Once you have been on the Health and Active Lifestyle program a while you might find yourself taking up running or jogging as a way of keeping your body in fantastic working order.  However as good as you feel about your newfound energy it is easy to overdo it. 

Here is a look at the common mistakes that runners and joggers make before they go for a run.

1. Overhydrating the Body

Although it is important to stay hydrated when you are on the Healthy and Active Program and particularly if you are on a detox diet or weight loss diet, there is such a thing as overhydrating. If you drink too much water just before a jog or run you will feel physically uncomfortable and risk impaired performance. There is a condition called Hyponatremia that results from drinking too much water that can induce nausea, headache, cramps and vomiting.

2. Ignoring Heat and Humidity

The ideal temperature for jogging or running is about five degrees Celsius and dryer, cooler weather is preferred.  Higher temperatures and humidity only slow a jogger or runner down. If it is really hot be sure to hydrate yourself slowly throughout the hours in advance of the race.  Wear thinner, lighter colour clothing and avoid wearing navy blue or black.  If it is really hot, shed as much clothing as possible before you go for a run or jog.

3. Not Breaking In New Shoes

It is a mistake to go running in a brand new pair of shoes that have not been broken in. Although some shoes do not need much breaking in at all, it is better to be on the safe side and make sure the shoes are comfortable before you wear them out on a long jaunt.

4. Being Unrealistic About Your Goals

Many people believe they can run a lot further than they actually can. If you are planning a course for a jog or a run that is long distance, make sure that you have a transit plan for return if you are not 100% certain that you can make your goal.

5. Failing to Slow Down When Going Up Hills

If you approach a hill it is okay to slow down if you find yourself gasping for breath. If you push too hard going up the hill you could use up all of your available glycogen and hit the kind of physical wall that could have you too exhausted to run your full jogging or running course.

6. Running With An Injury or Inflammation

If you have inflammation or an injury it is not a good idea to embark on a long exhausting jog or run.  This is especially true if the injury is in the spine, neck, legs or limbs.  Running when you are not healthy can cause permanent damage to your body.

7.  Not Being In The Mood to Run

If you are not in the mood to run, then don’t force yourself. You must feel enthusiastic about it or you will probably not perform at your best. Music and running with a buddy or dog can help provide you with the inspiration you need to get some exercise.

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41) 440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Michael Rahman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.

Walk With Intention To Rev Your Metabolism!

Walking to shed pounds is not about ambling or taking a stroll, although even a fifteen minute stroll is better than nothing if there is something in your lifestyle that is preventing you from getting the exercise you need on a daily basis.

Walking to lose weight is most successful if you can try walking with a bit of purpose. Make sure yoyo achieve a rolling gait and a steady pace.  You can walk slowly but make sure you are taking deep breaths. A good pace to walk at is one that is fast, but not so fast that you cannot hold a conversation with the person next to you.

Walking Is Inexpensive

One of the greatest fallacies about weight loss in general is that you need to join a gym, get a trainer or buy some expensive equipment in order to accomplish your goals. Although having gimmicks and glamorous place to go to work out can give you a bit of a boost in terms of enthusiasm for exercise, it is actually not necessary.  The best way to lose a great deal of weight in a very natural way is to simply walk at an “almost brisk” pace for one hour every day.  The idea is to get your heart rate going, without making you so uncomfortable that you have to sit down and take a break.

Take heart if you feel that you can never be a fast-paced walker. It is possible to lose weight by walking very slowly, it will just take you a lot longer to lose it.

Walking is Possible for Most

Computer Simulation of a Human Walking

Taking a walk is possible for most people. If you have a mechanical problem or problems with your feet then it is important for you to see a chiropractor or podiatrist who can help correct the imbalance that is causing you to have limited walking ability.

Sometimes, the issue is the shoes that you are wearing.  Make sure that you are wearing footwear meant for walking and not for other purposes.  If you must make an investment in your future health, invest in a good pair of walking shoes.

The secret is -- the more you walk the more lean muscle you will develop. Lean muscle burns more calories as you use it. This means that you burn more calories because you have more muscular mass in general.

A Healthy & Active Way to Lose Weight

You can lose a lot of weight just y taking a walk every day. To lose one pound a week you must burn off 3,500 calories. A good goal to strive for is to expend 500 calories a day just by walking five days a week. For most people this means walking a half-hour to an hour every day.

Not only is walking good for shedding pounds but it can rev up your metabolism and have you burning fat even while you are resting. Other benefits include the prevention of diabetes, stroke, heart disease and breast cancer.

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41) 440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Michael Rahman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.

Alkaline Diet Theory – A Brief History

Before it was called the alkaline diet, the alkaline-based diet that is now current part of the Happy & Active lifestyle program was known as the Ash Diet or the alkaline/acid diet. The reason it was called the Ash Diet is because alkaline foods contain minerals: mainly calcium, iron, magnesium, zinc and copper. In biochemistry these elements are incombustible, which means they catabolize differently when they processed by the body.  When digested, they create ash in water, which in turn creates an alkaline state in the body.

Robert 0. Young’s Theory About Alkaline Foods

One of the most well-known contemporary proponents of the Alkaline was Dr. O. Robert Young, who created many of the Western alkaline/acid food charts still in use today. Since the early seventies, Dr. Young written a series of groundbreaking books on the subject with the most famous being The pH Miracle (2002).

Robert O. Young

His claim was that health depends primarily on proper balance between an alkaline and acid environment in the human body. According to this theory, when the blood becomes too acidic, the body does whatever it has to do to regulate the acid-alkaline balance. This can result in all kinds of symptoms including food cravings, digestive symptoms, weight gain, yeast overgrowth, fatigue, raised cholesterol, raised insulin resistance and more.

Young claims that this one sickness and one disease is acidosis, the over-acidification of the blood and then tissues due to an inverted way of living, eating, and thinking. The "one treatment" is to maintain the healthy design of the body through an alkaline lifestyle and diet.

The Alkaline Diet

The original Robert Young diet recommends eating fish, vegetable and some grains. This groundbreaking theorist also recommended abstaining from "acidic" foods — such as red meat, shellfish, eggs, dairy sugar, refined foods, artificial sweeteners, coffee, alcohol, chocolate, and sodas, However, long before Young and his series of miracle pH books came into the picture there was a wide spread recognition that alkaline foods and liquids restored health to the body in the spa communities throughout the world.

For example, many of the mineral springs and mineral waters in Europe were recognized to be alkaline in character and therefore healthy for the body.

Of course, Robert O. Young originally got his information from a much earlier work.  Young’s work was based on one of the first books on the subject. It was penned by an alternative health advocate named George S. Weger who wrote a book called The Genesis and Control of Disease which identified acidosis as the cause of a many conditions including fatigue, infections and “mental disharmony and sleeplessness.”  It was penned in 1840 and talked about acidic states in the blood. Revised editions of this book also were printed in the 1930s.

Alkalinizing Using Fasting

One of the most famous books about achieving body alkalinity through fasting was written a century later. The Master Cleanse included instructions for Three Day Cleanses, 21 Day Detoxification Cleanses and ones that last as long as three months. This book was written in 1940, by Stanley Burroughs and is considered to be a foundation text about how to use fasting to detoxify and alkalinize the body. The book made a comeback and was massively reprinted in the seventies.

Burroughs purported that consuming no food at all and drinking a concoction made from lemons, maple syrup, cayenne pepper and purified water for a period of days (as long as you can stand) is the key to getting rid of acid wastes in the body and restoring them to a healthier alkaline state that does not support disease.  

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41) 440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Micheal Rahman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.

All Work and No Play Makes For A Boring Summer!

Learn Why It is Important to Live a Balanced Lifestyle!!

Are you a stress-aholic, over-achiever or overworked people pleaser who spends endless hours at work and not quite enough time socializing, exercising and eating right?  If so you might already be experiencing some type of physical, mental or relationship issue in your life that is actually a manifestation of this imbalance. 

Signs that it is time to take time out “to smell the flowers” include 

Extreme changes in weight due to lack of eating or eating unhealthy foods on the     run

•      Looking older and acting older than you are and appearing fatigued
•      Dependence on stimulants like coffee or cigarettes to meet work goals
•      Dependence on pills or alcohol to calm oneself down
•         Anxiety attacks about what will happen next
•      Feeling foggy and confused
•     Irritability and mood swings that affect all of your relationships
•     Changes in weight due to eating unhealthy foods on the run

Most dis-ease in our life is a mirror of some kind of injustice, over-compensation or uneasiness that we allow as part of our intent to make money. For instance, the man who spends twelve hours a day at the office is less likely to have a happier relationship with his wife and kids than the man who spends only seven hours and then goes home and eats a healthy home-cooked meal with his family. The assistant who spends all day rescuing people from bad situations may suffer from a lack of time for her own self-care and miss crucial dental check ups and mammograms.  The person who is always behind on deadlines might be sick from eating fast food all day and never getting any fresh air or exercise. Furthermore, the result of persistent mental and physical exhaustion is falling further and further behind until job loss is the result.

One of the deadliest things you can do for your cardiovascular health is sit in a office chair all day. A recent study has shown that just four hours of sitting in front of a screen all day provokes a fifty percent increased risk of death from any cause and a 125 percent increased risk of suffering from a heart attack.[1]

There are practical steps that you can take to reduce the amount of work-related stress in your life so that the general quality of your life is improved.

# 1. Make a pie chart with a 24- hour clock on it. Figure out how many hours you spend with family, with friends, sleeping, at work, taking care of yourself and just experiencing the joy of living. If you are working all day with 45 minutes for meals every day then it is definitely time to reconsider whether or not lowering your life quality to make more money is worth it.

#2. Make a list of priorities and then redo that pie chart so that the pieces of “the life pie” you are living are equal.  For example, what changes would you have to make in your schedule order to make more time for self-care or just relaxing with family or friends?

#3  Reorganize your priorities and organize them in as tasks in a schedule. Ultimately you are the person who decides what is most important in life. Managing your time will also help you be more relaxed and productive when you are actually at work.

Changes in lifestyle do not come easy for anyone but they are much easier to initiate in the summer months when the weather is nicer, most workloads are lighter and our loved ones have more available time to spend with us. Do not ignore the opportunity that the summer months offer to pace yourself and focus on health and your overall general happiness.

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41)440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Micheal Rahman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.

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[1] tamatakis E, et al. Screen-based entertainment time, all-cause mortality, and cardiovascular events: Population-based study with ongoing mortality and hospital events follow-up. Journal of the American College of Cardiology. 2011;57:292.s

Protect Yourself and Your Family From Eating Pesticides

Food needs to look attractive or it just does not sell. That is why farmers spray it down with pesticides, dye it and coat it with waxes. The same treatment is not given to food that is grown for mass commercial canning.  This is why, sometimes, canned food can contain less pesticides than fresh or frozen foods.  Also when foods are processed, they are often super-heated and peeled, which helps remove many pesticide residues.

This does not mean you should eat exclusively canned food, but if fresh, organic produce is not available, it may actually be a better choice.

Every year more than two billion pounds of pesticides enter our environment. Yet only 10% of the pesticides approved for use on food have been adequately tested for use in humans.  They are known carcinogens that cause impairment of the liver, kidneys and brain.  They also block the absorption of nutrients that are vital to healthy growth and development.

Pesticides also disables our ability to fight off infectious organisms, may impair fertility, and contributes to miscarriages and birth defects.

Pesticides are particularly lethal for children who tend to eat a small variety of foods rather than a great selection. This increases their vulnerability to consuming a pesticide, unless the limited food is one that is well known for not being sprayed down with chemicals.

To protect you and your family from eating pesticides do the following –

·      Be sure to remove the outer leaves of lettuces and cabbages and peel your fruits and vegetables if they are not organic

·      Thoroughly scrub unpeeled vegetables and rinse well with water

·      Soak foods that are hard to wash without damaging them in water. Examples would be grapes, strawberries, broccoli, lettuce and spinach. For foods that are more difficult to wash — like strawberries, grapes, broccoli, lettuce, and spinach.

·      Buy prewashed produce whenever possible

·      Stay away from mouldy, bruised or overripe produce

·      Trim all fat from meat as it  the fat that contains the most chemicals

·      Eat skinless chicken as the skin of animals also retains pesticide

·      Eat local to avoid waxes and preservatives that help produce grown far way survive the long trip to the grocery store. 

·      Purchase produce in season. Food grown out of season usually comes from another country and is covered with wax more pesticides.

The foods that contain the highest levels of pesticides according to the Environmental Working Group definition of the Dirty Dozen in the United States are: celery, peaches, strawberries, apples, blueberries, nectarines, bell peppers, spinach, cherries, kale/collard greens, potatoes, and imported grapes.

The foods that have the lowest pesticide residues are: onions, avocado, sweet corn, pineapple, mangos, sweet peas, asparagus, kiwi, cabbage, eggplant, cantaloupe, watermelon, grapefruit, sweet potato, and honeydew melon.[1]

To lead a healthy and active lifestyle, make shopping for pesticide-free items a priority.

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41) 440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Michael Rahman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.

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[1] Baby Center Medical Staff “Pesticides in Your Baby’s Food’, Babycenter 1997. < http://www.babycenter.com/0_pesticides-in-your-babys-food-what-you-need-to-know_1408813.bc?page>

Understanding Calorie Afterburn

For years, people were taught that the more sweat, the more calories you will lose. This is not exactly true, especially if the exercises you are doing are not effective at raising your basal metabolism. Your basal metabolism is a measure of how many calories you are burning when your body is at rest or just doing ordinary things such as sitting at a computer or watching television.

The truth is that when it comes to overall calorie burning, aerobic exercise is a little bit overrated. This is because aerobic exercise builds very little muscle.  Muscle is a key component of burning calories. That is because muscle burns up to an additional fifty calories a day just to keep that muscle in operation. Even if you can manage to add six pounds of muscles, you will find yourself burning an additional 300 calories a day even when your body is at rest.

Low Intensity Aerobics Can Rob The Body of Protein

Most people prefer to do low intensity aerobics rather than anaerobic exercises such as Pilates or weight –lifting. However, it is not that great of an ideal to do a long stint of low intensity aerobic exercise simply because aerobic exercises like biking, running and jogging require a great deal breath and cell respiration. As you continue to do the low-intensity exercise, your body calls upon glycogen (the stored form of carbohydrate in your muscles and the liver) to operate.  It only takes about twenty minutes of low intensity exercise to deplete your glycogen store. To keep going your body turns to the next readily available source of energy in your body, which is the protein in your muscles.  Your body will then burn about 5 to 6 grams of protein for every half hour of ongoing aerobic exercise.

The problem with this approach to exercise is that you are losing protein, rather than fat as you exercise and also diminishing your muscle mass.  This will ultimately slow you down, make you hungry and make it harder for you to lose weight.

The Principle of  Calorie Afterburn

Although it is true that you lose more calories while doing aerobic exercise then you do lifting weights but only during the exercise period, you need to take the calorie afterburn that is possible after each.  The metabolic effect of aerobics only lasts about thirty to sixty minutes whereas the effects of weight training lasts as long as 48 hours. That is two days more of an opportunity for your body to burn off additional fat.

The message here is that aerobic exercise essentially only really burns calories at the time of the workout while strength training is the “gift that keeps on giving”. You will continue to burn calories after you leave the gym, while you eat dinner, while you watch television, while you are in bed and all the next day.  This is why it is recommended that you do circuit training that involves a bit of both styles of exercise in order to lose as much weight as possible.

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41)440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Micheal Rahman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.