cardio at a fat burning level which is at a slower pace. 
The theory is that you will burn more fat if you do cardio at a slower pace (your fat burning zone). 
This made sense, but the flip side of this is that when you work at a slower pace, you burn less
calories.  If you do intense cardio, you burn way more calories, so you lose more weight. From a
purely numbers game of weight loss, you want to burn as many calories as you can, so this
“fat burning zone” stuff didn’t seem too important to me.

However, now I have two somewhat unrelated bits of information about burning fat.  One has to do with
lowering your consumption of sugar, and the other has to do with slower paced cardio.

There is a difference between burning fat and burning sugar. While your body can burn either fuel,
it is far better off burning fat. Fat is the body's fuel of choice. Fat, not sugar, is our most
inexhaustible and healthy energy resource. 

The reality is that far too many people do not have the energy they need or want, and there are a
series of slight adjustments one can take to change this aspect of your life.  Let’s incorporate
two somewhat unrelated bits of info.

The first step is to focus on reduction in sugar, and to stop viewing sugar as a primary source
of energy. When you start to reduce your sugar intake, you set in motion a process where your body
can start to burn more fat, to rely on fat as an energy source not sugar. 

The next step is to Slow Down and rethink the idea you hold in your head of what "ideal" exercise
is. When you do an intense workout, you often trigger an innate "fight or flight" mechanism, which
is designed to get us out of trouble quickly. This intense process primarily uses sugar as an energy
source. When you move slowly, your body primarily uses fat as an energy source. 

Key Concept: When you get your body into a mode where you burn fat, you tap into a virtually unlimited
energy source.  There is a guy named  Stu Mittleman who broke the American record for running
100 miles in a day. 

Stu says that our bodies store about 2,500 sugar calories, but have a minimum of 130,000 fat
calories available. When you burn fat your body does not "freak out" and want you to replace
it immediately. If you burn 500 calories in a high intensity workout, most likely you are burning
sugar. In this case your body starts to send signals out to replace that sugar ASAP which leads to sugar
cravings. When you approach exercise in a more comfortable and enjoyable pace, you can begin to
draw from the broader sources of energy. 

This concept might sound simple, but the difficulty lies in the fact that the dominant fitness 
culture promotes intense workouts followed by ingesting sugary sports drinks, and I was going
right along with it. This was one of my light bulb moments. Recently, I started doing a DVD at home
called Insanity.  It is a great high intensity workout, and I love it (and hate it).  As with any
workout DVD series, it comes with a nutrition guide.  One of the things they tell you to do is have
a “recovery” drink after your workout.  I have always had a protein shake after all my workouts, but
just protein.  This program says to get some simple sugars with your recovery drink, to replenish
what you just burned off.  SO I started having a Tbsp of raw honey added to my protein shake….
So I can replace the sugar I just burned off?  Really?  What was I thinking?  No more honey for me. 

Most likely you are familiar with the phrase "no pain, no gain." For many of us, me included,
our ideal vision workout might be an hour of a high level spinning class. We associate ideal
exercise with these high intensity workouts. 

But it is common sense if you think about it. Our bodies over the years were built to store fat
to keep us alive as we moved around long distances. We moved slowly, and our bodies adapted to give
us energy to move long distances. I am not going to stop doing my intense cardio workouts, but I
am most certainly going to pay more attention to the fat burning, slower paced workouts and make
sure I have a good mix of both.

Free from the bondage of poor health (final part)

Habit of Health # 5 is to be active.

Again, I use a car analogy…Even the most expensive, luxury car won’t run after being left in a garage for too long without use.

The batteries will go dead, the tires will go flat.

Similarly, a person whose heart, lungs and muscles have gone flat isn’t going to be able to do much.

So, keep yourself in shape!

The body adapts down in capacity if we are inactive physically.  Muscles become smaller, bones become thinner, hormone production decreases, cellular conversion of energy gets lazy — if we are inactive, nature chooses disintegration.

To avoid this, keep your self active… by keeping your body engaged in life and demanding performance out of it.

We’re not talking about extreme exercise, but we are talking about regular activities that promote deep breathing, sweating and that keeps our muscles toned. Walking (especially uphill), swimming, bicycling, weight training, even just deep breathing are all good activities.

As you know I am a huge proponent of exercise.  There are 100’s of reasons to keep active.  Most of my posts have to do with exercise and physical activity.  Find your reason, the best reason that makes sense to you and start moving!

Free from the bondage of poor health (PART 4)

Habit of Health # 4

Maintain the nutrient levels in your body

 

The nutrients your body needs come in this order of importance:

1. minerals
2. enzymes
3. vitamins
4. protein
5. all other nutrients

Nutrients are needed as spare parts for repair of cellular tissues and to ensure your cells operate correctly.

When your nutrient levels are low for a particular nutrient that your body needs, it starts to malfunction.  Cellular repair can’t be done right, certain processes in the body no longer occur correctly, and free radicals can’t be neutralized. As more and more things go wrong, cellular deterioration escalates.

There are two important concepts to nourishing your body. These concepts are:

1. Variety of Food
2. Nutrient Denseness of Food

Variety of Food

No single food contains all the nutrients the body needs. If a person gets in a habit of eating only a few foods that he or she likes, it is virtually guaranteed that this person will run low in the nutrients that are missing (or low) in those particular foods. So, mix up your diet, try new foods, and do a winter, spring, summer and fall rotation in the foods you eat by EATING WHAT IS IN SEASON.

Nutrient-Dense Food

We should eat only foods that contribute to our health and happiness. We should have the discipline to not eat foods that undermine our health and don’t add to our happiness.

Nutrient-empty foods aren’t worth eating unless they taste so good to you that your happiness is very positively affected… and even then, unless you really are willing to throw away a future of health for the pleasures these foods bring to the moment, you must save these celebration foods for “rare occasions”:

I recently read an article that categorized foods like this:

1. Celebration Foods
2. Fuel Foods
3. Nutrient Dense Foods.

These are Celebration Foods and should not be eaten frequently, but should be reserved for parties and celebrations:

• Processed grain products, white flour products (cakes, pastries, and noodles), white-rice, etc.
• Sugary foods such as ice cream, soda pop, syrups, etc.

 

These are Fuel Foods. They are nutritious and important to provide energy for activity and exercise. If you are completely sedentary, they actually provide more calories for the amount of nutrients provided. So make sure that you are doing some kind of physical activity to get the benefits from Fuel Foods.

• Grains (whole grain bread, whole grain rice, etc.)
• Most Fruits

 

These are your Nutrient Dense Foods and should be eaten daily by everyone:

• Vegetables
• Nuts
• Fish
• Good fat foods such as Avocados and Olives
• Uncooked oil extracts of all the foregoing
• Organ meats
• Eggs

Free from the bondage of poor health (PART 3)

Habit of Health #3

Keep your internal system clean.

Okay, so I have to make the car analogy here.  The most important thing to extend the life of your car engine is to KEEP IT CLEAN.  Engine cleanliness is important to avoid damaging the engine internals. That’s why cars have oil filters, gas filters and air filters and why we change the oil and oil filter frequently.

To avoid trouble with our human engine, we likewise don’t want sludge or contamination inside our circulatory system, gastrointestinal system or individual cells. Keeping our own engines clean also ensures that all of our hard work to eat healthy and exercise is not sabotaged by other harmful substances.

Here’s an important list for keeping internally clean:

#1 Avoid Sugar!

Table sugar is not the only offender with the insulin effect on the body. Refined carbs such as mashed potatoes, white rice, white bread and pasta are quickly converted to sugar in the body since your pancreas can’t tell the difference.

Sugar in not nonnutritive but it is anti-nutritive. When sugar is found in whole foods such as apples, berries and even sugarcane it comes complete with the vitamins, minerals and enzymes needed for complete digestion. When it’s found in your sugar bowl or in chemical compounds such as high fructose corn syrup, your body has to borrow from its stores of nutrients in order to process it. Sugar contains no minerals or vitamins. Metabolism of food takes the expenditure of nutrient tools, especially minerals. Since eating sugar results in the expenditure of more minerals than are obtained in the sugar, it is a net negative proposition — the more sugar you eat the more your body is depleted of health sustaining minerals. That is one reason why sugar is considered an immune system depressor.

#2 Avoid Free Radicals!

 Free radicals are a PRIMARY culprit in aging. The free radical theory of aging states that our bodies “age” or become altered (for the worse) at a molecular level because of contact with corrosive, unstable molecules called free radicals.

Another important topic regarding the goal of minimizing free radical damage to our cells and molecules is to AVOID FREE RADICALS where possible.

To minimizing free radical exposure:

Avoiding chlorinated water. Water used to bathe or drink or do laundry should be filtered to remove a major oxidant or free radical called chlorine. (This is a tough one for those of us who live in Phoenix)

Avoiding deep fried foods. You are better off to not fry foods in oil, unless you use coconut oil. Coconut oil can handle the high heat without being changed into a free radical. This is a good example of new and improved health information.  A few years ago, coconut oil was on the “bad” list.  Now it is on the “must have” list.

Avoiding polluted air. Many free radicals can be breathed into our lungs, including of course, cigarette smoke.

#3 Avoid Harmful Microorganisms!

The human gastrointestinal tract (the stomach and small and large intestines) are the first engine of the body. They should be colonized 80% or more by protective bacteria. These are like oil in a car engine. They protect it from damage.

In many people, however, this ratio is reversed with 80% pathogenic organisms. Pathogenic organisms produce a constant supply of health-robbing toxins.

Human parasites are just about everywhere in our environment, so it is easy to come in contact with them. My husband and I do an “internal cleanse” about once a year to flush out any lurking organisms.  There are several cleanses on the market to choose from ranging from hard core fasting to light core drinking a mixture before breakfast.

The following are just some of the ways people can acquire parasites.

• insect bites
• animal feces, and especially handling soiled litter pans (cats)
• walking barefoot in areas animals where animals may deposit their feces
• eating raw or undercooked pork, beef or fish
• eating contaminated fruits and vegetables
• eating meals prepared by infected food handlers
• drinking contaminated water

 

#4 Avoid Heavy Metals! 

 Heavy metals are potent free radicals and disrupters of human health.

The three most common are mercury, cadmium, and lead.

Heavy metals cause all of the following problems:

• Damaged or reduced mental and central nervous function
• Lower energy levels
• Damage to blood, lungs, kidneys, liver, and other vital organs.
• Physical, muscular, and neurological degenerative processes that mimic Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, muscular dystrophy, and multiple sclerosis.
• Allergies

 

Sources of mercury include dental fillings, eating of large fish, contact with fungicides and pesticides, cosmetics and medicines

Sources of Cadmium include cigarette smoking (30% of cadmium from cigarettes goes into the smoker and 70% into the air for others to breathe). Cadmium also leaches out of older water pipes, and comes from air pollution from factories, soil fertilization and eating of grains and root vegetables grown in such fertilized soil. Cadmium is concentrated in the inner core of wheat and rice, hence eating white bread and white rice tends to concentrate cadmium in the body.

Sources of lead include leaded gasoline, paint, tin cans, earthenware pottery and food grown in soils that have been fertilized with fertilizers containing lead

Internal Cleanliness will be one of the next greatest advancement in health. A clean intestinal tract is the one of the most important factors for creating one’s overall health, so as you choose the right kind of foods for good health, also avoid the harmful substances that lead to poor health.  Cover all your bases.