Health Foods Blog

Submitted by A Sizable Apple Blog,

Soreness vs. Exercise Injury

Recognizing soreness from an exercise injury is important for anyone involved with a workout regime.

A general rule of thumb is that soreness will come on the day after a workout, where as you’re more prone to feel an exercise induced injury right away or soon afterwards.

An injury may may feel like a pressure or pinching pain. Soreness is more likely to leave your muscles feeling stiff and tight. The difference comes from how you deal with the pain.

If you feel sore, it’s best to keep working out. This article specifically discusses the feeling of soreness as a sign of your muscles growing stronger. If you think you may have an injury instead of normal soreness, you may want to consider taking some time off from exercises incorporating the injured area.

If pain persists after a few days, consider talking to a doctor. To prevent both soreness and injury, it’s important to stretch before and after workouts.

For help with treating muscle aches, this site does a great job of determining between ice and heat therapy.

Posted by Dana at 9:21 AM 0 comments
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As a father of 2 young children, I’m always searching for ways to improve my family’s physical fitness. We live in a world of technology and let’s face it, kids love their video games and their television. However, not enough fitness can make JOHNNY an overweight little boy. Start eating healthy now and exercising and your kids will grow up to enjoy it; it will be a part of their lives. Life is balance and eating healthy and fitness should be part of that balance. What better way to enjoy fitness than as a family? Here are some tips and we’ll start with nutrition.

1. Carry healthy snacks around in the car with you. Fruits grow in hot weather. Fruits are in most cases non-perishable so apples and oranges can remain for days in a hot car in hot weather. An apple or an orange snack is much better than a snack at the local drive through. Also, carry water with you in the car. Hot water doesn’t taste well but it’s fine to keep it in your car many months throughout the year. Plus, it’s much healthier than a diet coke or a sugar filled coffee drink.

2. Just because your on a low-carb diet doesn’t mean your kids need to be on a low carb diet. Therefore, rice, beans and other healthy carbs can be part of their diet in moderation. If you want your kids to enjoy fitness and exercise, they need the energy. A few potatoes and a bit of pasta are not a bad thing. Just skip the cookies.

3. Processed carbohydrates are the worst thing for your family and therefore, you’ll be much better off if the shelves in your home have as little as possible of cookies, sweet cereal, candy, ice cream etc. If your kids don’t eat these foods when their young, they probably won’t when their older. Am I saying that they shouldn’t have a treat? Of course not, in fact there is nothing cuter than a child with an ice cream moustache. It just should not be a part of your daily diet.

 4. Vegetables should be part of every meal. Find the vegetables that your children will eat. I’m going to let you in on a little secret that may hit home. If you really believe that your children do not like vegetables, it’s probably because you don’t like vegetables. There has been no child born in the history of the world with a warning label - Caution: Does not like string beans, lettuce, broccoli, tomatoes, cucumbers, onions etc. You get my point.

Now the fitness part:

1. All children should be in some of physical fitness program. This doesn’t mean that you should enroll you five year old in a Gold’s Gym but most boys love things such as Karate and Soccer and Soccer, Dance, Twirling and Cheerleading are perfect examples of effective physical fitness for the young girls in the family.

2. I never met a young kid who doesn’t love to play tag or Hide and Seek. These are great ways to promote physical fitness and still have fun doing it.

3. Take vacations that allow you to have the time of your life while still enjoying an active lifestyle. Water parks are great, so are amusement parks. I’ve never been a big fan of cruises because of the restrictive nature. As the kids get older, book golf vacations and vacations that promote walking. Tanning on a beach may make you look good but it doesn’t do much for your physical fitness.

4. Family summer walks are great. When the kids are young, take them to a park or better yet, walk to a park. Your kids will cherish the memories and it will keep you young and healthy.

Most importantly, family physical fitness will form the family bond and will help build the family. Maintain an active lifestyle, eat healthy and smile.

I hope you enjoyed this post.

Submitted by A Sizable Apple Blog,

Reader Question: low carb, low sugar diets

One of my readers emailed me with a good question about dieting-

My husband is on a very low carb and sugar free diet. What is your opinion on these diets? New research on them? I find them extremely hard to stay on and do not have energy. - JanelI’ve never been a dieter. I love all different kinds of food too much to restrict myself and find I can maintain a desired weight with exercise and healthy eating. However, I understand that different dieting techniques work best for different people, and I encourage you, if interested in dieting, to read up on the best approach for you and try out several until you find one that works with your lifestyle.

I’m always weary to read about diets that cut out specific groups, as I think every food group is necessary in some regard. Carbs have been at the heart of the latest diets, promising results for cutting out the grainy group. I half agree, half disagree with the whole low carb theory. My explanation will take a bit of a nutrition lesson, so bare with me-

There are two types of carbohydrates- simple and complex. Natural simple carbs are going to be your basic fruits, while cakes, biscuits, honey, candy and refined sugar products. Basically, these guys are going to digest quickly, and give you an energy boost (hence the feeling of a sugar rush) without providing a ton of vitamins and minerals.

Complex carbs are where you’re going to find your oats, wheats, whole grains, corn and beans. These guys are going to naturally provide you with energy from their vitamins and minerals.

While both provide you with energy, the quick disintegration of simple carbs in your body is more likely to convert your burst of energy into fat for storage.

With that information in mind, it’s easy to see how cutting out carbs and sugar (sugar = simple carbs) from your diet can be beneficial. But, you’ll notice that you’ll want to keep some of those complex carbs around for their energy boost and essential nutrients.

To answer your question, Janel, to successfully manage a diet like your husbands, it takes some nutritional understanding. Because of the health benefits from complex carbs, I’ve found a lot of research against low/no carb diets. And while lean proteins have been shown to provide some of the energy boosting characteristics of complex carbs, I’ve yet to find research on any other food group that does wonders for your digestive system like the complex carb group does.

Of course everyone will have different results with different diets, but if you’re looking to jump on the bandwagon with your husband on this one, I would suggest incorporating some of the complex carbs into your diet along with lean protein to see if that will help with your lack energy.

Here are two other sites I found that may be of interest for reading up on low carb dieting: My Pyramid Site & Kent State University Health Site. Hope this helps!

As always, I love receiving mail and reader questions. Email me at asizableapple@gmail.com with any blog feedback or to submit a reader question!

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Submitted by Café Physique,

Dealing with Fitness Sabotage

AppetizerDon’t let your family and friends lead your fitness plans astray.

Main Course
If you are like most people, you’ve probably cheated on your diet because of your family and friends. Maybe someone from the office brought a batch of homemade cookies and insisted that you try a few because they were so good, or your friends made you miss a workout to go see a new movie. While an occasional treat or missed workout isn’t a big deal, it can become a problem if it happens too often. Here are a few ways to deal with fitness saboteurs:

Assume the best - Your family and friends aren’t doing these things because they are malicious; they probably just don’t understand. Don’t let your fitness plan become a source of stress in your social life, and assume that your loved ones actually have your best intentions at heart.

Just tell them - While not everyone appreciates the benefits of a healthy lifestyle, some might stop pressuring you to ruin your fitness plan if you just tell them how important it is to you.

Meet them halfway - If you’re being pulled to a movie, ask if you can see a later showing so you can still spend time on the elliptical. If your co-worker is always bringing in pastries full of saturated fat, just have a little nibble and throw the rest away. And don’t feel bad about wasting food. It’s better in the trash than on your thighs, right?

Dessert
Fitness, like any long-term goal, is really just about overcoming a series of obstacles. Sometimes those obstacles come in the form of those closest to you. But at the same time, family and friends can sometimes be a fantastic source of support. If you find that certain people are sabotaging your diet plans, try to surround yourself with a more supportive crew so you can have the confidence you need to achieve your fitness goals.

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Submitted by A Sizable Apple Blog,

Sprint vs. Marathon Workouts: Interval Training

Every time I go to the gym, I can spot at least one muscle man pumping the machines while red in the face, without fail.

While I enjoy high intense workouts, I’ve never understood the rush or sprint approach to working out incorporated with longer resting periods in between.

Generally speaking, your higher intensity workouts are geared to increase muscle size by training the body to respond to the activity quickly. Exercising at a slower pace, is going to promote more of your lean muscle while lengthening the muscle across your frame instead of bulking it.

This interesting article in the New York Times talks about the benefit of incorporating some sprint work into your workouts, called interval training or burst exercising. The addition of some high intensity work into your normal routine is a surprise to your body, which over time can benefit by increasing endurance and fat burning.

Switching up your workouts or adding an interval burst can help with your variety while at the gym. It also can fuel a competitive side, for a mid workout race or continue to serve as a challenge in your day.

Posted by Dana at 9:05 AM 0 comments
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Submitted by Healthy Foods and Eating Healthy Blog,

Why A Hangover?

Why do some people get hangovers where others only get headaches?

Usually a hangover is a direct result of drinking too much. However it is not just as simple as that. Whether or not you get a hangover depends on two things. Firstly your biochemical individuality, and secondly type of drink you take.

Some drinks have a more immediate impact than others. For example spirits such as gin and whisky, have a more immediate impact than beers or wines.

Any alcoholic drink that is mixed with carbonated beverage is more quickly absorbed into the bloodstream than if the drink was not mixed. Of course once absorbed the alcohol reaches your brain within minutes.

The immediate effect is one of euphoria or stimulation, followed by a gradual slip into nervous system depression with more consumption leading to numbness, slurring of speech, sleep, and alcoholic poisoning and unconsciousness if a serious over consumption occurs.

The over consumption point is reached much quicker if you are already taking drugs. It is also easier to reach a point where you’re breathing is suppressed because of the interaction between the drug and the drink, and if this occurs when you are in trouble. You have now got yourself to the point where you’re breathing could stop or you could choke on your own vomit.

The severity of the after-effects of drinking alcohol is loosely termed a hangover. It is caused by the by-products of the fermentation process in the manufacture of the drink concerned. These by-products are known as ‘congeners’, and the more congeners there are in a drink, then the more severe the resultant hangover may be.

Here is a list in order from highest to lowest of the drinks with the greatest number of congeners.

* Brandy
* Red Wine
* Rum
* Whisky
* White Wine
* Gin
* Vodka

So you can see from this table that Gin and Vodka which are low in the ‘congeners scale’, but high in the immediate impact list, give the quickest buzz with the lowest after-effects (providing of course you don’t overdo it!)

Did you know?

An average single pub measure of spirits contains 1.5 units, and the average pub measure of a glass of wine is the same. A pint of ordinary beer contains two units, whereas a pint of strong beer is double that at four units.

The recommended daily intake for the average healthy woman is two to three units per day, and for the average healthy man three to four units per day.
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Submitted by A Sizable Apple Blog

Favorite Links

Top 19 Fat Burning Foods This Women’s Health Magazine article has a great slide show including the top 19 fat burning foods. Some included are whole wheat bagels, avocados and chicken thighs.

Top 5 Ways to Shape your Butt Another great Women’s Health Mag find looks at different ways to sculpt your behind at the gym.

100+ Recipes This is a really interesting site where you can pick from a drop down menu which foods to include and nutrients to add as well.

6 Fast Freezer Meals A good article from Real Simple Magazine about freezing 11 different foods and 6 quick meals you can make fast straight from your freezer.

Shoe String Situations Having problem with your laces while you’re working out? Here are 5 of the most common tennis shoe problems and solutions.

Know of a blog or article that should make A Sizable Apple’s favorite links? Email Dana at asizableapple@gmail.com
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