Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you had a wonderful holiday and were able to enjoy some quality time with your loved ones.  If you're like most Americans, you probably also overdid it with the Thanksgiving goodies.  Did you know that to burn off the calories from the average Thanksgiving dinner you have to walk, jog, or run a full-length marathon?  That's 26.2 miles!  Even scarier . . . the left-overs!  Many of you will eat that same meal again tomorrow and the next day.  Unless you're one of those wild and crazy ultra-marathoners (and I know a few of my followers are), I hope you will try to find some balance this weekend . . . a few less left-over Thanksgiving calories and a little more exercise.

The Infographic below breaks Thanksgiving dinner down by calories and by the miles of walking, running or jogging required to burn it off.

Source: newmango.com via Shannon on Pinterest

If you can't read the print, you can click the image for a larger view of the graphic or press Ctrl and + at the same time on your keyboard to enlarge everything on your screen. (Pressing Ctrl and - at the same time will decrease the size when you are done.)

A Thanksgiving Milestone for Me

I thought I'd also share a healthy little milestone that I celebrated today.  Today was the 22nd anniversary of the day I became a vegetarian.  That's 21 years meat free . . . no red-meat, no poultry, no pork, no seafood.  I chose Thanksgiving to officially go vegetarian because there are so many great meat-less side-dishes on Thanksgiving, I figured I would never miss the turkey.  I didn't miss it way back then and I never have since.

Source: meatlessmonday.com via Shannon on Pinterest

Diet Soda Linked to Poor Health

Pass it on: A new study links the consumption of diet soda to poorer health

I've never been much soda drinker and especially not diet soda except for an occasional Fresca.  Over the years, I've watched clients time and time again drink calorie free soft drinks and struggle to lose or maintain weight as much as they would as much as if they were gulping down regular sugary drinks.  I never knew why it worked like this or really had any science to back it up. I just figured soda is full of unnatural chemicals so you can't expect your body to react in a natural way to something that is unnatural.

Two new studies on the topic of diet cola were presented June 25th 2011 at the meeting of the American Diabetes Association. Both studies have linked drinking diet soda to poorer health compared with those who don't drink the beverage. People who said they drank two or more diet sodas a day experienced waist size increases that were six times greater than those of people who didn't drink diet soda, according to researchers from the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio.

A second study that found the sweetener aspartame raised blood sugar levels in diabetes-prone mice."Data from this and other prospective studies suggest that the promotion of diet sodas and artificial sweeteners as healthy alternatives may be ill-advised," said study researcher Helen P. Hazuda, professor and at the university's school of medicine. "They may be free of calories, but not of consequences."

The human study was based on data from 474 participants in a larger, ongoing study called the San Antonio Longitudinal Study of Aging. In that study, the participants were followed for nearly 10 years. Diet soft drink drinkers, as a group, experienced 70 percent greater increases in waist circumference compared with those who don't drink diet soda. Abdominal fat is a major risk factor for diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer and other chronic conditions, the researchers said.

In the mouse study, researchers fed aspartame, a calorie-free sweetener used in some diet sodas, to diabetes-prone mice. One group of mice ate chow to which both aspartame and corn oil were added; another other group ate chow with only corn oil added.

After three months, the mice that ate aspartame showed elevated blood sugar levels.
"These results suggest that heavy aspartame exposure might potentially directly contribute to increased blood glucose levels, and thus contribute to the associations observed between diet soda consumption and the risk of diabetes in humans," said study researcher Gabriel Fernandes, professor of rheumatology and clinical immunology at the university.


 Source: My Health News Daily

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4615 Dump Trucks Full of Easter Candy

This year American will buy an estimated 120 million pounds of Easter candy . . . 90 Million Chocolate Bunnies, 4 Million Peeps, 16 Billion Jelly Beans -- the equivalent of 4615 dump trucks full of candy!!! I can't even begin to calculate how many zillion calories are in all that candy!

Think Twice

. . . before you pop that candy into your mouth!  With Easter fast approaching, you're probably already tempted by all that Easter candy. It's everywhere!  But think twice before you pop even one little piece into your mouth!  The vast majority of people when asked to estimate their caloric intake (how many calories they ate) versus how many calories they burned off through physical exertion missed by nearly 50% on both, underestimating the calories they were taking in by about 50% and overestimating the calories they burned from exercise or physical activity by almost 50%.  

Here's an example to help give you some perspective: The average person has to walk the full length of a football field to burn off the calories in just ONE M&M. On average there are 50-55 M&M's in a small bag.  Unless you are planning to spend your day parading up a down a football field, those extra calories are going to end up stored as fat some place where you don't want them.  Treat yourself to a small bag of M&Ms or it's caloric equivalent in peanut butter eggs, chocolate bunny ears, jelly beans, peeps, etc everyday and you could gain an extra 24 pounds this year!!!

50 Ways To Burn 100 Calories

Only 26 More to Go!

Did you know that you have to burn off and/or cut your caloric intake by 3500 calories to lose one pound? That means if you'd like to lose one pound a week you have to work on reducing your intake or burning off 500 calories a day.  This can be accomplished by eating sensibly and doing 30-45 minute cardiovascular workout or you could try some of these amusing methods recommended by Women's Health. Do any five of these to burn an extra 500 calories a day:

1. Slather on lip balm 765 times.
2. Relive the '80s: Lip-synch George Michael's "Faith" 16 times.
3. DVR an episode of "30 Rock" and watch it commercial free.(Laughing for 10 minutes straight can burn 40 calories -- no joke.)
4. Watch a documentary like "Food Inc.," "The Cove" or "An Inconvenient Truth." (Serious stuff doesn't scorch as many calories.)
5. Wiggle while you watch TV for 40 minutes: Fidgeters burn up to 350 more calories a day than couch potatoes.
6. Get off your butt 33 times to change the channel.
7. Use the remote to channel surf for 68 minutes.
8. Surf for real for 34 minutes.
9. Fly a kite for 20 minutes.
10. Play beach volleyball for 13 minutes.
11. Bounce a volleyball on your knee 600 times.
12. Spend 17 minutes wrestling a beach ball away from your boyfriend.
13. Carry a cooler stocked with three bottles of water, a six-pack, four PB&Js, two oranges, a bag of tortilla chips and 12 servings of salsa for 22 minutes.
14. Find the perfect teeny-weeny polka-dot bikini: Try on 16 suits (one every three minutes).
15. Polka for real for 23 minutes.
16. Do the horizontal polka missionary style for one hour and seven minutes.
17. Spice things up with 35 minutes of foreplay and 45 minutes of sex in different positions.
18. Ride him like a cowgirl for 26 minutes (straddling requires more calorie-burning leg work).
19. Swing a lasso over your head 375 times.
20. Milk a cow for 34 minutes.
21. Shear three sheep (six minutes per sheep).
22. Fish for 41 minutes.
23. Make like a fish and swim at a leisurely pace for 17 minutes.
24. Do 250 breaststrokes (about 10 minutes).
25. Indulge your inner dork and do 27 underwater handstands.
26. Dog-paddle for 17 minutes.
27. Walk a toy poodle for 41 minutes (at 2 miles per hour).
28. Let a Great Dane walk you for 13 minutes (5 mph).
29. Learn to "walk the dog": Yo-yo for 25 minutes.
30. Alternate between cat pose, cow pose and downward dog 13 times, holding each for 30 seconds.
31. Walk up 33 flights of stairs.
32. Strap on four-inch stilettos and you only have to climb up 25 flights.
33. Hit the stair climber for 11 minutes.
34. Push a grocery cart for 45 minutes.
35. Put a 42-pound 4-year-old in the cart's child seat and push it for half an hour.
36. Opt for self-checkout: Wait in line for seven minutes, ring yourself up for another 10, bag your own grub and load up the car.
37. Carry five grocery bags from the car to the kitchen and put the food away, take out the trash, wash the dishes, and wipe down the kitchen counter.
38. Eat chili for a couple of days: Research shows that chili peppers boost your metabolic rate, burning 50 more calories a day.
39. Chew calorie-free gum for nine hours.
40. Wash, halve and seed two acorn squash, then watch them bake for 30 minutes.
41. Play squash for eight minutes.
42. Play "Chopsticks" on the piano incessantly for 41 minutes.
43. Eat four meals with chopsticks instead of a fork: Slowing down can help you consume about 25 fewer calories per meal.
44. Lift and lower a soy sauce bottle 170 times with your right hand and a wok 170 times with your left.
45. Take a leisurely walk in the park for 51 minutes.
46. Walk backward in the park for 43 minutes.
47. Walk with hiking poles for 22 minutes -- you'll burn 20 percent more calories.
48. Pole-vault for 17 minutes.
49. Sing the "Grease" original soundtrack from start to finish.
50. Degrease by scrubbing in the shower for 15 minutes, then spend seven minutes shaving, three minutes toweling off, four minutes moisturizing, and 20 minutes blow-drying and styling your hair.

Source: Women's Health

Tip #7 -- Watch Your Calories and Where They Come From

Most Americans eat way too much food. Our portion sizes are huge and loaded with a surplus of sugar and fat. Moderation is the key, but that is easier said than done. In this “super-sized” era, many people no longer have any idea what moderation is. Try eating off your lunch sized plates, even at dinner. Eat out less, and prepare your own food more often. Get a small cooler, and pack your lunch and snacks for the day! The word snack is not synonymous with junk food. Your snacks should be more like mini balanced meals. Avoid fried foods, full fat dairy products, butter, margarine, regular mayonnaise, sweets, beer, wine, liquor, and regular salad dressing. Do not give yourself a “cheat” day each week. It is completely possible to sabotage a whole week’s worth of work in one bad day. If you are a normal healthy individual, a few “cheat” days per year are reasonable, but more is absolutely not okay.