Want to have a boy?
Forget about having to eat certain magic foods, having sex at a particular time or in a certain position. New research out today indicates the chance of having a boy is higher if the mother’s energy intake before and during the early stages of pregnancy is high. This has been shown before in animals, but not in humans.
I suppose this could lead to a whole bunch of son-craving males force-feeding their partners!
I speak to a lot of different people about a range of ‘dieting’ ideas. Some of the stuff is good, however there are quite a few different practices that really make no sense at all. Below I have outlined my current top three of the later. If you do any of these then you need to stop. Stop yesterday!
The concept that needs to be understood is that excess calories any time of the day may help you to gain weight. It is just as sensible to say don’t eat between 10am and 3pm, or to not eat between 2pm and 7pm as it is to not eat after a certain time. Come to think of it, that is a good business idea… The ‘No eating between 9am and 11.30am diet’… Kind of has a ring to it no?
This one really should not need too much of an explanation. What they don’t tell you is the other things they advise you to do (like eat fruits and vegetables, stop smoking, do a bit of exercise, and limit alcohol) are primarily responsible for any ‘cleansing’ (whatever that actually means) that goes on. Kind of like the stone soup story I remember as a child:
“The original stone was only a pretext to start the villagers sharing in a way that they would not have considered without the catalyst of the “stone soup” that they thought they were improving.”
Interestingly, this dieting ‘pretext’ works for many, many people. The thing about it that is questionable is the sustainability of it.
I could not imagine my life without chocolate. Yet if an uneducated nutritionist looked at my diet, chocolate may well be something they would recommend for me to eliminate. Interesting thing about nutritional avoidance is that it more often ends in a binge.
Good news is the best (sustainable) ideas helping you get to and maintain a healthy weight involve avoiding crap foods that you know are bad from you and a bit of forward planning. No gimics. No fad. Something you can keep up for the rest of your life.
Everyone know that exercising is good for you. It lowers the chance of getting a number of conditions and stops you from putting on weight for excess food consumption. It also may make you perform a little better.
What is your motivation for exercising?
Is it athletic performance, health, or aesthetic?
Honestly.
I would guess, although many people would not admit it, you are motivated almost exclusively by aesthetics. This was never more obvious to me than in initial consultations with people in gyms. Clients would talk about wanting to be ‘healthy’, but then when you got down to the root of the issue there was never mention of health as I would have measured it – it was all about losing fat and/or building a little muscle. Never was I asked on doing exercise for their heart or non-aesthetic health.
This despite what we know about health. It is better to be ‘fit and fat’ than it is to be the right weight but unfit. This is just a result of the social pressure to look ‘healthy’, even if you aren’t. This is obviously how we measure health – body shape – ignoring fact.
Interestingly, even if your goal is aesthetic we know the fear of becoming unattractive is a much bigger motivator for most than the desire to look good.
In summary: Our motivation to exercise is to not look bad.
Kind of depressing!
Too often people focus on a magic vitamin or mineral as being the key to good health. Unless you are severely deficient it is not. Eating fresh, whole foods is still the ‘secret’ despite what the newest diet, weight loss supplements, or health food shop attendant tells you.
Taking pill form vitamins and minerals may be a good safe guard against deficiency, but before you even think about buying them ensure you are doing the following:
As is often my theme, you should be trying to get the biggest bang for your buck. The biggest effect for your effort, regarding vitamins and minerals is without a doubt eating a variety of fruits, vegetables, meats and fish, nuts and seeds.
There is a bit of a buzz around ‘super foods’ (if you have not heard of them try googling super foods and you will see what I mean). They are, apparently, foods and beverages that provide a ‘super’ health benefit.
This is of course a whole bunch of hype about what you know already: Fruits and vegetables have lots of good stuff in them, as does fresh fish, and nuts and seeds. I have never seen a Big Mac or Large Fries listed as a ‘super food’ though, and so I suppose the concept is sending out a good message.
The reality is that we should all be eating these ‘super’ foods, and foods like them, often. Commonly quoted ‘super’ foods are:
Don’t be fooled. Are blueberries really that much better than strawberries? Raspberries? Blackberries? No, in fact, what is better than just eating blueberries is a mixture of all of the above berries as you get a wider range of vitamins and minerals. The same goes for other varieties of nuts, and most fish too.
And so how would this group of foods look as part of a diet? Outstanding, and so the question becomes how do you incorporate them into you diet?
The answer: Make these foods (or ones like them) the basis of meals that you eat often.
In a follow up to a blog I wrote at the start of the year, researchers have looked at over 250 short (5-6 hours), average (7-8 hours), and long (9-10 hours) duration sleepers over the last 6 years.
What they found: Short and Long duration sleepers were 35% and 25% more likely respectively at gaining 5kg over the 6 years. Or, put another way, the short duration averaged about 2kg gain, and the long duration sleepers averaged about 1.5kg compared to the average sleepers.
I think part of this has to do with simply being in a routine. People who have a sleep routine are more likely to have an exercise routine, eating routine etc. The reason this makes a difference is because people who regularly eat the same healthy meals are more likely to be a healthy weight… So I am assuming it is good eating routines that the people who have good sleeping routine have. It does not mean you have the same menu each week, just that good habits/routines are critical if health/fitness is your aim.
I could emphasise this point by discussing exercising in the morning. There are often workout plans/diets that focus on working out a specific time of the day. Many say the morning is best because you use a greater proportion of fat as a fuel if you exercise in a fasted state. For me it is a null argument because someone who does the exact same exercise at night is going to be getting 99% of the benefits as the person exercising in the morning. What is infinitely more important is 1. Adherence to the program, 2. The type of workout you do at whatever time you work out, and 3. What you eat for the rest of the day. For all these reasons working out in the morning probably is the best time to work out, but not for the insignificant reason the prescribers say – it has to do with adherence – you are simply more likely to do it!
So how can you ensure you get 7-8 hours sleep a night? Here are some tips on how to get a good night’s sleep from The American Academy of Sleep Medicine:
