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Home » Diets that Work » The diet changes to make this year – Mumbai Mirror

The only sustainable diet plan is one which involves small tweaks to your lifestyle. Commit to these three changes to get fit

By Luke CoutinhoNo nutritionist or doctor can accurately prescribe the quantity of food required by your body. Nobody can tell how much energy a persons brain, digestive system and emotions require. So if you are really determined to get fit, choose to adopt these lifestyle tweaks. They are far more powerful, far less costly, and far more likely to be things you turn into lifelong habits.

1 Listen to your body

How does it help: Once you start listening to your body, you will realise that fad diets simply wont work because the bodys needs are dynamic. It changes from day to day based on what it goes through. On an active day the body will need more carbohydrates, than on sedentary days.

The amount of energy you expend, the kind of mental strength you use at the workplace and everything else keeps changing every day. So, how can a single set of foods and method of eating work effectively for all of us, every day? Take breakfast, for example. Do you eat breakfast even if you are not feeling hungry?

I bet most of us do. But gone are the days where we were made to believe that breakfast is the most significant meal of the day. There are some people and children who genuinely wake up hungry because of their activity levels and metabolism. But if you are eating breakfast just because you have been told to, then it is wrong. Its important to get in tune with our bodies, because once you do, it becomes a way of life and frees you from all sorts of fad diets.

2 Cut down on salt and sugar

The more we consume foods laden with sugar and salt, the more addicted we get to these. Sugar and junk food addictions are the hardest to break because of the way they tricksyour taste buds.

Salt and sugar, should you decide to consume these, must be natural, unrefined and unprocessed. A lack of salt in the diet can alter electrolyte balance, and that can be dangerous for your body. So, too, is the case with sugar. We need these, but in limited quantities and from natural sources like fruits, raisins, raw honey and jaggery.

How does it help: Sodium is anhydrous in nature. Every gram of excess sodium chloride needs roughly 23 g of cellular water to neutralise it (water from cells). Hence, excess salt intake causes tissues to hold onto water leading to edema/ water retention. It also draws excess water in the blood leading to an increase in osmotic pressure directly impacting the pressure in the heart, leading to high blood pressure.

Refined salt also hardens the arteries, causes haemorrhaging in blood vessels and a thickening of heart muscles. Additionally, refined salt/common table salt also has additives like calcium carbonate, magnesium carbonate and aluminium hydroxide, which has a direct connection with Alzheimers.

Himalayan pink salt is one of the healthiest salts in the world. Its hygienic and unrefined, and great for digestion, immunity and cleans out toxicity. Apart from that it also contains 85 trace minerals. Make a switch from refined salt to unrefined pink salt (unless you already have elevated potassium levels, which may occur due to a kidney issue).

As for excess sugar, it is obviously linked to weight gain, inflammation, low immunity, acidity, premature ageing, poor skin health, hormonal imbalances, hyperactivity and a lack of focus, developmental delays in kids, imbalance in gut microbiome leading to all sorts of digestive disorders, mood swings, a decline in dental health, cancer, elevated lipids, especially triglycerides and belly fat.

The impact of sugar on children is even worse because when a child is two or three years old, the brain gets directly addicted to sugar, which can impact her behaviour. Its easier to gain control of sugar consumption in older children as they may understand why sugar is bad for the body.

Make the shift one food item at a time. Even reducing one tablespoon of sugar and salt is positively going to impact your health.

3 Eat an early dinner Your body is not designed to digest food at night and definitely not a greasy meal. Our body works according to nature within the 24-hour Circadian rhythm. According to our Circadian rhythm, as the sun sets, our digestive and metabolic processes slow down, the secretion of digestive enzymes is minimal and there is an increased secretion of melatonin a hormone responsible for inducing sleep. This leads to two things slow digestion and increased stimulus to put us in a state of rest.

Late-night meals, heavy dinners, alcohol, constant snacking, bedtime munching, and so on, disrupt the Circadian rhythm, impeding the digestive system and the process of sleep.

Eat your last meal as close to sunset as possible, followed by fasting all through the night. Then break your fast only after sunrise. This way you give your body a 12-hour fast.

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The diet changes to make this year - Mumbai Mirror

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Home » Diets that Work » The diet changes to make this year – Mumbai Mirror