for the importance of all 3 macronutrients and why the are essential for good health.
If you want to avoid bad fats, avoid transfats...they do significant damage to the body.6879. thoughtful - 4/5/2007 10:27:51 PM
clydefo, you assumed i meant complex carbohydrates. Well carbos are carbos the way the body sees them. It all gets converted to sugar which, as I said before, must be burned immediately or converted to fat.
The difference between complex and simple carbs are of course the amount of fiber that comes with them, which helps slow digestion and eases the 'sugar shock' that comes with carbs. And complex carbs like whole grains and starchy vegetables carry a boatload of nutrition over and above that of things like sugar and high fructose corn syrup. But the body reacts to grapes as it does to a snickers bar. In fact, grapes have a higher glycemic index of 66 vs. the snickers bar at 59. Both lead to insulin rush.
Further in terms of overall balance, excess carbs come at the expense of other essential macro and micro nutrients provided by fats and protein.
You and others may find this article interesting about the damaging effects of sugar on the body leading to diabetes and the echo effects. Seeing as it concludes with the effects of the final echo:
# Neuropathy
# Amputation
# Kidney failure
# Dialysis
# Heart disease
# Blindness
# Death
and seeing that diabetes is rising at epidemic rates, it's probably worthwhile reading for anyone interested in good health.
6880. arkymalarky - 4/5/2007 10:36:22 PM
This is just gross.
I don't remember a time when we've had more issues with contamination in food. To think a roof leaked into peanutbutter that was sold to the public. Ugh.
6881. arkymalarky - 4/5/2007 11:23:38 PM
This is a cute Slate piece on Green Tea
6882. clydefo - 4/5/2007 11:40:25 PM
...fat is important element to satiety. If you eat a meal with fat, you will feel fuller faster than if you don't, thus feeling satisfied with lower calories than not.
Satiety or sluggishness? Fatty meals cause the blood platelets to clump and reduces their efficiency. As with protein, fats are vital to body chemistry and "infrastructure", but create problems when any excess is consumed. Fat is a good fuel source only in a concentration camp.
The USDA recommendation of 20-35% fat calories, partially justified by their claim that "fat is the most concentrated source of energy" is due to meat industry lobbying. Fat is the worst source of energy, in part because of the caloric concentration.
A diet of minimally processed whole grains, vegetables and fruits provides all the essential fatty acids we need. Flax seeds and walnuts are unneeded and provide too many fat calories. The "more is better" attitude usually leads to bad ends.
...grapes have a higher glycemic index of 66 vs. the snickers bar at 59. Both lead to insulin rush.
Only if you've not eaten recently. If you have been grazing all along on various CC munchies, you've been maintaining a nice steady insulin level. Unlike the candy bar, the grapes are mostly water, and the fiber is very desirable.
6883. judithathome - 4/5/2007 11:48:06 PM
The Slate article was hysterical...Next in this progression will be an invisible ghost tea with the regenerative properties of fetal stem cells. Scientists may also one day discover that drinking hot water is good for you.
6884. arkymalarky - 4/6/2007 6:39:54 AM
Well, the first day went pretty easily except for the exercise. I did it for a short time, even the treadmill, but I'm very out of shape. I stayed under 1500 calories without feeling particularly hungry. I need to do two more things off the bat (besides going to the doctor tomorrow and getting my allergies back under control) and add more things as I go, especially healthier food and more exercise. The first is to pay closer attention to the water. I had four glasses or so, but I should have had more, and keeping it around all the time doesn't mean I don't forget about the glass sitting there. The other is sleep. Since "Huckabee spoke" I've been getting far less sleep than I used to. Rarely do I get over 6 hours a night, and it's usually around four or five. I'd love to get 8-9, and I hope I can start to do that. I'm just not sleepy at bedtime, and I'm usually sleeping like a rock when I have to get up on work mornings. Dad, healthy as he is, sleeps until 10-11AM, but he can do that now. I always thought of him as an early-bird, but he just had to be. I don't care so much about the bedtime/waking time, but until school's out I can't sleep in, so I have to figure out how to get sleepier earlier. I've read a number of places that sleeping more has benefits, one of which is weight loss, and that women tend not to get nearly enough.
6885. thoughtful - 4/6/2007 1:28:10 PM
I agree on the importance of sleep. In fact it is one of the essential steps in the schwarzbein principle. Her thinking is all about balance. Some things we do wear the body down, other things help restore it. Her thinking is that it's important to keep those in balance. Sleeping is an important element to rebuilding as is proper nutrition.
6886. wonkers2 - 4/6/2007 1:49:59 PM
Cap'n Dirty sez, "Sex at least oncet a day helps, too!"
6887. arkymalarky - 4/6/2007 9:20:19 PM
Day two has been a run-around day. We just got home. We ate breakfast out with Mose, and not lunch. We ate at Cracker Barrel and I didn't worry too much about what I chose (2 eggs w/bacon, one biscuit, and hash browns--AND OJ! AND IT WAS WONDERFUL! ;-)), but I didn't eat it all, I ate leftovers of it for lunch, and we got all our "town" business done, so I don't have to eat out Monday due to going from school to town for tax stuff and groceries, then to class. I can come home and eat and then go.
The most embarrassing thing for me to admit starting out is that as little as I did exercise-wise yesterday, my legs are sore and tight-feeling. I did do just a little (5 mins) on the treadmill after logging off last night.
Also, I forgot I need to do bloodwork, I am going to have to do a round of antibiotics before starting my allergy shots, and as a result I'm rescheduling my physical. I'll finish the meds and then get my bloodwork done and go in after that, sometime week after next, probably.
6888. arkymalarky - 4/6/2007 10:51:22 PM
A note about rural living:
We don't just zip to the store or to do anything in town. When we go to do "town business" we do everything that needs doing, hopefully for at least a week, and the drive there and back alone takes 40 minutes or so. Planning these trips carefully has a lot of impact on how I can manage the rest of my routine. For instance, I left my prescription at another store, didn't realize it until after I got done shopping, had frozen stuff that had to get home, unloaded the car, got the message on my machine which let me know I'd been wrong about where I'd left it, drove back to town and got it, and went ahead and did my taxes (they hadn't quite finished with them when we checked right after our Wal-Mart trip), then went home. The day began before 8 and ended around 2:30. We both got haircuts, though, so that's one less thing to worry about. I was glad we actually grabbed only one meal, and that it was breakfast.
I get the impression urban living is similar, but suburban and town living is easier. You need something, you run up to the strip mall and get it. Does taking care of seemingly endless errands drive other people crazy and wear them out? I know in this town, or even the one where I work, it's no issue to run grab anything you need and be back within 20 minutes. Of course repeatedly doing that is disruptive, so planning is still valuable, but it isn't such an ordeal for every errand.
6889. arkymalarky - 4/7/2007 6:39:26 PM
Judith,
Would you share what you're doing, routine-wise, with swimming? I'm going to be in class every weekday in June and I could swim as long as I wanted each day, but I wonder what a good water routine would consist of. I don't like to swim when my parents are home, but I'll either get over that, or try to time it when they're out running--which would mean before class, probably. I don't know when my class is yet.
