lifestyle blog

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Today’s busy moms are the saviors of future generations. Mother’s Day ought to be 365 days a year, and the rest of us ought to call our moms way more often!

They take up a role that comes with great sacrifices. As such, I see and hear this all the time: Moms in general always descend into a frantic rush of prepping their children for the day, and chauffeuring them around for sports and clubs and whatever else children do these days (and it always seems like they do more things in one day than I’ve done in my entire life). They often think about themselves last.

From my observation and conversations with busy moms, the most frequent complaint is there’s not enough time in the day, specifically for healthy eating.

And so they end up eating whatever they feed their children, which (for reasons I don’t understand) is often stuff they wouldn’t normally eat themselves. In other words, unhealthy food (but that’s another topic that I won’t go there unless I walk in their maternal shoes).

Anyway, my point is that, from cultural conditioning, people feel obligated to eat just because it’s time to eat. Biologically, there’s no reason for this, and some research show that skipping meals here and there can have positive impact on health.

I asked one mother, who felt awful because she had just eaten the rest of the pizza that her children didn’t finish for lunch. She said she just didn’t have the time to get something healthy for herself (I know, ignore the cognitive dissonance here), and the next time she could eat was at dinner. So she felt obligated to “at least eat something.”

Was it a fear of metabolic slowdown if she didn’t eat? Maybe. Was she conditioned to think that she must eat by the clock? Maybe. Starving? She said not really. She said it was “lunch time.”

So she ate the rest of the pizza, even though she wasn’t hungry. She could have skipped eating entirely until later, when she had the chance to eat something healthful.

Intermittent fasting (IF) is a tool not too many people know about. Just understanding how IF works to our favor — in health and in body composition — could liberate people from the guilt they feel when missing a meal.

It’s OK to skip a meal. Or three.

[Via http://theleansaloon.com]

Many of you saw the most recent Biggest Loser, where Jillian Michaels ‘had to’ eat a Taco Bell Burrito.  As she uncovered the best items from the Taco Bell Menu, all ceremoniously placed on silver platters, she could hardly keep her disgust in check.  It appeared that she had to restrain herself from tipping the table over and sending all of that food crashing to the ground.  Apparently this was one days food of the overweight duo on the opposite side of the table.  That is disgusting by the way.  They say something about not eating all day then chowing down on this pile of food for dinner and during the evening….

You know, I like Taco Bell as much as the next guy (okay, to tell the truth I am more of a Taco Time fan, so I will just imagine that this is all Taco Time food), but seriously, if you are going to eat about $60 worth of fast food between 2 people, vary it up for the love of god!!  Get a whopper from Burger King, a Burrito and Mexi Fries from Taco Bell, a piece of chicken from KFC and your fries from McDonalds.  Double that for 2 people and although you have an equally unhealthy meal, you have some awesome variety.  You can’t tell me that you have to go more than 1 mile in your car to find all of those restaurants.  They are always perched together at the mini-malls where the highway meets the interstate….  You may have trouble controlling your food intake and managing your addiction, but please, don’t let that make you so lazy that you can’t get some variety.

That said, I am certainly not advising anyone to eat the food listed above if you want to be fit.  It just doesn’t fit with a healthy lifestyle.  Sure you can eat fast food from time to time, maybe more often if you are careful what you eat each visit (for example if you can skip the fries/mexifries altogether, you stand a chance in a fast food restaurant).

So, to illustrate some point about how disgusting eating an obscene amount of  fast food is, a point that is entirely lost on everyone, from the producers to Jillian Michaels, because  instead of eating a whole evenings food for the couple, Jillian Michaels just noshes on a burrito.  Even this she can’t do.  Apparently fast food burrito’s are too disgusting to eat at all!?!!?  WTF!?!?  It was a little disgusting to see her spit out the burrito.  Seriously, someone alive, a fit person which is no surprise, cannot even stomach Mexican fast food.  She feels revolted smelling it.  She probably drives out of her way to avoid the fast food outlets because the smell of them make her skin crawl (I am picturing Agent Smith from the Matrix questioning Morpheus).

If this alone doesn’t point out just how different fit people are from the rest of us, I don’t know what does.  I have to avoid driving by fast food outlets because the smell will draw me in.  I have a problem with food, I love it!! I can’t get enough.  Salty and overly fat fast food tastes delicious.  I know it isn’t gourmet food, and if I was comparing it to a culinary delight such as my recent evening out at Cioppino’s, it wouldn’t even come close.  But I am not comparing it.  In fact, it has its own place in my food world.  I am not even comparing Taco Time to any of the fantastic mexican food that I love, like the Burritos at Primo’s, because it just wouldn’t hold up.  But that isn’t the point.  I am addicted to fast food, as I am sure most people out there are.  It is extremely hard getting fit when you are addicted to fast food.

That is why getting fitness book and lessons on how to get fit from people who don’t even like what is causing you so much distress is useless.  Sure, personal trainers can show you how to workout.  That is their job and they do it very well.  What they can’t do though is help you navigate the world of temptations that you have around you.  It is as silly as when Nancy Reagan headed up the Just Say No campaign.  Ya, that sounds easy… and it worked for you?  I will give that a try, it sounds like awesome advice….

Nobody listened to her, and nobody should be listening to fitness experts or doctors about how to avoid eating fast food and how to make fitness work for you.  You should listen to them about the techniques that work for exercise and the science behind weight gain and weight loss.  That is their expertise.  It sure as hell isn’t avoiding eating fast food.  That they know nothing about.

I am so tired of fit people telling us how to get fit when they don’t have a clue what the problem is.  By virtue of birth, either through learning good habits or genetics, they hit the jackpot.  They don’t have the weight problems we have.  Just as by that same virtue I am not an alcoholic and I would never pretend to tell an alcoholic about how to stay sober.  Yet when it comes to weightloss, because they are fit, we follow them like lemmings.  They all say, I was fat when I was young, but it always turns out to be some sort of a sham.  Could you imagine people who have no record of ever being alcoholics, and who clearly aren’t saying they were.  We would be up in arms.  We should be up in arms.

I would have been on that burrito like… well… like I would have jumped on a Smartie.  I would have had most of that food, including the nachos and that enchilada looking thing down my throat before the cameras could have mercifully been shut off to save everyone from seeing the carnage.  I don’t go near tables full of fast food, mexican fast food, because of that.

My point is, fit people are totally different from us unfit people.

[Via http://youarenotafitperson.com]

Why am I such a fan of “green smoothies”? This is because not only do they taste good, but they are good for you. When you add greens such as kale or spinach to it, this give you nutrients you otherwise probably wouldn’t get. The majority don’t like to eat greens. Combines with fruit, eating your greens can taste good.

I have one almost every night and sometimes in the afternoons on weekends. They help you feel fuller longer and help you lose weight.

[Via http://coachbettys.wordpress.com]

We’re 2 weeks into our 365 days and it’s time to take a second and be brutally honest with ourselves. No, I’m not going to tell you to put yourself down or be mean. What I want you to do is to look at that reflection in your mirror and honestly count the times you ate as good as you should have. How many times did you skip meals or pick a burger over fixing dinner at home? How many workouts did you do? How many did you give your 100% all and how many did you just skate through, barely paying attention?

How many times in the last 2 weeks have you let life happen TO you instead of making it happen? How many days have you really found joyful and how many were just tedium? How many people have you told “I love you” and how many have you ignored? How much of the last 2 weeks was spent worrying, berating and nagging instead of hoping, dreaming and planning?

How much of your last two weeks was hoping paired with action? Now, be honest, and plan how to make the next two weeks even better!

[Via http://getfitwithtina.wordpress.com]