Ok, so you decided that you wanted to start eating healthy, so naturally you head to the diet section of the supermarket and start filling your cart with fat free, low fat, low calorie, sugar free, low sugar, low sodium, gluten free, etc foods. Every box, jar, bag or whatever says something close to, "all the taste, without the guilt." Perhaps there are even pictures of women or men who are thin all because they ate this product.
You take your haul home, unpack it, and start eating. You notice a bit of a different flavor, but not too bad, and eventually it becomes something you might tell others you really like. In reality, you wish you could have the regular fat stuff, but you do everything possible to tell yourself and others that you don't even know the difference. People have been trying to convince me of this lie for a long time, but honestly, I know when fake sugar or fat is used, and I don't like the taste.
When I go to the store, I don't go anywhere near the diet food section. Why? Well, for starters- that stuff does not taste good to me. I want ice cream, not ice milk, not fat free frozen yogurt, not sugar free (Splenda) laden "food". I want real food, that tastes good... the good news? Real food tastes good!
There are some pitfalls you need to be wary of when buying diet food. First, usually when they process out fat from foods, they add sugar for flavor. Increasing your sugar while decreasing fat is worse for you than if you just ate a lard sandwich. Seriously, there is a lot of research that indicates that sugar is the problem of the American obesity problem, not fat. While we know eating too much bad fat isn't all that great for you, it's significantly better than sugar (sucrose, fructose, anything with "ose" at the end).
In fact, one of the biggest problems with corn sugar (corn syrup) is that it is cheap and easy to put in foods to increase the sweetness so that we will eat more. And since sugar (carbohydrates) burn so quickly in our system, we just get hungrier after eating it. That's why drinking a soda will just make you thirstier and why sports drinks are only good of accompanied by water (hence the watered down Gatorade at sporting events). Eat a lot of potato chips and you just want more.
What happens with the unspent energy from sugar is that it gets absorbed into the fat cells in the body. Sugar (carbohydrates) is quick energy and burns fast, while fat is slow burning. Some weight loss tricks include long-slow runs because the slower you run the less carbohydrates your body burns and the more your body uses the fat stores for energy. Distance running is all about trying to train your body when to use fat stores so that your body conserves the glycogen levels in the muscles. When done correctly, a runner can break through his or her wall and complete long runs successfully.
Okay, you say, then I'll just satisfy this problem with Splenda. After all, the commercials say that it's made from sugar so it must be all natural. I think we need to consider an alternative before we start filling our bodies with unnatural, possibly cancer causing, chemicals that our bodies were never designed to process.
First, read the ingredients on any product you are about to buy. You're going to notice a trend in that they are all sugar laden. Next, select products with ingredients that you can pronounce. Abandon any product with corn syrup or corn sugar. Then, begin to redevelop your pallet so that you don't desire so much sugar. While you do this, learn to make your own bread and other foods without sugar. Buy some evaporated cane juice, pure maple syrup, and pure honey (there are other, even better and more natural sugars that just don't come to mind at the moment)- make sure they are not just corn syrup with flavoring, which many are. When you want some extra sweetness in a dish, add it yourself, never allow these companies (or our government) to decide how much sugar you should consume.
Learn how to make condiments on your own. Believe it or not, there are recipes for mayonnaise, ketchup, mustard, salsa, etc that aren't hard to follow. When you control the ingredients, you control the sugar. If you can learn how to control sugar- not just trick yourself into eating the fake stuff- then you can start to control your weight.
Stop using fat free or low fat salad dressing- you might as well have eaten the burger and fries! Learn how to make your own salad dressing. When I was initially losing the weight, I made sure I had balsamic vinegar and extra virgin olive oil in the house. Just mixing these two created a tasty salad dressing, but why stop there? Throw in oregano, parsley, garlic- have fun and experiment. Mix it together and spoon it over your salad- now you have a healthy balsamic vinaigrette dressing. When you go through a salad bar or order a salad at a restaurant, ask if you can have oil and vinegar instead of your regular ranch. That's all I did, and I love bleu cheese dressing. I accommodated this by putting crumbled bleu cheese or crumbled feta cheese over the top of the salad, then put the balsamic vinaigrette on the top.
Finally, oleo. Use real butter. There really is nothing healthy about oleo (fake butter). It's all hydrogenated oils and is no healthier for you than butter. Use extra virgin olive oil in place of butter whenever possible, but when butter is called for, use butter.
I know this is a lot to think about, so I'll leave you with this reminder. February 22 is Ash Wednesday. In the Christian tradition, this is the beginning of a 40 day fast before Easter. My challenge is to make one drastic, healthy change to your life. Get everything ready now for that change to happen. Then start on February 22 and for 40 days, stick to it. After 40 days, if you still want to go back to the old way of doing things, you're welcome to it. There's no harm in trying- it's only 40 days.
God Bless!
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