Mindful Benefits | Lisa Schmidt Counseling
Mindfulness based therapeutic counseling and stress management services
Have you heard about your microbiome? The trillions of microorganisms living in our bodies are called the microbiome. These helpful bugs are key to our overall health. They help us digest our food, and provide critical nutrients , train our immune systems, turn genes on and off, keep our gut tissue healthy, help protect us from diabetes, and even cancer. Other studies show that they play a role in obesity, atherosclerosis, autimmune disease, inflammatory bowel disease, and liver disease.
It is pure sensation, pleasure in a crystalline form. We share as humans a desire for its innate sweetness, which begins at mother’s breast. This taste of milk sugars is the fuel that energizes all of life – white gold – pure carbohydrate energy that moves our bodies. The calories in a cup of breast milk are nearly 40% from sugar in the form of lactose. The deep and primal appeal of sugar is one of the reasons that sugar and sugar-filled foods are now among the most popular and commonly chosen edibles. In the past, sugar was expensive and rare, and consumption was limited to the wealthy and was reserved for the end of a meal. Now sugar is cheap and abundant, with manufactured sugars infused in nearly every packaged product sold in supermarkets.
Like many dietitians and nutrition experts, I used to recommend that sugar be eaten in moderation. Now, I’ve changed my tune. Due to the ever present presence of sugar in our lives, and because of the insidious way Big Sugar (The National Sugar Association, a sugar lobbying organization) conspired to manipulate scientific studies about sugar’s harmful effects, I now say avoid added sugars. PERIOD.
Added to nearly every packaged product and deliberately concealed by food manufacturers through its 56 different names, one cannot avoid eating added sugars. We have a long love affair with sugar, which is one reason why it is so hard to resist. The other reason is because it is hidden. In food as well as through deliberate concealment. More than 75% of the added sugar we eat is in food products, meaning that packaged food is by far and above the problem with our excessive sugar intake.
Beginning in the 1960’s, the National Sugar Association made sure that consumers wouldn’t learn about the harm that excess sugar caused. They paid off prominent scientific researchers from Harvard University to turn attention away from sugar causing health problems, pointing the finger in many instances towards fat. You can read the scientific study here. For a brilliant editorial from one of my heroes, Marion Nestle, you can read her post from Food Politics. Dr. Nestle is an expert on the politics that affect some of the more unhealthy foods like soda, and how our own health interests are routinely thwarted by Big Food. I share her conclusion: “we would all be better eating less sugary foods and fatty meats.” Simple nutrition, expert advice.
A recent study in a prominent scientific journal concluded that a high intake of added sugars increases the risk of weight gain, excess body weight and obesity, type 2 diabetes mellitus; higher serum triglycerides and high blood cholesterol; higher blood pressure and hypertension; stroke; coronary heart disease; cancer; and dental caries. Foods higher in added sugars are often a source of empty calories with minimum essential nutrients or dietary fiber which displaces more healthful foods and lead, in turn, to simultaneously overfed and undernourished individuals. Meaning, we are fatter and less healthy.
We all know that sugar is in soda, fizzy drinks, and cakes and cookies. But do you know about the worst offenders?
If you want to avoid diabetes, heart disease, obesity, and other considerable health risks, stop blaming your genetics, and take charge of your eating. Once you know the truth about sugar, you can make a choice to change. It truly is up to each one of us to act as our own health advocate. Remember, Big Sugar is not your friend. In fact, the food industry acts just like Big Tobacco, and they market to us in just the same way. I think we all know how this story will end – in perhaps 10 or 20 years, following innumerable suffering and death, added sugars will be banned, or at least revealed for the health problem they are – and sugar will be considered as unhealthy as smoking.
The father of modern medicine scribed these words nearly 2,500 years ago. The words of Hippocrates have been used to communicate how a connection with nature through a relationship with food can provide health benefits far beyond any other type of “prescription”. Seen through this lens, eating is an intimate way to extract life-sustaining energy from Mother Nature. [Read more…] about The healing power of plants
How do you want to spend the rest of your life? Whether its traveling, spending time with your loved ones, living out your passions, or even climbing Mt. Everest, what you eat and how you eat can help you get there. It also can help the planet, too! [Read more…] about Sustainable Living & Mindful Eating
Springtime has come to the desert! As I travel around the Sonoran Desert Preserve, I see the signs of spring everywhere. Even in the barren desert, spring brings life and new beginnings to my surroundings. I am reminded of the restorative power of nature, and the ways that all living things go through periods of dormancy, and new life. It’s never too late to create the life you want – look to the desert for inspiration!
Have you thought about the impact that eating and drinking “non foods” has on your body? Have you thought about the difference between real food and food like substances? It can be helpful as you work towards a fuller relationship with food and your body to think about how real food impacts your life, and how non foods interfere with your body’s natural workings.
There are three types of food like substances – processed, junk, and fake foods. Processed food is made from real food that has been put through chemical processes and is filled with chemicals and preservatives. Some examples of processed food include beef jerky, canned tea, jam, hot dogs, and low or non fat yogurt with sugar or sucralose.
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