Category Archives: Health Maintenance

Saturated, Unsaturated and Trans Fats

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To reduce your risk for heart disease, cut back on saturated fat and trans fat by replacing some foods high in saturated fat with unsaturated fat or oils.

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SATURATED FAT

Imagine a building made of solid bricks. This building of bricks is similar to the tightly packed bonds that make “saturated” fat. The bonds are often solid at room temperature like butter or the fat inside or around meat. Saturated fats are most often found in animal products such as beef, pork, and chicken. Leaner animal products, such as chicken breast or pork loin, often have less saturated fat. Foods that contain more saturated fat are usually solid at room temperature and are sometimes called “solid” fat.

UNSATURATED FAT

Now, imagine the links in a chain that bend, move, and flow. The chain links are similar to the loose bonds that make “unsaturated” fat fluid or liquid at room temperature like the oil on top of a salad dressing or in a can of tuna. Unsaturated fat typically comes from plant sources such as olives, nuts, or seeds – but unsaturated fat is also present in fish. Unsaturated fat are usually called oils. Unlike saturated fat, these oils contain mostly monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fat.

A few food products such as coconut oil, palm oils, or whole milk remain as liquids at room temperature but are high in saturated fat.

TRANS FAT

Trans fat can be made from vegetable oils through a process called hydrogenation**. Trans fat is naturally found in small amounts in some animal products such as meat, whole milk, and milk products. Check the food label to find out if trans fat is in your food choices. Trans fat can often be found in many cakes, cookies, crackers, icings, margarines, and microwave popcorn.

LIMIT SATURATED AND TRANS FAT

Eating more unsaturated fat than saturated and trans fats can reduce your risk of heart disease and improve “good” (HDL) cholesterol levels. Replace foods high in saturated and trans fat such as butter, whole milk, and baked goods with foods higher in unsaturated fat found in plants and fish, such as vegetable oils, avocado, and tuna fish.

SOME COMMON FOODS CONTAINING SATURATED FAT
beef fat (tallow, suet) butter chicken fat
coconut oil cream hydrogenated oils**
milk fat palm and palm kernel oils partially hydrogenated oils**
pork fat (lard) shortening stick margarine

Cut back on foods containing saturated fat including:

  • desserts and baked goods, such as cakes, cookies, donuts, pastries, and croissants
  • many cheeses and foods containing cheese, such as pizza
  • sausages, hot dogs, bacon, and ribs
  • ice cream and other dairy desserts
  • fried potatoes (French fries) – if fried in a saturated fat or hydrogenated oil
  • regular ground beef and cuts of meat with visible fat
  • fried chicken and other chicken dishes with the skin
  • whole milk and full-fat dairy foods

OILS AS PART OF A HEALTHY EATING STYLE

Oils provide essential fatty acids and vitamin E. They are found in different plants such as soybeans, olives, corn, sunflowers, and peanuts. Choosing unsaturated oils instead of saturated fat can help you maintain a healthy eating style. A few plant oils, including coconut and palm oil, are higher in saturated fat and should be eaten less often.

Choose foods higher in unsaturated fat and lower in saturated fat as part of your healthy eating style.

  • Use oil-based dressings and spreads on foods instead of butter, stick margarine, or cream cheese.
  • Drink fat-free (skim) or low-fat (1%) milk instead of reduced-fat (2%) or whole milk.
  • Buy lean cuts of meat instead of fatty meats or choose these foods less often.
  • Add low-fat cheese to homemade pizza, pasta, and mixed dishes.
  • In recipes, use low-fat plain yogurt instead of cream or sour cream.

https://www.choosemyplate.gov/saturated-unsaturated-and-trans-fats

 

(HIT) Training on the Eliptical

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When most people think of cardio, they think of long, boring jogs on the treadmill, or endless pedaling on the upright bike. But lately, the buzz in cardio training is high-intensity interval training (HIIT), which alternates between very high-intensity bouts of exercise with either a low-intensity bout of exercise or complete rest. This training style is a departure from the 30 to 60 minutes of continuous steady-state cardio that most people do on cardio machines.

HIIT workouts take less time than traditional cardio workouts and provide the same, if not greater, results. Benefits of HIIT workouts include:

-Raising your metabolic rate so you can burn more calories during exercise and at rest
-Increased aerobic and anaerobic pathways, which helps you utilize and intake more oxygen during steady state training and helps you sustain anaerobic activity for longer periods of time
-Ability to break through training plateaus
-Greater EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption), which translates into higher and longer calorie burning after exercise has stopped

HIIT can be done on any cardio machine that allows you to vary your speed or resistance. While treadmills make it possible to increase speed and incline, and bikes allow you to increase speed and resistance, the elliptical trainer has additional features that allow you to increase speed, ramp height and resistance. You may even be able to add an upper-body challenge if you have access to an elliptical trainer with arm handles. If you can complete at least 30 minutes of low to moderate cardiovascular activity on any one of the cardio machines, then you are ready to HIIT this workout, elliptical style.

Warm-up:

The first five minutes on the elliptical trainer should focus on getting the body ready to do the workout. Spend five minutes pedaling at a low-to-moderate pace to increase body temperature and prepare the body for more intense work. Then spend three minutes playing around with increasing the machine’s resistance level, ramp height, speed, or possibly a combination of these settings to find your true maximum effort.

Workout:

The workout consists of alternating bouts of high and low intensities for the suggested time. The short, intense work phase should be the maximum level at which you can push yourself. During the longer, low-intensity recovery phase, reduce the resistance, ramp height and speed to a pace that enables you to catch your breath.

 

Workout #1: Beginner HIIT
Time: 23 minutes

Elliptical Workout

As your fitness level improves and you are able to recover faster than the suggested time, reduce the time that you spend in the recovery phase.

Workout #2: Intermediate HIIT
Time: 20 minutes

Elliptical Workout

Cool-down:

Reduce the speed, ramp height and resistance level slightly lower than your low intensity settings. Focus on decreasing your heart rate and slowing down your breath before exiting the machine.

https://www.acefitness.org/education-and-resources/lifestyle/blog/3768/try-this-hiit-workout-on-the-elliptical-trainer

Indoor Stress Relief Games

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Indoor Stress Relief Games: These include the traditional card games, monopoly, charades, backgammon, chess, ludo, crosswords, Sudoku, puzzles, and several other similar games that we can play with our family, relatives and friends. Indoor games are a lot more convenient, less exhaustive and therefore, thoroughly relaxing. Indoor games are akin to meditation, they involve concentration that allows the mind to move away from the stress factor, and ensures intense involvement.

https://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/play_stress_relief_games_and_reduce_stress_easily.html

 

 

Health Benefits of Having a Routine

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People are creatures of habit, and routines offer a way to promote health and wellness through structure and organization. Having a routine can greatly improve your health.

the health benefits of having a routine

Many people who don’t have any type of routine suffer from:

  • Stress. No routine often means having the constant worry of “when will I get it all done.”
  • Poor sleep. Without a daily routine at work and/or home, you may find yourself playing catch-up with yesterday’s to-do list. If you’re always behind on what should have been done the day before, you’re likely also staying awake worrying about what didn’t.
  • Poor eating. Unhealthy diets (like eating lots of fast food) become the norm if there isn’t time scheduled for grocery shopping. Quick, unhealthy substitutes become the next best food option.
  • Poor physical condition. Working out usually requires some advance planning.
  • Ineffective use of time. Often, no routine means you simply run out of time, leaving things undone and not making the most of your time.

Routines can be fun and don’t need to be boring. Their health benefits will make you wonder why you didn’t start one earlier.

Some ways a routine can help include:

  • Better stress levels lead to improved mental health, more time to relax and less anxiety. A lack of healthy stress management techniques can put you at greater risk for heart disease and negatively impact your overall health.
  • Better sleep will leave you refreshed. Your daily routine influences your quality of rest. Your sleep schedule and bedtime habits affect your mental sharpness, performance, emotional well-being and energy level. It’s best if you can maintain a consistent time for waking and going to bed.
  • Better health is a result of just a little extra planning. Set the alarm a little earlier and you’ll have time to exercise and eat breakfast, fueling your body for the day. Even a quick (and healthy) breakfast will get you energized. Whether you like to just go for a run or go to the gym for a bigger workout, it’s important make time for exercise.
  • Good example setting will encourage others to try a routine as well. You demonstrate its importance and the positive effect it has on health, motivation and self-esteem.

Everyone is unique. Not everyone requires a fully scheduled day to reap the health benefits of a routine, so make the choices that work for you, knowing they’ll only make you healthier and more efficient with your time.

http://www.nmbreakthroughs.org/daily-health/health-benefits-of-having-a-routine

Outdoor Stress Relief Games

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Types of Stress Relief Games

Stress relief games can be divided into three broad categories: Outdoor, Indoor and On-line.  Today we will look at what Outdoor Games can do for you.
Outdoor Stress Relief Games: These include playing tennis, basketball, football or cricket. Outdoor games work similar to exercise and are a great way to unwind and relieve stress. Outdoor games serve as a healthy outlet for worries, frustration and depression. They are exhaustive and physical exercise helps reduce stress hormone levels in the body. Besides, exercise has many other benefits like weight control, improved metabolism, good digestion, etc. Outdoor games are enjoyable, encourages laughter, conversation,

Stress relief games are remarkably efficient in taking the mind off the stressor and rendering it free from worries.

Looking for School Immunizations?

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If you or your loved ones are looking for immunizations before school starts, there are no cost/low cost options for obtaining this needed service.  Marion County Public Health Department has many clinics that offer immunizations free or at low cost.  Some clinics offer appointments and others operate on a first come, first served basis.

If you have private health insurance, you may obtain immunizations, but you will pay at the time of service and then you will seek reimbursement from your insurance.

If on Medicaid, then services are covered.  If you have no insurance, then you may have vaccines with a top dollar amount of $20.00 for the visit.

The closest clinic to Butler University is located at 6940 North Michigan Street.  This is the Northwest District Health Office.  Their clinic hours are Mon., 3-5:30 PM; Tues. 8-11:30 AM; Wed-Fri. 12:00-3:30 PM.  This office operates on a first come, first served basis.

For additional resources check:  http://marionhealth.org/immunize/

 

 

Today’s Loss Tomorrow’s Gain

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How to Make Healthy Food and Healthy Lifestyle Choices Now

Learn how to control your impulses and delay gratification to make healthy decisions, avoid temptations, and choose bigger, long-term benefits over small, immediate rewards.

Today’s Loss Is Tomorrow’s Gain
Picture this: you’re walking down the beach, trip over a half-buried lamp, and out bursts a genie. But this is no ordinary genie — it’s a delay genie, and he’ll only grant you one wish right away or three wishes in a year’s time. (And hey, no time travel, or wishing for more wishes!)Three wishes are obviously more than one, but a year is a long time to wait. So you have the impulse to go ahead and make that one wish right now. Don’t feel too bad — this common trait behavior is called future discounting. It’s when we’re inclined to choose immediate gratification over greater future rewards.

Are you surprised? Like an opportunistic hunter-gatherer who stumbled across a bush full of ripe berries, evolution has taught us to take what we can get while we can get it. And just imagine all the things that could go wrong with that lamp over a whole year:

  • Your significant other sells “that ugly old lamp you keep around.”
  • A villain steals the lamp to make an immediate wish to take over the world.
  • You get hit by a bus (or run over by a flying carpet).

But we don’t live in a world of magic lamps, and we aren’t hunter-gatherers anymore. We exist in a time of 401k plans and long-term educational goals, a world where we can eat ten thousand calories at a sitting if we really want to. Moreover, research shows that the most successful among us in this modern world have the self-discipline to choose the options that benefit us in the future instead of doing what feels good in the moment.

Some of us have it worse than others, too. Extroverts face a harder time choosing the future over the present than introverts.1 (Who wants to worry about the future when you’re partying in the moment with friends?) And some people have addiction problems linked to the instant gratification that future discounting provides.

Here are some tips and tricks to gain more self-control so you can choose those three future wishes over that measly immediate wish.

Learn from the Past You

Forming new habits is a great way to gain self-control and minimize future discounting. Maybe it’s a common occurrence for a coworker to show up with donuts every morning, and the sweet taste of sugary dough seems a lot more rewarding than the healthier you that will result if you stick to your diet plan. If you got in the habit of making a delicious smoothie every morning, you can reward yourself with a filling treat and avoid the hunger pangs that say, “donut now!” Changing your habits can take away the future discounting choice altogether and replace it with an automatic action.

Trick the Current You

When faced with a present vs. future choice, change your wording to make it clear there will be zero reward down the line if you take the immediate option. By saying, “I can have three wishes in a year and zero now, or one wish now and zero in a year,” rather than, “I could have one wish now or three later,” you clarify that you’ll end up with nothing, zero, zilch in the future. And won’t that be disappointing?! This simple wording change helps us understand how much we’re giving up if we go for the immediate reward.

Here’s another trick. Diminish the delay by using specific dates: “I could have three wishes on December 31st or one wish now.” This puts the quantities at the forefront of your mind, instead of how long you’d have to wait between now and then.

Remember the Future You

Sometimes you forget that the future you is you. That future person feels like a stranger, and we aren’t keen on the idea of skipping our morning donut so that some abstract philosophical concept that resembles you (but doesn’t exist yet) can lose a few pounds and feel healthier. But research shows that when we remember the future you is still going to be you, just a little ways down the temporal road, it’s a lot easier to choose the option that benefits us the most. So, visualize the future you when faced with tough decisions, and make the best long-term decision for you both.

It isn’t easy to change your state of mind and choose what you could have tomorrow instead of what you really want today. But with the right state of mind, your choices will shower you with bigger benefits than ever.

Now choose your future, so you will be Healthy For Good!

https://healthyforgood.heart.org/be-well/articles/how-to-make-healthy-food-and-healthy-lifestyle-choices

 

Last 10/40 of Ways to Relax and Destress

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30. Go Barefoot

This is one of the many ways to get in touch with nature as previously mentioned, BUT it has unique properties of its own. Walking barefoot outside might make you a hippie, but it’ll also helps you absorb free electrons from the Earth and has a surprisingly powerful antioxidant effect on the body, as explained here. If anything, however, going barefoot gives you a natural, spiritual connection with the Earth on which we live. Deep.

31. Sing

Bring out your inner Beyoncé. Pair this up with “dance like nobody’s watching” (see #15), and you’re set as a backup singer/dancer.

32. Treat Yourself

Go out for some froyo, splurge in that clutch bag, give in to a guilty pleasure. Treating yourself is just a reminder that life is good, and that you deserve to have a good time.

33. Scents Make Sense

Try out aromatherapy. Some scents, like lavender and jasmine. Check out this page for a more detailed list.

34. Do Your Research

It’s important to relax, but it’s equally important to understand what caused you to stress in the first place. Acknowledge whatever it is, as it may just be right under your nose.

35. Chew Gum

Chewing gum can actually lower stress! Pop one in your mouth, and you’re set.

36. Find a Relaxation Mentor

AKA, a positive role model who excels specifically in the field of staying relaxed. Find that one dude whose catch phrase is “take a chill pill!” (Not limited to people who grew up in the 90’s…) By looking to others who are good at being calm, you can also learn their tricks.

37. Be Spontaneous

Take an alternate route to work, spice up your morning routine, or take an impromptu trip to your favorite store. We’re so entrenched in routine, but a bit of spontaneity once in a while is good for you.

38.Forgive Yourself

Any weird emotional tension? Let it go by forgiving others and yourself. Staying in the past is not worth missing the future.

39. Breathe

Probably the easiest thing you can do, and it takes only a few seconds. No matter where you are or however difficult the situation at hand may be, taking a deep breath can calm you down.

40. Remember You’re Human

It starts with awareness. We all make mistakes. Let go of any perfectionist tendencies that may be dragging you down, and let go of any unrealistic standards that you set for yourself and fail to reach. So… Relax, remember you’re human, and go reap the harvests of life.

To find the other tips check out: https://www.lifehack.org/articles/lifestyle/40-simple-and-brilliant-ways-relax-and-stress.html?utm_content=buffer917eb&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer