Top Ten Tips for Super Vegan Health
London Nutritionist Yvonne Bishop-Weston BSc Dip ION mBANT from Foods For Life gives her TOP TEN TIPS for optimum vegan health.
Probably the single most persuasive argument you could have to encourage others to join you in making a difference is yourself. Just being a happy, healthy looking vegetarian / vegan then that speaks for itself. There are huge benefits for living meat free not only to your long-term health but also for the viability and health of our planet.
Britain's largest ever health survey of over 37,000 people's health and diet, conducted by the Institute for Optimum Nutrition (ION) revealed
- only 6% were in optimal health
- 44% were in poor health
- 80% with frequent low energy
- 81% suffuered from constipation
- 75% had high stress
- 64% of women had PMS
- 65% had abdominal bloating
- 50% had frequent colds
- 46% had headaches or migraine
- and 46% had depression
The good news is that it found that the healthiest people ate 8 or more servings of fruit and vegetables a day.
- Start the day with a BANG! You've been asleep all night busy repairing the damage of a modern lifestyle give your body a break! Feed it! A mug of caffeine and a bit of toast with sugar-laden marmalade, or worse still a pop-tart, just won't do it long term. Try a bowl of porridge with strawberries or blueberries and some nuts and seeds sprinkled on top. If you are a toast-a-holic aim for wholemeal or rye breads spread with nut or pumpkin seed butter instead of jam.
- Put a rainbow in your life! Oranges are not the only fruit. Eat a wide variety of colourful fruit and vegetables. Many fruit and vegetables are that appealing bright colour for a reason - to attract you to them and their myriad of phytonutrients, vitamins and minerals. Research on the benefits of foods such as blueberries, broccoli, carrots, and mangoes claims benefits range from warding off Alzheimers to protecting against cancer. Buy organic or wash them lots. Your dinner plate should be at least half full with a mixture of colourful vegetables (not including potatoes) with a bias towards green leafy veg. Drizzle flax or hemp oil on your veg to get your quota of essential fats.
- Just Say No to Drugs! You may think coffee and sugary foods and drinks are giving you the energy to drag yourself out of bed in the morning but in actual fact it's them that are making you feel like you need them so much. Try decaff coffee or tea or better still experiment with polyphenol and anti oxidant rich teas such as Rooibosch (redbush) tea instead.
- Have a drink! A glass of red wine has been shown in a few studies to benefit you with it's anti oxidants and relaxing effects. Much more than that and the toxic effects of the alcohol on your liver and brain will start to out weigh any benefits. Give your body a chance to flush itself out. Drink 1 1/2 litres (6 mugs) of water a day between meals and especially if the weather gets hot.
- Get Fat not Fatter! Bizarrely you can lose weight by eating fat. You need the right sort of fat, which is the kind of fat that your brain rather than your bottom is made of. Even among the good fats balance can be a problem. Many people struggle to get enough vital omega 3 fats that can be found in their most useful form in high lignan flax oil, hemp oil and also in walnuts. Drizzle flax oil on your vegetables, cereal, soup or salad. You can also sneak it in your smoothies. Avoid trans fats, hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated fats like a dose of brightly coloured sudan1 rich Worcester sauce .
- Step Outside! Grab yourself some of the sunshine vitamin D. Take a tip from the birds hitch hike towards the equator for the winter. Yes too much is bad for your skin but not enough could be even worse. Nothing is ever that simple - there is a new study that suggests that sunshine slows melanoma growth - remember everything in moderation.
- Get up and Go! There's nothing quite like a bit of exercise to promote health. Get your heart beating a little faster for at least 15 minutes a day. Follow the example of your neighbour's cat and do a bit of stretching and yawning - yoga would be better, Tai Chi anyone? Remember all those exercises you used to do at school, crouching, leg raises? Walk, cycle, swim, dance but wherever possible DON'T take the lift or escalator.
- Atkins Smatchkins! Protein, remember that? OK so Dr Atkins was on a bridge too far but he had a point. A white bread base with a sugary red sauce and a bit of animal fat on top (pizza) or a bowl of white flour and water (pasta) with a sugar laden tomato sauce on top, or corn flour and water (tortilla) with vegetables and sugary chilli sauce (Fajitas) is not real food - it tastes great, but unless you throw a whole load of beans, nuts and tofu on there you are barely one step away from eating nothing but sugar. If you live in a basement and you had to run up 3 flights of stairs to answer the door to the Pizza boy then maybe your body could use a few instant calories - if not you're stuffed. Aim for about 20% or at least a quarter of your dinner plate to be mixed, protein rich foods such as lentils and mushrooms, beans, nuts and seeds, quinoa, buckwheat, tofu, hemp or meat-free alternatives without hydrogenated-fat.
- Carb Crawling! - Yes carbohydrates are delicious, but in their simplest (white) form, unless you are down the gym every night - forget it. Pick the complex ones - that's the ones still with a bit of how nature intended them to be, complete with fibre. One nutritionist is recommending a maximum safe limit of 5 french fries a day - you get the picture? Try buckwheat pasta - there is at least one brand that tastes nice. Try other protein rich pseudo grains such as quinoa and amaranth and fresh bean sprouts. Try to ensure no more than a maximum of one quarter of your dinner plate is starchy, complex carbohydrate such as brown rice, wild rice, wholemeal pasta, millet or potatoes. Try to always have some protein with any snacks you have such as hummus with your oatcakes and nuts with your organic chocolate. Avoid eating carbs separately unless you have just been working out in the gym for 40 minutes. For French bread think sugar stick. Try not to have too many carbs at night.
- Vive la difference! One of the failings of modern western medicine is that it tries to treat everyone equal when we are all different. So many different factors affect how healthy you are. One of the keys to the success of alternative and complimentary therapies is they look at the whole body and underlying causes not just symptoms. Don't be afraid to take a good multi vitamin and mineral supplement if you are struggling with life. If you pick a good brand they are more much more reliable, better quality and in the long run cheaper than getting extra vitamins second hand from fortified foods. It's not a cop out if you are a vegetarian, many meat eaters could benefit from extra selenium, calcium, zinc, magnesium, iron and even vitamin B12. The Soil Association will explain how the soil has been depleted of key minerals. Meanwhile Vitamin B12, it's effects on homocysteine levels and it's role as a health biomarker is taking on eureka proportions. We don't live in a natural world so please recognise that and at the very least take a sublingual vitamin B12 under the tongue on a regular basis until someone proves B12's bio-availability in algae (in addition to cow-pooh and Marmite).
If you are still struggling to reach optimum health after all that then seek out a good nutritional therapist. See www.bant.org.uk or www.ion.ac.uk, www.optimumnutritionist.co.uk
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Story posted by on 2006-08-28 19:49:03.
Story last updated by on 2007-10-08 18:58:29.