Should we eat meat?

I am not a big fan of red meat, preferring chicken and fish. I find red meat hard to digest and it leaves me feeling a bit uncomfortable. Other people chose not to eat red meat for religious, environmental and/or animal welfare reasons. However if you are one of the many people love their red meat the following information is for you.

All the research shows that eating white meat like chicken has very few health issues providing you eat chemically and processed free chicken. (More about processed foods in a minute). The health issues appear to be related to red meat and processed meat.

There are many healthy nutrients in red meat including iron, zinc and Vitamin B12. You can get these in other foods but need more of them and a wider range to ensure healthy quantities. For years the saturated fat in red meat was deemed to be the culprit however new research and findings several years ago have shown that it probably isn't the saturated fat that causes the heart problems and increased risk of cancer. It is something found in the lean part of red meat. The newest recommendations are that you reduce your intake of red meat to a few days only each week.

Processed meat contains nitrates and a lot of salt. The nitrates are thought to react with the bacterial in the bowel and this may lead to polyps which can then become malignant. Smoking meat produces another health issue when it reaches the bowel and may also cause some health issues.

Eating lots of vegetables, fruit and other fibrous foods helps the meat to pass through the bowel and reduces the risk of developing bowel cancer.

The ideal for red meat lovers is to avoid processed meats (bacon, ham, salami and sausages), keep meat dominated meals to no more than three times a week and when you do eat meat have it with lots of vegetables and high fibre carbohydrates like wholemeal pasta, wholemeal rice or root vegetables (except white potatoes). 

Enjoy your steak and roast beef

Sarah

Exercise can make you fat

Yesterday I booked into a Zumba class but it had to be cancelled and instead we were given a 'vive' class. On paper it probably appeared to be the same sort of class with some aerobic exercise to music but there was one very big difference.

Chronic stress leads to adrenal fatigue and your body functions differently in this state. As far as your primitive brain is concerned there are only three reasons for chronic stress: war, flood or famine.

An exercise class that involves lots of running type movements tells your primitive brain that it is correct because you are 'running away' from something bad. It gets your body to produce more stress hormones and instead of loosing weight you gain weight (because of the chemistry and biological changes that occur with stress).

When you dance your primitive brain interprets this as 'all is well' because who dances when they have to run away or survive a war, flood or famine? People dance when they are happy, at celebrations and when they are at a party.

And this is why an aerobic class is different to a Zumba class.

If you want to stay slender and are prone to feeling stressed and/or anxious the best types of exercise classes are fun ones like dance classes, and relaxing ones like yoga, Pilates and body balance. These reduce the amount of stress hormones produced and your body will switch from burning muscle to stored fat.

Have fun and stay relaxed
Sarah

A happy liver helps keep you slender

Last night I had to give a short speech and ended up giving a speech about drinking responsibly. I was not and am not suggesting that any one stops drinking alcohol. Personally I enjoy a good quality bourbon, especially since I had to stop drinking wine because I developed a sensitivity to it.

The message with alcohol is all about how much you drink, both in one sitting and in total during any given week. There are two reasons for this:

1. When you drink too much your thought processes change which can cause you to make choices that you would never consider when sober
2. Alcohol is a poison that your liver has to process and then pass on to other organs to excrete. If you drink too much it can destroy brain cells permanently, cause liver damage and a host of other health related issues.

One of these health related issues is body fat, and drinking lots of alcohol can lead to obesity and the health issues related to obesity.

When you drink alcohol your liver will process it first because your liver works on a 'most dangerous always gets to the front of the queue' system. This helps your body to excrete toxic substances as quickly as it can. Whilst your liver is busy processing the alcohol there is a slow but steady build up of other substances that need to be processed. These include things like cholesterol and estrogen. These might be able to enter the liver for phase one but have to wait too long for phase 2, so your liver sends them back into your blood stream without processing them. You now have additional cholesterol and estrogen in your system creating havoc.

Caffiene and nicotine also require processing by your liver and are put to the head of the queue after alcohol.

Alcohol can mess up your body's ability to maintain a healthy balance of insulin production, fat storage and hunger signals. Because your liver is busy with the alcohol your body ends up storing more of the energy you eat as fat. But your body needs to use instant energy so it uses the easily available glucose in your muscles. This adds up to less muscle and more fat storage. It can also lead to insulin resistance, which means that your body has to put out more insulin to be able to use the sugar in your blood.

Alcohol is very high in sugar, which means that any energy available from the alcohol will be utilized first and sugar from other foods and drinks will also be stored as fat.

As you can see drinking alcohol can make it difficult for you to stay slender unless you follow some basic rules:

• No more than 2 standard drinks per day
• To stay slender chose 2 days/evenings a week to enjoy a drink of alcohol and have 5 alcohol free days
• Plan your week (where possible) so that you can enjoy a drink with friends or at social occasions if you wish

• Now and then there will a surprise occasion where you drink when you had planned an alcohol free day. As these happen rarely enjoy the occasion and continue as before. If these occasions start to happen frequently you need to plan them into your week. 

Love and care for your liver and it will help to you to stay slender.

Sarah

Less sleep can equal more weight

A recent study showed that women not only work out of the home, but once home they undertake twice as much childcare and three times as much housework. I don't think that we needed a study to show us that. We already know!

It is not surprise that women can become so tired. There just aren't enough hours in the day to get everything done. Something has to give, and usually it is quality sleep. Even when you get to bed your mind is racing thinking of all the things that you still have to do, or haven't done that must be done by yet another deadline.

In most households everyone comes to you. Broken shoe laces, missing socks, forms that need signing, sore throats, insufficient phone credit... and the list goes on. "MUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM?"

20% of road fatalities are caused by fatigue. These aren't all tired women, there are many tired men out there as well. Being really tired is the equivalent to being drunk. It has similar neurological effects including being unable to make good decisions, being emotional, slower responses and quick to anger. Does any of these signs and symptoms ring a bell with you?

This blog is usually written in the morning, or even the day before, but I have been busy. I could have stressed myself out and either stayed up late or got up extra early to write it, but I chose not to. I know what physiological and psychological consequences either of those actions would involve. So I am writing it late in the afternoon, feeling nice and relaxed and enjoying the potential of helping some of you to say "NO!" I am not going to take all of that on today, this week or even this month.

When you go to bed tonight you will sleep so much better if you:

• eat before 7pm or only eat a very light meal before 8pm
• no coffee after 5pm (or cola)
• go to bed at a reasonable time, which is any time before 10pm
• once in bed read a book or a magazine but no television, phones, ipads or any other device unless you are reading a book from it
• keep the room cooler than during the day because our body's need to cool down to feel sleepy
• acknowledge yourself for all the things that you achieved today, including getting something partially done
• set the alarm for 10 minutes before you have to get up so that you can wake up slowly 

Enjoy a quality sleep of 8 hours as many nights as you can manage.

sweet dreams
Sarah

Hilarious!

You Know You're a Mother When ...

You count the sprinkles on each kid's cupcake to make sure they're equal.
You have time to shave only one leg at a time.
You hide in the bathroom to be alone.
Your kid throws-up and you catch it.
Someone else's kid throws up at a party. You keep eating.
As you cling to the high moral ground on toy weapons; your child chews his toast into the shape of a gun.
You hope ketchup is a vegetable, since it's the only one your child eats.
You find yourself cutting your husband's sandwiches into cute shapes.
You hear your mother's voice coming out of your mouth when you say, "NOT in your good clothes!"
You stop criticising the way your mother raised you.
You donate to charities in the hope that your child won't get that disease.
You hire a sitter because you haven't been out with your husband in ages, then spend half the night checking on the kids.
You use your own saliva to clean your child's face.
You say at least once a day, "I'm not cut out for this job", but you know you wouldn't trade it for anything". 

When we laugh our brains know that there can't be any danger around. It can relax and let your body go back to burning fat instead of readily available glucose.

What a great way to stay slender. Find ways to have a good laugh every day. In addition to jokes there are funny films, youtube clips and cute things that young children say. Even better have a laugh at yourself now and again, in a loving and gentle way. Trying to be perfect is stressful, and you know what happens when your brain becomes aware of stress.

Please share one of your favourite jokes below in the comment section.

best wishes
Sarah

See the illusion

Derren Brown is an amazing illusionist in the UK. He performs shows both on stage and for television where he uses his stunning level of skills in reading people using such techniques as NLP and behavioural profiling. It looks like mind-reading and telepathy but he is the first to assure that it isn't.

This man has spent much of his career showing how many of those who profess to predict the future are often taking money on false pretences. He is a great performer and even when he tells you how he has done it, and does it again, it can still seem like magic. We love a magic trick.

The world of advertising does the same thing. It creates an illusion that appears so real we believe to be true. Even better than this, these clever advertising bods can create this illusion so that we believe it unconsciously. We tell ourselves that we know it is just an illusion and yet our unconscious believes it to be true so we buy the product.

These clever advertising bods create images and jingles to help the illusion appear real. How many jingles can you sing? How many catch phrases and tag lines can you repeat? Let's have a go.

• "The burgers are better at ...?"
• "............. - where low prices are just the beginning."
• "It's not clean unless it's .... clean."
• "Only the flakiest, crumbliest ......"
• "I feel like ..... tonight."

When we shop, go out or want a treat our unconscious brain already has the answers for us thanks to years of clever advertising in addition to all the habits that we have developed along the way.

It is time to stick it to the advertising bods and the large companies for whom they advertise. It is time to free yourself from thinking that each of these is the solution to your problem. Chocolate may make you feel better for a few minutes but then how much better do you feel a few hours later?

Enjoy thinking for yourself
Sarah 

One of the big food labelling cons

Reading food packaging labels is becoming increasingly difficult. You practically need a chemistry degree to understand half of it, and the rest confuse and contradict.

For a start there may be several types of sugars in the product but they all have different names. Some of these names may not even sound like sugar. All of them are processed and should be avoided at all costs if you want to remain slender, avoid developing type II diabetes and cardiovascular issues.

Then there are the 'daily percentages' of each product, which if believed would mean that in some cases it is apparently fine for you to consume up to 30% of your daily food intake as sugar.

More concerning though, are the health claims. You know the ones. Reduced fat; fat free; low fat; GM free; no added sugar; all natural ingredients and the latest food fad: gluten free.

Technically you could slap a 'gluten free' sticker on a lot of food including fruit and vegetables, meat and fish and nuts. Much in the same way that you could claim that meat was 'sugar free' or that an apple is 'fat free'.

There are an increasing number of people who have a gluten sensitivity or intolerance, which is thought to be due to the change in the wheat produced which is now shorter, stronger and has more gluten in it. Being shorter makes it easier to harvest and having more gluten makes your bread even more sponge-like.

As someone who has a wheat sensitivity there are some specific products that I have to avoid if I don't want to experience abdominal pain. It can be useful to know that certain products are gluten free so that I can use them as a replacement for the product that I used to use. For example gluten free pasta.

But just because it is gluten free does not mean that it is good for you. Yes, the cereal in the middle of the picture at the top is gluten free because it is based on rice. In fact the cornflake cereal next to it is also wheat gluten free. However that doesn't make any of them nutritious. Porridge oats are far more nutritious and eaten in their natural form. They haven't been gleaned of all their fibre and tampered with by a large food corporation. Or have they?

You can still buy wonderfully natural porridge oats but you can also buy ones that have been turned into sugary breakfasts by the adding of sugar and flavourings. Again, not everything advertised as healthy is nutritious.

Enjoy avoiding being conned by food labelling

Sarah

"You can't eat that." Yes, I can!

Last week I was in a meeting and we were brought some Danish pastries. As I took one the person sitting next to me looked in horror as I helped myself to a mini pastry and exclaimed "You can't eat that". This person knows that my other business is weight management, and to her this meant that I shouldn't eat, let alone enjoy, any foods that don't fall into the 'healthy and good for you' category.

But here's the thing. Thinking that a food is 'bad' or 'off limits' leads to the brain interpreting it as famine, and I have written many times before about the knock effects of that happening. If you are new to my blog the shortened version is that the famine switch causes chemical changes in your body that can lead to weight gain, exhaustion and lethargy.

Weight management is all about balance. A mini Danish pastry for morning tea means no other treats for that day. If there is a day of treats, and let's face it, there are days like that, it means that there are whole days afterwards without treats.

 Recently we were in the UK on holiday for a month, and it involved a lot of cake. My family loves cake, and lemon tart. It meant careful balancing during the days we ate cake, careful balancing on the few days that we didn't eat cake, and some adjustment when we got home for a few weeks. Overall I gained one kilo, in that entire month of eating cake almost every day.

I was able to enjoy that Danish pastry because I know the seven rules of weight management. Life is meant to be lived, and if that means eating some cake now and then, I will eat cake. For other people it might be enjoying a portion of hot chips on a Friday night, or having a night out once a week, or enjoying your favourite chocolates.

At the end of the month I will be launching a program for those who want to learn the seven rules of weight management. Message or email me if you would like to know more.

In the meantime, enjoy a little of what you fancy once a week.

Sarah

Use this tip to speed up weight loss

I was at a funeral wake yesterday. It was a lovely ceremony because every person who was there had such lovely memories of the amazing 88 year old woman who had died. As is customary at such events there were platters of sandwiches and little cakes. It was the same at every graduation ceremony I have attended and many school functions, conference meetings and even at a training I attended.

In the Western world we tend eat a lot of grains in the form of bread, cereals and pastas. In the Eastern world we tend to eat lots of rice and noodles. Where ever you live and what ever culture you embrace, there will be a grain-based diet. Grains are cheap to buy, relatively cheap and easy to grow (climates and weather permitting), they fill people up and we use them for nearly every meal and for many snacks. How many meals to you have without grains? How many snacks do you have that don't include flour of some grain?

When I want to loose a kilo, such as when I returned from my holiday in the UK, I use this tip to ease my body back to my maintenance weight. It takes some 'thinking outside the box' to implement it and it can be done wholly or partly. I personally prefer to do this partly as I enjoy grains for breakfast.

You don't need to eat grains. I appreciate that this may be a surprising statement for you. You may want to know how else you will get sufficient fibre and Vitamin B. The answer is to eat more vegetables and fruit. This does not include white potatoes. I will help you further by suggesting some meals that don't include grains, and for snacks I have nuts and fruit.

For light meals, which for me is lunch, you could try:

• Avocado cut into chunks with diced tomato, dry roasted cashew nuts, pine nuts dressed with olive oil and balsamic vinegar
• Half a carrot thinly sliced and gently pan fried to which you add one diced orange and two large handfuls of baby spinach, then add a splash of soy sauce and a drizzle of honey or maple syrup. 

For main meals leave out the grain portion and add more root vegetables and green vegetables. An example is meatballs in tomato sauce (all home-made) on a bed of green beans and roasted carrots.

You may find that these meals don't fill you up as much as ones with grains, so take snacks with you such as mixed nuts and a little dried fruit, or a banana. Also remember to keep hydrated.

Share your experiences of this in the space below.

Sarah