Does the word “holidays” conjure up images of cookies and pies, gorging yourself on turkey and all the trimmings, and consequently packing on the pounds? It doesn’t have to!
Healthy eating can be a realistic goal during the holiday season; however, this goal requires careful planning.

Do not arrive at holiday parties hungry! Most people will overeat if they skip meals. Our bodies are designed to eat every four to five hours. Skipping meals to “save calories” for party eating will set you up for failure, because your appetite will be keen. Eat a light meal, or drink one of our shakes, before a party and you will arrive in control of your appetite and will actually eat less.

Make time for exercise during the holidays. Even the best plans leave room for error. Exercise will help burn off some additional calories. How about planning a family walk or hike together before the holiday meal? Keep in mind, however, that you have to walk approximately 30 minutes at 4 miles per hour to burn off one small slice of pie.

Limit your alcohol intake to one or two drinks. Calories from alcohol add up very quickly, particularly if you are consuming mixed drinks. Try drinking water or sparkling water between alcoholic drinks — this can help keep you hydrated as well as consuming less alcohol and empty calories.

Be a social butterfly. Holidays are a time to be sociable. Spend time enjoying the company of others. The more you talk, the less you will eat.
Do not wear loose-fitting clothes during the holidays. If you can’t feel your waistline, you’re more likely to overeat.

Fill up on vegetables and fruits. They are loaded with vitamins, minerals and disease-fighting phytochemicals, and are low in calories. The fiber in these foods may help you feel full and leave less room for high-calorie, tempting treats.

Look up some lowfat versions of your favorite holiday recipes. For example, use lowfat milk instead of whole milk when making mashed potatoes. Applesauce can be substituted for oil when baking.

Try new side dishes instead of traditional ones. Serve baked sweet potatoes or grilled asparagus or steamed artichokes as a nice new side dish (use a non-fat dip for the artichokes or just sprinkle with lime juice).

Limit your indulgences. Choose the one food you will indulge in and enjoy it while taking small portions of the other offerings.

Fiber is your friend. Your good friend. Add in fiber throughout your day as fiber keeps you feeling full. Try adding beans to soup or making pumpkin soup or pancakes (pumpkin is great source of fiber as well as vitamins A and C).

Attitude is everything. If your holiday meal is a late lunch or early dinner, start off the day with a high fiber shake made with fruit. Get away from the attitude of: “Oh well, I’m going to blow it anyway today, so I might as well start the day off with sausage and high fat, high calorie egg nog…”

Swap this for that:
* Green tea with a few drops of stevia instead of coffee.
* Drink sparkling water sweetened with root beer flavored Stevia instead of diet soda.
* Try almond milk instead of dairy milk and soy milk.
* Avocados, nuts and seeds are great alternatives for cheese on your salads.
* Use lettuce instead of bread for sandwiches and wraps.

Many of my patients find they enjoy the holidays more – and feel better both during and after – when they make sensible choices like these suggested above. Happy holidays from Dr. Ridley and Emily at LiveWell!

Eating a lot of sugar-laden and high fat foods will change the flavors that our taste buds expect. So if you give your children a lot of sweet, salty, high fat foods throughout the day then these are the flavors their taste buds will come to expect. This will influence what they crave.

It is important to recognize that every bite of food affects both your own and your children’s taste preferences. Every time you give in and eat unhealthy (high fat and sugary) foods, it makes it harder for you want healthy (low fat and low sugar) foods.

Some popular television may have a negative effect on children’s brain function. New studies are examining whether fast-paced, fantastical television has short- and long-term effects.

One study divided sixty 4-year-old children into three groups. One group was shown a nine-minute segment of Spongebob Squarepants; the second group was shown a nine-minute segment of a slower-paced cartoon; children in the last group did not watch any show, but were given paper, crayons, and markers, and drew pictures for nine minutes.

After the nine minute activity, “each child was administered a set of standard exercises designed to test such aspects of executive function as working memory, attention and self-regulation.” The first group performed much worse on such tasks than did either the slower-paced TV show viewers or the kids who colored. This study suggests that viewing frenetic animated television might impair a 4-year-old’s executive functions, such as memory and attention.

If your child is still in the developmental stage of life, I recommend you encourage activity that helps promote healthy brain function, such as puzzles, sports and playing outside. Stay away from anything that harms brain function, such as fast-paced TV shows and video games, and make sure your child receives all the vital nutrients needed to ensure healthy growth.

Want an easy way to eat healthier? Try creating an inviting atmosphere for eating at home.

A new study, probing why people tend to eat more nutritious meals at home than away from home, suggests that psychological factors involved in eating pleasantly at home may help override our hard-wired cravings for high-fat, sugary foods. Researchers believe that, since home is where people often feel most content, the positive emotions associated with home-cooked meals may be part of the recipe for a healthy diet.

These findings suggest that people, who are in a good mood at home, enjoying the atmosphere there, tend to prepare healthier meals. They also feel better emotionally after eating. This cycle of positive reinforcement was more pronounced at home than elsewhere.

Using strategies such as attractive kitchens and eating areas, positive communications around meal times, your own music, and a pleasant view outside the window entice people to eat at home. And when eating at home, in a pleasant atmosphere, you just might find you’re eating healthier. Bet you never thought your doctor would give you a script to remodel that kitchen!

I strongly encourage all my patients to stay away from aspartame. If you’re still consuming this poison, let me bend your ear for a moment.

Aspartame is the most commonly used artificial sweetener in the United States. It represents over 50 percent of the market, with sales exceeding a billion dollars in 2010 alone. This is mostly due to Americans consuming close to 50 billion liters of soda every single year (which equates to roughly 216 liters, or about 57 gallons per person), much of this in the form of “diet” soda loaded with aspartame. There is little doubt that people are cramming themselves full of this toxic synthetic chemical because of their mistaken belief that drinking diet soda will help fight weight gain.

The truth is that it doesn’t. And it never has. And it never will.

You may think you’re making a healthy choice by swapping out sugar for artificial sweeteners, but the truth is that you’re not. Your body, when given artificial sweeteners, begins craving sweets because you are not giving it the proper fuel it needs. Then you tend to not only eat the wrong foods, but too much of them.

Not only does aspartame contribute to weight gain, it is toxic. The FDA, in fact, rejected aspartame, not once but multiple times. The scientific data just did not support it as a safe product. There is ample evidence that excitotoxins such as aspartame and MSG correlate highly with tumors, especially brain tumors. But the FDA is a federal agency, and is subject to the manipulations of politics and big money. And the FDA Chairman who stood in the way of aspartame’s approval was removed from office. His replacement, a man named Arthur Hayes, was much more congenial to the idea of approving what some doctors have called “an addictive excitoneurotoxic carcinogenic drug that interacts with drugs and vaccines.”

But even with a friendly new FDA Chairman in place, the agency still rejected aspartame for approval by a 3-2 margin. So Chairman Hayes added a sixth member to the approval board, who voted in favor of aspartame. Then, with a 3-3 tie on the issue, Chairman Hayes himself broke the deadlock with his own vote of approval for aspartame. Much later, one of his last acts in office before he left the FDA in1983 amid accusations that he was accepting corporate gifts for political favors, was to approve aspartame for use in beverages. The story is as ugly and sad as aspartame’s actual effects on the human body.

As our nation grapples with skyrocketing rates of learning disabilities, autism and related neurological disorders like lupus and MS, the Environmental Protection Agency is preparing to release a roster of the pollutants likely to contribute to these or other neurological disorders. Aspartame has been included on this list.

Healthier alternatives exist when you just want a taste of something sweet. One safe, natural alternative to be used in moderation is a natural plant called Stevia. Unlike aspartame and other dangerous chemicals, Stevia is a safe, natural alternative that’s has been around for over 1500 years and is ideal if you’re watching your weight, or just trying to avoid sugar. Stevia is hundreds of times sweeter than sugar and has virtually no calories.

I prefer to use Stevia in its liquid form and I personally recommend the English Toffee and French Vanilla flavors. I want to emphasize, however, that if you have insulin issues, you need to avoid all sweeteners, including Stevia, since they all can decrease the body’s sensitivity to insulin.

Bottom line: I encourage you to toss out all artificial sweeteners and products that contain them, immediately. Poison has no place in your pantry or your fridge.

I get asked this question a lot.

The short answer is, between 30 and 40 grams per meal.
Protein requirements for generally inactive people are around .8 g/kg of body weight. But active people’s protein needs can be up to 100 percent higher than that (1.6-1.8 g/kg of body weight vs. 0.8 g/kg).

So, a typical adult weighing 150 pounds needs 88 grams of protein per day, which translates to approximately 30 grams per meal. That amount increases to 115 grams (about 40 grams per meal) for someone who weight-trains.

Current data suggests that protein needs are higher not only for active individuals, but also for:
Children and teens who are still growing
Dieters
Vegetarians
Anyone with less-than-optimal muscle strength
The elderly

The types of protein that you eat are another important consideration. There is a vast difference between eating a fast food hamburger and a hamburger you make yourself from grass-fed organic beef. Why? Because you signal your body’s DNA differently with high quality food choices. For example, if you consume 1200 calories/day in jelly beans, versus 1200 calories/day in carrots, which day do you think you would feel better, think more clearly, and lose weight? Obviously, the carrot day, because it is not about the calories, but the quality of those calories.

• Here are some great food sources of high-quality protein:
  Poultry: If you remove the skin, you’ll benefit from a good protein source without saturated fat.
  Beef: Ideally grass-fed and organic, beef is an excellent source of protein.
  Eggs: From free-range organic chickens
  Beans and Legumes: Containing the most protein found in any vegetable, you can’t go wrong with beans. In addition, they’re a great source of fiber that’ll help you feel full without overeating.
  Nuts: Eaten in moderation, nuts offer a lot of protein power in a very small package.
  LiveWell Detoxification shakes