One of the first things you can do to help improve your eating habits is to stop drinking soft drinks.  Soft drinks include sodas, punches, and juice cocktails, and they add unnecessary calories and sugar to your daily intake.  Liquid calories that go down easy will quickly sneak up on you. 

In addition to the calories, the sweetness in soft drinks encourages the desire for more sweet stuff.  Most sweet snacks, for many, are a hindrance to weight loss, as they are calorie dense and nutritionally deficient.  It’s easy to see how regular soft drinks can derail your wellness and weight loss efforts.  

Yesterday, the news reported that the government is on the verge of allowing meat and milk from cloned pigs and cows to be sold for food. After years of study, the FDA determined that it’s safe, insisting that products from cloned animals are no different than those of naturally bred animals.

Watchdog groups and scientists are not so sure, however, stating that defects can and do occur during the cloning process, and more investigation is needed before these products are released for mass consumption.

It’s a well known fact that most of us need to eat more fruits and vegetables daily, and despite that knowledge, we still don’t do it. Some of us will eat a salad once in a while or eat a piece of fruit each day. Take me for example. I like fruit, so that’s no problem most of the time. 

In all honesty, I’m not a salad person and most of the time when I eat vegetables, they’re cooked. I know I need raw vegetables but I usually don’t “feel” like eating them. So I juice them. Not only is it a super healthy drink, juicing also allows me to get in more than I would if I were eating vegetables. I’ll drink a full glass of carrot juice no problem, but I’m not likely to sit and eat 5 big, fat carrots.

As a trainer, I see a lot of this. People want to get in shape, but most don’t make lasting changes in their lives. The results we want are not achieved, the goals we set are not reached, and we’re right back where we started. If you want a drastic change, you must re-vamp your lifestyle. For example, if you really want to get rid of that extra back fat or that spare tire, do you really think you can do it while you continue to eat the way you currently do with only minor changes?

As you watch television, more and more you’ll see shows about overweight children.  Childhood obesity is at an all time high, and it is especially alarming because it leaves children with problems typically found in adults – diabetes and high blood pressure and cholesterol, for example. 

Parents get on talk shows seeking help for their overweight kids.  They usually want to know what causes childhood obesity.  In rare cases, there are genetic diseases which cause childhood obesity, but for the most part it’s caused by children eating too much and following their parents’ sedentary lifestyle. 

Whenever you talk to a personal trainer about how to improve your eating habits, one of the first things he will say is “Don’t eat fast food!” This is because if you cut it out, you automatically cut down on saturated fats, processed foods, excess sugar and unnecessary chemicals in your body. 

Although we preach and teach this regularly, this advice is seldom followed because most people simply don’t think fast food is that bad. They figure if they eat it a few times a week, that’s not so bad because they work out. Take a closer look and you’ll see that eating fast food on a regular basis can derail the progress of even the most religious fitness buffs.

When discussing diet, a lot of people figure they’ll make their breakfast healthier by switching from regular bacon to turkey bacon. I am usually expected to discuss how great that is, but I don’t. I usually just say is that it’s good they are reducing they’re fat intake, and that I’m glad they are not eating fast food for breakfast everyday. 

What do I have against turkey bacon? Turkey bacon and other processed meats (like regular bacon, hot dogs, bologna, turkey lunch meat, corned beef and others) contain sodium nitrite. Take a look at the ingredients in the meats in your refrigerator and the canned meats in your cupboard. Most people will find sodium nitrite in abundance.

If this question is coming from an otherwise healthy, active individual, then nine times out of ten, the answer is: You’re not eating as healthy as you think.

Without even going into frequency of meals, or how important breakfast is, let’s discuss the variety of foods that are often touted as healthy, causing the masses to rush right out and buy them. In an attempt to cut down on “bad” things, people migrate to other bad things without even knowing it. 

When I worked a local gym, I was often approached by members asking me why they were not getting results anymore. One of the first questions I would ask is “How’s your diet?” The member, telling me what they thought I wanted to hear, usually said something like “I don’t eat bread anymore.” If I asked about fast food, I would sometimes hear “I’ll eat the burger without the bun.” 

This is a common practice because many people think bread is a high fat item. Let’s take a look: The average slice of bread contains 15 grams of carbohydrates, 3 grams of protein, and only 1 gram of fat!

• Protein: 10-20% of daily calories
• Fat (good and bad):  No more than 30% calories
• Carbohydrates: About 60% of caloric intake.

However, if trying to lose fat, it’s recommended that you consume about 20% fat and 20% protein.

Drinking too much sugar sweetened beverage such as soft drinks isn't good for your health.  According to thirty (30) recent studies, drinking sweetened beverages, primarily soft drinks, promotes weight gain and obesity in children and adolescents. 

Soda is the biggest intake of sugar for most children and adolescent diet. Experimental studies have proved that soft drinks causes weight gain because it doesn't provide satiety (life normal foods), which bypasses the body's natural control of regulating calorie intake.  As a result, this causes over consumption of calories for the body.

Every day someone comes up with a new weight loss gimmick.  Whether it’s a new diet, exercise, pill, book, video tape, scientific break through or TV show, everyday we are bombarded with new information. 

We are constantly reminded of the reality of our health.  It’s true that Americans are in trouble when it comes to healthcare.  We are unhealthy as a nation, our healthcare system is broken and the future looks bleak for how we will handle it.