I have had many conversations with people over the last 10 years or so about nutrition through working as a Personal Trainer and by having discussions with people in various situations, such as at work, around sporting activities or just catching up. When someone is explaining to me how they generally eat or what they have eaten one day I have noticed some very common themes. These themes display to me further the mislead nature of the population due to reasons I have explained in previous posts and the way people almost unknowingly neglect their health because they believe what they do is ‘not that bad.’ Also, they seriously believe that doing some good things can offset the negative effects of bad food.
There is a saying in relation to exercise, ‘you can’t out run a bad diet,’ which means that despite the amount of exercise you might do, your body will never be as good as it should be if you are not eating correctly. The wrong foods cause inflammation which has a pivotal effect on your ability to recover from exercise and perform at an optimal level with sufficient energy production. Also, in many cases, those bad dietary practices will become extremely evident when you might reduce or stop exercising and since you are addicted to those foods you continue to consume them in the same quantities.
However, this saying actually applies to everyone because you can't get away from the negative effects of poor diet whether you exercise or not. Exercise can have a beneficial effect towards controlling blood sugar in some people, for example, but it will not last forever if you continue to eat blood sugar inducing (and, ultimately, insulin inducing) foods.
One of the themes I have witnessed in people when hearing about their dietary intake is telling me the knowingly poor choices they have made, such as sweet foods, baked goods, fast food/take-away, treats, certain breakfast products (mainly cereals that are not marketed necessarily from a health perspective), etc. and follow it up with a declaration that they had meat and vegetables for dinner. However, I can't blame them for doing this and believing it shouldn't have such a bad effect on their health because, as we are told so often, 'everything in moderation.'
This is a basic example of how a huge amount of people approach their food intake partly due to their knowledge about food being blurred by the massive range of marketing and poor advice out there. Unfortunately, this is not effective in maintaining either short or long term health. Every day that you only consume the right foods some of the time you are having a serious negative effect on your longevity and are bringing disease and illness weeks or even years closer.
There is constant talk of a 'balanced diet' and regular exercise being the only sure way to overall health which is accompanied by relatively broad, sometimes contradictory and often misleading information about food. But, what is moderation for each individual food item and how do you get the right balance of foods to achieve a 'balanced diet' which is actually healthy? With such a wide range of foods, which can have vastly different effects on the body, how are people truly supposed to know how to choose the best things all of, or at least the vast majority of, the time?
Even though, having one decent meal a day is better than having none, I’m afraid that it is not wiping out the effects of those poor food choices you may be making the rest of the time. This simple fact is one of the best reasons for people not achieving body weight objectives. Although, as we know now, the world has been lied to which means those one or two occasions a day that people are consciously trying to do the right thing, they are likely contributing further to their problems by consuming high carbohydrate, low fat foods. This is the case, particularly, when consuming foods in the form of wheat (bread, pasta, etc.) and other grains or the myriad of foods marketed as healthy yet contain various sugars and/or vegetable oils high in inflammatory polyunsaturated omega-6 fats.
It's so important to understand that consuming a wide range of foods, from those which I suggested in my previous post, about 95% of the time and preferably as close to 100% as possible, paying particular attention to the consumption of quality meat, fish, eggs and non-starchy vegetables, is the only way to truly give your body the best chance of avoiding the large amount of diseases and illnesses, which can be anything from obesity to cancer, that bad food contributes to or causes.
This may sound like a big deal to many of you but I can tell you, from my personal experience with transitioning to a low carbohydrate, high fat lifestyle full of natural and unprocessed foods, that it won't be a big deal for long. That is one of the major points to remember when making this change to your nutrition lifestyle. It only takes a very short amount of time in the context of your life to change your nutrition approach and see the rewards.
It will take several weeks to start enjoying the full effect of the benefits that come with truly healthy eating and there will definitely be times where you are battling your cravings for those foods you have been hooked on. It just takes those few weeks for your body to realise that it has to adapt to the foods you are now providing to it for energy. During that time, although you might feel a bit, or a lot, sluggish, you can still begin to see changes. In particular, those of you looking to reduce weight can see reductions within the first week just from the lack of carbohydrates causing less fat storing insulin to be pumped around your body as well as reduction in excess water retention.
However, once you have made the change and the longer you have been doing it, the greater the reduction in cravings for bad foods. Eating the right foods and seeing the physical and psychological positive changes happening makes a world of difference in how you view foods and the effect it has on your brain. You stop having such strong mental reactions upon the sight or thought of those foods that you know have been previously holding back your health and/or weight goals. Soon enough, you start finding it easy to say no to those biscuits or cupcakes someone has brought in to work and you stop searching for those sweet treats at 3pm and a couple of hours after dinner which you used to do even when you weren't hungry. This is all about the chemical/hormonal reactions in your brain being changed purely by the foods you are eating.
The big question is, what is the best way to make the change knowing that it's going to be difficult and you don't know exactly how long it will take to start feeling good?
In my opinion, go cold turkey. Clean out all the crap from your fridge and pantry. Stock up on all the good stuff I've mentioned in my previous post and only eat those foods, drink plenty of water and sleep as much as possible.
How quickly your body adapts to this change will be very dependent on how much you relied on those bad foods previously. The more you consumed them before, or were addicted to them, the more likely your reaction will be particularly difficult to deal with. However, if you've ever known someone who has quit smoking, especially if they have done it cold turkey, you will know that they go through the initial withdrawal phase which can be incredibly difficult to push through without relapsing. Then, there eventually comes a time when they truly see the positive changes happening to them as a result of quitting and this tends to be huge motivation to stick with it and they never look back.
I believe, going cold turkey will allow for the transition to happen far quicker because the body is remarkably good at adapting to its surroundings and stimulus but in this case you will be rewarding it with the best nutrition which means it doesn't have to work so hard anymore dealing with the bad stuff.
Also, when you see the positive changes happening so obviously within just a few weeks you know for sure that it has worked, whereas, if you try and make changes very gradually, those changes may not be obvious at all and you might not be sure that the changes are doing anything.
So, is it all or nothing? Not exactly but it's not far off.
I very much hope I can entice you to give this lifestyle change a go but, specifically, make the entire change and try to stick to it for at least one whole month to really give your body the opportunity to respond properly. I am very confident that anyone who can do this for one month will see significant improvements in a variety of areas, including a major reduction in their cravings for bad foods, and by continuing on will progress those improvements a whole lot further.
**Please note: if you currently suffer any medical condition or take regular medication it is essential that you consult with your medical practitioner before and/or while you undertake this lifestyle change. Medications may need to be adjusted and medical conditions may be effected. An example of this would be a type 2 diabetic, who is using insulin and/or another medication to help lower blood sugar, needing to reduce their usage because they are not consuming foods which cause high blood sugar.
Cheers,
Lincoln.
