Tag Archive for: Terrine Pearsall Nutritional Coach

Are Low Carb Diets for Everyone?

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When I hear low carb to me it means, “low sugar,” or “less processed foods.” If we’d all make an effort to avoid chips, cookies, cakes, high corn syrup drinks, and candy, then we’d be reducing our overall carbs and eating more healthfully at the same time.

There is also no need to avoid foods that are grown and served as close to their natural state as possible such as fresh fruits and vegetables, nor must you avoid brown rice or even pasta.

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It’s not pasta that makes us fat, it’s the creamy sauces and the loaves of bread, desserts, and drinks we have along with our spaghetti. It’s the combination and quantity of food, not just one food or category of nutrients. When I hear someone say they eat bacon non-stop but they refuse to eat a baked potato or fresh peeled orange it makes me want to scream. I’m not a nutrition expert (even the experts can’t agree at this point), but it does not take a genius to know that bacon is not a better choice over an apple. It just makes sense to eat the foods that grow in our soil first and to avoid the processed versions (think apples versus Apple Jack’s cereal).

For a good basic diet overall, eat as much as you like of wholesome, clean foods. Include healthy grains, rice, beans, salads, vegetables, fruits, nuts (in moderation). Use nut and vegetable oils for cooking. Cook at home once in awhile. Stop super sizing. Buy fresh produce when it’s available from your local farmers. Buy as close to home as possible, and walk to the store, if you can! What a concept.

Check the Serving Size on Processed Foods

If you want something pre-packaged read the label. How many servings does the label state? If more than one, multiply the numbers if you know you’ll eat the whole thing, or if you and your spouse will eat it all, then multiply by servings and divide by two. I’ve seen candy bars that say they serve 2.8 people! When’s the last time you split a candy bar?

I teach people to incorporate healthier eating into their lifestyles, not go on food plans dictated by some book or program which say what you can and cannot eat. Even those who can stay on the plan and do lose substantial amounts of weight, eventually eat something “off plan,” which leads to something else and finally to the mental shift, “Well, I’m off that plan. Better eat up!” What did that experience do for that person? Nothing, but probably they’ll end up a bit heavier than when they started.

Far better to learn how to eat within your usual lifestyle and create new habits that you then can live with, so even though Sunday is the big family party and you may (probably will) overeat, it won’t matter because Monday you’ll be back to your usual habits and patterns. That’s how people without a weight problem eat whatever they want — they just usually eat reasonably with the occasional deviation into unhealthy foods and quantities, rather usually eating an unhealthy diet and occasionally dieting like crazy to lose weight before a big event.

If you want a treat, have a treat, and no, it’s not a treat if you eat it every day. That’s a habit.

Start by Cutting Back Only 500 Calories

Get a reasonable idea of how many calories it requires to maintain your weight, i.e. if you are basically sedentary (get little or no movement regularly) then multiply your body weight by 12. Example, 200 X 12 = 2400. That would mean that if you did nothing but sit in a chair all day, you’d still need 2400 calories just to maintain your body weight!

Start by cutting back the calories required to maintain your weight by 500, so our 200 pound fellow would be perfectly fine eating 1900 calories a day. I eat around 2200 calories on average every day (weekends I eat more than weekdays but it averages out to around 2200). I’m active, and I maintain my weight at around 135 pounds which on my 5’7″ frame is fine for me.

No matter where you begin, start by cutting back by just 500 calories, instead of trying so valiantly to stick to 1200 calorie eating plans that aren’t suitable for a 10-year old child. Remember, your activity increases your calorie requirements, so if you do get out of bed, you’ll likely need more calories than your base. Whether you prefer low carb, low fat, low calorie or any combination thereof, just start to reduce what you’re eating now, make substitutions where possible and create a healthier diet that fits, then add more daily exercise and you’ll reach your goal in no time. Stand up in your chair, sit down. Stand up, sit down. That’s exercise. It can be that simple.

So yes, the low carb approach can be right for everyone. We can all adopt the low carb approach when it means eating less processed foods and adding more fresh fruits and vegetables.

Low Carbs Diet Guide

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So there has been a lot of talk about low carb diets and how remarkable they are. In this article we’ll get down to business on exactly what low carbs diets means so you’ll have a enhanced grasp on the how and why.

Let’s get this out of the way first: It’s not NO carbs, but it’s LOW carbs. You body is fueled by what you eat, and your body can’t operate properly without carbs. It is a essential energy source that supports all bodily systems, specially your muscles and brain.

carbs
What we don’t need is the quantity of carbs the average person consumes and particularly the types of carbs that are thrown in front of your face on every corner, magazine page and menu.

Let’s get down to the fundamentals which is being healthy, right? What better way to be healthy than to eat foods in their whole unprocessed state right? The closer the food can stay to it’s natural state, the better. Eating foods in this state will give you the most fiber and nutrients possible.

So you want a simple way to create a low carbs diet? Following these tips will really help out:

  1. Go for fruits! – These are sweets in their most natural form.
  2. Green means go! – Green vegetables are plentiful with chlorophyll and nutrients
  3. Say NO to refined sugars! – Watch out for hidden sugars in breads, lunch meats, dressing, soda, candy and cookies.
  4. Legume you say? – It’s not as strange as it sounds. These are foods rich in fiber like beans, peas and peanuts.
  5. Whole gains only! – When eating carbs, stick to products that contain only 100% whole non-refined grains. These have a much better stabilizing effect on your blood sugar.
  6. What’s all this talk about soy? — The miraculous bean has been used to substitute just about every food know to man. It’s a super food high in fiber and has also been known to diminish your risk of certain cancers and heart disease.

Here is a simple rule of thumb to go along with those quick tips: Permit yourself 5 servings of complex carbohydrates a day. A single piece of toast, serving of oatmeal, crackers, rice or a small potato.

I know everyone has different serving sizes, but for simplicity, half the size of your fist or it’s about a ¼ cup uncooked, ½ cup cooked. For a real thrust in slimming down, make your last serving no later than 6pm when your body is slowing down and has not a lot demand for these calorie dense foods.

Now let’s talk about a bit of the technical information on why so many have been so successful with a low carbs diet. First off most calorie dense foods come in the form of simple sugars and refined wheat products. When, not if, you get rid of these types of food from your diet, you will be cutting out a ton of calories. This also includes regular sodas and coffee drinks with added flavorings.

The first two weeks of a restricted carb diet, you body starts to break down glucose from your muscles and liver. The make up of glucose is a substantial amount of water, which is why you frequently hear the term “water weight.” For this reason during the first two weeks or so, many people can see impressive results which regrettably will taper off. This weight loss is predominantly water, but weight none the less.

If you keep up a diet with less than fifty grams of carbohydrates a day for more than fourteen days, that is when your body will start burning fat for energy! The name of this is called ketosis. A derivative of the breakdown of fat is called a ketone which is released in the blood stream and filtered through the kidney. Because of this increase in ketones in the blood, it is essential to drink more than the recommended eight cups of water a day while on this type of diet.

Are You Fooling or Fueling Your Body?

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Year in and year out, people promise themselves that this is the year they will start exercising and losing weight. However, that journey is much more complex that many people think. Losing weight and taking care of your health also includes nutrition.

If you go to the gym and do cardio, lift weights or even group exercise classes you will not see a change in your overall physique if you don’t provide your body with the necessary fuel to make that change happen. The marriage between nutrition and exercise could make the difference in making this year the year that your life changes.

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During Anaerobic exercise (resistance training) your body uses up muscle glycogen (a carbohydrate) in order to find energy sources of ATP (adenosine triphosphate). In high intensity exercises the body’s glycogen can be depleted quite quickly due to the small amount found in the muscle. Due to this decline, blood sugars drop leaving you at risk of a poor workout and it can even influence your next one. Therefore, post workout, your body needs to replenish these glycogen stores in order to prepare your body for your next workout.

Think about what are you eating now? Do you know if you are supporting a change in your physique or hindering it by neglecting to add the right things into your diet? Are you incorporating healthy fats, carbohydrates and lean protein in your diet? Your body needs macronutrients to provide it with calories and energy for functioning. Macronutrients are classified as carbohydrates, fats, and protein. All of these macronutrients are essential and provide you with various amounts of energy in calories.

Carbohydrates provide the body with 4 calories per gram, Protein 4 calories per gram, fats 9 calories per gram and ethanol-in alcoholic beverage form-delivers 7 calories per gram. Adding the right macronutrients into your body-along with a smart exercise/training program-can help you lose FAT weight and hold onto or even gain lean muscle.

However, neglecting to add these macronutrients in the right amounts-or NOT engaging in an exercise training program-could lead to fat loss and muscle loss, which is a less than desirable result.

Many of you know the importance of eating macronutrient rich foods to support your exercise but what about supplemental forms of them? Food should always be your first resort however there are certain situations when supplements can benefit your workout and maximize your results more efficiently.

Protein shakes are a common supplement used at the gym post workout. One of the main reasons for having a protein shake at the end of your workout is to replenish the body and support the rebuilding of muscles that have been broken down during resistance/weight or endurance training.

Another reason to have protein in the form of a shake after a workout is because it is a lot faster to make and consume than eating a meal (unless maybe you have a meal already prepared and can quickly swallow large chunks of food!). However, protein drinks should not be the only element of your post-workout drink.

When your body becomes efficient at creating and using energy for fuel, you begin to burn fat as well for energy. You do not exhaust all of your muscle fat during exercise and therefore you do not need to replace fat after a workout, especially if you are doing resistance training or short duration (less than several hours) endurance training or racing. However, it is important to maintain a diet with a modest amount of healthy fats.

Another great supplement that can be incorporated into your workout is a patented, sugar-free carbohydrate called Vitargo. Vitargo is a research based “supercarb”-an extract of starch-which has been studied in prestigious university laboratories. The subjects who took the Vitargo increased their work output by up to 23% just 2 hours after completing exhaustive exercise, compared to when they took a maltodextrin and sugars drink, or calorie-free placebo.

Vitargo also doesn’t cause the common bloating that occurs after ingesting other carbohydrates because it has been shown to move through the stomach and into the intestines 2.3x faster than a combo of maltodextrin and sugars (over 90% maltodextrin).That means you will get the necessary fuel you need for your muscles without experiencing that “heaviness”, when taken pre-, during (“intra-“), or post-workout. Vitargo also has been researched to show that it replenishes glycogen stores 1.7 times faster than a maltodextrin plus sugars combo-again 2 hours after exhaustive exercise.

Glycogen is the body’s way of storing carbohydrates, like plants and grains store starch. It does this in muscles, and the liver and brain. This means you will be able to provide your body with the necessary fuel/energy replenishments needed for your next workout. In addition to all of these bonuses, Vitargo also increases the rate of blood sugar rise 2 times quicker compared to Maltodextrin and sugars.

So, what does all this mean? In order to get maximum results from your workout you need to be eating adequate amounts of macronutrients like carbohydrates, fats, and proteins every 3-4 hours in order to provide your body with the necessary energy and rebuilding components. You also, however, need to make sure that you are also giving your body the right supplements pre and post workout.

Because of the unique nature of Vitargo, you can drink it pre-workout to provide your muscles and your brain with the necessary fuel you need to make it through an intense workout. You can also mix it with your protein powder post workout to replenish your glycogen stores, support muscle repair, and promote faster recovery before the next time you dive into an intense workout.

Providing your body with the necessary fuel pre and post workout, can not only bring yourself one step closer to your fitness goals but also fuel your workouts, not “fool” them! Next time I’ll write about why many find it hard to train/work out while on a low carb or “keto” diet and how to use pulsed fueling tactics to have better workouts… and better results!

Health of Body and Health of Mind

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What does it really mean to be healthy? If you are fit and can do all your work reasonably well, then does it mean you are healthy? Is fitness health?

Most people equate health with health of body. This is not exactly wrong, because until some years ago, that was the concept and meaning of health that we had in mind. We thought that health of body means that you are healthy. People believed that if you are free from disease, it meant they were healthy.

body

But, these are old notions. In today’s world, it is not just enough to be free from disease to be healthy. The view has definitely widened.

Today, health has various aspects to it. Experts speak about the physical, the mental, the spiritual and even the social aspect of health. Health is no longer just absence from disease, but you have to be free from any mental, psychological and social disorders too to be counted as healthy.

Think about a criminal. A person who does something against society does so because they are not well in the mind. Though they may not have any disease hounding them, they are definitely not healthy. They need to be cured; and hence even corrective methods used by governments and law agencies are modes of treatment.

There are so many signs of ill-health that parents completely ignore in their growing children. They see things like sickness and disease, but they completely ignore their mental grown and development. A child who lies needs to be corrected.

A child who finds happiness in troubling their parents and teachers needs some kind of help. These are not issues of the body; they are issues of the mind. They need to be tackled early on, because like any other disease, they can grow to serious proportions.

In the past, health was something that was individual. If you did not take care of your health, it was only you who suffered. But, with this widened definition for health, the scope has definitely increased. If you don’t take care of your health now, it won’t be just you who suffer.

Think about the child whose habits are difficult to control. Such a child probably grows up and becomes a torment to society in some way or the other.

Health and wellness do not mean the same thing as they did a decade ago. In fact, even medical practitioners include various interpersonal and social methods of treatment. It is all a part of a much larger game.

Give Your Health the Importance That It Deserves

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Health is not a fad that will be over anytime soon, it is something that we are reminded every now and then, the commercial breaks, a short visit to the doctor, the leaflets given to us on the streets; seems like a lot of people are catching up with this health awareness issue. Even with all that information that we get do we ever follow it to the latter, do we really watch what we put into our mouths?

Do we cautiously follow the recommended balanced diet? It really needs a lot of effort to be able to eat wisely and this can be achieved by setting goals to a healthy life.

healthy

That desire should come from you, being forced to keep fit will do you no good because in other’s presence we will follow the whole diet thing but behind their backs we will do exactly the opposite. Trying to keep fit is not such an easy task especially if you are used to throw in just about anything into our stomachs and if we are not strong enough then we tend to go back two steps behind after making a step of progress. If you have a strong desire to make a difference then believe me you will go far with it.

They say an apple a day keeps the doctor away but that does not mean that by just eating an apple you will be healthy; you have to take in a balanced diet. Don’t you think by keeping a healthy lifestyle, you would keep the doctor away from you for the longest period ever and no more scary visits to the hospitals which many of us loathe or no more fears of being diagnosed with ‘incurable diseases?

So how do you keep a healthy lifestyle? You first have to believe that you can truly do it or else you will not go far. You have to set your goals right, put them down on paper and make sure you are able to beat the deadline.

You have to ensure you take a balanced diet containing the carbohydrates, proteins and the vitamins not forgetting the roughage or water. You should also exercise from time to time to ensure you don’t have excessive fat in your body system.

Avoid the canned food and opt for fresh food, ditch the red meat and go for the white type of meat and also avoid fried and baked food as much as they are sweet, they will lead you to a premature death. With the gradual change that you make, your life will change too and get better in terms of health.

The Science Behind Losing Weight

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Two things which you absolutely have to do when you are trying to lose weight are; Eat healthy meals, at regular times throughout the day, and get more cardiovascular exercise.

Some people are of the opinion that dieting is quite easy. That is certainly not true, at least for most people. It should be noted that if losing weight were easy, there wouldn’t be so many millions of different diets, weight watchers and gastric bands.

weight

Having said that, exercising at the gym and working out regularly is for some people very easy, whereas other people just really could not hate it more. So it is different for everyone.

A while back there was an article posted on a website which explaining that losing weight is a very simple thing to do. ‘Weight loss is easy’ it read. It is hard to understand how some people think it is easy. The website in question was dedicated to fitness and dieting and it had some very good advice about how to stay in good shape; however, the section that talked about dieting was not very accurate.

Weight loss can be seen as a science, however it is also psychological. Dieting science is all about burning more calories on a daily basis, then you are consuming. The psychological part of it is somewhat different. You need to train your brain to hate foods which will make you fat. If you can’t do that then you will not be able to stop eating those foods. That’s how it works.

There are ways to overcome both these factors, both psychological and physical. Although I’m not a dietician or a professional trainer, I can explain to you what has worked for me.

First of all, you should find out what your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) is. In order to understand how exactly this works, you can go to my hub which is entitled ‘What-are-the-components-of-a-healthy-balanced-diet’

Once you know what your BMR is, you will be able to figure out how many calories you should be consuming in one day. This will ensure that you do not gain any extra weight.

The part which is a bit harder is the psychological factor. What works for me is this.

Write down all the reasons why you want to lose weight. The list can be as long or as short as you want it to be. Next, write what you would do differently if you would be able to lose weight. Maybe you would be able to play more with the kids; maybe it would give you extra confidence around members of the opposite sex. Or maybe you would just feel better in general. Write down everything that comes to mind.

The next thing to write down is what would happen if you did not lose any weight. The things that would happen if you would not be fit and healthy.

When you have that list written out, you should read it at least once a day. Either in the morning or at night before sleeping. After a few days of reading that list, I am sure you will not want anymore unhealthy foods.

Keeping Fit for Life

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It seems the issue of health and wellness is well known among children, men and women and everyone wants to keep fit. Have you realized how people go the gym of late, seems that business is really booming but I think you don’t have to spend a dime in the gym well unless you need to tone your muscles after losing weight and have a fabulous body that will be people’s envy.

All you need is to eat healthy and enjoy these fruits of your graceful work.

keeping fit

Keeping fit helps you develop a psychological framework that conquers depression. You see when you’re obese or plump in the manner of having excessive fat in your body you will get depressed and continue to eat in a very unhealthy manner, since most people succumb to eating when depressed and this is a risk of shortening your life .It should be able to help you counter most health problems like high blood pressures and cardiac arrests.

People believe that by starving themselves, the amount of fat in their bodies is reduced and some even end up being anorexic but that is not the case. If you again maintain a healthy lifestyle, your metabolism will be increased and do all the work for you by finding a natural way of burning the food that you eat so you do not have to starve or worry about what to eat.

You will be more flexible and active since having a fit body means that you also have an energetic body therefore you can perform any task without having to tire quickly.

A high percentage of us have an ageing phobia and so more plastic surgeries are performed and more people are heading to the shops for anti ageing creams. Why spend all that money yet you can easily withhold the ageing process, hard to believe right?

Here is the thing, when you feel old, it means that your body is tired or not in good shape but when you feel young, it means that energy is freely flowing in your body and your body is in a pretty good shape.

So by keeping fit, you will feel younger and thus ageing will not be an issue to you. It also helps you burn more calories than you take in and this is a good thing. If you can burn around ninety thousand calories a year then a daily intake of two hundred and fifty calories will not be a bother and this is another way of losing weight without starving. Keep fit, stay healthy, younger and happier.

4 Weight Loss Supplements for Fast Weight Loss Success

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Weight loss supplements are always known to be able to provide a little boost to your weight loss campaign. Exercises and a proper balanced diet can help in losing weight but most of the time, you will need weight loss supplements to push you through a plateau.

In this article, you are going to learn about the four supplements that you can add to your weight loss plan. However, the results may vary from person to person. Also, you must consult your doctor about taking these supplements if you are underage, pregnant or taking other forms of medication.

Apple Cider Vinegar

Used by the ancient Egyptians and passed to us today after some long centuries, apple cider vinegar is popularly known for its weight loss effects. The most desirable benefits of taking apple cider vinegar as a weight loss supplement is that it does not bring along any negative side effects. Children and elders can even consume them for the health benefits.

Apart from being able to help you to lose weight, apple cider vinegar is also able to improve the condition of a person facing certain ailments or illnesses.

Hoodia

Hoodia gained popularity in the weight loss industry as a great and effective appetite suppressor over recent years. Imported from the Kalahari desert, it has been turned into weight loss pills and supplements. Although it can bring weight loss results within a short period of time, one is not recommended to use it for long term fitness maintenance plan.

Prescription Diet Pills

If you want the safest diet supplements in the market, then you should go for prescription diet pills. Regulated and tested by the FDA, prescription diet pills are known to have little to no side effects to human body. Fat burning, appetite suppression and carbohydrates blocking are some of the major functions of the pills.

These pills are normally inexpensive. Trial offers and test samples are also being given away to consumers by health companies manufacturing these pills. You should take advantage of these offers before spending any big money on them.

Propolene

Propolene is being used widely in supplements and pills for weight loss. Its common functions include suppressing our diet and fat burning. It forms a fiber mass once it reaches our stomach, stimulating our brains that there is no hunger since the stomach is filled. If you are looking forward to lose a large amount of weight or fat, propolene is the ingredient that you should be looking for when buying weight loss supplements.

3 Ways a Good Weight Loss Supplement Can Help You

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In the traditional way of thinking, a weight loss supplement was supposed to play a ‘supplementary’ role to diet and exercise in the loss of weight endeavor. A person who was looking to lose mass was usually advised to enlist the help of a supplement for loss of weight, of course in addition to a diet that was conducive to their mass loss goal, and, ideally, a good exercise regime. The combination of diet, exercise and weight loss supplement was in most cases guaranteed to deliver loss of mass.

Then came the age of instant gratification, and that approach to weight loss suddenly became unfashionable. People began to ask, in the spirit of instant gratification and avoidance of effort, whether it wouldn’t somehow be possible to lose mass with the help of the supplement for loss of weight alone.

supplement

This was to be expected, seeing that besides the supplement for loss of weight, the other mass loss aids (diet and exercise) were quite ‘unpleasant:’ calling as they did, for considerable exertion on the part of the person looking to lose weight.

All this led to a situation where people started looking to lose mass with the aid of mass loss supplements only. For the most part, they ended up being unsuccessful. And this led to frustration, which had the long term effect of making people to start questioning the efficacy of the weight loss supplement. Indeed, some went on to declare that mass loss supplements don’t work.

The truth of the matter, however, is that a good loss of weight supplement, properly used, can help you in three ways in your endeavor to lose mass. To be sure, it may be a tall order to lose weight with the help of loss of weight supplements exclusively. Indeed, many tend to come with a disclaimer to exactly this effect: which goes something like ‘this supplements works best when used alongside diet and exercise.’ Still, there are the three ways in which a good loss of mass supplement can help you in your endeavor to lose weight.

1. The first way through which the loss of mass supplement can help you in your endeavor to lose weight is making the mass loss faster. They call in expediting the process, and the effect, using the right way loss supplement can be rather considerable.

2. The second way through which the weight loss supplement can help you in endeavor to lose weight is by making the loss of mass less demanding in terms of efforts. This is where you may still have to make dietary modifications and exercise if you are to lose weight, but where a good weight loss supplement increases the ‘returns’ you get for your investments into the mass loss endeavor.

3. The third way through which a good supplement for loss of mass can help you in your weight loss endeavor is by keeping you motivated on the process. Many people who decide to ‘live with’ their mass problems tend to be people who attempted to lose weight and failed. A good mass loss supplement, by expediting your weight loss and ‘increasing the returns’ on your investments in that endeavor gives you at least some ‘initial results’ to celebrate, and keep you motivated to continue on your mass loss effort. Attempting to go about trying to lose weight without a mass loss supplement could mean that it may be months before you start seeing any results out of your effort, by which time you could have given up on the whole venture.