Friday, September 21, 2012

Get Healthy Step #1: Build a foundation

Hello everyone! This post goes with my "Get Healthy With Me Challenge". You can find this in one of the top page tabs. I urge you to join me on this journey of getting fit! :)

Step #1 (Educate yourself! Build a foundation!)
Energy! This is the main reason most of us do not work out. I won't get into finding time. You know your schedule and I promise you that you can squeeze in a workout if you wanted to. Why don't we want to? Again (at least for me) it's lack of energy! I am a SAHM and run 2 online businesses, so my energy is shot by the end of the day. It's time to banish those energy zappers once and for all! Also when we get to actually working out (baby steps people!) we might want to pick a time of day that we actually have the most energy. For me I'm slow at waking up in the morning and my energy is zapped by night time. So For me I would choose before or after lunch. Lets get on to this list of energy zappers shall we? What things can zap your energy?

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*Not sleeping well the night before

*To much sugar in your diet
*Dehydration
*Processed food/fast foods
*Caffeine
How do these effect us?

*Get more sleep! Plan to get at LEAST 6 hours of sleep a night. Don't stay up until 2am and push your luck getting up early. Go to bed at a decent time. (For me that's before midnight, hopefully sooner if my work allows.) Drink some
sleepy time teaor take a small dose of Melatonin(no more than 3mg) to regulate your sleep. Try going to bed at the same time and waking up at the same time. This sets your biological clock and things just work better when it's ticking right!

*Cut back on sugar. We'll really try to cut this out later on in another baby step, but for now let's just cut back. Be more aware of what has sugar in it. Look at your labels. Sugar can give you a rush of energy, but it can give you one bad energy crash! Sugar causes lack of motivation, fatigue, and irritability. While we're not cutting this out yet, just make yourself more aware of it. Names on labels that mean sugar: lactose, sucrose, glucose, maltodextrose, maltose, dextrose, fructose, corn syrup, honey and maple syrup. Just making yourself aware of this in your food will help out later when we REALLY try cut most sugar out of diet later on. WE CAN DO THIS PEOPLE!

*Dehydration: Drink 6-8 glasses of pure clean water a day. Don't count soda's. To help break you soda addiction try some yummy MIO with Energy. It is naturally sweet and your body will thing your eating sugar and it has caffeine as well. This is a good way to "wean" yourself from soda and then gradually off of caffeine later, plain MIO or plain water. This worked for me and I was drinking about 3-4 soda's a day! So it can work for you! Dehydration can make you feel: sleepy, light headed, dizzy, and can cause headaches. Sorry, but being dehydrated will not get you off the sofa and moving. Drink that water!

*Processed Food/Fast Food: While we are not going to get into all the ins and outs of diet and nutrition, just know that these two things will cause you to become sluggish. It will block up all your innards and your body will not be able to properly assimilate nutrition/vitamins. It will make you sluggish, unhealthy, and put you at high risk for heart disease. It's just not good people. I know it's so easy to grab a burger and those fries taste so good! But is it worth it. We're doing baby steps here, so let's just give this some thought for now.

*Caffeine: Oh yea, it helps when your in a slump, but your most likely to feel worse later. Not to mention the sugar that comes with most things that contain caffeine. It goes right back to the sugar making this one a double wammy! Caffeine causes the body to product cortisol. Cortisol suppresses your immune system and your metabolism. It can cause you to actually retain weight! YIKES! Caffeine is not something that gives you "energy" it is something that stimulates the nervous system. Not the same people! Bottom line here, lets try to cut back on this to.

WRAP UP!
So this "Baby Step" is a big one! Mostly take it as education. We are educating ourselves on what is healthy and what is not so that we can become more energetic and motivated to make a change. This is going to create our foundation to getting healthy. Be more aware of what you put into your body. For now lets work on getting sleep and drinking our water. These two things are a great way to get things started! :)

1 comments:

Jenny said...

**I hope everyone following this is having a good results from sleep and drinking your water! I know I am! My head is more clear during the day and I can focus much better to. This by itself is lowering my stress levels! So keep at it! Get that sleepy time tea out if you have to! :)

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