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Wednesday, October 05, 2016

DENNIS PATRICK: “WAIST” MANAGEMENT AND CURBING THE “HUNGRIES”

Do you live to eat, or eat to live? With Holidays approaching this is a fitting question. Poor eating habits may reflect unrestrained indulgence or lack of self-discipline.

There are reasonable ways to modify eating habits leading to healthy weight. Whether dieting or maintaining, regressing to poor eating habits is a fast way to sabotage healthy weight.

The importance of fiber and water in any diet cannot be overemphasized. Fiber helps slow the entrance of glucose into the blood stream thereby extending the sensation of satiation. Fresh fruits, vegetables, berries, most nuts, whole grains and cereals are all great sources of fiber.

Drink plenty of water. Water combined with fiber keeps you feeling full between meals. Water also is necessary when consuming a high fiber diet in order to "keep things moving." As such, water helps flush waste products from your system including fatty material.

Eat meals slowly. Give the fiber a chance to "do its thing." High fiber foods take longer to chew. This "tricks" the body into realizing that satisfaction is on the way. Eating slowly buys time for the body to register that the food you've already swallowed is providing fulfillment.

An apple a day keeps the doctor away -- and the "hungries" at bay. Apples as a high fiber food takes longer to chew giving your body and your brain time to register that you are feeding your craving. One study suggests that people who ate 2 to 3 small apples a day tended to loose significantly more weight than those who did not eat apples.

Flaxseed is a good appetite suppressant – particularly milled flaxseed. As with apples, the more fiber consumed at a meal, the slower the rise in blood sugar thus staving off the effects of hunger hormones. One ounce of milled flaxseed renders 8 grams of fiber. Besides eating flaxseed as an appetite suppressant, flaxseed also is an excellent plant source of omega-3 fatty acid. Additionally, the National Cancer Institute has demonstrated the positive effects of flaxseed in lowering LDL, the "bad" cholesterol.

Oatmeal is an old standby. It's low on the glycemic scale and high in fiber. Nutrients enter the blood stream slowly leaving the feeling of satisfaction long after breakfast is finished.

soup is another good choice. Choose broth-based soups in lieu of cheesy soups. Vegetable soups provide another good source of fiber together with water.

Eat a small garden salad at the beginning of a meal but beware of the creamy dressings. Salads have long been known to decrease the appetite. Salads also slow down the sugars entering the blood stream. Soup and salad consumed before the main course of a meal justifies its own rationale.

Another neat trick is to eat a small handful of pine nuts one half hour before mealtime. Pine nuts contain a polyunsaturated fat called pinolenic acid. When eaten, this chemical triggers two hormones that suppress the hunger urge. They tell the brain that the body is no longer hungry. At least one study indicated that consuming a small amount of pinolenic acid in the form of pine nuts before a meal may reduce food consumption by up to 35%.

When attempting to loose weight, emphasize protein (beef, pork, poultry and fish) over starch. Protein is the building block of body cells. Starch, on the other hand, is converted to sugar which, in turn, is burned for energy. Excess sugar not consumed for energy is stored as fat. Not so with protein. It stands to reason that starch and sugar consumption should be limited or avoided if weight loss is desired.

Get plenty of sleep. Give your body a chance to rejuvenate and repair itself. During waking hours your body expends energy incurred through the stress and strain of activity. During sleep body cells rebuild and replace themselves preparing for the next bout of activity. There is another great benefit when you sleep. You don't eat. Snacking is the great enemy of weight loss or weight maintenance. Go to bed early to avoid snacking.

With a little forethought, “waist” management is not so difficult.

 

Dennis M. Patrick can be contacted at P. O. Box 337, Stanley, ND 58784 or (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

 

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