Weighing the Options By ChaChanna Simpson
The other day it hit me. I am getting older and I won't look
this good for the rest of my life if I don't start
exercising and eating right. In my family, as it might be in
many families, we have a history of diabetes, high
cholesterol and high pressure. It just occurred to me the
other day that I don't want to have those problems plaguing
me when I get older. Like most of the world, originally, I
wanted to lose weight so that I could wear those low-rise
jeans and two-piece bikinis and look stunning in them, not
having my flab hang over all sides of the jeans. Yuck! I
have respect enough not to offend the general public.
The first step in getting healthy is eating healthy. You can
exercise all you want, but if you are still shoveling
donuts, fast food and every kind of dessert you can think of
in your mouth, it kind of defeats the purpose. So, to help
me on my quest for healthy eating, I enlisted the help of
The Diet Center, in Darien, CT.
The first thing people do when they are planning to lose
weight is go on a diet. Just to clarify, diet is, " the
manner in which people eat. It teaches people how to eat and
make healthy choices," according to Melissa Arnold, Director
of Fitness at the Diet Center. It is not depriving yourself
of carbohydrates or some other important nutrient your body
needs. When you cut them out "the body tries to get that
nutrient from something else. If you change or stop eating
something you will lose weight but you are setting your body
off balance and that is not healthy, " says Arnold. Your
body needs all of its nutrients. Unless you are going to
swear off a particular food or food group for the rest of
your life, as soon as you eat it again you will most likely
gain the weight right back. Then you are right back to
square one, plus more weight and you are all depressed about
it.
The way to go is optimal nutrition, which is "the balance of
healthy foods and whatever is needed to keep your body in
balance. It is different for everyone because it depends on
your lifestyle, illness, genetics and where you live," says
Lisa French, Diet and Fitness Consultant at The Diet Center.
It is important for people in our twenties to begin taking
care of our bodies now because the more we are "aware of
what [you] should be doing then the aging process can be a
lot kinder," says Arnold. Eating all the proper nutrients
brings the body into balance and helps you age gracefully,
giving your body what is needs in order to function
properly.
As for those diet pills and such, Arnold says that because
they are not FDA approved, what is on the outside label
doesn't have to be what is really inside the bottle. So who
knows what you are really ingesting into your system.
Another misconception is that if you skip meals you will
lose weight. That is absolutely false. When you are starving
yourself and thinking that you are doing something good,
your body is in survival mode. So what does it do? The next
time you eat, your body will hold on to the food because it
is not sure when it is going to get fed again. The Diet
Center suggests that you eat small meals throughout the day,
so that you will keep up your blood sugar and have enough
energy to get through the day. Also, make sure that you
drink eight glasses of water. Water will give you a full
feeling and it cleans and replenishes your cells.
This is just an introduction to nutrition to get you all
started on the proper way to nourish your body. Don't forget
to incorporate fitness. It works hand and hand with
nutrition. You have to burn the fuel that you are putting in
your body.
ChaChanna Simpson is the publisher and editor of
Twentity.com, the free ezine for twentysomethings, featuring
cheap and free events every Wednesday. Subscribe today at
www.twentity.com.
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