Your Complete Guide About Diet and Weight
Fitness
How to Eat Healthy on a Tight Budget
It seems that everyone is feeling a financial pinch these days as the economy continues to sag. We’re all trying to save money any way we can, while keeping our fingers crossed that our jobs remain intact. One of the easiest targets in any budget-slashing enterprise is the grocery bill because it’s one of the most flexible expenses. But there is a tendency to forgo the healthiest items on our lists, such as fruits and vegetables, since they’re often the costliest. It’s not a good idea to sacrifice your health in order to save a few bucks, however, so here are some ideas for how to eat healthy on a tight budget.
I’ll admit that it takes a bit of work to eat healthy on a tight budget, but it absolutely can be done. If you’re committed to following through, then you can still buy the ingredients for hearty, wholesome, nutritious meals that won’t put too much of a dent in your wallet.
The first thing you have to do is forget about buying prepackaged foods. It’s no secret that consumers pay a premium for the convenience of bagged salads, heat-and-serve breakfast sandwiches, and the like. You can save lots of money each week by making your own salads and meals with fresh ingredients. Moreover, a key component in how to eat healthy is avoiding the preservatives that often go into prepackaged goods, so you’ll actually be killing two birds with one stone.
Another thing to do is to use coupons or stick to items that are on sale. This sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised at how few people take advantage of coupons anymore. Shopping this way does take some discipline, so be prepared to make frequent substitutions. If apples aren’t on sale this week, make do with oranges instead. If beef has been slowly creeping up in price, switch to turkey or chicken. Most people who know how to eat healthy on a tight budget are very strict about the sales-only rule. It really makes a difference!
And finally, if the option is available to you, consider joining a wholesale club such as Costco or BJ’s. In addition to the typical gallon jugs of ketchup these places are known for, they also sell meats and produce. If you have enough room in your freezer, you can stock up on lean cuts of beef, pork, or chicken, and simply defrost them when you’re ready to cook. Similarly, you can purchase discount produce — as long as you’re sure you can use all of it before it goes bad. Loading up on vegetables and then making a couple weeks’ worth of stews and casseroles to freeze is something lots of folks do.
These are just a few basic ideas for how to eat healthy on a budget. I know it’s tempting to simply stop off at McDonald’s or Burger King and order off the dollar menu on your way home from work, but you won’t be doing your waistline any favors that way. Your health is worth the extra effort!
Foods with Vitamin D so Easy to Find, do you still Need Supplements?
If I just told you that they invented a new kind of treatment that could help strengthen your bones, keep heart disease and kidney disease at bay, and to boot, help with your blood pressure, wouldn’t you pay a lot for it? There have been medical research reports out recently, that there is such a remedy already – and it is a well known micronutrient that you find in some varieties of milk, and fish, and also in exposure to the sun – of course you know what it is - it is vitamin D. But as wonderful as vitamin D is, and as plentiful as foods with vitamin D are, about one out of every two people in America is somewhat deficient, and about 10% of all children are quite deeply deficient. Doctors are now taking to routinely prescribing vitamin D tests to patients; apparently there has been about 50% more tests done this year for vitamin D levels, than the year before.
When doctors find some kind of deficiency, usually, they decide that a changed diet would be too slow to be effective. They offer supplements instead and America is now knocking back vitamin D supplements worth a quarter of a trillion dollars a year. This may not really be a good idea; the science behind it as shaky at best, and doctors seem to be letting the idea run away with them. There haven’t been any real randomized trials done in research yet, and no one really knows what the ideal level is supposed to be either. As an example of the kind of simple and unsophisticated level we are at in understanding vitamin D, doctors only believe that you need to have a certain high level of vitamin D because that is what they see in healthy people. And yet, that could just be circumstantial evidence. What if it were just that healthy people happen to have high levels of vitamin D by accident, and not that the vitamin D were actually responsible? They do happen to come together, vitamin D levels and good health, but who says that there is a cause-and-effect relationship?
They are trying in-depth clinical studies now to find the foods with vitamin D that should help the most; one study includes 20,000 elderly people, men and women, to see how fish oil supplements that contain vitamin D and omega-3 should help. So what exactly is it that vitamin D does around the body? Basically, vitamin D is supposed to be the signaling juice around the body. It helps cells turn on or turn off as they are needed to. About one gram of fish oil a day should probably do the trick. This is probably overkill too; but it does help older women with osteoporosis, protect themselves from fragile bones that are prone to fracture. In fact, I should probably have my mother put aside her revulsion for fish oil, and have her protect herself. They’ve also found that this kind of a high dose of fish oil can even help protect against breast cancer.
If doses go any higher than that, they can often do some harm too. In men for example, very high levels of vitamin D in the system, can dispose you to diabetes. And it is easy when you read health advice in a piece of this kind, to get really carried away.
The Best Way to Lose Weight in Two Weeks
If you want quick weight loss but don’t want to ruin your health in the process you have to be very careful and of course, get your doctor’s approval first. But there are certain tips and tricks that can help you to lose weight quickly without using over the counter supplements or prescription drugs. These tips are the best way to lose weight and can help you trim down in as little as fourteen days.
Tip Number One: Eat lots of grilled chicken breast. You can buy skinless, boneless chicken breast at Costco in bulk and save lots of money. Cooking tip: cut the breasts in half lengthwise so they are half as thick. Put them in a big plastic baggie and pour in your favorite low fat Italian dressing for a quick, healthy marinade. Make sure to always barbecue it on your outdoor grill for the best taste with the least amount of calories.
Tip Number Two: Drink lots of water or diet cokes. A lot of people will argue with me but this is the best way to lose weight quick that I know of. Diet Coke or Pepsi has zero calories and they fill you up. Basically they are colored water and perform the same function as water, which is to fill you up so you don’t eat unhealthy foods. You need to fool your stomach and stay as full as possible in order not to cheat.
Tip Number Three: Do thirty to sixty minutes of exercise per day at least four days a week. This is very important because your body will break down muscle tissue to build leaner tissue, and getting rid of the stored fat. The truth is that most people cannot lose weight by exercise or diet alone. You need to do both in combination in order to have serious and effective long-term weight loss.
Tip Number Four: Don’t eat anything after 7p.m. This is probably the best way to lose weight quickly. You will find that it is difficult at first not to have that late night snack but your hunger will dissipate in three days because your stomach will shrink. Sticking with it for 3 days in a row is the key. The problem is that when you eat at night all of that food just gets stored as fat because you cannot burn it off.
Tip Number Five: Rebound from lapses. Know before you even begin this or any other weight loss program that you are bound to go off it one day. That is alright. The key is to rebound from any lapses immediately and jump back on the program the very next day. Once again you need to continue with the program for 3 straight days after the lapse. Eventually you will be able to do 3 straight days, then 1 day off, 3 straight days, then 1 day off, over and over again. This is the best way to lose weight and keep it off. If you can master the 3 day rule you will never be fat again and for two days a week you will be able to eat whatever you want.
Get a Total Body Workout in Just 45 Minutes
If you want to look like a Hollywood star you need to get a personal trainer and spend a couple of hours or more in the gym at least five times per week. You will also need to hire your own personal diet chef who will cook three low-calorie meals a day for you. If you are not rich there is still hope with the following total body workout.
Finding the time in our modern day hectic schedules for a total body workout seems impossible. That is why I recommend the following regimen where you can get a total body workout in just 45 minutes a day, four days a week (if possible).
The secret to burning fat and building lean muscle is to surprise the muscle itself. If you do the same exercise routine all the time then you are probably not getting the results you are looking for. If you really want to look your best and don’t have a lot of time or money, you need to check out the following five steps:
1. If you go to a typical gym that has lots of machines in it, then head to the nearest chest press machine and do three sets of 15 reps at low weight. Low weight for men is different than for women so just test it until you get it right. You need to feel the burn. Take very little time between sets. Go quickly to another machine, this time for abs and do 3 sets of 15 again at low weight. Again spend as little time as possible recovering. Don’t talk to friends or other people working out as that is just a waste of time. Do another set of curls on the curls machine. One more machine should do it and your 45 minutes are up. If you are not sweating then you took too long between sets.
2. Take one day off. The day after that you don’t go to the gym but instead find a steep hill to walk or hike. Hike up and down the hill hard and fast (you can run if you are able) for 45 minutes. By the end of the total body workout hike you should be sweating. The next day you should feel it in your calves.
3. Next day you do not take off. Instead you go back to the gym. Instead of doing the machines this time you will go straight to the dumbbell area. Take a low weight dumbbell in each hand and do curls while standing. Then sit on a bench with a back support and do military press. Again, very little recovery time, high reps and low weight give you the best total body workout in the quickest time. Sit at the bench and lay down with the dumbbells in either hand and do chest flys. This is where you extend the arms out and raise them up while lying on the bench with your back flat.
4. Next day you relax. After that you go back to step number 1 above. You can mix up the machines if you feel that you are not getting results. The trick is to fool your muscle memory and break down muscle tissue. This will result in a total body workout.
5 No total body workout would be complete without some diet advice. If you really want your body to respond as efficiently as possible to the total body workout then you have to change your eating habits. Two easy quick tips are: cut out oil, butter, and sugar, and have six small meals (one third the size of a normal meal) spread out throughout the day but nothing but water after 6 p.m.
Follow these steps for three weeks straight and you will see dramatic results.
Weight Training Supplements
A few years ago, the FDA refused entry into the US to a large shipment of traditional Indian health potions and remedies They came with names like Chyavanprash, and were from some major manufacturers in India. Laboratory tests found that the health preparations in the shipment contained high concentrations of heavy metals, a sign of the careless and primitive herbal extraction processes used. These were destined for health stores around the country, where health and body building junkies look at the exotic Indian names, and throw them in their shopping carts. This isn’t an exception though; most health preparations and weight training supplements you find in any health store, that don’t come from the major pharmaceutical companies, are usually tainted with dangerous impurities, or are of dubious utility. And are all aimed at taking advantage of any of the health fads that come and go, at any gym around the country. Weight training supplements, products with names like Weight Mass Explosion or Muscle Monster that are close to the hearts of many bodybuilders though, have been of especial interest to researchers recently.
As much interest as mainstream bodybuilders have in these, research more and more convincingly, has been demonstrating how protein-added powders and other weight training supplements, are of no utility, to anyone short of Mr. Universe-level bodybuilders, and even then, maybe not so much. At best, they waste your money that you could use to better effect elsewhere, and at worst, they can send you down the road to heart disease and kidney disease. Protein is something you need when you do resistance training, certainly. The entire process of putting on more muscle fiber or strengthening existing ones, involves subjecting your muscles to a little more than they can handle, and thus causing a little bit of injury. The protein in your diet will provide the body with what it needs to rebuild the muscle to be more strong.
Actually, it adds up quite easily. A regular bodybuilder who weighs about 200 pounds, unless he has world-beating ambitions, needs about a gram of protein for every kilogram of body mass. This, you could easily get with a little milk three times a day, a little side order of fish, and a normal sized steak. Anyone but the most insanely ambitious bodybuilder could even get by wonderfully on your standard vegetarian diet. The researchers did a survey of bodybuilders in gyms across the country, and found that half of them took weight training supplements, protein powders and the like. After testing them, the researchers found that not one of them needed to have taken any. And only one out of four could even really put together a coherent explanation for why they needed supplements. No regular person in America who doesn’t live in terrible poverty, suffers from any kind of protein deficiency.
The aggressively marketed weight training supplements, you’ll know them by their names to use, have plenty of calories in them too. A regular dose can can contain up to 1000 calories; whatever it does, it could actually get you out of shape. Other than that, clogging the body with protein it can’t use, is just an unnecessary strain on the kidneys; they have to convert all of them to urea. And the more the kidneys work on proteins, the more you’ll get kidney stones. Those can be pretty painful. Being a great bodybuilder is all about staying informed. It becomes very hard to maintain any kind of body at all, with sick set of kidneys.
Women’s Weight Training
The newest research in exercise science indicates that weight training is crucial to fitness and weight loss. Cardio exercise which doesn’t incorporate or include weight training is far less effective and can even be counter-productive. But women’s weight training routines require a specific approach. Women should not weight train in the same way that men do. Weight training approaches which are designed with men in mind may not achieve the results that women are looking for.
Women who want to incorporate resistance training into their workouts must consider certain hazards which probably do not bother men. For example, excessive muscle building can appear unattractive on a feminine frame. Women’s weight training must build muscle strength without creating the appearance of bulkiness.
It’s also true that women’s weight training must focus on different parts of the body than men’s weight training usually does. For example, men might like to build size and strength in their lats or trapezius (shoulder) muscles. But women most likely will not want to perform weight training exercises which create bulk in those areas.
So women embarking upon a weight training regimen should carefully consider the weight training routine which best accomplishes their gender-specific goals. Women’s weight training should be tailored to the strengths, weaknesses and aesthetic concerns unique to the female body.
Women’s weight training should generally involve lower resistance than men’s weight training. In other words, weights should be less heavy. But compensate for the lower weight with a larger number of reps for each exercise.
Also, women should focus on certain muscle groups more than others. Women who are weight training will not want to build too much bulk in the biceps, shoulders, back or thighs. However, women’s weight training should give special attention to the abdominals, pecs, glutes, triceps and calves. Those muscles, when well developed, contribute to the appearance of a lean, slender, feminine figure.
Overall, when embarking upon a workout regime with includes weight or resistance training, women should be well aware of the distinctive needs and concerns of the female body. Not all weight training regimens are the same, and not all are designed specifically with women’s needs in mind. Take time to consult with a personal trainer to design a women’s weight training routine which suits your own needs. Women’s weight training is not the same as men’s, and most trainers should be aware of the important distinctions.
Healthy Eating Plan
With the rising risk of obesity and poor-eating health related complications on the rise, our society is today bombarded with conflicting advice about healthy eating plans. As such, it becomes extremely challenging for a person searching for insight about the same to get the appropriate details. This raises the question; what exactly is a healthy eating plan? It is simply a concise arrangement by a person to include healthy foods in his daily diet.
To formulate a healthy eating plan, one needs to know what constitutes healthy meals. For starters, fruits and vegetables should be a daily inclusion in all meals. Dieticians recommend that any person above five years of age should at least consume five portions of fruits and vegetables everyday. A portion is defined as 80 grams of any fruit or vegetable.
A healthy eating plan should also include at least five portions of cereals and whole meal foods. Foods from this group include oats, breakfast cereals, rice, pasta, noodles and whole meal breads. One can also consume Irish and sweet potatoes to compliment his or her diet. A healthy eating plan should also include 2½ average servings of milk and other dairy products. Some of the healthy food choices in this category include yoghurt, cheese and skimmed milk. One should avoid the consumption of butter and dairy cream.
A healthy eating plan should also include food groups that are high in proteins. Such includes meat, fish and poultry. Eggs are also a healthy source of animal proteins but they should be consumed in moderation. When consuming animal proteins, it is always advisable for a person to plan on consuming foods that have low fat content. Alternatively, one can opt for animal proteins, which can be sourced from kidney beans and nuts.
Although there has been so bad comments going around about fats and sugars in the diet, it is important that every one realizes that they too have a vital role to play in the human body; they are the main source of energy. As such, a healthy eating plan should contain a healthy content of the same. To avoid the disadvantages that come from such foods, one should limit their consumption to a maximum of three servings a day. To be on the safe side, one should plan to include unsaturated fats such as corn oil, sunflower and olive oil in their dietary plans. Saturated fats contained in animal products and highly processed foods should be avoided. When factoring in sugar in the diet plan, one should strive to include complex sources of the same. Foods containing highly refined sugars such as biscuits should be avoided. Overall, a healthy eating plan should contain foods in the three basic food groups: proteins (body building foods), vitamins (mineral-rich foods) and carbohydrates (energy-giving foods). Fats are also a vital component in the eating plan.
Most Affordable Health Plan
The last time at work that they had an enrollment session on for benefits, you could have heard a lot of bandying about of the expression consumer-directed health plan. Did you ever wonder what that meant? It’s not really that they are directing a lot of great health at you, the consumer. It is that you the consumer, are being tapped to let the employer off the hook as far as possible, by accepting an incentive for it, and opting for a different consumer directed plan. It’s not always that they give you a clear choice. They just tell you you have no other choice – like General Electric did. Another name for this kind of plan, is a high-deductible health insurance plan. What that means is, that there’s a big deductible once a year, something like a couple thousand dollars for a family; but the trade is that your monthly premium is quite affordable. And there is a tax benefit you can claim, come tax time. Is this really an affordable health plan?
Here’s how this system works. If we happen to be getting our health care on our own dime, we aren’t going to be allowing every useless test that they think of at the hospital. You will ask a lot of questions, to try to be as economical and efficient as possible with the tests and procedures – until you run through the high annual deductible, that’ll be your money. A plan like this will save your employer 20%, and so, they’re enthusiastic about it. And you can also make use of a health savings account, that helps you set aside tax-free health contingency funds, up to about $6000 per family. And the tax break can be quite substantial too. Any health savings you do not use in one year, can rollover to the next, and also to another company should you change jobs. But this is not the only affordable health plan that companies on a tight budget offer you.
There is a Health Reimbursement Arrangement too. And this is something that you typically get with small companies. Your company sets aside a certain budget for each employee, and it is their call, if they will give you any interest on the money set aside for your needs, and they will let the money roll over year on year. So which is best, or rather, which is better? If you are young and healthy, with no diabetes or anything, the high deductible plan makes a lot of sense. And if you have something like it, then either plan could make sense, depending on the specifics.
You’ll just need to ask yourself a few tough questions. Which plan, gives you access to the hospitals and doctors you need? You’ll also want to make up your mind how much you can afford to contribute. If you feel cash-strapped, the high deductible plan saves you enough money on the premiums to make a difference. But none of these options makes any sense unless you have a lot of money to spend on your health. You could quickly find yourself owing a lot of money should something happen and you don’t have enough for your high deductibles. But that just happens to be a reality of today’s health scene.
Walking and Weight Loss Go Hand in Hand
Most fitness gurus and diet doctors agree that the way to lose substantial amounts of weight is not by diving into crazy fad diets. Fad diets can ruin your health because most of these diets do not give you the necessary nutrients, vitamins, and protein that a healthy body needs to keep functioning. Fad diets can lead to dizziness, nausea, intestinal problems, anemia and in severe cases even diabetes. One thing that all of these experts agree on is that walking and weight loss are two very compatible behaviors that complement each other very well.
A good diet combined with a steady, regular regimen of walking will lead to substantial weight loss without leaving you feeling depleted. A good diet that many experts recommend is one that incorporates all of the necessary food groups, starting with fresh fruits and vegetables. Add lean protein like white meat chicken or fish like salmon which has recommended levels of Omega-15 fatty acids which promote artery health, and you will have the beginnings of a healthy diet. Add some walking and weight loss will come naturally.
Walking is arguably the best exercise there is. Anyone can do it and they can do it just about any time, in just about any weather. A good thirty to sixty minutes per day, three days a week is all it takes. This amount of walking and weight loss will be the result in just a matter of weeks. You need to be steady and regular with the walking in order to achieve the best results. If you combine it with a good diet, you cannot help but lose weight, and you will do so with increased energy and a positive mental attitude.
Walking and weight loss can be accelerated by walking up hills. Hill walking is one of the most low impact and highly recommended exercises by experts in the field. Get some comfortable walking or running shoes and find a track with some stairs, or just find a decent sized hill that you can walk up to the top of without getting too winded. The point is that if you get too winded you will stop and you need to continue for at least thirty to sixty minutes. The key is to keep going because walking and weight loss require long periods of hill walking in order to get the heart rate up but not so much that you get too tired too quickly. Many times walkers will graduate to light jogging and even running if they are in good enough shape. Just be careful if you have arthritis or suffer from hip pain or joint pain. Running can be a bit too much pounding for people that are not athletes or just out of shape.
As with any diet or exercise program you should consult with your doctor first and get his approval. Keep going for at least four weeks and you should see some dramatic results from walking and weight loss programs like this one.
A Good Weightlifting Workout is Beneficial in More Ways Than One
When people decide to incorporate a weightlifting workout into their fitness regimen, they often do so with the mindset that they are going to get a lean and muscular physique that the opposite sex will find appealing. There is nothing wrong with that, but weightlifting workouts actually benefit you in a lot of different ways beyond an aesthetically pleasing build.
I did my first weightlifting workout when I was 14 years old, and after it was over it was difficult to move. I thought about never picking up another weight, but my friends convinced me to stick with it, and as time went by, it became easier, and I got stronger.
What I have discovered over the years is that having a weightlifting workout as part of your fitness regimen, by which I mean cardiovascular exercises, strength training and diet, is essential to preventing, or at the very least lessening, the severity of injuries.
Back pain is one of the more common problems that people seem to face, and I can honestly say that I have never had a back problem in my life. I work out the muscles in my back on a regular basis and try to practice good posture, and it is simply not an issue for me.
When I got my first writing job, I was worried about carpel tunnel syndrome with the amount of typing that I would be doing. I decided to incorporate some wrist and forearm exercises into my weightlifting workout, and I have never had any difficulties with my wrists, either.
I was also told by a doctor that if you are trying to lose weight, you should definitely make a weightlifting workout part of your exercise routine to tone up areas with loose skin and prevent your body from losing muscle while you are losing fat.
The reason a weightlifting workout is important for a lot of us guys is that being strong can impress the ladies. I remember when I was helping a girlfriend move a few years back, I picked up a chest of drawers by myself. She was quite impressed, and it made me feel really proud.
A friend of mine who used to work out regularly recently told me that he wanted to start up a weightlifting workout again because he was finding that he was actually more prone to breaking bones since he stopped. He said he had broke his leg and arm and was convinced in both cases that if he had been in better shape, that would not have happened.
I don’t know how much truth there is to that, but I do know that a weightlifting workout has served me well over the years, and I just feel better about myself when I make that a part of my fitness regimen.
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