What You Don’t Know Can Hurt You
Did you know the percentage of Americans who are now obese is nearing 50 percent? Let me put that into perspective for you… the obesity rate of Italians for example is around 10-12% - and they eat pasta! Did you know that obesity is one of the leading contributors to chronic disease and even your susceptibility to acute illnesses? So, how did we get here?
There has been a lot of incorrect information on diet over the last 50-60 years in the U.S. but there is also a big and I believe damaging misconception that if you are obese, it is your fault. I believe this most often is NOT true, or at least not as much as you might think.
While there is personal choice and responsibility and it is your job to choose the right foods, choose to be active and focus on getting adequate quality sleep, many people do not know what the right foods are or how active or how much sleep they really need. They have no idea what the foods they are eating are really doing to them. How can you make healthy choices when you don’t know what healthy choices look like?
I heard this many times over the years in private practice, “I make sure I only drink diet soda, so I don’t gain weight,” or “I only eat lean meats and low-fat dairy,” or “I am running on the treadmill for an hour, three days a week to try to get the weight off.” The truth is the information we have on health and diet has changed a good bit as there has been more research but simply put – most people don’t know what they don’t know!
The misinformation the American public has been given over the last 50 to 60 years – “Eat low fat.” “Eat no fat.” “Carbs are the reason you are overweight.” “Eat less and move more.” Yet none of those have worked and America has gotten bigger and bigger with each passing year and chronic disease numbers are soaring higher than ever previously thought imaginable.
As if that wasn’t enough, the highly industrialized food that many of us have eaten, as well as the overuse of antibiotics, acid blocking medications and non-steroidal anti-inflammatories has destroyed our gut microbiome, making weight loss even more difficult to obtain and a healthy weight difficult to maintain and that’s fairly new information but it has happened none the less.
It is important now more than ever to learn as much as one can about the current and changing information on good health and disease prevention and I believe doing this in a sensible and easy to understand way with moderation as our guide and in changing our health habits slowly, we can create change that will last! If that is what you are looking for, stick with me as we dive more into what you can do in your lifestyle to improve your health and reduce your odds for chronic diseases like hypertension, diabetes, heart attack, stroke and more.