Nutrition recommendations are often suited to patients in particular based on their lifestyle but some important general guidelines apply.
If you’re like most people, your daytime job precludes the notion of eating many small meals a day so you will, out of necessity, eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
The First Meal: Breakfast
Breakfast, the first meal of the day, is of great importance to the body as this is the nourishment of a body which has been in rest for 6-8 hours and having no nutrient intake. Stay away from fried foods and high levels of refined sugar – and you’d do well to avoid too many liquids with your mail as this interferes with yours stomachs ability to digest what you’ve eaten due to the dilution of digestive stomach acid. Caffeine in coffee increases your metabolism, causing many to feel nervous or uptight after drinking it, so limit your intake of this. Being a mucous contributor, milk has detrimental effects as wel, clogging absorption sites in your small intestine and making it more difficult for your body to absorb the nutrients you are eating. A longstanding fallacy milk fallacy is that calcium is attached to a protein complex in milk; actually, forms of calcium that are usable (aside from calcium supplements) would include green leafy vegetables. Tomatoes and sesame seeds are outstanding sources of calcium!
Lunch & Dinner
Lunch should ordinarily be the largest meal of the day because your body needs to consume the calories required to push you through the rest of the day. If you’re eating your biggest meal of the day in the evening there’s a good chance that it’s not being digested properly before you go to sleep leading to a significant probability of weight gain.
While recommended portion sizes will vary depending on lifestyle and body size, a good guideline to follow is to eat a protein portion which is one-third of your vegetables. If after eating one serving you’re still hungry, eat salad instead of more protein. The body has a difficult time processing protein in large amounts and resorts to converting this to often detrimental carbohydrates.
Perhaps the most practical guideline is to exercise moderation. If you find yourself binging on one snack or another, get yourself into the habit of changing these nutritional shortcomings. Too much refined sugar or even meat will have noticeable detrimental effects on the body, which is a fragile ecosystem that requires your attention.
When you can get yourself on the right track, I believe you’ll agree that the importance of exercising good nutritional habits can change your life!