Learn about five diet & nutrition mistakes made by many
1. “Low Fat” or “Fat Free” foods are probably not good for you.
There are a ton of products on the market that advertise as being “low fat” or “fat free”. There are some products out there that naturally fall into these categories, such as rice cakes or fruit. Those foods are fine, what you want to look out for are things that would normally have fat, but have been engineered to have reduced fat or no fat. Things like cookies, breakfast bars, brownies, etc. These items have probably had a ton of processed & artificial ingredients added to them so as to replace the texture of the missing fat.
Also it’s very important to realize that “Low Fat” or “Fat Free” foods can still make you fat. Fat is more easily stored in the body and will probably hit your thighs quicker than other sources of calories, but protein & carbohydrates contain calories which will convert to fat as well. So if you’re eating something that is “fat free”, but has 300 calories per serving, you’re really not doing yourself many favors. Continue reading “5 Diet & Nutrition Mistakes” »
An interesting study by Dr. Gerard E. Mullin(John Hopkins University) provides some evidence that vitamin D3 may be of some use to people dealing with Crohn’s Disease. Dr Mullin gave patients with Crohn’s disease a 1200 IU daily dose of vitamin D3 & tracked the results for 12 months. After those 12 months, of the 46 given the vitamin d3 dosage, only 13% showed a relapse with their Crohn’s Disease. The 48 patients who received a placebo saw a relapse rate of 29%. While the total number of patients was only 92, these results are still pretty impressive, especially given how simple oral vitamin D3 supplementation is.
Some news articles are stating that 1200 IU is a high dosage, really it’s not that high at all and is easily obtainable in supplement form. If you’re interested in buying some vitamin D3 supplements you might want to check out Now Foods 2000 IU Vitamin D3.
A recent study by the Boston School of Medicine has found that those who are dealing with Crohn’s Disease are more likely to be deficient in Vitamin D2 partially due to problems with absorbing it. The study found that those with Crohn’s had a absorption rate that was 30% lower than normal & approximately 70% of the patients had Vitamin D deficiencies. Vitamin D is often labeled as ‘the sunshine vitamin’ as it can be produced by the skin when exposed to sunlight or obtained from foods and/or in supplements.
If you’d like to try supplementing Vitamin D2 check out Now Foods’ 2000 IU Vitamin D2. Keep in mind that a lot of the Vitamin D on store or pharmacy shelves is Vitamin D3, not D2, so keep that in mind when buying a supplement.
You can review all the findings by reading the full study.
Vitamin D & Irritable Bowel Syndrome
Was browsing over @ IBSGroup.org & found a blog post by user ‘absoluterob’ about Vitamin D deficiency. It is an interesting post on how Vitamin D can help reduce inflammation. Vitamin D is known as ”the sunshine vitamin” since most people produce it naturally by being out in the sun. I don’t get a whole lot of sunlight during my day & a lot of people in the northern hemisphere probably don’t get a lot either. Besides helping with inflammation it also helps with mood. Seasonal Affective Disorder which is basically seasonal depression is suspected to be caused partially by a lack of sunlight/Vitamin D production. So overall it would seem like supplementing Vitamin D would be a wise idea. Continue reading “Vitamin D & Irritable Bowel Syndrome” »