Educate yourself about how processed foods lead to insulin resistance, diabetes, heart disease and other medical problems. I am going to give a simple overview here but if you want more detail, you will find reference books under the “wellness” tab.
As a nation we have been lied to!
We were told that eating fat makes us fat and that a low fat, low calorie diet would keep us healthy. We have also been told that “a calorie is a calorie” so just COUNT CALORIES!
Is 200 calories of M&M’s the same as 200 calories of Kale?
To most that sounds ridiculous but that’s what we were told. I don’t have time to go into detail here about how the food industry and medical industry makes millions, no billions of dollars keeping us fat. The grains grown are modified and treated with chemicals to grow faster, the animals are treated with hormones and antibiotics which get into our systems and the pharmaceutical companies are selling us expensive medication to treat our high blood pressure, diabetes, etc.
If you want more information I will put links to articles and sites at a later time. For now, let’s try to understand how we can get healthier by cutting out these chemicals.
I have tried almost every DIET from my late teens until just a few years ago. I counted calories and paid for more than 3 commercials diet company programs. Some worked but as soon as I stopped the rigid diet plan I gained all of the weight back and more. When I became menopausal, none of them
worked at all. So what is the secret behind weight loss?
You can’t be on a diet. You have to change your lifestyle! You have to change what you put in your body and then your body will heal itself!
According to Jason Fung MD, and now many other studies, INSULIN is the main cause of obesity. Sounds crazy, right? We give insulin to diabetics to make them “healthy,” but higher insulin levels cause your body to store fat. Ask any diabetic and they will tell you that when they started insulin they gained weight.
We lower our insulin levels by cutting out the foods that stimulate your pancreas to release the insulin. You have to cut out sugar and carbohydrates, basically processed foods. Your body wants to be an efficient machine and it will always take the easy path to make energy for you. The simplest way for the body to make energy is to burn sugar, next is carbohydrates, which essentially break down to sugar in our bodies. When there is no more sugar the body will need to burn fat for
energy!
A quote from Dr. Fung,
“In terms of the foods, this is not a low-calorie diet. This is not even necessarily a low-carbohydrate diet. This is not a vegetarian diet. This is not a low-fat diet. This is not a carnivore diet. This is a diet designed to lower insulin levels because insulin is the physiologic trigger of fat storage. If you want to lower fat storage, you need to lower insulin.”
How do you cut out your favorite foods, stop your cravings for unhealthy sugar, and decrease your hunger? You increase your fat intake. Yes, I said FAT! There are healthy and unhealthy fats. Trans fats and other processed fats need to be avoided. Some examples are processed meat (most deli meat) and processed vegetable oils.
Natural fat examples are extra virgin olive oil, avocados, butter from grass fed animals and ghee, fatty fish, nuts and seeds.
The basic idea is to eat natural, unprocessed, foods and if eating animal products choose those that are from grass fed animals and which are minimally processed. This fat will keep you full so it is easier to stop eating the processed sugars. Protein is important too which you can get from nuts, animal products and some vegetables, (spinach, broccoli, bok-choy and more).
The goal here is to stop high levels of insulin and to break down the fat already stored in you.
BASIC OVERVIEW OF HOW TO GET STARTED:
- Include healthy fat in your diet, at least 50%.
- Avoid all processed foods
- Avoid even fruits that are high in sugar. The best fruits are berries
- Avoid carbohydrates that are processed and those that break down to sugar, potatoes, bread, yes even wheat bread, unless no chemicals were used to grow the grain. Basically, if you grow it yourself.
- Eat fresh when possible, but flash frozen vegetables are great too. I shop twice a week for fresh veggies and meats but I also stock my freezer with frozen vegetables, cauliflower rice, zucchini spirals and flash frozen fish.
- If you need to eat bread, cookies etc., then make them yourself. Almond flour is an excellent way to make cookies and bread, and pizza crust can be made with mozzarella or cauliflower.
- I have links to many of my favorite recipes and websites under the wellness tab.