Good Mood Diet Articles

OK, pop quiz time: Which selection at McDonald’s has more calories, salt and fat: Two Big Macs or a large chocolate shake?

If you answered two Big Macs, join Dr. Harold Goldstein. He got the answer wrong too and he is executive director of the California Center for Public Health Advocacy or CCPHA.

"I have a doctorate in public health, and I failed this quiz," said Goldstein to the Reuters news service. "Common sense does not help ... who would think that a large chocolate shake at McDonald's has more calories than two Big Macs?"

Apparently, not a lot of us. The California public health organization commissioned a new poll that posed the Big Macs-shake question to more than 500 respondents, along with three other questions about items on menus at Chili’s, Macaroni Grill and Denny’s franchises. Not a single person answered all four questions correctly, and two-thirds of participants didn’t get a single one right.

Not one. And this is among people living in California, which is considered a more health-conscious state than most.

Here’s the Denny’s question: Which meal has the least number of calories, salt and fat:

• Ham and cheddar omelet


• chicken-fried steak and eggs


• three slices of French toast with syrup and margarine


• three pancakes with syrup and margarine

So much for being "good" with the margarine. Chicken-fried steak and eggs had the fewest number of calories, salt and fat among the four breakfast options.

Less than one percent answered three of the four questions correctly. That’s four people out of 500-plus.

Dr. Kleiner commented, “While [chicken-fried steak and eggs] is NOT a healthy choice compared to homemade cereal and eggs, this study is a great demonstration of what happens to foods in a restaurant kitchen. Without a nutrition facts label, there's no telling what's in the food.

Restaurant chains like Denny’s and McDonald’s have voluntarily posted nutritional breakdowns of menu choices on their Web sites in recent years. But food activists such as Michael Jacobson at the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Science in the Public Interest (http://www.cspinet.org/) contends that consumers need to most see that information when it’s time to order.

"Many people would make different choices if the restaurants listed the calories, salt and fat," says Jacobson. "And then the restaurants would make adjustments."

Jacobson’s point is: hey, splurges are OK. Just recognize them, which, by the evidence of the California poll, is not as apparent as it might seem.

One number for which those California respondents scored high: Eighty-four percent said they would welcome laws that require restaurant chains to post nutritional information on menus or menu boards.

In the Good Mood Diet, Dr. Kleiner and I were intent on presenting an eating plan that "traveled well." Here are some of Dr. Kleiner’s tips for dining out and staying in the Good Mood range:

• Don’t start on the breadbasket until other food comes to the table.


• Share appetizers and order your salad with dressing on the side.


• Ask for meat and fish sauces on the side.


• When ordering pasta, choose the red sauce.


• Split desserts for the table.


• Think combinations of meat/fish, veggies and grains.

Dr. Kleiner also has Good Mood choices to fit into a hectic, fast-food sort of day. She likes Subway the most.

"Choose a six-inch sub or wrap," she says. "To increase protein, ask for a double serving of meat, especially if you are working out regularly. Skip the mayonnaise, but do have the olive oil and load up on the veggies."

For her part, Kleiner skips the sodas (me too). But she sees the baked potato chips as the occasional splurge item.

"I pack nuts or fruit from home to supplement a Subway sandwich on the run," said Kleiner, "but the baked chips can be on the special treat list."

Bob Condor

The misconception of "lower abdominals" is still alive in gyms, on TV shows and in fitness magazines. Talking about and thinking that there really are muscles known as “the lower abdominals” is prevalent in school Phys Ed classes, personal training sessions and group exercise classes. It’s commonly heard but it’s just not true. There is no such muscle and therefore there is no need to make up exercises to strengthen it. Let it be heard loud and clear! You don’t need to work out, isolate or even strengthen your “lower abdominals” to attain a "flat stomach" or to strengthen your core!

The phrase “lower abdominals” implies that there is an abdominal wall muscle that is lower than the others. This is anatomically false. Just glance at any abdominal chart and you’ll be able to see that each of our abdominal muscles have attachment sites on the pubic bones (right there at the bottom of your jean’s zipper). None of them is any lower than the others.

Some think the words “lower abdominals” merely refers to the lower half of the central abdominal muscle, the rectus abdominus. The problem with thinking the lower portion of a muscle’s fibers are a separate muscle is that this implies the lower half of a muscle can contract without its upper half being affected. This is impossible due to the structural construction of our skeletal muscles. Read on to understand why this isn’t possible.

To understand the abdominal muscles, it is vital to understand the basics of all skeletal muscles. A muscle has at least two ends. These ends attach directly, or by way of a tendon, to at least two separate bones. Each muscle crosses at least one joint. When the muscle contracts, it either causes the joint between the two bones to flex (bend) or causes them to extend (straighten). One end of the muscle, referred to as its origin, is usually stable and doesn't move. The other end, called the insertion, usually moves when the muscle contracts.

Full range-of-motion is recommended

The meaty part of the muscle is made of fibers that stretch from the origin to the insertion. The long fibers in the abdominal muscles go from the origin (on the ribs and xiphoid process) to the insertion site (on the pubic symphysis). A concentric contraction (concentric means “toward the center”), done during curl-ups or sit-ups, is performed as the two ends move closer together. For full range-of-motion to occur on each repetition of the exercise, the muscle relaxes and allows its two ends to move as far apart as possible to regain its resting length. The next contraction happens from this length and is referred to as being done from its full range-of-motion. It’s considered a basic principle of good exercise performance to do all strength building exercises (including those for the abdominals) by going through a full range-of-motion.

The all-or-nothing principle of muscle contraction

The two ends of the rectus abdominis (the main abdominal muscle on the center front of your belly) move toward each other when the muscle fibers contract or one end can hold still while the other end moves toward it. They may switch duties, or they both may move toward the middle. But the entire length of the muscle fiber is always involved no matter which end is mobile. You can not isolate the muscle’s contraction into just one half the length of the muscle.

The “all-or-nothing principle” pertains to the length of a muscle fiber, not to all the fibers of a muscle. One fiber may contract while a nearby fiber does not, but the fiber that is contracting is committed along its entire length. A muscle fiber cannot contract along only half its length.

Imagine a stretched rubber band representing the rectus abdominis. As the rubber band shortens to its resting length, the entire band is involved in the shortening process. This is similar to the way the muscle contracts along its entire length. For one end of the muscle to move, it must be pulled upon from the anchored end at the origin site. Hence, the lower end of the abdominal muscle cannot contract without affecting the rest of the length of fiber.

Spot reducing

Exercisers have been led to believe that exercises for the “lower abdominals” are those that make the bottom end of the abs move or at least feel the pain of exercise (for example: when the hips lift and the ribs remain stationary on the floor). This makes you "feel" the exercise below the waist where most people store most of their abdominal fat. Exercisers gladly try to feel the exertion near this fat storage spot because they believe in spot reducing. They believe that if the pain is near their detested fat pad that fat will be targeted and made to reduce. This dangerous misconception perpetuates the belief that you need to feel pain to gain the effects of exercises.

If “spot reducing” is inherently linked to lower abdominal exercises, then the entire concept is incorrect. Different exercises move either one or both ends of the rectus abdominis, but that movement does not mean the fat above it is being used to fuel the movement. Nor does it mean one particular end of the muscle is going to be strengthened or tightened more than the other. There is no need to switch emphasis of which attachment site is held stationary on any other muscle group to cause directed fat loss. Doing a variety of abdominal exercises is nice and may prevent boredom and fatigue that makes you stop exercising before very many calories have been burned, but the variety is not essential. A full range-of-motion is the best way to strengthen the muscle. A stronger muscle is firmer, harder or tighter. A stronger muscle has a higher metabolic rate and will use more calories daily, even during rest.

It's time to be cognizant and to apply these basic exercise principles to our abdominal wall workouts and stop taking exercise advice from poorly trained “trainers” who pass on erroneous gym talk about "lower abs."

Experts advise us to perform at least four different abdominal exercises to give enough variety to stimulate each of the four pairs of abdominal muscles (none of which are the “lower” abdominals). I'll share my favorite abdominal strengthening exercises in my next article.

Eat right and exercise regularly!
Alice Lockridge

The reaction to listing trans fats on food labels has created a revolution in the food industry. If you look at the nutrition facts label on the back of most packaged foods, you’ll see a big zero beside the trans fat column, except for several stragglers in the frozen food, snack food and popcorn categories. If trans fats were so pervasive in the food supply before the labeling legislation, what are the food manufacturers using to replace it in the list of ingredients?

More importantly, are the trans fat alternatives better, or worse for our health, than the original?

Trans fat primer

Just in case you’ve been living on the moon for the past few years and you’re not sure what the big deal is about trans fats, here’s a quick lesson. Unlike other fats in our food supply, trans fats are mostly artificial. A very small percentage of trans fats are actually found naturally in meat and dairy products, but the mother - load of trans fats are manufactured in the laboratory through the process of hydrogenation. This process changes a healthy liquid vegetable oil into a partially saturated fat.

These fats were created as alternatives to butter and lard in processed foods, removing the saturated fats found naturally in those foods. The trans fats maintained the same flakiness, crispness and taste imparted by butter and lard, and at the same time increased shelf life by reducing rancidity. They were a miracle boon to the world of packaged foods and restaurant fare.

In 1993 Dr. Walter Willet of the Harvard School of Public Health questioned the impact on health that artificially manufactured trans fats might have on the American public. Research that he conducted at that time showed that the more industrially produced trans fats you ate, the higher your risk of heart disease. Except for the consumer watchdog group Center for Science in the Public Interest, few people paid heed to Dr. Willet’s findings. The explanation at the time was that trans fats just weren’t that prevalent in the food supply; they were found mostly in margarines.

Fast forward to the 21st century. Current research on trans fats shows that they are at least as bad, if not worse, than butter and lard in promoting heart disease. Until the labeling law went into effect last year, trans fats were almost ubiquitous in our food supply, and heart disease is rampant. Huge serving sizes and overeating of fast foods, fried foods and snack foods haven’t helped the situation any. The solution to the abundance of trans fats in the food supply was to require their listing on the nutrition facts labels of all packaged foods. With the negative press and public opinion weighing on their shoulders, food manufacturers took rapid flight from the use of trans fats and are racing to find an alternative.

The race is on

So what is in the food that we’re eating now that trans fats are out? Well, first you should know that up to .49 grams of trans fat can be in a serving of food that is labeled as 0 grams of trans fat.

Some manufacturers have just reduced the portion sizes of their foods to meet the zero trans fat threshold.

Others have removed some proportion of their trans fat ingredients (but not all) and replaced it with mixtures of other oils.

Many manufacturers are using the tropical oils: palm, palm kernel, and coconut oils, which are saturated vegetable fats, as replacements for trans fats. They can mimic many of the food chemistry attributes of saturated fats like butter. Historically, nutritionists have guided consumers away from these saturated oils, but there is some speculation that because these come from plants, and not animals, their saturated fat content may not be as bad as we thought. The jury is still out on that one.

New chemically rearranged fats are also on the market and are big news in the industry. Called interesterified fats, the fatty acids are shuffled on each fat molecule in the laboratory to create partially saturated fats. Just like hydrogenation, interesterification produces some molecules that are rarely, if ever, found in nature.

In a recently published study from Malaysia in the January 15th issue of the online journal Nutrition & Metabolism, researchers found that the interesterified fat that they tested had significantly more negative effects on blood sugar and cholesterol levels compared to a trans fat or palm oil. The study received wide press coverage. Many scientific experts, however, have argued that the design of the study was flawed. They claim that the study was funded by a Malaysian palm-oil-industry group, that the researchers conducting the study all had financial ties to the industry group, and the volunteers were employees of the organization. The goal, say experts, was to create the illusion that palm oil is the healthy alternative when compared to interesterified fats or trans fats.

The interesterified fat used in the study was more highly saturated than a typical fat that would be used in place of trans fats by the food industry. Additionally, the trans fat was less hydrogenated, containing fewer trans fats, than one typically used in food processing. In fact, some industry scientists say that in past studies, interesterified fats have had more healthful effects on cholesterol than have trans fats. I’m not sure that’s saying all that much. So the jury is still out on this one, too.

The high-tech agricultural industry is getting in on the race, too. With genetic alteration through selection and interbreeding, more stable oils could be cultivated. These might be derived from soy, corn, sunflower and other domestically grown crops. Genetic engineering is also a possibility for creating entirely new crops.

Who wins?

Right now we don’t have a clue about the health risks associated with any of the trans fat alternatives. Many feel that the tropical oils are the best option; others feel that interesterified fats hold the most promise.

The fact is that something is already replacing the trans fats in packaged foods. But not only packaged foods. Restaurants in NYC have had to make their menus trans fat-free. Nationwide, the Starbucks chain has required all its bakeries to meet the requirements for zero trans fat labeling. In all likelihood, unless you only eat fresh, unprocessed foods at home, you are already eating foods using the trans fat alternatives.

Who wins? In my book, it’s the food manufacturers. A whole new industry of processed oils is being reborn. New products will be created that will be more palatable with the new oils. And it will be another decade or more before anyone notices whether these oils are healthy or harmful. Either enjoy being a guinea pig, or reduce your use of packaged foods and fast foods.

As always, the most healthy alternatives are fresh, whole foods from a trusted source.

Proteins, carbs, vitamins, minerals, water, and fats. Of the six primary classes of nutrients, which is the most critical for growth, muscle development, and health? If you guessed water, you’re right!

It is hard to say enough good things about water. Water is the most abundant compound in the human body, making up about 60 percent of the body weight in adults. It fills virtually every space in cells and between them. All biochemical reactions occur in water, and water is an active participant in those reactions. From energy production to joint lubrication to reproduction, there is no system in your body that does not depend on water.

But with all the obvious importance of water, it appears that most of us aren’t drinking enough. Nearly one-third of the U.S. population is walking around slightly dehydrated. “So what?” you ask. “What’s the big deal about being slightly dehydrated?”

A voluminous problem

Just about everyone knows that you can get pretty sick and even die from severe dehydration. But the fact is that chronic, mild dehydration – a constant 1 to 2 percent deficit of body weight caused by loss of fluids – can have a measurable effect on mental and physical performance, muscle growth, and even long-term health.

Water and your muscles

Since muscles are nearly 70 percent water, even a small loss of fluid will affect their function. Muscles are controlled by nerves. The electrical stimulation of nerves and contraction of muscles occurs due to the exchange of electrolytes dissolved in water across the nerve and muscle cell membranes.

• If you’re low on water or electrolytes, your muscle strength and control are weakened.
• A water deficit of just 2 to 4 percent of your body weight can cut your strength-training workout by as much as 21 percent, and your aerobic power by a whopping 48 percent!

If gaining muscle is your goal, then you should care about cell volumization, or the hydration state of your muscle cells. In a well-hydrated muscle cell, protein synthesis is stimulated and protein breakdown is decreased. On the other hand, muscle-cell dehydration promotes protein breakdown and inhibits protein synthesis.

Cell volume has also been shown to influence genetic expression, enzyme and hormone activity, and metabolic regulation.

Water and your body fat

As you mobilize your stored fatty acids to burn off as energy, you release any fat-soluble toxins that have been benignly stored in your fat cells. The more fluid you drink, the more dilute the toxins in your bloodstream, and the more rapidly they exit from your body.

When your goal is losing body fat, water is your friend.

• Drinking an adequate amount of water can help take the edge off hunger so that you eat less. And water has no calories.


• If you are on a high protein diet, water is required to detoxify ammonia, a by-product of protein energy metabolism.

Water and your brain

When it comes to peak mental capacity, whether at the office or in competition, your hydration state will affect your performance. In a study of subjects’ abilities to perform mental exercises after heat-stress induced dehydration, a fluid loss of only 2 percent of body weight caused 20 percent reductions (as compared to their well-hydrated state) in:

• Arithmetic ability


• Short-term memory


• The ability to visually track an object

Kidney stones, cancer, heart problems

Probably most surprising is the effect that chronic, mild dehydration has on health and disease. It was a practice of Hippocrates to recommend large intakes of water to increase urine production and decrease the recurrence of urinary tract stones. Today approximately 12 to 15 percent of the general population will form a kidney stone at some time.

Many factors can modify the urinary risk factors for developing stones.

• Of these, diet – especially fluid intake – is the only one that can be easily changed and that has a marked effect on all urinary risk factors.

Several studies have discovered a direct correlation between fluid intake and the incidence of certain cancers.

• Studies in Israel, Great Britain, and the United States have observed that the more fluid that people drink, the lower their risks of bladder, prostate, kidney, testicle, renal pelvis, ureter, colon, and breast cancers.

In some of the studies, a decrease in cancer risk was specifically associated with water intake.

• A study in Seattle Washington showed that women who drank more than 5 glasses of water a day had a 45 percent decreased risk of colon cancer, versus those who consumed 2 or fewer glasses per day. Men had a non-statistically significant reduction of cancer by 32 percent when they drank more than 4 glasses a day, versus 1 or fewer glasses a day.


• Although the data are preliminary, a pilot study in Great Britain found that the risk for developing breast cancer was reduced by 79 percent among water drinkers when adjusted for all other related factors.

Mild dehydration can also be a factor in the occurrence of mitral valve prolapse.

• In a study of 14 healthy women with normal heart function, mitral valve prolapse was induced by mild dehydration, and resolved with rehydration.

Your fluid plan

Contrary to our drive to eat, our drive to drink is not as keen. Our thirst mechanism doesn’t kick in until we are already mildly dehydrated.

When you’re working out moderately in a mild climate, you are probably losing 1 to 2 quarts (2 to 4 pounds) of fluid per hour through perspiration. That means that a 150-pound person can easily lose 2 percent of their body weight in fluid (3 pounds) within an hour. If exercise is more intense or the environment is more extreme fluid, losses will be greater. You can see how easily you become dehydrated.

• If you don’t replenish your fluid losses during exercise, you will fatigue early and your performance will be diminished.


• Without fluid replenishment after exercise, your performance on successive days will decay, and your long-term health may be at risk.

Design a fluid plan just like you plan your food. To cover your minimum intake, make sure you drink non-caffeinated and non-alcoholic beverages all day, as follows. Since alcohol and caffeine can promote water loss, make at least 5 of your beverages water.

• A couple cups when you get up in the morning


• A few more cups mid-morning


• A couple cups at lunch


• Two more in the mid-afternoon


• Two more at dinner

Then add what you need to be well hydrated before, during, and after exercise.

Monitor your hydration status. One of the easiest ways is to check your urine; it should be relatively odorless and no darker colored than straw. Anything darker is a good sign that you are dehydrated and need to be drinking more.

Don’t get caught empty-handed

Many factors increase water requirements, including high heat, low humidity, high altitude, exercise, dieting, illness, travel and pregnancy.

• Carry water and fluids with you as a constant reminder to drink.
• Freeze fluids in water bottles to keep them cold during long-distance exercise.
• Remember that fruits and vegetables are great sources of water.

And whoever is driving you to drink, tell them “thank you!”

---

Symptoms of dehydration

Early signs	Severe signs
Fatigue Loss of appetite Flushed skin Burning in stomach Light-headedness Headache Dry mouth Dry cough Heat intolerance Dark urine with strong odor	Difficulty swallowing Stumbling Clumsiness Shriveled skin Sunken eyes and dim vision Painful urination Numb skin Muscle spasm Delirium

Fluid intake guidelines

• Drink a minimum of 1 quart (4 cups) of fluid for every 1,000 calories you eat every day.
• Drink at least 5 cups of water every day.
• Fluids should be cool.
• For moderate exercise that lasts an hour or less, water is sufficient for replacing lost fluids. If you like flavored drinks better, then use flavored beverages.
• For intense exercise that lasts less than 1 hour and exercise lasting more than an hour, carbohydrate-electrolyte sport drinks are best.
• Drink 2 cups of fluid 2 hours before exercise.
• Drink 4-6 ounces every 15 to 20 minutes during exercise.
• After exercise, drink 16-20 ounces (2-2½ cups) of fluid for every pound of body weight lost during exercise.

In several recent blogs, I’ve talked about one of my most frequently asked questions, in which the asker grabs some part of their body that they find undesirable and asks, “Can you give me an exercise to get rid of this?” This common question brings up two important topics: body shapes and where your fat is stored and that all-time favorite subject of “spot reducing.” To learn about where fat is stored and how different bodies burn fat differently, check my blog archives.

Today I’d like to talk about the fact that you can target muscle firmness – or tell your body exactly where to firm up a muscle.

Targeting muscle strength, firmness, and tone is a really good aspect of exercise. If you use a muscle (make it contract and relax repeatedly) it will be hungry or metabolically more active. If you do this often or involve a lot of muscles in this activity, you will use a lot of calories and perhaps burn some of your stored body fat. But of course, the fat that is burned isn’t necessarily the closest fat cells to the worked muscles.

If you have reached the primary goal of being physically active most days of the week, it’s a good idea to set a goal of doing some targeted strength building. To plan an exercise routine that will build strength in skeletal muscles, you should know the “Thirty Repetition Rule.” This rule of physiology says,

“If you can repeat an exercise 30 times, then that proves you are already as strong as that particular exercise can make you. You won’t get any stronger by doing it, even if you do it for more repetitions.”

If you want to get stronger, then you need to overload the activity enough that you are not quite able to do 10 repetitions of the activity. The resistance you use can be metal weights, rubber balls filled to make them heavy, jumbo rubber bands, or for some exercises, your own body weight. No matter what the resistance device or your age or gender, you want to make it hard to repeat the exercise 10 times. If you pick up a book bag to use for your weight and you find that you can only repeat the exercise 2 times because the bag is so heavy, then make it lighter until you find just the right weight – that you can perform between 8 and 10 repetitions and are really glad to stop there. If you can easily do 10 or 15 repetitions, then you will need more resistance to be able to make yourself stronger.

The American College of Sports Medicine advises that American adults should find 10 exercises to do at least twice a week and do them against a resistance that makes it hard to do 10 repetitions. Each exercise you do will probably need a different amount of resistance because different parts of your body have different strength levels. So plan on finding 4 to 10 different weights/bags/bands.

Once you have loaded the muscles that perform each of your chosen activities with enough resistance that it is hard to do 10 repetitions, you have found a way to build more strength, cause the muscles to firm up, and to become more toned. Keep at it about twice a week and your muscles will become stronger, denser, heavier and hungrier! You will then have a higher metabolic rate and will be able to burn today’s food better and also will be a better fat metabolizer to burn up yesterday’s stored food.

Finding ways to eat more food and not be concerned about it turning to fat puts me in a good mood!

Originally published in Fitness Rx For Women

One of the most typical diet questions that I’m asked while standing aside the buffet table at a party is “what do you think about having a cheat day?” You’ve probably asked yourself, or a health professional, the same question. Here’s my answer (a little more detailed than you’d get at the party).

News flash: It's different for women and men

The idea of the “cheat day” came out of the world of bodybuilding. While notorious for their ability to follow a very restricted diet before competitions, male bodybuilders found by observation that on the day after their competition they looked much better than while they were on stage for the event. Not surprisingly, while they were eating only tuna and chicken breast in order to get cut before competition, immediately after the competition the nearest ice cream parlor was packed with competitors. After the late afternoon indulgence they’d awake the next morning to an incredibly buff body, showing more cuts and definition than the day before. It didn’t take long for the “cheat day” to be incorporated into the standard dieting regime of male bodybuilders.

But what about female bodybuilders? By self-report, the women that I work with find that adding in a cheat day every once in awhile is fine. However, different from their male counterparts, who seem to be able to return to their diet regimen with great control, the weekly cheat day leads to less restraint during the rest of the week.

Pamela Peeke, MD, MPH, confirms this idea in her book, Body-for-Life for Women (Rodale, 2005). According to Dr. Peeke, women are more likely to binge during a cheat day. She recommends incorporating balance into your every day diet, promoting healthy relationships with food, leading to successful weight loss.

What does the research say?

Until recently the whole concept of a cheat day was based on theory and anecdote. There isn’t any good data on what happens physiologically or metabolically when people include a cheat day regularly in their weight loss plan. Now, however, there is data on what happens behaviorally, and the outcome of that behavior. In 2005, a study was published by researchers at The Center for Human Nutrition at the University of Colorado, examining the common characteristics of successful long-term weight loss maintainers on the National Weight Control Registry (NWCR). The NWCR consists of over 4800 individuals who have been successful in long-term weight loss maintenance. Although the NWCR does not represent a random sample of all dieters, it does have value in identifying potential strategies that may help others become successful in keeping weight off.

Among the many topics examined, dieting consistency was significant. Participants were asked whether they maintained the same diet regimen across the week and year, or if they tended to diet more strictly on weekdays and/or non-holidays. Few people said they dieted more strictly on the weekend compared with the rest of the week (2%), or during holidays compared with the rest of the year (3%). Fifty-nine percent reported that their eating was the same regardless of the day of the week, and 45% reported that it was the same on holidays, vacations, and the rest of the year. A minority of 39% reported stricter eating patterns during the week compared to weekends, and 52% were less controlled on holidays and vacations compared to the rest of the year.

When the investigators evaluated whether maintaining a consistent diet was related to subsequent weight regain after 2 years they found very interesting, and useful results. The results reported that those participants who maintained a consistent diet across the week were 1.5 times more likely to maintain their weight within 5 pounds over the subsequent year than participants who allowed themselves a “cheat day” during the week. The same was true for those individuals who allowed themselves more flexibility during holidays and traveling. Both groups that had “free time” outside their diet plans had a greater risk of regaining their lost weight. (1)

Think positive: balance, don’t cheat

The whole concept of cheating exemplifies the negative approach that we have toward food. When we cheat, whether planned or not, it implies guilt for a bad deed done. We live through a week of deprivation where our favorite foods are off limits, so all we do is crave them while working hard at avoiding them. Then comes our cheat day, and rather than eating a normal serving size of the chocolate cake, we binge and eat half the cake. Then the guilt sets in and there goes the other half of the cake. What a waste of time and emotion!

Get rid of the idea of cheating. Build in a positive approach to food and dieting by daily balancing your food with your exercise, and your favorite foods with all the foods that you eat to maintain your health. When foods are not off limits, when you don’t feel deprived, and when you know you’ll be able to have that small piece of cake several times a week, then you don’t binge, and you feel satisfied. This positive approach eliminates the whole concept of the “cheat day” because you’re building in the “cheat” at least several times a week, if not daily.

While this approach may make you nervous at first, it follows beautifully with the results of the Colorado study. Rather than changing your diet plan from weekday to weekend, a strategy that led to weight gain in the majority of NWCR members, you will be following your plan all week long. I like to call this balance, rather than planned cheating. And while it might take you a little time to become comfortable with the idea, once you try it you’ll never want to go back to that negative approach to food. You’ll be losing the weight off your shoulders, as well as your hips and thighs.

Creating balance

The easiest way to structure the balance in your diet is to start with the big picture: what are your favorite foods that you think you should avoid, and which days are your most active days? By plugging in sweet treats after exercise, you put the sugar to work for you. Not only should you not feel guilty about eating it, your body needs to have sugar after exercise. You can feel good about eating it and rewarding yourself for a hard, sweaty workout. Whatever that sweet treat is, make sure to include a source of milk protein at the same time, to get the biggest bang for your buck. Is your calling a sweet blended milk-based drink at your neighborhood latté stand or smoothie bar? Or maybe a cookie and a glass of milk? What about a latté and a bagel? All of these contain the right ingredients to help your muscles recover, build and refuel after exercise. Of course, keeping your serving sizes small will help contain your calories, but it will seem like plenty when you’ve never before even allowed yourself to eat anything after exercise!

Is your weakest moment in the evening? Are you dying for chocolate? Then plan to have a hot cocoa to help you relax and get you over the hump. The high tryptophan levels in milk combined with the few grams of carbohydrate will raise your serotonin levels and help your mind and body get ready for sleep. Non-dutched, natural cocoa powder, or bittersweet chocolate containing at least 70% cacao will do the same. So it’s something good for you to plan into your days.

What about the unplanned splurge?

There will always be very special moments in life when we do something, or eat something, just because we feel like it at the moment. I say, “celebrate those moments, don’t disparage them.” Don’t ruin your wedding because the cake isn’t in your plan for the day. Don’t avoid the champagne toast on your birthday. And definitely don’t forego sharing food during a special moment with a loved one. Food plays a very intimate role in our lives, and restricting food during tender moments, happy occasions and celebrations can make you feel left out. I’m talking about really special occasions, when it doesn’t matter if you’ve gone off the plan because these days happen very infrequently. So it’s not every holiday, or day off from work, but the very special ones.

When the day is done, look back on it with fondness. I hope the food and the moment were as good as you had hoped. Then tomorrow, go back to your plan. Cheating included; no guilt allowed!

References:
1. Wing RR, Phelan S. Long term weight loss maintenance. Am J Clin Nutr 2005;82(suppl):222S–5S

Alice Lockridge, Physical Activity expert, MS PhysEd, Exercise Physiologist
with Liz Diether-Martin, Editor of The Good Mood Diet web site

How often have you heard the saying, “Use it or lose it?” And how often have you stretched your arms straight over your head and held them there for 60 seconds? If you’re like most people, you’ve heard the saying way more than you’ve done the stretch.

As a fitness instructor, I remind my clients that it’s a good idea to stretch every day even if they don’t do any other exercises. Stretching is also an integral part of a workout program:

• As the second part of the warm-up before any brisk physical activity. All it takes is a little walking for 5 minutes and a few static stretches (static means the stretch is held still) involving your shoulders, back, hips and calves. This combination enables your walking muscles to create heat to send to the stretched joints, readying them for more intense activity. With a quick warm-up you’ll feel better and be more apt to burn more calories during your workout. It also gives you an opportunity to notice sore spots or injured areas that need to be cared for before you work out. Try the stretches listed below, holding each stretch at least 10 seconds to produce the desired warm-up effect.


• During the cool-down phase after any vigorous physical activity, work or exercise. The following exercises are good for helping your muscles recover after a bout of intense or unfamiliar activity. Holding stretches for at least 10 seconds after workout helps you cool down and flush out metabolic waste products that are built up during the activity. Holding stretches for at least 60 seconds is needed if you want to increase your flexibility and ability to move through a larger range-of-motion. Pick one of these exercises to hold for the full minute each time you cool down to help you reach greater flexibility.

With all stretches, being careful with your body is key. Stretch slowly and hold still at the point where you feel a slight sensation of stretching. Never pull on a body part or bounce or jerk when stretching. Stretching should be a smooth action, not a quick or forceful action that could tear or injure the muscles. Abrupt, forceful stretches are counter-productive. Our bodies automatically respond to abrupt stretches by contracting the muscle. This protective response, called the Stretch-Contract Reflex, tries to prevent us from tearing our muscles.

Remember it this way: “Never stretch with a jerk!”

For each of these exercises, I’ll point out the ultimate goal. You may not be able to get there at first, but keep the goal in mind each time you stretch to help you have the most correct form.

Shoulder flexion

1. Lie on your back with knees bent and feet on the floor.
2. Reach your arms straight up over your head until they reach the floor.
3. Relax your arms and shoulder and lie passively.

The goal is to keep your arms narrow, alongside your head, elbows straight, with the length of your arms and your wrists touching the floor. Pay attention to your lower back and hold it in a neutral position without a huge arch underneath. If reaching your arms overhead pulls your back up into an arch, use your abdominal muscles to do a pelvic tilt to hold your trunk still.

Spinal twist

1. Lie on your back with your arms spread wide.
2. With one leg extended on the floor, bend the other knee and move it over and across your body and your straightened leg, trying to put your bent knee to the floor.
3. Relax and be passive, letting the weight of your leg and arms stretch your back muscles.
4. Pull your leg back and repeat, going the other direction with the other leg.

The long-term goal is to have both shoulders on the floor while your knee touches the floor. At first both may be off the floor and hovering. Be patient and let your body adjust to this new twist!

Spinal side bend

1. Sit on the floor with your legs either crossed or slightly bent.
2. Reach up with one arm, across your head toward the other side of the ceiling, keeping your elbow straightened.

The goal is to laterally bend your spine to 30 degrees and to stretch the muscles between your armpit and hip. Check your position: If you had keys in your upper hand and dropped them, they’d miss your head, but would drop straight to the floor on the opposite side of your body.

Spinal forward hang

1. While sitting with legs either crossed or slightly bent, let your arms hang loosely toward the floor.
2. Round your back and move your chin toward the floor.

The goal is to move your head as far from your tailbone as possible and make your back as round as possible.

Hamstring hug

1. Lie on your back and extend one leg on the floor.
2. Lift the other leg, with your hands behind your knee (on the back of your thigh not smashing your knee into hyperflexion).
3. Hug your thigh against your belly. Hold for 10 seconds.
4. Slowly straighten your knee, moving your foot up into sight while maintaining the hug of your thigh. Hold for 10 more seconds in a position just before the place that makes your leg “shake like a Chihuahua.” It should be a passive-held stretch not a tug-of-war!

The goal is to stretch the fibers of your hamstring that cross both your hip and the back of your knee. Normal range-of-motion is to be able to lift your leg, with your hip bent to a 90-degree angle, and have your knee straight. The ultimate position would be to have your leg move closer toward your face. Take care to avoid over-flexing your knee during the first part of this stretch. This stretch should be used to replace touching your toes from standing or seated positions.

Calf stretch – straight knee

1. While standing, position your right foot flat on the floor, pointing straight forward. This is the hard part. Your back foot will try to point outward, toward the side wall to avoid getting any stretch in your calf muscle.
2. Shift your weight back onto your right heel and gently take a normal step forward with your left foot. You don't have to be in a tight-rope walker's stance so step wide enough to maintain your balance.
3. With your right heel still on the floor, move your head and hips forward, away from your back heel and hold for at least 10 seconds.
4. Relax and repeat with the left leg in the back.

The goal is to stretch the gastrocnemius (the big calf muscle) so that the stretch sensation is in the belly, or the wide part of the muscle close to your knee. You should feel less of a stretch in the Achilles tendon, the big ropey tendon that attaches to your heel. Note: If these two calf stretches are too confusing to be done correctly, there is a great little blue calf stretch gadget made with a curved bottom that will keep you in the correct position and allow you to stretch longer and more comfortably.

Calf stretch – bent knee

1. While standing, position your right foot flat on the floor, pointing straight forward.
2. Shift your weight back onto your right heel and take a small step forward with your left foot so that the left foot is only slightly ahead of the right one. Again, step wide enough to maintain your balance.
3. Bend both knees and hips in a semi-squat, keeping most of your body weight on your right foot. Hold for at least 10 seconds.
4. Relax and repeat with the left leg in the back.

The goal is to stretch a much-underrated second muscle at the back of your calf. It's the soleus and it is much shorter than the gastrocnemius and only reaches up a few inches above your heel. Calf injuries are one of the most common for adults starting a new physical activity so don’t skip this stretch. Tight calf muscles can become injured and put a halt to your daily physical activity.

Susan M. Kleiner, PhD, RD, FACN, CNS, FISSN

Heart Disease accounts for the deaths of 1 out of every 3 women. It is considered nearly epidemic. For years the symptoms and risks of heart disease in women were ignored. This week the American Heart Association published the most comprehensive guidelines yet for preventing heart disease in women. The focus has changed to a woman’s lifetime risk for heart disease, rather than the short-term risk that was the focus of the 2004 guidelines.

According to Dr. Lori Mosca, chair of the American Heart Association’s (AHA) expert panel that devised the guidelines, “Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death among women. The rate of awareness among women has increased from 30 to almost 60 percent, but we still need to work on the confusion around preventive strategies. We are very encouraged that the release of these new guidelines can help clear up some of this confusion and help our women engage in more conversations with physicians and health care providers as to what are the best strategies to reduce the burden of the number-one killer of women.”

The new guidelines include expanded recommendations on lifestyle factors such as physical activity, nutrition and smoking cessation, as well as more in-depth recommendations on drug treatments for blood pressure and cholesterol control that you can pursue with your health care provider.

Highlights of the changes include:

Help manage blood pressure by controlling weight, increasing physical activity, moderating alcohol intake, restricting sodium intake, and especially eating fresh fruits, vegetables and low-fat dairy products.

Quit smoking. If you need to quit, the 2007 guidelines recommend counseling, nicotine replacement or other forms of smoking cessation therapy.

If you need to lose weight or sustain weight-loss, exercise. Include at least 60 to 90 minutes of moderate-intensity activity on most, and preferably all, days of the week. Brisk walking is a good, moderate-intensity activity.

All women should reduce their intake of saturated fats to less than 7 percent of calories, if possible. (See the Chapter Notes for Chapter 1 in The Good Mood Diet for more information on saturated fats.)

Eat oily fish at least twice a week and consider taking supplements as follows:

• Women with heart disease should consider taking a capsule supplement of 850 to 1000 mg of EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid) and DHA (docosahexaenoic acid).


• Women with high triglycerides should take a capsule supplement of 2 to 4 grams of EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid) and DHA (docosahexaenoic acid).

Not recommended to prevent heart disease:

• Hormone replacement therapy and selective estrogen receptor modulators (SERMs) are not recommended to prevent heart disease in women.



• Antioxidant supplements (such as vitamins E and C and beta-carotene) should not be used for primary or secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease.



• Folic acid should not be used to prevent cardiovascular disease. This is a change from the 2004 guidelines that did recommend it be considered for use in certain high-risk women.

Aspirin therapy may be considered as follows:

• For women age 65 or older, regardless of their risk for cardiovascular disease, routine low-dose aspirin therapy may be considered, if the benefits are likely to outweigh other risks. (Previous guidelines did not recommend aspirin in lower-risk or healthy women.)


• For women with a very high-risk for heart disease, consider reducing LDL cholesterol to less than 70 mg/dL. (This may require a combination of cholesterol-lowering drugs.)

All women should take these guidelines very seriously. If you are in a room with 2 other women, the odds are that one of you will die of heart disease. Make the choice to change that statistic today.

Susan M. Kleiner, PhD, RD, FACN, CNS, FISSN

Family dinners, tea ceremonies, sharing a bottle of wine, religious ceremonies, family game night, or curling up with a good book... All of these are rituals in our lives. Imagine life without them; a life without patterns, without the ability to know what's coming, or what to look forward to.

Rituals decrease stress and anxiety. When you have a plan, or you know what to look forward to, you don't have to worry about what is going to happen, what is expected of you, or whom you will be sharing your time with.

The Japanese Tea Ceremony is a great example. In an article published in 1996 in the Holistic Nurse Practitioner Journal, Keenan wrote, "When people attend a Japanese Tea Ceremony, they often remark that it had a calming effect on them." The effect comes from ritualizing everyday chores and giving them an aesthetic dimension. Rather than focusing on the mundane acts, you concentrate solely on the present moment, shutting out worries about the past and anxieties about the future.

Research has shown that adolescents raised in families with frequent family dinners and celebrations have better mental health, better relationships, and fewer high-risk behaviors. According to the researchers, "Family rituals such as regular mealtimes may ease the stress of daily living in the fast-paced families of today's society."

If you look, you'll find lots of rituals built into The Good Mood Diet. The most obvious is the pattern that you follow as your Good Mood Template every day. Your hot cocoa in the evening is a very important end-of-day ritual to look forward to as you ease into rest and relaxation, and finally sleep.

If you are a tea drinker, your afternoon tea can also become a ritual that you look forward to. I have a cupboard full of different teas that I enjoy depending on my mood in the afternoon. I have loose teas for when I'm home, and I have bags for when I'm out and about. I find it especially important to carry tea with me when I travel, bringing a little bit of home and comfort with me while I'm on the road.

Alcohol plays a big ritualistic role in our society. It is part of religious ceremonies and celebrations of any size. We associate it with relaxation. It acts as an ice-breaker at a gathering, giving party-goers something to talk about and to do with their hands.

Alcohol (more than 2 drinks per week) is on the Feel Bad Foods list. Because of the important ritual surrounding alcohol, I would never remove alcohol from The Good Mood Diet without giving you another ritual as an alternative. If you enjoy the ritual of alcohol more often than twice a week, we have created a great alternative for you. While you won't have the alcohol, it may actually be the ritual of it all that you really enjoy.

In the recipe section of the book you'll find several "smoothie" recipes that are actually wonderful juice drinks. Call them "mocktails" if you must, but we have created them to create a whole new Good Mood ritual. You can still use the fancy glassware, and get all dressed up, but instead of drinking a Cosmopolitan, drink a Good Mood Metropolitan. The Mango Mambo and Blackberry Bliss were big hits at our last Good Mood Diet Club party.

So create some new rituals that feel good to you. Even better, create some new Good Mood Juice Drink recipes and send them in to us to share online. Have a party. Get your club together and get those creative juices flowing!

Susan M. Kleiner, PhD, RD, FACN, CNS, FISSN

The front page of the January 24, 2007 Wall Street Journal ran a story about so-called spiritual healers with an MD after their names, a dollar sign on their entry doors, and bottles of snake-oil for sale masquerading as cancer treatments. They use faith and prayer as their sales pitch and a promise of unsubstantiated cures to prey on the fearful and the faithful. They don't reveal their methods beyond prayer vigils, and never expose the list of ingredients in their supplements.

For someone who is facing death and has unsuccessfully reached the end of available treatment options, these purveyors of quasi-faith-based medicine may offer a sweeter final stage of their disease, at least offering some comfort and hope when traditional medicine can offer none. The financial cost of this hope can be extraordinarily high, leaving loved ones in debt but perhaps feeling some emotional satisfaction for their dear departed one.

For those who have just been diagnosed with serious illness, turning first to these untested practitioners and unsubstantiated cures rather than science-based medical specialists can lead to a devastating outcome. Cancers that were at a treatable stage can advance and spread, and the time is lost where the patient could have looked forward to a successful outcome. They may have spent their financial resources on supplements costing from hundreds to thousands of dollars weekly, along with additional costs for visits, whether in-person or even long-distance.

While I am not against (and I am often an advocate of) the use of alternative therapies as a first start or adjunctive therapy, your practitioner should be willing to tell you the risks and benefits of the treatments, the supporting data behind their methods (published research is the gold standard), and certainly the ingredients in any supplement or product that you are asked to consume. Any secret mixture or magic potion should be suspected immediately.

This should be a guiding principle for all supplements.

Recommended Supplements for Good Mood Dieters

I do recommend two different supplements in The Good Mood Diet: a daily multi-vitamin mineral supplement (brand of your choice) and isolated whey protein (also your choice of brand).

I am frequently asked how to choose a mutli-vitamin-mineral supplement. First, ingredients should be fully disclosed on the labels. Brands from nationally known companies are generally more reliable than from small obscure manufacturers. Manufacturers should follow "good manufacturing practices" (known as GMPs). This is a sign of quality control in processing.

The US Pharmacopeia (USP) sets quality standards for ingredients and their disintegration rates during digestion. The USP symbol on a supplement label indicates that the ingredients listed on the label have been tested against a high standard. These standards can be for disintegration, meaning that the product disintegrates with digestion in an area of the gut where it can be absorbed into the body. Often, supplements either are not digested at all, or are digested too low in the gut to be absorbed and are ultimately excreted. The USP symbol can also indicate quality, purity and potency standards.

Finding More Information about Supplements

You can do a little research on your own to decide which product might be right for you. Just last week Consumerlab.com published a report investigating the quality of 35 popular multi-vitamin-mineral supplements. They are the "Consumer Reports" of the nutrition products industry. To see the full report there is a membership fee which supports the ongoing work of the lab.

Research reports are occasionally published in scientific journals. One very good and unusually large report was published by researchers from The University of Alberta, in Edmonton, Canada in February 2006: Investigation of vitamin and mineral tablets and capsules on the Canadian market. While they investigated products in the Canadian marketplace, many of the same products are available in the U.S. as well.

Skepticism: The Best Supplement of All?

Don't just pop anything into your mouth just because someone tells you to do so. Whether you are working with a physician, a dietitian, or other health care practitioner, ask questions and get satisfactory answers before blindly following anyone purely on faith. While faith can be a powerful participant in healing, medical practice should be based on science.