Last Friday night, after finally finishing the last leg of my journey and coming home to Long Island, I checked my email and found many emails with questions about low-fat, no-fat, and low-carb diets.
First of all, no fat diets are dangerous, and you really shouldn't even attempt anything like that except under strict medical supervision. Even then, I'm hard pressed to think of why it would be necessary.
Fat is very important for the body to function optimally, but the question remains: how much fat is enough? For almost the last forty years, the medical community has been recommending a low amount.
The medical consensus on carbs was essentially the same. The long-held belief was that a diet that followed the high-carb, low-fat rule would be the best way to achieve weight loss. You can look around and see for yourself how unsuccessful that theory has been.
Truly, the most essential factor in a successful diet is BALANCE.
When we speak of balance, we are speaking of the balance of fat, protein, and carbohydrates.
I have gone over this before, but it bears repeating: the best foods are those that are closest to their natural state. Essentially, that means choosing unprocessed food over processed food. A baked sweet potato is close to its natural state. Potato chips are not. Fresh fish with grilled vegetables would be classified as food that is close to its natural state, but breaded, fatty frozen fish sticks are not.
An excellent way to judge healthy food versus unhealthy food is whether or not it comes in a package. Simply put, packaged food is generally unhealthy. Look at the ingredients: packaged food typically contains trans fats and high fructose corn syrup -- both of which are highly detrimental to your health.
Most low fat items have high sugar contents. They're always sweet, which makes them palatable, and the same rule applies to no fat. Sugar, or a sugar substitute, is always in the mix.
Low-carb foods most often contain a sugar substitute as well, and they tend to taste just awful. In order to eat them, you really have to persuade yourself that they taste good. I'd rather not.
You can eat almost any food as long as it doesn't come in a package mixed with other ingredients. Frozen vegetables, as long as they're just vegetables, is A-okay. Frozen vegetables mixed in a sauce, is not. The sauce, if you can call it that, is mixed with all kinds of things that make the sauce stable, and you fat. More often than not, there are more calories in the sauce, than in the vegetables.
Even though vegetarianism is considered to be a healthy way of life, there are many problems with that type of dietary restriction. Vegetarians often end up with a serious case of under-nourishment and are vulnerable to many other health risks -- all stemming from the fact that they do not eat a balanced diet.
The best way to gain control of your diet is to start slowly, one meal at a time. My friend Nate has some words of wisdom on the subject: "Practice push ups instead of doing sit downs." His message is that when you are full you should push up from the table, not sit down in order to eat more.
My recommendation is that you take a daily dose of pharamceutical-grade enteric coated fish oil which is manufactured to be free of contaminants. Taking this type of fish oil every day will insure that you are getting the omega 3 essential fatty acids that you need to keep you body performing at its very best.
The other day someone referred me to a bodybuilding web site, where the genius bodybuilder who took fish oil was cutting back his dose, because he didn't want to get too much fat in his diet. I guess that's why he's a bodybuilder, because he doesn't even know why he's taking it in the first place. All brawn, no brain.
The truth is, because he is an athlete he needs MORE fish oil, not less. Athletes typically train for hours every day and should be increasing their dosage of fish oil, instead of being concerned about a few extra fat grams. What he doesn't know is that ingesting the proper amount of fat would most likely make him look better and perhaps contribute to his winning a competition. I'm not betting that he'll take this advice.
First of all, no fat diets are dangerous, and you really shouldn't even attempt anything like that except under strict medical supervision. Even then, I'm hard pressed to think of why it would be necessary.
Fat is very important for the body to function optimally, but the question remains: how much fat is enough? For almost the last forty years, the medical community has been recommending a low amount.
The medical consensus on carbs was essentially the same. The long-held belief was that a diet that followed the high-carb, low-fat rule would be the best way to achieve weight loss. You can look around and see for yourself how unsuccessful that theory has been.
Truly, the most essential factor in a successful diet is BALANCE.
When we speak of balance, we are speaking of the balance of fat, protein, and carbohydrates.
I have gone over this before, but it bears repeating: the best foods are those that are closest to their natural state. Essentially, that means choosing unprocessed food over processed food. A baked sweet potato is close to its natural state. Potato chips are not. Fresh fish with grilled vegetables would be classified as food that is close to its natural state, but breaded, fatty frozen fish sticks are not.
An excellent way to judge healthy food versus unhealthy food is whether or not it comes in a package. Simply put, packaged food is generally unhealthy. Look at the ingredients: packaged food typically contains trans fats and high fructose corn syrup -- both of which are highly detrimental to your health.
Most low fat items have high sugar contents. They're always sweet, which makes them palatable, and the same rule applies to no fat. Sugar, or a sugar substitute, is always in the mix.
Low-carb foods most often contain a sugar substitute as well, and they tend to taste just awful. In order to eat them, you really have to persuade yourself that they taste good. I'd rather not.
You can eat almost any food as long as it doesn't come in a package mixed with other ingredients. Frozen vegetables, as long as they're just vegetables, is A-okay. Frozen vegetables mixed in a sauce, is not. The sauce, if you can call it that, is mixed with all kinds of things that make the sauce stable, and you fat. More often than not, there are more calories in the sauce, than in the vegetables.
Even though vegetarianism is considered to be a healthy way of life, there are many problems with that type of dietary restriction. Vegetarians often end up with a serious case of under-nourishment and are vulnerable to many other health risks -- all stemming from the fact that they do not eat a balanced diet.
The best way to gain control of your diet is to start slowly, one meal at a time. My friend Nate has some words of wisdom on the subject: "Practice push ups instead of doing sit downs." His message is that when you are full you should push up from the table, not sit down in order to eat more.
My recommendation is that you take a daily dose of pharamceutical-grade enteric coated fish oil which is manufactured to be free of contaminants. Taking this type of fish oil every day will insure that you are getting the omega 3 essential fatty acids that you need to keep you body performing at its very best.
The other day someone referred me to a bodybuilding web site, where the genius bodybuilder who took fish oil was cutting back his dose, because he didn't want to get too much fat in his diet. I guess that's why he's a bodybuilder, because he doesn't even know why he's taking it in the first place. All brawn, no brain.
The truth is, because he is an athlete he needs MORE fish oil, not less. Athletes typically train for hours every day and should be increasing their dosage of fish oil, instead of being concerned about a few extra fat grams. What he doesn't know is that ingesting the proper amount of fat would most likely make him look better and perhaps contribute to his winning a competition. I'm not betting that he'll take this advice.
About the Author:
If you want assistance with your weight loss, Dr. Bill recommends an enteric coated fish oil If you want health and wellness.