Countdown to Fitness

Weight issues, heart disease, arthritis, diabetes, allergies of various types — including food, asthma, some cancers, and many other diseases have a common tie.  Inflammation.  Which is triggered by inflammatory foods in one’s diet.  The Inflammation Syndrome — “the cumulative effect of low-grade inflammation–including the aches and pains that we all experience–that grows into chronic, debilitating disease” — is a must-read book to create long-term good health.

I highly recommend The Inflammation Syndrome: The Complete Nutritional Program to Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease, Arthritis, Diabetes, Allergies, and Asthma, a well-written book, to prevent or reverse these health issues.  It’s imperative to learn what causes inflammation and how to reduce it, and author, Jack Challem, does a fantastic job of describing the issues and laying out a fifteen-step diet to reduce inflammation.  He is a leading health and medical writer with articles published in several journals, and he’s also a contributing editor for two magazines, as well as consumer health publications. (more…)

Do you have high blood pressure, cholesterol, or triglycerides?  Are you diabetic?  Do you want to lose weight? Maybe you have arthritis or some other auto-immune disease.  Perhaps you are just looking to eat healthily.  Maintaining good health and a healthy weight is all about managing your insulin levels.  The master hormone insulin is key to regulating energy and glucose metabolism, which comes from eating carbs.  Insulin, when dominant in your body, tells your body to store food as fat, to make cholesterol, and to do other functions, which, when working properly is fine.  However, our Western diets, high in carbs, create an overabundant amount of insulin in the body, leading to health problems, like an overabundant amount of body fat, cholesterol, triglycerides, among the other health problems mentioned above.  Therefore, managing your carbs is key. (more…)

Maybe you want to lose or maintain weight.  Perhaps you have diabetes, heart disease, high cholesterol, high triglycerides, diseases of the eye, or autoimmune disorders.  Or maybe you just want to find a healthy way to eat. The Protein Power Lifeplan by Michael Eades, M.D., and Mary Dan Eades, M.D., which I highly recommend, is the best book on this subject I’ve read so far.  This is not just a diet book, but as the cover says, this book is “A New Comprehensive Blueprint for Optimal Health.”

While the authors had written a previous book Protein Power: The High-Protein/Low-Carbohydrate Way to Lose Weight, Feel Fit, and Boost Your Health–in Just Weeks!, which I also bought, I was going on a trip and grabbed their second book first.  (I’m going to be reading their first book next.) (more…)

Live Springs Farm Pasture-Raised Pig

Back in March, I wrote an article “Why Fitness Hopeful Is Eating a High-Protein, High-Fiber, Moderate-Carb, Moderate-Fat Eating Plan.” I’ve still been evolving my eating plan since then, so its about time I posted something about it.  While I’m still currently eating a high-protein, high-fiber, moderate-carb, moderate to higher fat plan, what I’ve eliminated is the big difference. (more…)

If you are looking to eat healthier or to lose weight, great recipes are the key, and Cook Yourself Thin: Skinny Meals You Can Make in Minutes can help you get started. This 80-recipe cookbook is a companion to the TV series Cook Yourself Thin, a Lifetime channel reality show that claims that you can have your cake and eat it too by substituting healthier, flavorful ingredients in all sorts of recipes from main dishes, sides, and desserts.

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