Do these detox diets actually work?

Have you ever done any of these detox diets? I personally tried some of those green juice diets but must admit I never felt much better.
Maybe I should not have given up so fast and keep at it but still I remain skeptical.
Below is an article on this very subject that might interest you too:

Does a Detox Diet Really Cleanse Anything?

Toxins can damage your organs, sap your bones of calcium, increase your body’s inflammation, and reduce your ability to fight off cancer.

Meanwhile, detox diets—from juice fasts to intestinal cleanses to strict elimination diets—promise to rid the body of toxins to help you drop pounds, reduce your risk of disease, increase your energy, and give you better skin.

“But all experts in modern medicine know this is a scientifically ridiculous concept,” says Brian Quebbemann, M.D., a bariatric surgeon with the Chapman Medical Center in California and president of The N.E.W. Program in Newport Beach.

“The human body itself is a powerful detoxification machine. It uses numerous sophisticated physiologic systems to prevent toxic substances from hurting our bodies,” Quebbemann says. Before toxins such as alcohol, excessive caffeine, phosphoric acid from carbonated beverages, vegetable oil, or even metals reach your blood stream, intestinal enzymes modify many of them to detoxify them or prevent their absorption. And if they do enter your blood stream, your liver and kidneys can pretty much take care of them.

Still, it’s worth mentioning that the liver can sometimes fall short—as is the case in people with liver disease—and toxic substances can accumulate in the liver and other organs. But there’s no evidence that a detox diet can do anything to prevent or treat liver disease…

Read on:https://www.yahoo.com/health/does-a-detox-diet-really-cleanse-anything-121691191610.html

The Risks of Exercising Too Much

As we touched on in your introduction, exercising too much can come from an emotional and physical addiction, or from simply overtraining.

And unfortunately, too much of a good thing can be a bad thing. That is the situation with the physical stress that you put on your body will work out.

Do not get us wrong. Your body needs exercise for you to live a long, healthy life. When you stress your muscles and expend moderate to intense levels of physical exertion, your body begins to heal stronger and healthier after that workout is over. This is a simple physiological process that allows human beings to adapt to adverse conditions.

And at one level it is very healthy. But unfortunately, some fitness fans get caught up in the process, either through addiction or accidentally.

Extreme exercise can lead to the following risks and conditions:

• Rhabdomyolysis
• Heart attack
• Shorter lifespan
• Heart diseases
• Weakened immunity system
• Damaged muscles and tendons
• Stroke
• Irregular heart rhythm
• Altered sense of reality

Rhabdomyolysis is a physical disorder where your muscles begin to break down. Instead of repairing themselves stronger and healthier, they release the natural components that they are composed of. Your muscle cell membranes are damaged, as is those infected muscles’ ability to produce energy.

This is a disorder that is frequently associated with CrossFit training. But make no mistake about it. This debilitating and physically crushing impairment can come about if you exercise too hard, using any particular fitness regimen.

The list of heart problems shown above is just the tip of the iceberg as far as the dangers of overexercising are concerned. Mental and emotional damage can also occur. Those who become addicted to working out can suffer from an incorrect perception of themselves, their bodies and the world around them.

This it leads to problems with relationships at home and at work, and often times an inability to function as a “normal” member of society. From the brain to the body, inside and out, the dangers of overtraining are widely known. How do you know if you may be putting your health and life at jeopardy when it comes to physical fitness? Let’s find out.

10 Signs That You’re Exercising Too Much

Understanding that overdoing it in the gym or with your fitness program is a great start to keeping yourself strong and healthy. But knowledge is not enough. You have to take smart action based on that knowledge. The first thing you need to know is if indeed you are exercising too much. If any of the following 10 signs seem familiar to you, you just may be addicted to exercise, or accidentally overdoing it.

1 – You exercise for emotional reasons, not physical ones.

Your body releases “feel good” chemicals during periods of physical stress. This includes when you work out. For some, this may be the only area of their life where they feel successful. This could lead you to workout in response to emotional triggers. And if you answer your feelings with exercise too frequently, you suffer the physical and mental risks discussed in the previous chapter.

2 – You feel wiped out instead of vitalized.

The proper amount of exercise should leave you feeling challenged and tested, but alert and energized as well. The old adage “no pain, no gain” is not healthy, and neither are you if you always work out to the point of exhaustion.

3 – You catch colds and flus easily.

This is a classic symptom of someone who exercises way too much. What happens is, you beat down your immune system. You are training so frequently, your body’s defense system cannot keep up. When a cold, flu or virus comes along, your weakened immunity against infection means that you get sick quickly, and it takes you longer than normal to get better.

4 – Your sleep patterns are not normal.

The stress you cause your body and mind when you push yourself too hard can definitely affect how much sleep you get. In some, the negative impact of overtraining can cause the desire to sleep forever. In others, the inability to fall to sleep is a sign that they are exercising too frequently.

5 – You have a short temper.

When your body is over-stressed, over-trained and over-worked, your brain starts to give you signals that you need to slow down. When you do not respond by lowering the frequency and intensity of your workouts, an inclination for hair-trigger emotional outbursts can be the result.

6 – Your muscles always feel sore, for days on end.

Proper exercising benefits your body through a tear-down and repair cycle. That is why you should never train the same muscle group on back-to-back days. If you feel sore all the time, this could be due to over-training.

7 – You exercise when you are tired, or even sick.

Your body will tell you when you should and should not exercise, sleep or engage in any other activity, if you just listen to it. Never exercise when you are physically sick or exhausted. Your body is in no shape to take the physical stress exercise delivers.

8 – You suffer from a guilty complex when you do not workout daily.

If you skip a workout every now and then, do not beat yourself up. And if you are suffering from pangs of guilt and anxiety because you do not work out 7 days a week, you are probably over-training yourself.

9 – Your self-esteem is attached to how often you workout.

You should never judge your day or your life as bad or good based on how much you exercise. This is where dangerous addiction can begin to develop, as you treat your feelings of low self-worth with more exercise.

10 – You arrange your life around exercise, rather than the other way around.

Do you arrange and cancel work meetings, social outings and other life experiences around your workout regimen? To some extent, this is just dedication. But when you take it too far, your coworkers, friends and family members will let you know that you are probably exercising too often.

Did you identify any warning signs that you may be doing your body more harm than good because of your exercise? If so, it is important that you know the reason why you are overexercising. It is only then that you can take the proper steps to regain control over a smart and healthy workout program.

Do you have Pre-Diabetes?

Do you have pre diabetes? Well if you’re genetically predisposed and seriously overweight chances are that may well be the case, First thing to do is to see your doctor and get the related checkup and if that confirms you are than you shouldn’t despair because fortunately prediabetes can often be reversed or staved off with exercise and the right diet:

You Have Prediabetes – Now What?

Robin Dorsey’s grandparents, mother, siblings and cousins have all had diabetes. She was the lucky one who escaped the grasp of the chronic disease that’s expected to impact 1 in 3 Americans by 2050 – until she became pregnant at age 29. That’s when hormonal changes pushed her body into a state of prediabetes, setting the stage for the full-blown variety, Dorsey says.

Prediabetes wasn’t just bad luck. Dorsey, now 37, was genetically predisposed. Because her mother had Type 2 diabetes, Dorsey’s risk for developing diabetes was already 1 in 7, according to the American Diabetes Association. Some researchers believe the risk is greater if both parents have Type 2 diabetes. The ADA also reports that 86 million Americans age 20 and older had prediabetes in 2012, up from 79 million in 2010.

There aren’t any particular symptoms of prediabetes beyond having blood glucose levels that are higher than average. This elevation in blood sugar – also called glycated hemoglobin or HbA1c in technical terms – is often not high enough to be considered Type 2 diabetes, says Dr. Margaret Powers of the International Diabetes Center at Park Nicollet in Minneapolis.

People without diabetes have a normal HbA1c reading of 5.7 percent; those with prediabetes often have a range of 5.7 to 6.4 percent. Beyond that is full-blown diabetes, according to the ADA’s website.

People who are overweight, inactive or have a family history of diabetes have the greatest risk of developing prediabetes. Importantly, Powers adds: “If somebody is diagnosed [with pre-diabetes], it doesn’t mean they will get diabetes, but it does mean they’re at a higher risk than someone without diabetes.”

Read on: https://health.usnews.com/health-news/patient-advice/articles/2015/06/23/you-have-prediabetes-now-what

What you should know about Detox Teas

Have you tried any of these detox teas yet, I did and must admit not having been impressed by the effect on my waistline. Funny thing is one tends to buy these also because they’re supposed to be good for your health but are they? I suggest you read the story below before you do that:

5 Things You Should Know About Detox Teas

So-called “detox” teas have been popular for years, primarily among people who frequent health-food stores, or consult with alternative practitioners. These days, though, they’ve become big business, and a handful of celebrities are touting their weight-loss benefits on social media. In a way, detox teas have become the liquid version of waist trainers–the before and after results are often dramatic, and their celeb backing generates buzz, but you may be wondering: Do they really work, and are they safe? Before you plunk down your hard-earned money and start sipping, here are five things you should know.

You still have to diet and exercise for them to work
One detox tea brand, recently Instagrammed by Amber Rose, advises per their website that for “best results,” the tea should be consumed along with plenty of water, healthy, balanced meals, and three to five workouts a week. Another, which has been Instagrammed by several celebs, including Kourtney Kardashian, Christina Milian, and Hilary Duff, states online that the tea “…is recommended to be taken in conjunction with a healthy energy-controlled diet and regular exercise” and the website offers an accompanying meal plan for sale. Personally, I’d love to see a study comparing outcomes generated by a detox tea compared to a placebo, with both groups following the exact same eating plan, but I haven’t found any. That makes it difficult to know whether the weight-loss results people are getting from these teas are actually due to drinking them, or simply the result of a cleaned-up diet and consistent workout routine, which we already know can lead to weight loss. In any case, simply sipping detox tea while continuing to skip the gym and order takeout is unlikely to help you shrink your shape. ;

Here’s the link to the full story in case you’d like  to read on:
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/healthcom/5-things-you-should-know_b_7648864.html

How to Define Heart Disease

Do you ever get nervous about your heart health? I definitely do especially since I’m somewhat overweight, don’t have perfect blood pressure levels and probably not exercising enough.

But how do you define Heart Disease? Read below how John Bisognano (md.phd ) who’s  a preventive cardiologist and director of outpatient cardiology care sums, lays it out for us:

People often equate heart disease with heart attacks, but they’re not one and the same. While heart attacks occur because of heart disease, heart disease is a broad term for many conditions that can raise your risk of stroke or heart failure.

1. Coronary artery disease

Coronary artery disease (CAD) occurs when plaque (cholesterol and fat deposits) builds up in the arteries that supply oxygen-rich blood to the heart. The plaque causes arteries to narrow, slowing or preventing the flow of blood. When our hearts don’t get enough blood, the resulting pain is called angina. If the artery is completely blocked, it can cause a heart attack.

Many times people learn they have this condition after they’ve experienced a heart attack. Doctors assess your risk of CAD by checking cholesterol, blood pressure and blood glucose levels and reviewing your family’s history of heart disease. If you’re at risk, your physician will likely prescribe inexpensive medications to lower your blood pressure, cholesterol and glucose levels, and closely monitor your condition.

Tests to check for CAD include electrocardiogram (EKG), exercise stress test, chest x-ray, angiogram and cardiac catheterization.

2. Hypertension

Hypertension, or high blood pressure, is a silent disease. One in five Americans have it and don’t know it. That’s why doctors make a habit of using the arm cuff to check our patients’ levels as often as we can, looking closely at both the top and bottom numbers. This is important because when the force of blood pressing against the walls of your arteries is elevated, it raises the heart’s workload and can cause serious damage to the arteries as well as the heart…

Read on at this link:https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/patients-families/health-matters/june-2015/defining-heart-disease.aspx

For pain relief head to the kitchen

When you’re in pain you automatically walk over to your medicine cabinet for your favorite painkillers but here’s a story that might have you change that habit especially since it might get you better results:
A lot of people live with pain, from chronic conditions like arthritis or joint pain, or maybe from starting a new exercise.
Instead of heading for the medicine cabinet to grab some aspirin you could try looking in your kitchen cabinet.

As cbs2’s emily smith explained, there are things in your kitchen that can help you feel better.
Teri rogacki is 34, but her rheumatoid arthritis and lupus had her in excruciating pain.
“It was awful. I felt like i was 90-years-old waking up every morning. It took me at least 45 minutes to get out of bed,” she said.
When traditional medicine didn’t work, rogacki tried tart cherry juice every day on the recommendation of dietician leslie bonci, and it worked.
“Thirty days later, my pain was gone. Completely gone,” she said.
The key is, it has to be tart, and you have to drink it every day; 8 oz. Of juice or one tablespoon of the concentrate.
Bonci said it’s just one of many food products that can reduce pain.

Saffron has been used for centuries.

“This is like gold. Very, very costly, because it’s very, very rare,” she said.
Saffron adds unique flavor to foods, but it can also be taken as a supplement.

Here’s the link to the original story

10,000 Steps Isn’t The Magic Number For Fitness Trackers

Are you using any of these fitness trackers? Well I must admit that using apps like Runkeeper to track my biking is really useful and that’s in spite of having one of those VDO cycle computers. You get all sorts of interesting data which does somehow motivate you to try and outperform your previous session. and just in case you were wondering, you can perfectly manage with the free version.

below is an interesting story on this topic:

Why 10,000 Steps Isn’t The Magic Number For Fitness Trackers

The rise of wearable fitness technology is something of a paradox. The surge in popularity of devices that monitor the amount of exercise you do suggest more people than ever are interested in maintaining regular fitness regimes. Just witness the success of the company behind fitness tracking bracelet Fitbit, which investors have just deemed worth $US4.1bn after it floated on the stock market. Yet this comes at a time when physical inactivity has reached levels of global pandemic proportion.

This shows how important it is that the public understand and follow science-based health and behavior advice. The advantage of wearable fitness technology is that it can provide a way for personalized data to shape how much extra physical activity (including exercise) a person needs to do and when.

The well-publicized recommendation to take “10,000 steps a day” is a perfect example. The figure actually originates from Japanese walking clubs and a marketing slogan for pedometers more than 40 years ago. But step counts have been shown to provide a reliable measure of daily activity in healthy adults. They also provide a meaningful everyday metric that allows individuals to self-monitor their physical activity and walking.

The self-monitoring (observing and evaluating one’s behavior) and goal setting that come with devices like Fitbit are two of the most complementary and potent ways of changing people’s physical activity behavior. Combining activity trackers, which allow the wearer to observe their steps in real-time and review at their leisure, with goals such as walking 10,000 steps can make people more motivated and more able to increase or maintain their physical activity levels..

Click here in case you want to read the original story

How Meditation can relieve irritable bowel syndrome and inflammatory bowel disease

As you may know meditation is credited with all sorts of benefits including the improvement of energy levels, reduction of stress levels, increase in creativity etc, which you will agree, would be sufficient to  seriously consider having a closer look but now there’s a study that also shows meditation may actually relieve IBS and IBD as well, see below:
Meditation may relieve IBS and IBD
Researchers found the relaxation response showed improvements in the two gastrointestinal disorders

A pilot study has found that participating in a nine-week training program including elicitation of the relaxation response had a significant impact on clinical symptoms of the gastrointestinal disorders irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and on the expression of genes related to inflammation and the body’s response to stress.

The report from investigators at the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), both Harvard affiliates, is the first to study the use of the relaxation response in these disorders and the first to investigate the genomic effects of the relaxation response in individuals with any disorder. The report was published in the open-access journal PLOS ONE.

“Our results suggest exciting possibilities for further developing and implementing this treatment in a wider group of patients with gastrointestinal illness,” said Braden Kuo of the gastrointestinal unit in the MGH Department of Medicine, co-lead author of the report.

“Several studies have found that stress management techniques and other psychological interventions can help patients with IBS, at least in the short term; and while the evidence for IBD is less apparent, some studies have suggested potential benefits. What is novel about our study is demonstration of the impact of a mind/body intervention on the genes controlling inflammatory factors that are known to play a major role in IBD and possibly in IBS,” said Kuo, who is also a Harvard Medical School assistant professor of medicine..

Click here if you want to read the whole article

Poor Sleep Can Harm Your Heart Health, Too

How many hours of sleep do you put in? I always try for a minimum of 7 hours and since the alarm goes off at 6am I need to be in bed by 11pm.This doesn’t bother me at all for when  you get up at 6 you’ll be quite tired 17 hours later.

Anyway have a look at this interesting story about how a lack of sleep can have a serious effect on your heart health too!

Poor Sleep Can Harm Your Heart Health, Too

Bad news for those who don’t catch enough Z’s on a nightly basis: Poor sleep increases the likelihood that you’ll suffer a heart attack or stroke.

Valery Gafarov, a professor of cardiology at the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences, shared the findings of his recent study at a medical conference on Monday. The results, he said, highlight how poor sleep should be considered a risk factor for cardiovascular disease in addition to smoking, inactivity and an unhealthy diet.

The Background
Sleep deprivation currently affects more than one third of both men and women in the United States, contributing to health problems like obesity, diabetes, memory loss and even cancer. And now we have further evidence that heart health is also jeopardized by failing to rest well each day.

The Setup
Gafarov’s research, which was a part of the World Health Organization program Multinational Monitoring of Trends and Determinants in Cardiovascular Disease, used a representative sample of 657 men between the ages of 25 and 64 to investigate the relationship between poor sleep and their long-term risk of stroke or heart attack. The study began in 1994, using the Jenkins Sleep Scale to assess participants’ sleep quality. The ratings “very bad,” “bad,” and “poor” were qualifiers for sleep disorders. Gafarov then monitored each subject over the next 14 years, recording any cases of myocardial infarction during that time.

“Until now,” he said at the conference, “there has not been a population based cohort study examining the impact of sleep disorders on the development of a heart attack or stroke.”

Here’s the link to the original article:https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/19/poor-sleep-affects-heart-health_n_7598126.html

5 Tips to Make the Transition to Clean Eating Easier

Clean eating might be easier for some people if they already have a fairly healthy way of eating. But for others, transitioning to clean eating can be as jarring as a physical move from one state to another.

There will be a little bit of an adjustment period as well as a conscious awareness to step away from bad choices. First, you need to eat between five and six times a day to make it easier on your body.

This will keep your energy up and your desire to snack down. It can also help you eliminate the cravings for foods that aren’t good for you. There are four things you need to make sure you have with your meals and snacks when you’re practicing clean eating.

Make sure that you have a protein, a fruit and a vegetable – and with meals, a complex carb. The protein will help you keep your energy level up. It doesn’t have to be something big.

For example, if you need a protein with your snack, then opt for a serving of unsalted, unprocessed nuts. Second, make label reading an automatic part of your shopping.

Remember that the more ingredients that are listed on the label, the further away from clean eating the food will end up being. When you’re choosing clean eating, there should only be one (at the most two) things listed on the side of the can or bag.

Watch labels for potassium bromate, artificial sweeteners, trans fat, food dyes, BHA and BHT, monosodium glutamate and avoid these ingredients. If it’s possible for you to choose organic food products, then do that.

As part of a clean eating plan, organic foods are free of harmful pesticides and GMOs, both of which can be harmful to your health. Third, make sure that you get plenty of water.

Clean eating means making sure that you’re maintaining a healthy water intake. You should have at least sixty four ounces of water a day. Fourth, if possible, get the entire family involved in clean eating.

Not only will this make it easier for you, but it’s healthier for them, too. If you start kids out on healthy eating plan when they’re younger, they’ll already know how to make good choices when they’re older.

Fifth, because clean eating can be a little bit more time consuming than just grabbing that processed food at the store, you’ll want to find ways to make it easy to stick to this way of eating.

One of the ways that you can do that is to package the foods that you eat yourself. This means that you can go ahead and chop, cut or cook the foods in advance so that on those days when you’re short on time, you can grab something that’s healthy and stick with your plan.

Click Here for more useful information about Clean Eating