September 1-7 is celebrated as National Nutrition Week. The motive behind this is to promote a healthy lifestyle by adopting healthy eating patterns and the right nourishment. A healthy mind lives in a healthy body, thus we need to have all the essential vitamins and minerals that make up well-balanced food. Both mental and physical growth requires proper nutrition.
We all know that carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, minerals, and water form the basis of our nutrition. These are crucial for a healthy immune system. Let’s take a look at some of the interesting facts regarding nutrition.
- Your weight is not the tell-tale factor of your health – Health is much more than your weight. Just like being overweight is not healthy, being underweight or normal is not necessarily healthy. Fat accumulation is bad, try to avoid the deposition of fat anywhere in the body.
- Eating every 2-3 hours – Most of us believe in the fact that taking smaller and more frequent meals help us to lose weight. But studies suggest meal size and frequency have nothing to do with body fat or weight loss. Moreover, it is inconvenient. Simply, eat when you are hungry and try to eat only healthy nutritious food.
- Sugary drinks are the unhealthiest drink – Adding extra sugar is worse and taking it in liquid form worsens it even more. People often don’t register liquid sugar while consuming. Among all junk food, sugary drinks are the most fattening foods.
- Fruit juices are not different from sugary drinks. However, they contain some antioxidant properties but the useful property doesn’t make up for the large amounts of sugar.
- Low-fat foods are not the alternative to healthy foods – Processed foods labeled low fat are generally full of unhealthy ingredients. Instead, take food items that naturally contain low fat like fruits and vegetables.
- Take care of your gut bacteria – The gut bacteria or gut flora or intestine bacteria affects human health to a large extent. It can have an impact on your brain functions to your entire body weight. Just like your body needs food to live, the gut bacteria also need its portion. And fibers are the preferred food for these bacteria. Include a sufficient amount of fiber in your daily diet to fulfill the need of the body and bacteria.
- Fats or carbs don't make you fat – We all know that fats contain high calories, higher than proteins and carbs. If we have to lose some weight, the first thing we are asked is to avoid fat from our diet. Both fats and carbs are fattening – including or omitting them may make a difference but your weight also depends on the rest of the diet and overall lifestyle.
- The label ‘gluten-free’ and ‘organic’ doesn’t make the product healthy – Natural gluten-free products are healthy but artificial products labeled ‘gluten-free’ contain many unhealthy ingredients which make them even worse. Hence read the label carefully.