Healthy Eating - how seriously should you take it?

[Parm]

I've recently become a bit of a fitness enthusiast. I went circuit training earlier in the year and my levels of fitness were so appaling it pretty much shocked me.

Since then I've become a member at my local gym, work out for about an hour and a half, three times a week.
I'm eating a lot better, fitness is improving all the time and I feel a lot better too. I'm really happy with my progress.

When it comes to eating, I still enjoy myself with a few treats from time to time as I think I'll work it off again at the gym. I don't eat junk food unless I'm out with friends or unless I have relatives staying over, then we might end up ordering something.

But how far should you go with health eating?
My sister is almost a fanatic. She has books on the subject and takes it all pretty seriously.
She no longer eats cereal as she insists that milk is really bad for you after the age of 3! That statement alone is tough for me to digest as I love my cereal at all times of day.

As part of my healthy eating I just try to ensure I get my 5 a day. I eat loads of fruit and veg now and really enjoy it.

My physique is generally good, I'm in good shape but I personally think I have a bit of a belly. Not much of a belly at all, and not noticeable but it's not the rock hard abs that I want hehe.
I'm therefore thinking about getting serious with my eating too, but the question is, how serious should you take it?

[steve threlfall]

Well if you want to lose a serious ammount of bodyfat (Youl need to have bodyfat of 10% or less for visible abs) the answer is serious.

Theres no need to cut out everything and make yourself miserable though. You should have a rest day each week where you do nothing (sat or sunday?) and dont have to follow a strict diet

What are your goals as far as the gym is concerned, fat loss or muscle gain or both?

[5lab]

if you read up on it, any food is bad for you. people like your sister really wind me up - we've (as a race) been drinking milk for millenia - i'm guessing her reasoning is our digestive system isnt designed for it?? by the same count it's not designed for cooked meat, but that seems to go down ok

if you have a fair, balenced diet - not too much or too little of anything, you can't go far wrong imo

[-ChEM-]

ive studied biochemistry and i'd tend to agree

theres a lot of bs talked by self styled nutriotionists that has no basis whatsoever

e.g every antioxidant thats been trialled has been found to increase cancer risk in one way or another if you take it on top of a normal healthy diet but supplements are constantly being encouraged

people tend to think that if something performs an important role in our body youll can make yourself healthier by eating above-natural levels of it which is wrong and can be dangerous... selenium was (and still is i think) recommended simply because it had recently been discovered as a coenzyme so it started getting sold in health food shops, then once some proper research was done they established the toxicity level was much lower than the doses sold so they were actually harmful, and even in the right dose there havent been any benefits found

the important thing is to get into the habit of eating as varied a diet as possible, then you wont have any problems... eating 3 different fruit/veg is probably better than just eating 5 apples and there are variations in the way things are absorbed when they're combined with different things

afaik the milk thing started because breast fed children had lowered a juvenile diabetes rate than those fed on other milk... it was recommended by a group of doctors to avoid other animals milk because it had something bad in it, but that was never proven to be beneficial, and it could equally be that breast milk contained something important that the other milk lacked... on the other hand it was proven to lead to a lot more broken bones before the age of 18 which is when your risk of back problems, osteoparosis etc later in life is decided... if you dont drink milk you better eat lots of bones and grissle to get your calcium

that is the right kind of logic to follow though... things that have changed recently (in the last few thousand years that is) like farming milk, food additives, altered food from selective breeding are the only things that are worth altering artificially in your diet

omega-3 oils are the only major thing i can think of really, as we're supposed to eat a lot less than we used to... there are lots of studies going on now so that might come up

but if its just people going on about how you should eat this "for your immune system" its 99.9% likely to be bs, eat it once in a while just like you would with everything else

[5lab]

iirc, one of the best things you can do for your imune system is live in a hole, and not wash up properly - i think it was proved that kids in very clean environments got ill more than other kids because their immune systems weren't used to dealing with sickness

[Funkstar]

i can quite believe that, 5lab

I find it difficult to explain to people my views on healthy eating, I've been asked about it a couple of times recently.

Basically i go for the more natural and traditional options over modern "healthy" varients because of the weird things you seen on the labels. Butter for instance. in a pack of real butter there is, well, butter. thats it. In tubs of spread you get all manner of chemically processed fats and preservatives. Sure the lite spreads are possibly technically better for you, but i just don't trust them.

Same goes for diet drinks. I'm a lot more wary of the things that artificial sweetners can do to you compaired to good old sugar.

does that make sense? know what i mean?

[0iD]

imo there's healthy & there's obsessive. Everyone knows basically what constitutes a healthy balanced diet, but there are those who chose to ignore common sense. Personally I work out hard, much as yourself, plenty of walking & running with the dogs, so i recon i can go wild every now & with a takeaway. Plus i still eat the odd biccie, choccy bar, cake & packet of crisps. Doesnt effect my weight or fitness noticably.
I have a good strong gut, but it's far from flat. I cant be arsed to cut all the fat from my diet to get that washboard look. I can still do 3 sets of 50 sit-ups on an incline bench with a 20kilo barbell, nice & slow so who cares if it aint flat? throw in good mornings & side dumbell raises for the obliques etc etc. All amounts to a good strong core.

[Parm]

What are your goals as far as the gym is concerned, fat loss or muscle gain or both?

Well at first it my main goal was really just to improve fitness. I've been doing a lot of cardio for a solid 3-4 months now and my fitness has come along really nicely.
As a result I've started to do more weights too as now I'm hoping to build some muscles and tone up.
I do want to burn some fat off my belly, but there's virtually no fat anywhere else on me!

the important thing is to get into the habit of eating as varied a diet as possible, then you wont have any problems... eating 3 different fruit/veg is probably better than just eating 5 apples and there are variations in the way things are absorbed when they're combined with different things

Glad you said that! I try to cary my diet a lot more now.
As I said in my first post, I try to ensure I have my 5 a day everyday, but I read somewhere about the 5 a day colour scheme. The idea being that you have 5 fruit or veg a day, but they must all be a different colour. Works for me! I think it's a great idea and really helps add to your variety.

I agree with pretty much everything that you guys have said. I don't take healthy eating overly seriously, I still eat out when I fancy it. But I am concious about stuff and I do the basics. I eat a lot more fruit and veg, don't drink fizzy drinks, eat brown bread not white.
Most importantly I work out a few times a week.

I've only been working out regularly for 3-4 months so who knows, maybe if I just keep doing what I'm doing the abs will start to show.

[Taz]

I agree with most of the above. I became obsessed with my diet for 12 months. I lost weight very quickly (and kept it off whilst I was obsessed with my diet). However, I wasn't overly happy at having to refrain from eating the odd chocolate bar, biscuit or a cake.

I have now relaxed my diet slightly and do eat things like chocolate puddings as part of my main meal. My weight has gone up by a couple of KG but I feel a lot happier and that's what counts I guess!

[Brocken]

I find if I keep active and do regular excersize I don't have to worry about what I eat, I just eat sensibly.

[awm]

5lab is actrually correct, I read that too. My guess is you have fat and lazy white blood cells if they never have to do anything. A little work now and then keeps tham trim and in shape.

[perlmode]

Actually milk is always bad for you. Infant formula, I could go on and on about. Basically, humans are the only species who drink the milk of another species with the exception of animals in the wild who are taken in by another species.

Your sister is right if that is what is working for her. If she is going to worry over eating "junk" food, then she should eat the way that makes her feel the best. I have been at both ends, and although I believe healthy eating is important. I think intense exercise can counteract bad dietary habits better than a healthy diet and sedentary lifestyle is.

[Dorza]

A good diet is the foundation of any exercise regime. I don't car what anyone says. If your serious about training you need to eat right. If you don't eat right you don't get the most out of your exercise.

To be able to do intense workouts often you have to get the right food stuffs inside you and binge on crap food rarely. Eating the right foods provides your body with all the nutrients it needs, to recover, repair, and go on from such exercise. The quality of fuel in helps determines the performance out, its a simple common sense approach. It can take me a good few days to recover if don't eat the correct foods. Its amazing what eating correctly can do for the recovery of ones body.

Eating properly is important however eating "junk" every now and then won't hurt, its good to satisfy the sweet area of your tongue, we wouldn't have it otherwise. A lot of the people i know who are really into their training take one day a week or the weekend as a free period, where they eat what they like, but they control them selfs enough to not be silly about it. Since their in the training mind set, they set them selfs up to work harder to work off what they binged on the day or two before.

The bottom line is eat sensibly and don't deprive your self of the foods you want, you'll end up binging on them. If your serious about training then eat even more sensibly.

[Annabelly]

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[Kezzer]

I take my healthy eating pretty seriously. I have about 7 or 8 pieces of fruit a day (proper pieces of fruit, not those crappy "has 3 servings of fruit in it" type things), I also drink 2 litres of water a day and I usually do three or four runs a week. As for bad foods, I don't drink coffee any more as I had seriously bad mood swings from it, caffeine seems to effect me really easily. I try not to eat too much chocolate, and if I do I typically have dark chocolate. As for other drinks, I tend to have some fizzy drinks at work lately which isn't like me, but my problem is that I like flavoured drinks a lot.

Think about it logically though, naturally the human body is supposed to get that kind of fruit intake as well as things like meat (despite me being a vegetarian). I wouldn't say there's such thing as going overboard and it means you'll be in shape all the time

[shaneyp]

The way to stay healthy is to excerise 6 hours a week and don't worry what you eat (of course it has ot be a balanced diet and not takeway everyday). Doing this i can afford to have a nice Chinese evryweek (not always chinese) and still build muscle etc. You need fat to stop your body "eating away" at your muscles when you get hungry or need energy.