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Do You Still Believe These 5 Fitness Myths?

We’ve all heard or read them.  Grand pronouncements over what foods are sure to be the cause of disease or others that are sure to be the cure-all.  Then a few years (or decades) later, actual studies and population data prove it all wrong.  First eggs were bad, then they were good.  Ditto chocolate, coffee, tea and wine.  Others were thought to be good, until they were proven otherwise.  Think of sugar substitutes throughout the years.  Remember the fifteen minutes of fame Olestra had?

Some of these myths persist beyond what should be their lifespan.  Sometimes because the myths seem logical or intuitive, as in the case of calorie-free sugar and fat substitutes being better for us than real sugar and fat.  Sometimes, unfortunately, false myths stay alive because they’re kept alive by those with vested interests.  From food manufacturers and agricultural groups to animal rights and environmental organizations, both sides of this wide spectrum wield a great deal of resources and political sway.  If it’s wrong for cattle ranchers to manipulate data to convince the public that beef is a health food in order to get people to eat more of it, then it’s equally wrong for environmental groups to manipulate data to convince the public that beef causes disease in order to get people to eat less of it.

Food and exercise and their effects on our bodies, good or bad, are very complex and we’re far from knowing all the answers.  But, every study gives us more clues to discover the truth.  Knowledge is expected to evolve over time.  Sometimes the experts will be right and sometimes they’ll be wrong.  But, it’s important for us to know when they’re wrong even if the truth goes against our preconceived notions about what is and isn’t healthy or conflicts with our individual biases that guide our choices about diet and exercise.  Behold, five health myths that just won’t die:

1) Saturated Fat is Unhealthy

I could write a book on this but Nina Teicholz already has.  Suffice it to say that avocado, coconut and dairy – all of which are sources of saturated fat – show evidence of doing more good than bad inside our bodies.

In the meantime, more studies are showing that some diseases we used to attribute to saturated fat consumption may be due to an imbalance of Omega-3 to Omega-6 fatty acids.  Put simply, we don’t get enough Omega-3s (polyunsaturated fats found in fish) and we get too much Omega-6s (polyunsaturated fats found in plant oils/seeds, packaged snack foods, processed meats, and butter/meat from grain-fed beef).

Despite this evidence, government agencies continue to advise a very low saturated fat consumption, no limits on Omega-6s and no suggestion to increase Omega-3s.

2) Detoxes & Cleanses are Healthy

The liver is the organ that naturally cleanses our bodies of toxins.  The remainder of our lower digestive system does the rest.  If you have a liver that isn’t working properly, a cleanse isn’t going to fix it and you’ve got bigger problems to worry about than Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop Detox.  The truth is, cleanses are a waste of time, money and effort and could be harmful.

3) Juicing is Healthy

While it’s true most Americans don’t consume nearly enough fruits and vegetables for optimal health, juicing may not be the answer.  The main reason has to do with fiber.  While fiber isn’t technically a nutrient, it is treated as such because it’s vital to a healthy digestive system.  The other important feature dietary fiber provides is satiety.  It helps us feel fuller and lessens the chance we’ll overeat.  Juicing strips the fiber out of produce.  Save time and money, eat your fruits and veggies, don’t drink them.

4) Gluten is Unhealthy

Gluten is the protein portion of wheat, rye and barley.  For the small percentage of the population who have Celiac disease or a gluten allergy or intolerance, gluten must be avoided.  For the rest of us, it’s perfectly safe and healthy.  Avoiding gluten unnecessarily puts one at risk of B vitamin and iron deficiencies and makes it more difficult to consume enough daily fiber.

5) Height & Weight Charts Determine Health

The most common chart most doctors still use to determine a patient’s health is the Body Mass Index (BMI).  The BMI uses a ratio of height and weight to place a person into one of four categories: underweight, normal, overweight and obese.  The problem is, people with certain body types can routinely be placed in the wrong category.  Studies comparing test subjects’ BMI over a period of years show that the chart is very poor at predicting an individual’s mortality and disease risk.  Furthermore, more studies are showing that overweight and active is healthier than thin and inactive.

A better measure of fitness is waist-to-hip ratio (waist circumference/hip circumference).  Rather than aiming to decrease the number on the scale, aim to decrease waist circumference by eating properly portioned, healthy foods at least 80% of the time, increasing your total daily steps and decreasing total minutes sitting each day.

Maybe these myth-busters fit exactly with your preferences.   Or maybe they’d be easier to accept if the myths turned out to be backed by science.  Chances are, these revelations tend to be a mixed bag for most of us.  Remember, it’s always better to be informed than uninformed.  Only with all the facts at hand can we make the best choices for ourselves and our families.

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Couch Potato to Exercise Dynamo: Cracking the Code

The “Five Secrets of Steady Exercisers” is revealed in today’s Wall Street Journal.  The article explains exercise and human behavior scientists contend only about 21% of American adults exercise regularly and they’ve endeavored to identify what behaviors these individuals have in common.  The belief being, if that code can be cracked, it may help the other 79%, many of whom attempt but fail to convert from couch potato to exercise dynamo year after year.  They’ve found five habits most regular exercisers have in common.

Being a convert myself and helping to convert others, I know a thing or two about this evasive phenomenon.  Today I’m taking these five secrets and expanding on them, adding context, expertise and personal experience.  If you’re among the 79% who’ve tried unsuccessfully to crack the code of conversion, this post’s for you.

WSJ Secret: “They exercise at the same time most days.”

Michelle’s Code: Scheduling leads to consistency.  If you place work meetings, kid’s extracurricular activities and doctor appointments on an electronic or paper calendar so you won’t double book or forget about it, you should be scheduling your workouts the same way and giving them the same priority.

While the WSJ rule doesn’t specify that regular exercisers schedule their exercise, working out at the same time most days is essentially the same thing.  The point is a specific time is carved out most days and given top priority. Exercise dynamos needn’t actually put their workout sessions on a calendar any more than they need to put brushing their teeth on the calendar.

But, for those who haven’t yet created exercise habits, physically scheduling and mentally prioritizing are musts.  Not only for the first week or the first month but for at least a year.  It’s more important that you schedule them at times when they’re least likely to get bumped on any given day than to schedule them at the same time every day.

WSJ Secret: “An increasing number of active people are widening their definition of exercise.”

Michelle’s Code: Seek out ways to move every day.  People trying to establish a workout routine tend to view exercise as an “other” in their daily lives.  They see it as something separate they must add to everything else they need to accomplish during the day.  Regular exercisers tend to view dedicated workouts as on par with walking during their commute, yard work, cleaning, playing soccer with their kids and preparing to host a celebratory meal.

It may seem counterintuitive, but if you consider daily activities that involve walking or standing along with twisting, bending, lifting, pushing or pulling as constituting exercise, even if they don’t induce perspiration or last only ten minutes at a time, you’re more likely to also perform dedicated workouts regularly.  What workout dynamos understand is active, in all its forms, is the opposite of sedentary.  Your heart and lungs don’t know if you’re on a treadmill, at a Soul Cycle class or digging a hole to plant a sapling.  If you’re moving, you’re exercising.

Once you internalize this, you take the pressure off.  You can legitimately believe, while you wish you hadn’t overslept and missed your morning Pilates class, you haven’t failed because you walked during your lunch hour and cleaned up the playroom after the kids went to bed.

WSJ Secret: “They have a streamlined pre-exercise routine with visual cues.”

Michelle’s Code: Always be prepared to be active.  Dynamos, for example, have their workout items out and ready for the next day before going to bed.  Using the example from the last paragraph, a regular exerciser also has a pair of sneakers at work so, on the occasion she misses Pilates, she can walk during her lunch hour.

Ultimately, it’s a no-excuses mindset.  If you believe any and all activity constitutes exercise, then you’ll set up your environment to be sure any tool you may need to take advantage of an opportunity to be active is available to you wherever you are.  Never allow yourself an excuse to say no to an opportunity to exercise.

Courtesy of Bing Images

WSJ Secret: “They’re more flexible than infrequent exercisers about how long or vigorously they exercise.”

Michelle’s Code: Turn the rigid exercise mindset on its head. To be fair to the 79% considered inactive, the rigid exercise mindset comes straight from the fitness industry.  Even the guidelines on exercise from U.S. Health and Human Services suggest that exercise should be of a certain duration, frequency and intensity to count.

Science proves nothing could be further from the truth.  By every measure, several short bouts of any exercise that cumulatively add up to one hour is equal to one hour straight of that same exercise.  Furthermore, several short bouts of high intensity exercise is more beneficial, by every measure, than one longer continuous bout of that same exercise at a lower intensity.  Activity of any form, duration and intensity is always beneficial and always infinitely better than inactivity.

When you embrace this healthier mindset, every activity you engage in becomes a win and psychologically encourages you to get another win.  When you only count a one-hour Zumba class as exercise, then any time you miss that class, it’s counted as a failure and you’re psychologically discouraged from trying again for a win.

WSJ Secret: “They’re more likely to exercise for pleasure than for weight loss or other long-term health goals.”

Michelle’s Code: Shift your goals. This is undeniably the most difficult to do.  There’s so much pressure to exercise to achieve aesthetic changes.  Yet, aesthetic goals don’t work well in the short-term and rarely work in the long-term.

Again, science is our friend.  We now know it’s better to be fat and active than to be skinny and inactive.  Let that one sink in for a minute.

What does better mean?  It means a lower mortality rate, higher quality of life, better sleep, greater feelings of well-being, elevated energy levels and sex drive and a more positive body image.  The true embodiment of fit and happier.

 

 

 

 

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Fitness or Vanity? Your Answer Changes Everything

Here’s a passage I came across today from “A Trainer Gets Brutally Honest about Why You Aren’t Seeing Results” by Brandi Kupchella on Popsugar Fitness:

“…you have to be honest with yourself and set reasonable expectations. You can’t do 1,000 burpees in 10 minutes and you will never change the basic biology of your body. If you are bottom heavy, you will likely always trend that way when gaining weight. If all the women in your family get saggy underarms by the time they are 40, guess what? You probably will too. And no amount of treadmill work will change your DNA… There are many ways you can improve the body you have. But no amount of exercise will completely transform you into someone else… You were made to be you, unique and special. You can be the best you possible… Once you accept that, you can stop fighting your body and start working with it to achieve your goals.”

On this concept, I wholeheartedly agree with Brandi.  Some of her other opinions in this article, not so much.  For example, “Instructors know how hard you are working, and that you probably aren’t working hard enough.”  I say this all depends.

If the ultimate goal is something extrinsic like flat abs, removal of a muffin top, fitting into a particular clothing size or any other strictly aesthetic dream, then, yes, I believe that happens a lot.  In those cases, we’re driven by vanity and the vehicle we’re in is to be seen.  We want to be seen attending the class, we want to make it look like we’re working as hard as everyone else and we believe that simply showing up and going through the motions means we’ll eventually attain (or maintain) the fill-in-the-blank feature that we want and everyone else will envy.  But, when it comes to fitness, vanity may get us part-way, perhaps even fully, there.  But it’ll never keep us there.

If, however, our motivation is intrinsic as in health-related terms like blood glucose, cholesterol and triglyceride levels, blood pressure, and normal function of the heart, brain and hormones then merely showing up won’t satisfy us.  If exercise makes us feel stronger physically, mentally and emotionally then we’re intrinsically motivated to workout to our potential on any given day no matter how hard the person next to us in class is working or what she looks like.  In fact, fitness-focused people are less likely to compare themselves to, or even notice, others in class.  When our motivation and goals are primarily intrinsic as opposed to extrinsic, we’re much more likely to know our potential, workout to our potential and feel the results each and every time.  And, as such, we tend to realize our goals and maintain them for a lifetime.

Are you intrinsically or extrinsically motivated?  You may need to do some soul-searching to answer that question.  If you believe you’re motivated for fitness and not vanity but you find yourself less enamored of your workouts or cutting corners lately, then it may be that you’ve reached a plateau or that you’ve gone as far as you can with a particular routine.  It may be time to change things up.  Change can be scary, particularly after you’ve made huge strides in your fitness.  But, it can also be really exciting.  And, if you remember why you’re here in the first place, you can accept that your body is telling you it needs to be challenged in a new way to be stronger and healthier.

If, however, you think you’re extrinsically motivated, then it’s time to find new reasons for working out.  If vanity is the only thing lighting a fire under you, that wick is going to burn out sooner or later.  Take it from someone approaching the 50 year mark, eventually Mother Nature and Father Time conspire to do unpleasant things to your body regardless of excellent diet and exercise habits.  If your main motivation is making the mirror your best friend, you’ll quickly learn there’s little payoff to sweating next to people half your age or trading ice cream for carrot sticks.

I acknowledge this is easier said than done.  Though I’m predominantly intrinsically motivated towards fitness, I struggle with my own vanity demons.  It’s human nature and society norms don’t help.  There’s a high value, figuratively and literally, placed on how we look to the outside world.  It’s an uphill battle for all of us.  But, we can’t be truly healthy and happy unless we’re comfortable in our own skins.  We can and should be motivated to keep what lies beneath the skin – mind, body and soul – as healthy as possible.  When we do, we’ll be confident that what we present to the world is authentic, beautiful, strong and worthy inside and out.

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Reject False Fitness, Embrace Health & Happiness

I came of age in the 1980s.  One of the biggest health concerns for teen girls in that decade was eating disorders.  There was a high correlation between eating disorders and females in aesthetic-based industries – models, actresses, musicians, dancers, figure skaters and gymnasts – and it seeped into mainstream America as media elevated them and girls wanted to emulate them.  We, as responsible citizens, began having conversations about promoting healthy body images and pushing back against leaders in these industries who placed pressure on females to conform to an unhealthy, underweight body type.

I wish I could say we’ve learned our lesson and are healthier for it nearly 40 years later.  But, the reality is there has only been more added to the already toxic stew.  Ironically, the fitness industry can be added to the list of bad guys promoting unhealthy body images.  Fitness is supposed to be about health on the inside but it’s often bastardized into being about body-perfect on the outside.  We’re still telling women they should look like Barbie as we did in the 80s, except now we’re supposed to look like Barbie with visible biceps and sculpted abs.  Don’t believe me?  It took me five minutes to find these top headlines on the most popular fitness sites:

  • “Sculpt Your Legs with This 20-Minute Bodyweight Leg Workout” (Fitness Magazine)
  • “The Sexy Legs, Arms and Abs Workout from Jeanette Jenkins” (Fitness Magazine)
  • “How Dakota Johnson Toned Her Legs for Steamy ‘Fifty Shades Darker’ Scenes” (Yahoo Fitness)
  • “Elle Fanning Shows Off Her Toned Abs After Gym Workout” (Yahoo Fitness)
  • “37 Essential Butt-Lifting Moves” (POPSUGAR Fitness)
  • “Get Faster While Burning Belly Fat with this Treadmill Interval Workout” (POPSUGAR Fitness)

Each of these stories is accompanied by photographic “proof” – many of which are likely doctored to exaggerate desired features – of how every woman’s butt, abs, waist, arms or legs should look.  And, as each title suggests, achieving these aesthetic goals is supposed to be the purpose of working out and the measure of whether or not one is fit.

Add to this the reality that social media allows anyone who wants to be a minor celebrity and, voila, we have body-shaming and skinny-bragging all disguised as fitness being hurled in tweets, Facebook posts, snaps, YouTube videos and Instagram pics for thousands of the most vulnerable in our society to absorb.  Can’t exercise or starve your body into conformity?  Then plastic surgery becomes the accepted alternative.  Here’s proof women are taking these messages to heart:

In the 80s, the message was skinny equaled beautiful.  That lie, instead of being erased, has been extended to include more meaningless, yet psychologically damaging, parameters.  In the 90s, the message was a skinny waist and large bust equaled beautiful.  Fast forward to 2017, and the requirements are: skinny waist, large breasts, visibly toned abs with a flat belly, high butt, thigh-gap and toned arms and back.  The message is: if you’re missing any of these aspects, you aren’t fit and you definitely aren’t beautiful.  Nothing could be further from the truth.

Jessica Brown Findlay

In my small corner of the fitness world, I try to remind my readers of this fact.  And I promote others in my industry who fight the good fight with me.  Skip over those skin-deep, skewed articles like the ones I cited above and read these truth-telling fitness stories instead:

  • “Downton Abbey’ Star Opens Up about Eating Disorder” Jessica Brown Findlay, suffering privately from an eating disorder since the age of 14, has decided to make her struggle public, believing it’ll serve the dual purpose of helping herself and others.  She says she’s finally learned that she’s, “…not going to be a better actor if I’m a dress size smaller.”
  • “Lies the Fitness Industry Tells Plus-Size Women” Author of the upcoming book Big Fit Girl, Louise Green says, “Plus size women feel fitness isn’t for them.  And it creates this myth that fitness isn’t approachable because we can’t see ourselves.”

  • Cassie Ho

    “If Social Media is Toxic for You, Do These 4 Things” Cassie Ho, creator of Blogilates, tells us, “Sometimes I’ll find myself seeing pictures of other people and start to question my own body and worth. Like I always tell you, comparison is the thief of joy.”

  • Kelli at FitnessBlender

    “Fitness Doesn’t Have to Be Complicated” Kelli of FitnessBlender reminds us, “Fitness looks different on everyone! Remember your body is constantly changing and try not to tear yourself apart as it does so.”

Fitness doesn’t have a body shape, number on the scale or dress size.  Fitness is a way of life and you can’t see it by looking at someone any more than you can taste, hear, touch or smell it.  Until we all understand and accept this, many of us will continue to chase an unhealthy, unachievable, unsustainable lie.  You and I can’t stop others from believing the lie.  But we can stop believing it ourselves.  Start with you – reject the lie, embrace true fitness.

 

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Tell the Members-Only Fitness Divas to Take a Hike

What if there was such a thing as a Members Only designer shoe industry?  The only way to acquire a pair of beautiful Christian Loubutin sandals or trendy Stuart Weitzman boots is if you’re a part of the club.  Imagine you’ve received a once-in-a-lifetime pass to shop at a designer shoe store.  You walk in, dazzled by the displays and envious of the specially trained sales staff who have access to it all.  You’ve saved every extra penny for months, given up morning lattes and lunch with friends so you could afford to splurge on the most amazing pair of shoes you’ll ever own.  You’ve finally made it, you’re on the inside.

But, wait!  You now learn that all the shoes in the store, every last pair of them, come in size 6 only.  Size 6?  This can’t be!  You’re a size 8, the most common female shoe size in America.  Who in the world wears a six?  But, alas, that’s the dirty little secret in this absurd world of Members Only designer shoes.  The good news is the designer shoe industry doesn’t actually operate this way.  Sadly, the diet and exercise industry, in many ways, does.

Ever since the 1970s, when the average weight of Americans began to creep up, there has been an all-out panic in the fitness and health industries to identify the culprits and reverse the trend.  Oddly, the most obvious explanations were summarily ignored.  Namely, we were becoming more and more sedentary at work and at home as technological advances made obsolete many kinds of manual labor.  At the same time, these same technical advances made getting an abundance of foods to our plates easier, faster and cheaper.  Bottom line: We were moving less and eating more.

Instead, some leading experts went looking for hidden monsters in the closet to explain the increasing numbers of overweight and obese.  This lead to a string of incorrect assumptions about the causes.  Fats were the first to be blamed, leading to an over-consumption of carbohydrates, grains and sugars in particular, which made the obesity rates worse and introduced a growing rate of adult-onset diabetes and other metabolic diseases.  Other food culprits were and continue to be fingered along the way, leading to similar results.  All this to say that extreme dietary reactions are the name of the game in finding one’s way to fitness according to many of the experts.

The recommendations for exercise have been similarly extreme in nature.  Does it really make sense to tell an obese, sedentary individual that she can’t consider herself fit until she’s working out really hard for at least an hour a day six days a week?  Not only doesn’t it make sense, it’s incorrect and unfair.

I know from reading my industry publications that many experts bristle at the word moderation.  I fail to understand why.  Isn’t it true that the further one gets from a moderate position, the closer she gets to an extreme one?  Those who are mostly sedentary and consuming calories far in excess of what their bodies need are living in an extreme.  It makes sense to me that we should be helping them find their way to a moderate and balanced diet and exercise plan.  Why would it make sense to steer them to the other extreme, where exercise is proscribed at the highest amounts of frequency, duration and intensity and where wide swaths of foods are forbidden and calorie consumption is highly restricted?

It’s been a long time coming but science is telling us a few important things when it comes to diet and exercise:

  • Replacing natural fats, proteins and carbohydrates with highly processed fake ones is making us less healthy.
  • Losing large amounts of body weight through calorie restriction over long periods of time almost always backfires.
  • The percentage of active adults who’ve adhered to regular exercise for more than a year stays small and relatively flat.  For the rest, a majority of the population, many try to adopt exercise programs but fail to reach adherence over and over again.
  • It’s healthier, in terms of mortality rate, to be overweight and active than to be normal weight and sedentary.

Basically, science is proving that the extreme solutions promoted to fight the obesity epidemic not only don’t work but may actually be detrimental.  Some of us in the fitness industry are paying attention and making moderation our mantras.  There needs to be more of us.  I’m convinced we’ll get there.  Rising fitness stars like Kelli at FitnessBlender are gathering followers each day.  Here’s a vlog by Kelli as she makes her case.

Too many in the industry practice a one-size-fits all, extreme prescription with their clients.  It’s as absurd as my Members Only designer shoe scenario.  It’s high time we inject some science-backed common sense and realistic expectations into the fitness equation.  We’re not all going to be svelte specimens who appear in the front row at every fad fitness class subsisting on a raw vegan diet.  How balanced and content can their lives really be anyway?

Take the pressure off.  Tell those Members Only, body-shaming, diet-and-exercise divas you’re not interested in their club of extremes.  You’ve found a completely different way to true fitness and you’re happier for it.

Interested in a moderate, common sense approach to fitness?  Check out my Small Steps program.

 

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Cheese Lovers Rejoice!

Eggs, coffee, chocolate, red wine – these are just a few of the foods that once were demonized by nearly all of the nutrition experts that have since been vindicated by a plethora of studies, common sense and the test of time.

manchegoDairy products which naturally contain saturated fat – whole milk, butter and cheese, in particular – appear to finally be getting their day in the sunlight of nutritionally approved foods.  But I suspect (and hope) it won’t end here.  I think it’s high time all natural saturated fats be taken off of the nutrition police’s top most wanted list.  But, before I get ahead of myself, here’s the skinny on dairy.

Recent Studies Vindicating Dairy

Since 2009, there have been several studies that have linked full fat dairy to lower rates of obesity, lower risk for cardiovascular disease and the prevention of fat accumulation in the liver.  But, 2016 has ushered in a trifecta of published, peer reviewed studies that seem to indicate that full fat dairy may actually be better for our health than low or no fat dairy.  Two of these studies are clinical studies, the gold-standard in scientific studies and far more conclusive than the more common epidemiological studies.  By the way, most of the nutrition community’s shunning of saturated fats, including dairy fat, over the last 50+ years is based on old epidemiological studies.  Many of which were later discovered to have major flaws.

blue-cheeseIn January, the Children’s Hospital and Research Center Oakland published the results of a controlled, clinical study to determine if a higher fat DASH diet made a difference in health markers compared to the original DASH diet.  The DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) diet has long been known to reduce blood pressure and other risk factors for cardiovascular disease.  The diet promotes high volumes of fruit and vegetables, small amounts of lean proteins and moderate amounts of low and no-fat dairy.

This study compared the health markers of three groups of people following three different diets: the traditional DASH diet allowing only low and no fat dairy, the high fat DASH diet allowing for full fat dairy and a control group who followed none of the parameters of a DASH diet.  The study revealed that blood pressure was reduced the same amount in both the regular DASH and high fat DASH diets compared to the control group.  But the high fat DASH participants showed a greater decrease in triglycerides and LDL (bad) cholesterol compared to the regular DASH diet.  Strike one for low and no fat dairy.

MilkIn April, a Harvard and Tufts epidemiological study, based on a follow up of the Nurse’s Health Study which followed 3,333 people for fifteen years, found that those participants with the highest amounts of dairy fat in their blood were nearly 50% less likely to develop diabetes.  Strike two for low and no fat dairy.

cheese-wheelsLast month, a controlled, clinical study conducted by the University of Copenhagen was published by The American Society for Nutrition.  This study, which ran for twelve weeks, had 164 participants split into three groups.  One group consumed 80g of full-fat cheese daily, the second group consumed 80g of reduced fat cheese daily and the third group (the control) consumed 80g of bread and jam (a carbohydrate alternative to cheese).  At the conclusion of the study, LDL (bad) cholesterol levels for participants of all three diet groups were statistically the same compared to the start of the study.  However, only one group saw statistically significant increases in HDL (good) cholesterol by the end of the study – the full fat cheese group.  Strike three for low and no fat dairy.

The Take Away

More and more experts in the field of nutrition are beginning to be swayed by the ever increasing, quality studies that seem to suggest that not only is full fat dairy not bad for you, but it may actually be better for you than dairy that has fat removed.  Unfortunately, the latest U.S. government guidelines still recommend that all dairy be consumed in low or no fat form.  And they allow for only a tiny intake of total saturated fat – less than 10% of daily calories.  It’ll be another five years before new recommendations will be published.  Will they finally catch up?

AvocadoOn a similar note, dairy fat has been marginalized because it’s saturated fat.  Saturated fat as a whole has been demonized by the same, flawed epidemiological studies I referenced before.  The nutrition community has come around on saturated fats from plant sources, such as coconut and avocado oils, and from fish that contain omega 3 fatty acids.  And they seem to be coming around on dairy fat, but what about saturated fats from other animal sources?  Are they really as bad as we once thought?  And, if not, can’t we allow for more saturated fat than is currently recommended?

Hopefully we’ll find out the answers to those questions soon enough.  In the meantime, this dairy-loving girl is thrilled to get the green light on cheese.  Bring on the brie!

 

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Fit Tip of the Month: Stretching – Why, When & How

This month’s Small Step is all about becoming flexible and staying flexible.  But why do we need to stretch?  And, when and how should we stretch?  Fortunately, the reasons are clear and the rules are simple.  Here’s the scoop on stretching.

StretchingWhy Stretch?

It’s easy to understand that cardiovascular training improves the health of our cardiovascular system and strength training builds muscle and bone.  But was does flexibility training do?

There are two other parts of our musculoskeletal system that neither cardio nor strength training addresses – our ligaments (connecting bone to bone at the joints) and tendons (connecting muscle to bone).  There are two types of amino acids, or proteins, that provide the necessary properties of rigidity and elasticity to ligaments and tendons.  Collagen is what gives these tissues rigidity.  Rigidity lends strength and keeps the tissue from being over-stretched.  Elastin allows for elasticity, making it possible for a joint or muscle to achieve full range of motion.  Collagen and elastin also reside in muscle tissue performing the same duties.  But, when you consider the roles of the tendons and ligaments, you can understand how vital both rigidity and elasticity are to them.  Only flexibility training assists in the regeneration of elastin and collagen in ligaments and tendons.

updogSome forms of training and sports put above-normal strain on ligaments and tendons.  Long-distance endurance training and field and court sports that require quick bursts of lateral movements or repetitive, explosive swinging or throwing motions all have high incidents of ligament and tendon injury.  But ligament and tendon health isn’t a concern only for competitive athletes.

Many unexpected challenges for our tendons and ligaments occur throughout our days: turn an ankle, try a new move at Spin class, suddenly reach out to save a toddler from danger, lift a grocery bag that’s heavier than it looks.  Any one of these mishaps can lead to a torn ligament or strained tendon if we don’t have enough collagen and elasticity in them.

But that’s not all, the aging process breaks down elastin and collagen.  It is unavoidable.  As we get older, if we aren’t specifically training to re-build our elastin and collagen, range of motion in our muscles and joints becomes compromised leading to muscle imbalances and dysfunctional movement.  This chain reaction eventually leads to muscle tightness, joint stiffness, pain and, sometimes, injury.

When To Stretch

It’s a myth that one should stretch before working out.  In fact, multiple studies over several decades have proven not only that there’s no benefit to stretching so-called cold muscles before working out but some of these studies indicate that pre-workout stretching, without a preceding warm-up, may impede performance and raise risk for injury.  For the same reasons, it’s not recommended that one stretch immediately after getting out of bed in the morning.

standing-hamstring-stretchTherefore, flexibility training should be done at the conclusion of every cardio and strength training workout.  In addition, stretching can be done prior to exercise or a sports event but only after a proper warm-up is completed.  Flexibility-based workouts, such as yoga classes, should be formatted with simple poses done in conjunction with movement and breathing to properly warm the body before more challenging poses are incorporated.

How To Stretch

Static Stretching: Static stretching is the extension and hold of a specific muscle or muscle group to the point of tension but without pain.  The stretch should be held for 20-30 seconds for 1 or 2 repetitions.  Examples of common static stretches are the seated toe touch, overhead triceps stretch and the cobra.

  • triceps-stretchNever stretch when your muscles are cold.
  • Stretch at the conclusion of every cardio and strength training workout when muscles, ligaments and tendons are warm and more pliable.
  • The more muscle groups you stretch, the better.
  • If you have limited time to stretch, prioritize by stretching all the muscles that were specifically involved in your workout.
  • If you have a particular muscle group that is tight, it can be helpful to stretch them prior to beginning a workout.  In those cases, you should always do a 5-10 minute warm-up before stretching prior to exercise.
  • Stretch especially tight muscles twice after completion of a workout.

Dynamic Stretching: If you play a recreational sport, you should incorporate dynamic stretching before a game or match.  Dynamic stretches put muscles and joints through a full range of motion in preparation for explosive power movements.  Downhill skiing, pick-up basketball, tennis and golf are just a few examples of common recreational activities that should be preceded by dynamic stretching.  Examples of dynamic stretching are a swimmer wind-milling arms before a race, a sprinter high-stepping prior to getting into the blocks, or a baseball player taking practice swings with a weighted bat while on deck.

  • Do a quick warm up before performing dynamic stretches.
  • If you will be doing a combination of static and dynamic stretching before your activity, do the warm up first, static stretches next, dynamic stretches last.
  • Always perform static stretches for all major muscle groups at the conclusion of the activity.

The bonus is, in addition to protecting against injury, some studies show regular flexibility training can alleviate arthritis pain, reduce stress and anxiety and promote overall feelings of well-being.  All in all, not a bad deal in exchange for a relatively small investment in time and energy.

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Why Do You Diet and Exercise?

The CDC, as recently as last year, reported that 71% of American adults are classified as either overweight or obese.  Boston Medical Center states that 45 million Americans go on a diet in any given year.  Annual fitness industry data suggests many of these people also join a gym, take exercise classes or purchase fitness equipment.  It isn’t a stretch, therefore, to state that most Americans would like to lose weight and most of these people will try diets and exercise at least once in their lives in order to achieve weight loss.

ScaleDespite the availability of diet and exercise offerings and the willingness of people to adopt them, the numbers of the overweight and obese don’t budge.  This isn’t new.  The rise in American waistlines began post World War II and has accelerated exponentially each decade since the 1980s.  In the meantime, there has been no shortage of nutrition and exercise studies and an ever-changing, ever-increasing body of information and products released to the public, from both government and private entities, lecturing us on what we should and shouldn’t eat and whatever we’re doing for exercise isn’t enough.

After over 50 years of this, it’s high time to admit it isn’t working.  It’s time to change the focus and change the solution.  The focus should not be weight or body image, it should be health and quality of life.  The solution should not be a narrow-minded list of good-foods vs bad-foods or a constant monitoring of every morsel ingested.  Neither should the solution be an obsessive count of every step taken or every calorie burned.

perfect body adI have offered my version of a path to health and improved quality life – a fit and happier life – through my Small Steps plan.  But, I am not a one-woman movement.  There are many of us out here who have uncovered the weight-loss myths for ourselves and who are committed to spreading the word.  We are a movement of liberation.  Liberating people from the perfect body lie, the diets, the rules, the counting, the shame and the agony of pushing your physical and emotional limits for something or someone other than your own well-being.

Yet, I’m aware my reach is small and sometimes a reader may need to hear what I’m saying in a different way, coming from a different perspective to be able to really understand it and take it to heart.

So, I’m giving a shout-out today to one of my favorite sites, the health section of Refinery29, which has bloggers who are living and preaching the philosophy of the Small Steps program, albeit under their own monikers.

  • Read Sophie Kreitzberg’s compelling “Weight Watchers Led to My Eating Disorder – Here’s Why” to understand why diets not only don’t work but are inherently unhealthy.
  • Don’t miss Kelsey Miller’s description of her “Rational Fitness” term to understand why exercising for the goal of weight-loss instead of health sets us up for unhappiness and failure. Kelsey has her own recurring column at Refinery29 entitled “The Anti-Diet Experiment” that is chock full of intelligent, funny and meticulously researched articles.

If you’ve come out of the dark side of diets, fad workouts and the quest for skinny and into the light of fitness and health, don’t stand on the sidelines.  We need an increasing army of voices and role models to counter the unhealthy body-image-centric messages from the entertainment industry, marketing campaigns, social media and an all-too-large chunk of the fitness industry.  We have to do it for the health of society as a whole but, most especially, for women, who are most targeted by the false messages, and the most vulnerable among us: our girls.

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We’ve Come a Long Way, Baby

Gymnastics Team

Gymnastics Team

The 2016 Summer Olympics are in full swing in Rio.  As with any Olympics, there are lots of fascinating statistics and stories coming out of Brazil daily.  But, there’s one statistic that is of particular interest to me and, I think, bodes well for the future well-being of girls in the United States.  This summer the U.S. has the largest female contingent in the history of the Olympics.  And, for the second time, the U.S. is represented by more female athletes than male athletes.

Basketball Team

Basketball Team

Gone are the norms of my mom’s generation that told us it’s unladylike to sweat, that healthy competition was a man’s endeavor, physical strength an unnecessary achievement and that muscles detract from physical beauty.  Girls are learning from the women representing our country in Rio that these old rules are myths.

Further, female Olympians are proving that physical strength and fitness come in all shapes and sizes.  That girls who aspire to be Olympians don’t have to be born with a physique perfect for only gymnastics or figure skating.

Swim Relay Team

Swim Relay Team

What’s remarkable when looking at pictures of these women is that, while they all have fitness, physical strength and endurance in common, their outward physical appearances run the gamut.  But none of them resembles the 5′ 10″ and 110 lbs frame of the typical runway or magazine model.

Soccer Team

Soccer Team

The young women in the Olympics today are teaching our girls that it’s good to have dreams but they’re not achieved by sitting on the sidelines waiting for someone to wave a wand.  They’re learning from example that achieving goals takes commitment, hard work and persistence.  They’re learning that failures and defeats are a part of realizing one’s dream and the only real obstacles any of us face are the ones we place on ourselves.  That all of these things build character and make us better human beings.

Track and Field

Track and Field

These, of course, are lessons Olympians have taught young people for generations.  What’s new this year is the U.S. female athletes are teaching our girls that physical strength and endurance are cool.  That there is no activity that’s off limits.  And that there is no one height, weight, bone structure or skin, hair or eye color that makes one woman stronger, more capable or more attractive than another.  In short, anyone can be fit and being fit is beautiful.

This is huge.  We have a long way to go in the realm of body image issues in this country.  But, thanks in no small part to the U.S. Olympic women, we sure have come a long way.

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Low-Fat is Bad and Other Common Sense Truths

Milk“The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet,” Nina Teicholz’s best selling book, delves into decades of nutritional studies that indicate the low-fat movement, while well-intentioned, was based on flawed, misinterpreted data and lacked rigorous scientific study.  Recent clinical studies are adding more heft to the argument that dietary fat in general, saturated fat specifically, is not unhealthy.  Even more importantly, a reduction of our intake of dietary fat over the last several decades may actually be detrimental as evidenced by this study that links full-fat dairy intake with a reduction (by nearly 50%!) in Type II diabetes risk.

Which leads me to say, “Duh!”  Why do we get sucked in, over and over again, by these new “rules” of diet and fitness? Does it make sense that fats, one of only three macronutrients necessary for human survival, are killing us?  Ditto carbohydrates?

Let’s put some common sense out there and state what we know about the existence of humans on Earth for millennia:

  1. Humans are omnivores: The idea that saturated fats, which in non-tropical areas come predominantly from animals, are the main contributors to obesity and heart disease just doesn’t add up.  The first humans, the hunter-gatherers, got the bulk of their nutrition from animals.  Some civilizations, such as the Inuit, had little or no vegetation in their diets.  For the same reasons, it’s illogical to believe consumption of animal meat causes human disease.  As yet, there are no clinical studies that have proven a link between animal-derived foods and human disease, sensational and misleading headlines notwithstanding.
  2. The human diet has evolved: The first Agricultural Revolution happened over 10,000 years ago and several minor Agricultural Revolutions took place in Arab and European civilizations centuries ago.  Also, agriculture is constantly evolving both as part of the natural evolutionary process and as humans have perfected and scaled farming techniques.  As such, apples and wheat farmed today are quite different from those same crops 500-1000 years ago.  But, they’re still apples and wheat.  Their DNA, so to speak, is still the DNA of apples and wheat.  The plants themselves have evolved and adapted and humans have ‘bred’ stronger and more fruitful plants.  This doesn’t make them bad for us as those touting the Paleo diet and many demonizing gluten (the protein in wheat) would have us believe.  Indeed, without these innovations, many of us would be vulnerable to famine and drought as we were thousands of years ago and, unfortunately, as many in undeveloped nations still are.
  3. Humans have adapted. Human survival during migration periods meant we had to adapt to changing diets.  This adaptation allowed various peoples to flourish whether seaside or landlocked, whether in the desert or the rainforest.  Why did the Inuit, who subsisted only on animals, not suffer from scurvy, a vitamin C deficiency?  We associate vitamin C with citrus fruits and other produce.  Yet vitamin C, and many other micronutrients we associate with produce, are in abundance in animal products as well.   But not in the meat we consume today.  Vitamin C and other nutrients are found in the organs and bone of animals.  Cultures that relied only on animals to exist consumed the entire animal and, as such, those civilizations survived and thrived.  Similarly, cultures that had little animal resources available have also been able to adapt to survive and thrive on a mostly vegetarian diet.  Yet, somehow, vegetarian diets are viewed as more healthy than predominantly animal-sourced diets.  The evidence does not support this common assumption.

ApplesSo, what gives?  Why are obesity and diseases like heart-disease and diabetes on the rise in Western cultures?  I contend that the blame has been misplaced for quite some time and the changes that we have made in response to this is actually contributing to the worsening of these problems.

If humans have been consuming carbohydrates in the form of wheat for centuries and animal fats for millennia, why would these foods suddenly make us sick?  They haven’t.  But, we’ve been told they have and these food products have been altered to remove the “bad” stuff before we consume them – removing the gluten from wheat, removing the fat from milk.  We’re monkeying with the food and that, in part, is what’s making us sick.

If you think about it, the emergence of these lifestyle diseases doesn’t correspond with the Agricultural Revolutions.  But it does correspond with the Industrial Revolution.  This is the revolution that gave us manufactured oils and shortening to replace butter, tropical oils and lard.  This revolution, coupled with misguided nutrition advice, also had us removing the fat from our dairy and, a newer trend, removing dairy from our diets altogether.  However, apparently, this is giving us more diabetes.

My theory is that the Industrial Revolution, and the more recent Technological Revolution, gave us food in greater abundance while, at the same time, automated a lot of the physical labor of daily living.  In short, it isn’t what we were eating that’s making us sick, it’s how much we’re eating and how little we’re moving.

The common sense approach is, if you want to avoid obesity and lifestyle diseases like diabetes, eat and move like generations did before these problems existed.  Stop removing fat and gluten from farmed food and replacing it with manufactured junk.  If you aren’t allergic to milk, why would you shun milk from a cow to have factory-made “milk” from a soybean or nut?  And, get off your duff.  Long periods of sitting is linked to higher risk of disease.  Common sense tells us great-great Grandpa was chopping wood and tilling his crops and he wasn’t binge-watching “The Walking Dead.”

Join me in eating and moving common sense-style.  It tastes delicious and feels so good.

 

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