Addiction to Food

There's a new study out that talks about how an addiction to food, specifically the high calorie, high bad fat, high sugar ones, can be very similar to an addiction to cocaine.

I think everyone pretty much knew that about junk food. Those that really get a first hand look at it are people that have essentially lived off junk food and decide to cut it out cold turkey and go through the same withdrawal symptoms that people go through when they cut off a drug, alcohol, coffee, soda, etc.

This study used rats as the subjects for 40 days and they broke the rats into three groups:

1. One group was fed healthy rat food (I guess whatever "healthy" means to a rat..)
2. A second group was fed healthy rat food, but also given junk food that they could munch on for only an hour a day.
3. The third group could eat as much junk food that they wanted, 23 hours a day.

Shockingly, the third group that could eat all the junk food that they wanted, became obese fairly quickly.



But the interesting part is how their brains changed.

By monitoring implanted brain electrodes, the researchers found that the rats in the third group gradually developed a tolerance to the pleasure the food gave them and had to eat more to experience a high.

The researchers also added a little pain into each of the groups when food was present. When that pain was administered, the rats in the first two groups were frightened away from eating, while the rats in the third group didn't care, they were solely focused on eating that junk food.

This relates fairly closes to studies done on rats involving cocaine and heroin:

In previous studies, rats have exhibited similar brain changes when given unlimited access to cocaine or heroin. And rats have similarly ignored punishment to continue consuming cocaine, the researchers note.

When relating this to humans:

The ingredients in purified modern food cause people to "eat unconsciously and unnecessarily," and will also prompt an animal to "eat like a drug abuser [uses drugs]," says Wang.

It appears that the main culprit in all of this is the neurotransmitter, dopamine that rats (and humans) have:

The neurotransmitter dopamine appears to be responsible for the behavior of the overeating rats, according to the study. Dopamine is involved in the brain's pleasure (or reward) centers, and it also plays a role in reinforcing behavior. "It tells the brain something has happened and you should learn from what just happened," says Kenny.

Overeating caused the levels of a certain dopamine receptor in the brains of the obese rats to drop, the study found. In humans, low levels of the same receptors have been associated with drug addiction and obesity, and may be genetic, Kenny says.

How do we get past this addiction?

With continued research like this, there's always the possibility that treatments can be developed to stop the decrease of dopamine that is associated with the addiction.

There's also the practical applications of:

1. Slowly cutting bad food out and replacing them with healthier choices or
2. Just cold turkey throwing out all the junk food and going healthy (although this is the more extreme approach and can result in a withdrawal period, I tend to like this one the best. Get it over with).

But we probably need to look a little further into it to determine the "Why?" of the addiction, just like it's necessary when working with someone with a drug or alcohol addiction.

In other words, maybe people are using that junk food as a substitute for something else, and maybe digging deeper into that realm will help with getting away from the addiction of food, permanently.

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A Healthier Michigan

I was contacted last week to start blogging for a new website that is being put on through Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan called ahealthiermichigan.org.

The site contains forums, blogs and a whole lot of information out there on how to make yourself, businesses, your community, and the health care system, healthy.

From a health standpoint, Michigan tends to always rank at the bottom of every nationwide study. The economy has been in the crapper for at least the last 5 years in Michigan and there are major changes headed our way when it comes to our health care system.

So I hope this site takes off and starts to throw around a lot of ideas that are "out of the box" to get some new innovative ideas on how to move forward in Michigan.

My blog over there will pretty much be a cut and past job from this site but, you'll see me floating around the Healthier You forums from time to time with some different ideas.

So make sure to go to ahealthiermichigan.org and sign up for an account and come back often.


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Inteval Training Studies

There's some new Interval Training Studies out there that are hopefully going to help with being able to use this type of exercise protocol for the overweight and even the obese population.

I've talked recently in this post that the problem withe the classic interval training of going "all out" for short periods of time can be rather difficult when dealing with people that are quite overweight due to the amount of compression that would result on various joints, particularly the knees.

That's why I was advocating in that post the concept of what I like to call "Metavals" where instead you use a number of exercises in a circuit fashion for a period of time and you'd be getting just as much fat loss benefit as you would with all out sprints.

But this new interval training study that said it's not completely necessary to go "all out" in order to be effective.

As Gibala explained to the press:

"We have shown that interval training does not have to be 'all out' in order to be effective."

"Doing 10 one-minute sprints on a standard stationary bike with about one minute of rest in between, three times a week, works as well in improving muscle as many hours of conventional long-term biking less strenuously," he added.

So the part about the sprints being just as effective in a short workout compared to a long distance session is something we've known. But the part about not having to go all out and still being effective is something new.

In this new study they used a standard stationary bike and a workout that was still beyond the comfort zone of most people (about 95 per cent of maximal heart rate), but was only half of what might be regarded as an "all out" sprint.

This less extreme form of HIT should work well for people whose doctors might be a little worried about them taking up the "all out" form: that is people who are older, less fit and likely to be overweight.

The subjects in this study had six training sessions over a two week period where they completed 8 to 12 one-minute high intensity bursts (although it still wasn't "all out") followed by 75 seconds of active rest period between the bursts. I'm assuming they had some kind of warm up and cooldown so each workout probably came out to 30 minutes at most.

The results:

The results showed that the training significantly increased exercise capacity in two cycling time trials (one for 50kJ and the other for 750kJ).

The researchers also compared biopsy samples of vastus lateralis muscle (the largest part of the quadriceps) taken before the 2 weeks of training with samples taken after, and found that the later samples showed increased maximal activity of mitochondrial capacity and other relevant chemical processes.

The conclusions:

"This study demonstrates that a practical model of low volume HIT is a potent stimulus for increasing skeletal muscle mitochondrial capacity and improving exercise performance."

The researcher also concluded that to get the same results within the same time period (2 weeks) of slow steady state endurance, a person would have had to go for 10 hours, rather than the 3 hours of total work that it took to get these results in this study (at the same time, it would have been interesting if they would have had a separate group of subjects actually doing that in the study so that they could make a better comparison of that).

I like the fact that they used the bike on this and I think if interval programs were to be used for those that are fairly overweight, it's probably the modality to use since there's less jolting of the knees. NOTE: If you're going to use a stationary bike, use the upright one, not a recumbent.

But if that's not available, I still wouldn't recommend running sprints for this particular population since it's a knee injury just waiting to happen. The metavals that I talk about in this post are still your other best option.

It's great to see though that Interval Training studies are still coming out and showing that it's a more efficient and effective workout compared to slow steady state cardio.

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Salt in Processed Food

I hate processed food and I hate the fact that there is so much salt in processed food.

Blunt enough?

Well, it looks like according to this article, the food companies are getting that point as well.



According to the article:

Last week, Kraft Foods Inc. announced it would cut the salt in its North American line by an average of 10 percent in over 1000 products over the next two years. On Monday, PepsiCo unveiled a global nutrition initiative to reduce sodium in food products by an average of 25 percent by 2015. The company also has a 10-year plan to decrease added sugar in beverages by 25 percent and saturated fat in foods by 15 percent. Other companies, such as ConAgra, Sara Lee, and Campbell Soup, already have plans underway to reduce salt in key product categories.

That's great to hear. But this part of the article really blew my mind on how much salt there really is in the food we buy:

Kraft's initiative alone is projected to eliminate more than 10 million pounds of salt from the food supply over the next two years

.

10 million pounds of salt will be eliminated in two years, and that's just from ONE food company? That's pretty amazing.

I worry though that they are just going to find another ingredient to add into their products that is going to be just as harmful as salt.

Trust me, they aren't just going to pull the salt out of all those foods that are big sellers because of craving people have for salty food and watch people stop buying them. These companies wouldn't be taking this initiative for the health benefit of the nation if they thought they were going to see a disastrous decline in their profitable products.

Let me live in my little dream world for a moment though.

I don't add any salt to my food. I don't buy products that have salt in them (if they do, it's very minimal).

I haven't died of starvation or deprivation due to no salt.

If you want to truly stay away from salt, stick with these foods:

1. Meat, fish, chicken, turkey, pork etc.
2. Vegetables
3. Fruits
4. Nuts
5. Oils
6. Non-salt spices like garlic and onion powder and a slew of others for taste

Sure, you might go through a little withdrawal of the lack of salt in those foods but, you'll adapt and you'll be surprised how much better you'll feel when you focus on just eating those kinds of foods listed above, 90% of the time.

There's no need to eat all that salt in processed food. There's many other foods out there that can taste just as good and that are much more healthy for you.

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Ways to Prevent Breast Cancer

There's a new study out that talks about ways to prevent breast cancer.

As some of you may recall, I walked in the Susan G Komen 3-Day for the Cure last year and the fight against breast cancer has kind of become my personal social cause to work with.

This article talks about how we're basically at a decent spot for early detection in order to slow the disease.

"What can be achieved with screening has been achieved. We can't do much more," Carlo La Vecchia, head of epidemiology at the University of Milan, told The Associated Press. "It's time to move onto other things."

Just some background stats on the prevalence of breast cancer in western society.

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women. In Europe, there were about 421,000 new cases and nearly 90,000 deaths in 2008, the latest available figures. The United States last year saw more than 190,000 new cases and 40,000 deaths. A woman's lifetime chance of getting breast cancer is about one in eight.

What's interesting is what they think fuels a lot of breast cancer cases:

Many breast cancers are fueled by estrogen, a hormone produced in fat tissue. So experts suspect that the fatter a woman is, the more estrogen she's likely to produce, which could in turn spark breast cancer. Even in slim women, exercise can help reduce the cancer risk by converting more of the body's fat into muscle.

Now granted, this isn't always true. My cousin that I walked for last year is and always has been a slender woman that exercises, eats healthy and just overall lives a healthy lifestyle. But, since the vast majority of the population is overweight or obese, I think for the most part they are right on target.

La Vecchia cited figures from the International Agency for Research on Cancer, which estimated that 25 to 30 percent of breast cancer cases could be avoided if women were thinner and exercised more.

And there we have it. Another reason why we need to exercise more and eat healthier.

There's just simple things that you can do to lose weight by eating healthier and exercising that are simple and at the same time, is one of the ways to prevent breast cancer:

1. Stick with whole foods such as meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts, and oils.
2. Stay away from processed food (if you can't pronounce the ingredient that is listed on the box, then put it down).
3. Simple (yet intense) exercises that involve the biggest muscles in your body in order to not only burn more calories during the workout, but also after the workout.

The Home Workout Routines that I offer (that'll cost you less than $10 for a 4-week program) is a great exercise program to get you started AND it comes with a Fat Loss Nutritional Guide. Best part is that you can do the workouts right in your own home and you don't need ANY exercise equipment.

If you're trying to find ways to prevent breast cancer, this simple program is a great way to get your exercise in and get your eating in line to help reduce that risk.

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Too Much Exercise

It's great to exercise but sometimes you have to ask yourself the question "How much is too much exercise?"

We get into our fitness routines, and keep doing the same thing over and over again and then we might start feeling some pain in our lower back, maybe even in our knees or ankle joints.

Sometimes it doesn't take long to feel that pain during exercise to know that it's too much exercise.

Take for example the show that I love to hate: The Biggest Loser. You take someone that is 450 pounds and on their first day you send them out to run a mile. That's just flat out stupid and is the wrong kind of exercise for someone that size that is just asking for an injury.

This article tends to state the obvious that too much exercise can lead to overuse injuries.

"People tend to do the same thing over and over again, without varying it, without taking adequate rest, without building slowly, and they end up with an overuse injury," said Geralyn Coopersmith, national manager for the Equinox Fitness Training Institute.

"Tendonitis, bursitis, fasciitis, these kinds of inflammations are pretty much guaranteed if you don't vary your training," said Coopersmith, who oversees the training of 1,400 personal trainers in 48 Equinox clubs nationwide.Yet she concedes that even clients who complain of nagging aches and pains are loath to change their routine.

"People get terrified. They'll say, 'The treadmill made me lose weight.' Well, exercise made you lose weight. The treadmill was the modality. That doesn't mean it's the only way or the best way," she explained.

This makes absolute sense and I think everyone does this (including me). You get into a routine, but then you start to feel a little "pinch" somewhere but tend to rationalize it away. You keep at your fitness routine and then the pain becomes a little stronger, but you still just say that you'll "work through it." Finally it gets so bad that you can't do it anymore and end up having to take a break.

You've done one of two things: Taken on too much exercise too soon or keep doing the same exercise over and over again with no changes so that your body hasn't had time to build up the strength and muscle around the area that you are constantly using.

If you're starting off new to exercise, you need to start at the bottom and work your way up. Try something out a couple times a week, then after a few weeks, add in another day.

For those that have been exercising for awhile and are doing the same thing day in and day out, change what you are doing. If you're running, take some time off from it and do some strength training. If you're strength training and you've been working with heavy weights for awhile, back off and do some lighter lifting for a little bit to let everything recover.

The best option would be to look into getting subscribing to my fitness routines program. If you're a beginner, you'll have programs available where you can start from the very basics to make sure you don't overdo it too quickly.

If you're a more seasoned exerciser, these fitness routines will give you the variety from month to month to make sure you aren't overusing a certain area on your body that could lead to injury.

All the while, the routines are designed to help you get the body that you strive for without prescribing you too much exercise. It only costs $4.95 for the first month so it's well worth a try to see if it's something for you.

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Misleading Food Labels

Misleading Food Labels are...well...misleading.

But we're not talking about the actual nutritional label that lists out the amount of each nutrient and gives you the calories per serving size like this:



We're actually talking about the front of the product. You know, where the producer says things like "Reduced Fat" or "Low Sodium" etc.

According to this article, a lot of manufacturers are pushing the line on how accurate those statements are.

Seems that it all came to a head in September of 2009:

The situation reached something of a head when in September of last year, The New York Times wrote an article about the Smart Choices program — a voluntary labeling program used by several companies in collaboration — and how the label that was supposed to indicate foods that were healthy choices ended up appearing on a box of Fruit Loops, among other less-than-healthy options.

That's actually funny. I wish I would have saw that in the grocery store at the time. I would have bought 5 boxes just to have a record that they were actually pushing Fruit Loops as "healthy" (what I think would have been interesting though is to see if sales of Fruit Loops went up because of the misleading food label).

The overall problem with front of the box food claims is that it doesn't tell the whole story. Okay fine, a product claims that it's "reduced fat." But when you look at the actual food label, you see that it's loaded with sugar, thus not as "healthy" as it would appear from what is listed on the front.

The goal that the FDA is striving for is to find out what information consumers are going to find helpful on the front of the product to make an accurate assessment of whether it's going to be healthy or not:

Various labeling schemes have been used and proposed: Some list just a couple key points of nutrition, such as calories, accompanied by a check mark or other symbol; some are a truncated version of the Nutrition Facts label that show key points, such as calories, fat, sugar and sodium; others include on top of that information a "traffic light" symbol (something that has been used with success in the United Kingdom) by each nutrient that indicates whether that nutrient is in the acceptable range (green) or not (red).

I'll be honest, I don't see this ever happening. There's no way the food manufacturer lobby would ever let this go through. If they all of a sudden put out a "traffic light" symbol on a product, who would ever buy that? You'd see sales and that company fall into an immediate crash.

Besides, the idea of originally putting the current nutritional label on products was to give people a better concept of the ingredients in them so that they can determine whether a product is "healthy" or "not healthy." That was supposed to help people make healthier choices. Well, I'm not sure that worked since our waistlines have gotten larger and larger by the day since they starting requiring that on foods in 1994.

In other words, people have the ability to read the current food label on the side or the back of the product, might even actually look at it, and are STILL buying the unhealthy products. What are the chances that if you put on the front of the product that it's bad for you that people are STILL not going to buy it?

There's a warning on cigarette packages warning against the risks of smoking, but does that seem to stop someone from buying them?

My suggestion? Stay away from foods that are in boxes. Meaning, buy fruits, vegetables, meats and nuts, and that's really all you need.

You don't need to worry about misleading food labels with my fitness routines that I offer that come with a nutritional guide that lays out the very simple process you need to take to lose body fat that doesn't have you worrying about whether a product is healthy or not healthy and it's incredibly affordable to try this program out at just $4.95 for the first month. Give it a shot.

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