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Nutrition:  Are Women Getting Enough Vitamin D and Calcium? (cross-posted to BlogHer)

How much vitamin D do we need?  A recent report calls for a small increase in the daily recommendations of vitamin D, but does not go as far to recommend the much higher levels thought to possibly prevent chronic illness (such as cancer and diabetes).  The US-Canadian report reviewed nearly 1,000 published studies along with testimonies from scientists and other experts, and it concluded that there is not strong enough evidence (at least at this time) that vitamin D can prevent chronic illness.

The new recommended levels are somewhat higher than the ones set in 1997 (the last time a government panel examined vitamin D intake).  However, the new recommendations are much lower than many doctors and supplement advocates had been suggesting, and some are even suggesting there is a cover-up going on.

The panel focused primarily on skeletal and bone health to determine their new recommendations for both vitamin D and calcium.

The good news is — Most American’s and Canadian’s do seem to be getting enough vitamin D in their diet for healthy bones.

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Diet and Weight Loss:  Is it possible to eat healthy during the holidays?  Do you really want to?

For me, the answer is yes and no.

Yes, I know it’s possible to continue to eat healthy during the holidays.  But no, I really don’t want to.  So instead, I’ll try to find a happy medium.

Some say that most people only gain about a pound during the holidays, others say you can gain up to ten…I imagine it depends on the person.

Here are my 8 tips for avoiding holiday weight gain that I wrote last year around this time…

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Weight Loss:  It’s Not About The Twinkies, Stupid – (cross posted at BlogHer Health & Wellness)

Here’s what I think about the Twinkie Diet and the professor who claims to have lost weight on it…

In an unprecedented show of nutritional and scholarly savvy, a forward-thinking professor of nutrition was seeking to prove that limiting calories is the key to weight loss.  And incredibly, his theories have turned out to be correct.

Wait a minute, wait a minute, am I being Punked?  Isn’t it already a fact that eating less calories than your body burns is the key to losing weight?  I guess we can overlook that minor detail, because it’s how the professor lost the weight that is so astonishing.

You see, the real excitement of this story is how Twinkies and junk food are finally taking their rightful place in the war against obesity.

Yes, it’s true…

A one-man pseudo-research experiment has proven without a doubt that eating Twinkies can lead to weight loss (just as long as you consume considerably less calories than your body requires).  I know, it’s a shocking revelation.  It’s being dubbed, the Twinkie Diet, and you can actually eat just about anything (candy, cookies, chips, cake. fruits, vegetables) and still lose weight, just as long as you are taking in much less calories than your body burns.

If it sounds like a miracle diet, IT’S NOT.

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Are your kids drinking enough water?  Is it really that big of a deal if they’re not?   The answers may surprise.

[For the sake of this post, when I use the word child I am referring to children as young as 2, and as old as 19.]

We all know that our bodies require a lot of water, and living without it for even just a few days can be life threatening.  But the implications of even mild dehydration can not only be serious, but it can often go unrecognized.   Here are a few examples…

Does your child seem more tired than other children his/her age?

Is your child finding it more difficult of concentrate on school work?

Does your child complain about headaches or muscle weakness?

Each of the above problems can be associated with your child not drinking enough water.  Your child could also suffer with an impairment of their cognitive and mental abilities as well, simply because they have become mildly dehydrated.  It’s a much bigger deal than parents realize.

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Understanding The Latest Research About Hormone Replacement Therapy

For years there have been suspicions and studies linking Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) to breast cancer, but new research is now definitively linking HRT to an increase in breast cancer death rates.

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The Choose You Breast Cancer Health Kit is a wonderful resource for all women, and anyone who loves one.  It basically puts all the information you need about breast cancer prevention at your fingertips.

The Health Kit takes you step by step showing you everything from prevention tips to getting an early diagnosis, and it is also filled with many additional invaluable links and tools.

Best thing — The same lifestyle changes that can help you prevent breast cancer, can also help you prevent heart disease, other cancers, and even many chronic illnesses.  So check it out, and if you haven’t already…Choose You.

Choose You Breast Cancer Health Kit

This is my personal story of how I lost those last 10 pounds.  It started over two years ago when I lost 30 of the 40 pounds I had gained.  Those first 30 came off just by making healthier food choices, but the last 10 were proving to be much more difficult.   But I did it, and so can you.

Many of you who read my BlogHer posts are familiar with the struggles I’ve had with weight loss over the years.  For the most part I’ve been successful, although it took almost two years to finally get rid of those last ten pesky pounds.  But before I tell you my “how I did it” story, I want to share with you my “how I got there in the first place” story.  I think it’s just as important to recognize how and why we gained the weight, as it is to actually lose the weight.  Don’t worry, I won’t bore you with all the details, but in a nutshell two things had the greatest contribution to my (rather rapid) weight gain of about 40 pounds…

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A few weeks ago my daughter and I were at the mall doing some back-to-school shopping and walked by a kiosk selling what looked like cigarettes.  We both thought it was odd, but we assumed it must be some type of “quit smoking” devise.  But, on the way out we actually saw a man demonstrating this product which looked exactly like a cigarette (including the smoke).  I have to admit, it was very strange seeing someone smoke in a mall, you just don’t see that anymore (except for right outside the mall).  As we walked by I noticed a sign that claimed it was a “clean” way to smoke.  At the time we just rolled our eyes at the ridiculousness of it all, and wondered why anyone would want to pay money for something that looked like a cigarette but wasn’t?

Fast forward to a few days ago when I was asked to write a post about the controversy surrounding the e-cigarette.  I hadn’t heard of an e-cigarette, but after researching it, I realized it was the same thing we saw being sold at the mall.

After reading more about e-cigarettes, I have mixed feelings about their benefits.  On one hand, the manufacturers of the e-cigarettes are claiming they only want to give smokers an easier way to quit smoking.  But on the other hand, they are marketing the product by glamorizing a new “cleaner” way to smoke.  So what is it?  It’s clear the real motivation (as always) is in making money, not so much the health or best interest of the consumer.  And that’s why I’m happy to hear that the FDA is cracking down on these “questionable” products.

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TIME recently reported on a new study that suggests heavy drinkers outlive non-drinkers.  However, as usual with these studies, it’s not as cut and dry as the title suggests.

This latest study is a bit very misleading, especially for women.   First, it had less than 2,000 participants.  Second, only 37% of the participants were women (that’s just a few hundred women).  Considering the fact that there have been other studies on the harmful effects of alcohol on women, and that these studies have had over a million women participants, I’m not inclined to take this latest study very seriously.  It certainly wouldn’t be advised that a woman start drinking or increase her drinking based on this study.

Here are a few facts about the dangerous effects that alcohol (even in small amounts) can have on women…

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It’s no secret that I’m not fond of diet pills, and I’ve written quite a bit about my disdain for “Alli:  The Diarrhea Diet” over the last few years.  And it is now being reported that the prescription diet pill “Meridia” increases a person’s risk of heart attack and stroke.  Didn’t we learn anything from the whole “Fen-Phen” debacle?

When it comes to taking any medication, the first thing you have to do is determine if the benefits outweigh the risks of taking it.  So let’s take a look at the benefits.  It seems that Meridia offers less than a nine pound reduction in weight.  But is this really a benefit?  This is a drug that is prescribed by physicians to “obese” patients (people that need to lose a lot of weight before they will see any health benefits), so a nine pound reduction in weight hardly seems to be worth the risk.

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