The New Normal Exercising at Home Part 2

Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com

I absolutely love what the photo above says wake up and workout and ever since the pandemic started for some of us working out at home has become a part of our new normal routine. Last year I wrote part 1 to this blog post and it received some pretty good traction and so today since that blog post did so well I want to follow up with part 2 which is an at home workout video! Now I’m not saying I’m an expert when it comes to working out but I wanted to visually show you all some of the exercises I enjoy doing at home.

Join along with me! 14 minute video

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Portion Sizing Is it really necessary?

Photo by Any Lane on Pexels.com

Now as we are getting towards the end of the month into a new month the last thing that I would like to talk about in terms of dieting is portion sizing. Since January we have been talking about sugars, carbs ,  dieting and now portion sizing. The first question is how many of you actually take the time to do this? Portion sizing can seem a bit tedious to many people but it is actually is very important especially if you are trying to watch your weight or want to lose weight. As many of you know if you know if we do not do this the result will be overeating and weight gain.

For me I’ve been putting this into practice now more then ever because over the past two years I have gained a good amount of weight. The first tip that I would give when it comes to portion sizing is that in order to know what your portion size is you have to know what the serving size is. Well where do you find the serving size? I’m glad you asked! The serving size is found at the very top of a nutrition facts label. Your serving size tells you how much calories you will get out of one serving. Once you have figured out your serving size then you can portion size. Not everything comes with a nutrition facts label so you are going to have to do some extra research and there are a lot of apps that can track calories for you if your are unable to figure out the calorie and serving size. The next tip I would give is use your measuring tools to help you portion your food. For myself I used dry measuring cups to measure out most of my food. For example if the cereal box says 1 cup is the serving size I use my dry measuring cup to scoop it out not so bad!.

Now figuring out the portion sizes for other things such as meat and fish can be pretty tricky those things are usually measured by the ounce so I found some guides that use your hands to portion out your food. I will put that picture guide down below. Overall, portion sizing is really not that scary and easy to do so don’t run away from it be smart and portion!

I do not own this photo. This photo was found using a google search for free images
Check out my Youtube video on portioning

Why is sugar so bad? Sugar is not your friend

Photo by Polina Tankilevitch on Pexels.com

Well guys , it is the holidays and Christmas is literally less than four days away Whew! I know with everything that has been happening in 2020 we are looking forward to the holidays. One thing some of us look forward to is having our SWEETS! Yes I said it SWEETS. For most of us it all really starts with Thanksgiving, and we are not usually working on our summer bodies at this time. I always have a sweet and a lot of the time I have to remind myself to get that under control and not go overboard. With that being said now I will let you know all the reasons why sugar is not your friend:

1. Too much sugar consumption leaves the door open for many diseases and disorders

2.  Too much sugar in diet can cause you to crash and feel sluggish

3. Too much sugar in the diet opens the avenue to Type 2 Diabetes due to an excess in sugar in the body can lead to insulin resistance

4. More prone to cancer

5.Weight Gain

6. Heart Disease

7. Arthrosclerosis and so much more

Now that you know why sugar is not your friend , how are you going to work on limiting it in your diet? To start always read your nutritional facts label that is where you will find out how much sugar is in your food. Also keep in mind if a food item is more than one serving and you eat more than one you will consume more sugar per serving. Try other alternatives to sweetening your food such as honey, agave, and stevia. I’ve even heard now that there is coconut sugar ! It is recommended that men should have 37 grams or 9 teaspoons of sugar a day while women can have 25 grams or 6 teaspoons of sugar a day according to the American Heart Association. Now that is not a lot so you can see why controlling our sugar cravings is so important. Make sure this holiday not to splurge to much sweets but also enjoy what can in moderation. Happy Holidays! Stay Safe

Check out my Youtube Video on why Sugar is not your friend

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Blogmas Day 10 – Health and Wellness

Hey Everyone,

Lately on Youtube I have been seeing that everyone is doing Vlogmas and I love watching Vlogs. Since I am not on Youtube anymore and I am getting back into the groove of blogging I decided that I am going to do Blogmas! I thought that this would be interesting and get me used to writing more since I have been gone for a while. I am a bit late so I will be starting with day ten of Blogmas. I hope you all enjoy reading and Happy Holidays to All!

I say choose both because both are equally important and yes they both do mean different things. The real question I guess I want to ask is how well do we think we care of ourselves on a daily basis.  The definition of Health is “ the state of being free from disease or injury” and the definition of wellness is “ the state of being in good health, especially as an actively pursued goal” (see references below). 

Those definitions above is how health and wellness is defined by the World Health Organization but now I would like to break down how I view both. My definition of health goes beyond just the state of being free from disease or injury but it also deals with your mental health as well , how you think about yourself, how to do view the world or society, and how well do you cope in difficult life situations. I always viewed wellness as the ways in which you take care of yourself, such as eating right or a healthy balanced diet, being physically active, hygiene (hair , skin, and nails), and mental health such as yoga and meditation. All of these things are vital to us taking care of ourselves. 

It all starts with YOU. A lot of us carry habits from when we were younger into adulthood such as eating fast foods and many people do not know what it is like to exercise. I will admit I was never a big fan of exercising but as I entered into my mid 20’s my physical health changed and I became weaker. I also gained a lot of weight in my mid 20’s and when I did begin to exercise I struggled but it also felt so good. Every time that I would exercise and go to the gym it felt like my mind was being cleared and free. Then when I was diagnosed with LPR Acid Reflux that was the point that I started to take my nutrition health more seriously, even though I was studying nutrition sciences in school it took awhile for me to apply it towards myself.

Don’t wait until something happens to you to take care of yourself. Take preventive measures to make sure that you are in good health and maintaining homeostasis. Take control of your life and your health!

Reference Links:  

Definition of Health : https://www.who.int/about/who-we-are/constitution

Definition of Wellness: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/wellness