Pimp My Health
Introduction
Between fighting for the independence of India and being a political and spiritual leader Mohandas Ghandi was once quoted saying,
“It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver.”
And between doing his washing and being late for his morning nutrition lecture, I, Ross Edgley was once quoted saying,
“Take good care of your body, you tend to only get given one.”
Two great quotes both in relation to what this section of the site was designed to do…. help you improve (Pimp) your health. So as always have a good read through the various sections below…or don’t and leave but expect your blood type to be ‘gravy’ in just a few years time.
Pimp My Health through Nutrition
Good people welcome to the part of the website which explains to you what should be going down your pie hole on a daily basis to ensure you remain healthy and fit as a butchers dog. Let’s begin with the very basics, that being:
Pimp My Health’s 7 Nutrition Commandments:
THOU SHALT EAT BETTER FATS….
The Recommended Daily Allowance of Fat is 20%-30% of someone’s diet…Now let me stop you there before you jump up from your seat and raid the biscuit tin. Since many people are confused about the difference between Good Fats and Bad Fats. In it’s simplest form:
Bad Fats = Hydrogenated oils and saturated fat. Not only is this bugger responsible for those ever increasing love handles and double chin, they also increase the body’s LDL Cholesterol (Low-density lipoprotein) which can cause many forms of cardiovascular disease.
Good Fats = Polyunsaturated and Monounsaturated fat. These guys are your heart and arteries best friend and your love handle and double chins worst enemy, since not only do they increase HDL (high density lipoproteins) a.k.a. good cholesterol, which takes cholesterol away from cells and back to the liver to broken down or excreted, they also act as fat burning agents greatly aiding weight loss.
The Good fats that should go in your gob are: salmon, tuna in the can (low sodium & packed in water), walnuts, almonds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds (all without salt), avocado, flax oil and flax seeds (ground), olive oil, and supplemental essential fatty acids.
THOU SHALT DRINK A LOT OF WATER….
Water is about as important as remembering to put your trousers on in the morning! Supplying your body with enough water will have the following benefits:
- Toxins and other metabolic waste products (such as ketones, excess nitrogen and urea) can be efficiently removed by the kidneys
- The kidneys can function efficiently, which means its surplus workload is not passed on to the liver meaning the liver can do its job of metabolising stored fat for energy properly thus meaning more fat is burnt.
So think of drinking enough water as, flushing the chain after you’ve been to the toilet (i.e. it gets rid of all the waste products in the body) or giving your kidneys a helping hand.
THOU SHALT EAT LESS SUGARS….
Here is a little tip….don’t eat 64 pounds of sugar…now you’re probably sitting there thinking, “great, nice tip Pimp My Health…you might as well tell me not to eat 64 pounds of candle wax.” Now I will be the first to admit this tip is a simple and obvious one, however on average we consume at least 64 pounds of sugar a year! Yes that’s right, 64 pounds, I promise I am not pulling your plonker. Now besides it’s obvious effects of piling on the pounds of any consumer, sugar also causes premature aging, age spots and inflammation. So if you want to look like an obese, old age pensioner at the age of 30 then please be my guest and continue shovelling copious amounts of sugar down your pie hole. Since yes you may get O.A.P. discount on the bus and other such perks but small children will run from you in the street in fear that you will eat them.
THOU SHALT EAT LESS PROCESSED FOODS….
Good people here is yet another tip….don’t eat 9 pounds of additives… now once again you are probably sitting there thinking to yourself, “This guy is an idiot, University degree my arse.. tell me something I don’t know” well I shall, on average we consume up to 9 pounds of additives a year, once again I jest you not. Nowadays supermarkets are stocked full of foods crammed with artificial colours, flavours, texturizers, and sweeteners and stripped of their nutritional value. Furthermore processed foods have little or no enzymes compared to their raw, organic friends. Enzymes are proteins that catalyse chemical reactions within the body, foods absent from them are lifeless and thus leave you feeling the same.
THOU SHALT EAR 5 SERVINGS OF FRUITS & VEGGIES DAILY……
Now if I stood before you with a ‘magic’ tablet and said to you, “hello, this is a magic tablet” you would probably laugh at me. If I then went on to say, “this tablet has been designed to combat the effects of aging, cancer, high blood pressure, and diabetes but to name a few, if taken a few times day” you would probably snap my hand off and swallow it (the tablet that is, not my hand.) Unfortunately there is no such thing, however the benefits of such a tablet can be found in fruits and vegetables that contain vital phytonutrients. I don’t know about you, but that’s enough of a reason for me to put 5 servings a day of those bad boys down my gullet.
THOU SHALT DRINK LESS SOFT DRINKS & JUICES…..
Now be honest…are you are ‘soft drink drinker?’ If you are I want you to stand up by your laptop, put your hand on your heart and repeat after me,
“I ( insert name here ) so solemnly agree….no soft drink, no matter how:
- Tasty
- Seemingly refreshing
- Tempting the coca cola man on the advert may seem
Shall pass thy lips for it is the beverage of evil and my body does not need it.”
Now if you’ve just taken my oath you have just improved your health dramatically and let me tell you why; soft drinks have an average of tens packs of sugar added to them and are jam packed with artificial substances (basically poison to your body.) Furthermore they contain phosphates, which rid our bodies of all their essential nutrients. Soft drinks are a prime example of commercialised ‘drink’ having an adverse effect on our bodies.
On a similar note, make sure you check the seemingly harmless and friendly carton of juice that lurks in your fridge. Since not only are many full of added sugar, the concept of fruit juice is prone to pile on the pounds. You see, juice has been separate from the natural pulp of the fruit (the essential fibre) which slows the absorption of carbohydrates. Without the pulp your body is ‘showered’ with carbohydrates, which are then in turn converted to glucose, which then affects your insulin levels. Excess amounts of glucose go to the liver and muscles, and are stored as glycogen. If there’s excess after that, it’s stored as fat. This exact same thing can happen with the soft drinks containing sugar that I mentioned before.
So my advice would be, and this is only my opinion, consume fruit as nature intended for it to be consumed (as a solid) and drink water as nature intended it to be drunk (as a liquid)
THOU SHALT HAVE LESS SALT IN THY DIET….
Salt: one of your body’s worse enemies….your body hates salt as much as a turkey hates Christmas. Salt causes:
- Edema (water retention)
- High blood pressure
- Heart disease
Now I personally run for the hills if at the very sight of salt…ok exaggerating a little, well I avoid it. But for you salt lovers out there, if you really, really can’t live without your beloved sodium, here is my advice to you:
Salt (a.k.a. ‘common salt’ as found in supermarkets and in most processed foods) is mined from inland salt deposits, heated to extremely high temperatures, and refined. To iodise it, Potassium iodide or sodium iodide is added as well as Dextrose (sugar), sodium bicarbonate, and sodium silico-aluminate to keep the salt white and easier to pour. However Sea Salt is obtained by a much simpler process, Sea water is simply concentrated under the sun. It contains more trace minerals, and no additives. Up to 5% of sea salt is composed of naturally occurring potassium, calcium, magnesium, and trace elements, which are responsible for the mild flavour and good taste of sea salt. Lastly and perhaps more importantly, the body can assimilate these natural minerals and trace elements very easily. So put simply if you really must salt…sea salt.
Basics of Nutrients
Food is absolutely essential to our lives, without it…we’d have nothing to do at dinner time, restaurants would only serve you water and ‘Dinner parties’ would just become Parties, haha, just jesting… food plays a vital role in the development of every cell in our bodies. The body needs essential nutrients such as Proteins, Carbohydrates, fats, vitamins, minerals, and water, however the key to creating and maintaining a health body is learning the principles of healthy eating (I.e. how much to eat of each nutrient to consume, when to eat and for what purpose.)
FAT:
Fat, perhaps the most misunderstood of all nutrients, people don’t realise that there are basically two kinds of fats: (put simply) Bad fats and Good fats. Just because they are both labelled as Fats it doesn’t mean they are the same and should therefore be treated the same…..my cousin has the same second name as Brad Pitt, but that doesn’t make him a Movie Star and that doesn’t mean he gets to sleep with Angelina Jolie.
Bad Fat (Saturated Fat and Hydrogenated Oil)
- Saturated fat is solid at room temperature
- Causes heart disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes and you to gain body fat
- Is found in lard, chips, chocolate, crisps and most pre-packaged food
- Basically you want as a little of this as possible in your diet
Good Fat (Polyunsaturated Fat and Monounsaturated Fat)
- Unsaturated fats are usually liquid at room temperature
- Specific unsaturated fats cannot be made by the body and are necessary for thousands of biochemical reactions, therefore must be consumed in ones diet (omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids.)
- Maximise your body’s ability to burn stored bodyfat
- A deficiency of these fatty acids will interfere with the optimal function of each and every cell in your body and its outer layer, or cell membrane, is compromised primarily of essential fats.
- Cold-water fish (which have a higher fat content than warm-water fish), such as salmon, mackerel and trout have linolenic acid (omega-3) in them. Low-fat like haddock, sole and flounder contain almost insignificant amounts of these important fatty acids. Good sources of omega-6 include sunflower oil, flaxseed and UDO’s oil.
PROTEIN:
Protein, soooo important to your diet…a diet without protein is like Christmas without Santa Claus, it’s just not right. Here’s a cheerful little analogy that I find best explains the role of protein,
“Like the structural steel of buildings and the metal meshwork in concrete, proteins provide the framework for every cell of the body. Just as workers at a construction site need a steady supply of building materials, tissues undergoing repair and those that are growing need a steady supply of protein to build and rebuild organs, muscles, antibodies, hormones, and enzymes - every kind of cell in the body. At eight months or eighty years, bodies need protein.”
Furthermore it’s important to note that complete proteins contain all the essential amino acids, these are the basic building blocks of muscle as well as a playing an important role with countless enzymes, hormones, neurotransmitters, and antibodies. Amino acids flow through the bloodstream and delivered to systems in our bodies that depend on them. Protein is extremely important for those who are trying to build leaner, stronger, healthier bodies because exercise increases the body’s turnover rate of amino acids, thereby increasing daily requirements.
Lastly protein is the daddy of all nutrients for the Thermic effect of feeding i.e. protein burns more calories when being digested than any other nutrient, and it makes you feel fuller for longer.
CARBOHYDRATES:
Yet another misunderstood nutrient…now I don’t want to point the finger of blame at anyone for creating the whole misunderstanding of carbohydrates…hmmmm…. Ok I do… Dr Atkin you wolly! But after that idiot published his book on the Atkins Diet, everyone ran for the hills when they ever saw a Carbohydrate. But the truth is carbohydrates are so important to good health, fat loss, building muscle and of course energy production so all diets should have them.
Furthermore carbohydrates activate the release of insulin, a powerful hormone needed to help amino acids enter muscle cells, basically no carbohydrates and its friend protein can’t work efficiently. There are two basic types of carbohydrates: simple and complex. Generally, I would recommend you eat complex carbohydrates, foods such as brown rice, vegetables, oatmeal, and wholegrain pasta are complex, (low Glycaemic Index) which provide the body with a consistent release of energy.
Simple carbohydrates are quickly converted to blood sugar after you eat them. Refined sugar, most fruits and fruit juices, and white breads and pastas are sources of simple carbohydrates. They cause your blood sugar to rise rapidly, which signals the rapid release of insulin as well, which shuttles the glucose into muscle, the liver, or fat cells. If you need instant energy, for example if you’re going for a run, playing football, or any activity which requires your heart beat to raise dramatically, and your endurance is fading, that’s when consuming a simple carbohydrate performance drink can be a good thing. Also ideal post work out, to shuttle essential protein and amino acids to the muscles you’ve just ‘broken down,’ and replenish glycogen levels.
In terms of fat loss, simple carbohydrates are about as good as a chocolate kettle (i.e. crap) because of the powerful and sudden effect they have, they can interfere with fat loss and also cause a spike in energy and then a sudden crash. When the latter occurs, you will often feel very hungry ‘“ that’s the body demanding more blood sugar’“ demanding more food. Try to avoid this problem by choosing primarily complex carbohydrate foods. However if you are going to eat simple carbohydrates, try to have them with some essential fatty acids, fibre or protein to ensure the insulin release (rise in blood sugar) is more stable.