Healthy Eating For Kids

Getting kids to eat healthy can be quite a challenge. Children seem to abide the rules of ‘bad things taste good, good things taste bad,’ and ‘eat things that taste good.’ Even adults fall into this pattern often, but it’s important for everyone to eat a healthy diet. It’s especially important for kids because they are still in the stages of developmental growth and how they take care of their health when they’re young can strongly impact how healthy they grow up to be as adults. Parents should be informed about healthy eating for kids so that they provide their children with what’s good for them.

Healthy eating for kids includes components from all parts of the food pyramid. Balance is key, too much consumption in one area can have negative health consequences. This is especially true of fats, salts and sugars. And while substances like protein nourish our bodies and are generally good for us, an excess of protein can put more stress on the body and lead to the buildup of fat. So a healthy diet for kids is low in fat, salts and sugars and it has a substantial, but not excessive amount of things like protein, calcium, carbohydrates and iron. Kids should eat enough grain and plenty of vegetables and fruits. And it’s okay to treat your children once in a while, but make sure to keep it occasional.

Make sure that your kids have breakfast. Kids need energy to get through the day, and kids who don’t have breakfast are likely to overeat later in the day. Studies suggest that kids who eat breakfast perform better at school and have lower levels of cholesterol, lower weight and less illness. Kids should eat a balanced breakfast that includes carbs, calcium and fruits. A bowl of (not too sugary) cereal with a banana or a waffle with fruit and yogurt are both good breakfast foods for kids.

But while maintaining a healthy diet has great benefits, these benefits can diminish if they aren’t supplemented with exercise. Healthy eating for kids includes healthy physical activity for kids. Eating healthy won’t do your children a whole lot of good if they’re sitting in front of the TV all day. Healthy eating for kids also starts with healthy eating for parents. Parents eating habits heavily influence how and what their kids eat. Set a good example and make healthy eating a family activity.

Advanced Nutrients

The body is remarkably resourceful. It takes what it gets and it does the best that it can. Many take vitamins because they know they aren’t eating like they should, but even some of those people are taking too much. What they don’t realize is that when they are taking too much, the liver must work overtime to rid the body of what it can not use. Unlike storing energy for later, the body can not store vitamins. If they are not useful, they are discarded. Those who take advanced nutrients might be doing more harm than good.

Between foods and vitamins, it is hard to know if we are getting what we need, or if we are overdoing it. The average person might need a multivitamin, but that is about all they need. If they are taking advanced nutrients, they may be overloading their liver, making it work harder than it has to. Even those that eat very poorly might be surprised to find out that they really don’t need all of those extra things you can get when you stock up on advanced nutrients. Not only could these harm the body, they can drain the pocketbook needlessly.

There are some who will benefit from advanced nutrients in many forms. Children are often ones who have problems with eating, and they can get some benefit. Athletes are often in need of something a little extra, though not all of them will need this. High school children are probably okay with a good, balanced diet and a vitamin, but those who train all day and play professionally might need something extra in the form of advance nutrients. Others with some diseases and illnesses might also benefit.

However, this is not something the average person can ascertain for themselves. When someone wishes to take advanced nutrients for any reason, they should have a long talk with their doctor about the possibility. It might even be wise to go over a persons average menu to see what might be missing. A change in diet might negate the need to spend money on and taking advanced nutrients. A doctor knows the score, and they can recommend what you need while looking out for a persons health all at the same time. A nutritionist can also help, and might be even more helpful than a doctor at times. As long as someone is keeping an eye on things, everything should be just fine.

Teens Losing Weight

Teens losing weight need an understanding of good nutrition and plenty of common sense!

Teens are particularly sensitive about their weight. If you’ve indulged in too many sweets, junk foods, soda and fried foods as a child and pre-teen, you may now be looking with dismay at some legitimately extra pounds that you don’t want! On the other hand, you may be of a normal weight, but be of the ’skinnier-the-better’ mind set. In either case, you’ll first want to consult your physician to see how much, if any, weight you need. Often, teens losing weight simply embark on a program of their own making, lacking an understanding of basic nutritional concepts and also, perhaps some common sense.

Surely your Mom has pushed the balanced diet theory on you, fixing nutritious meals, ‘for your own good’. However, the snacks of candy bars and soda at school and maybe a bag of fries on the way home, have caught up to you now. Young kids burn a lot more energy, riding their bikes, playing at the playground and other strenuous activities you no longer do on a regular basis. So, if your physician agrees that you should lose 10 pounds, it’s probably sound advice. Getting and staying fit and trim is far easier to do when you’re young than it is once those pounds are firmly entrenched! So teens losing weight under responsible guidance can give you an advantage for life.

On the other hand, some teens should not be trying to lose weight. Let’s say that you’re 5′6″ tall and weight 120 pounds, but the image you see in the mirror says ‘You’re overweight.’ This is a psychological misconception. If your doc tells you that your weight is normal, believe it. Dieting will only rob your body of nutrition required to keep you developing normally. If you nonetheless continue feeling ‘fat’, let your doctor or Mom know. You might need to adjust your perceptions of your physical image through counseling.

Sometimes, as an adolescent, your rate of metabolism may change, slowing down from what it was as a kid. This is another reason for a seemingly sudden gain in weight. This means that when you were a kid, you could get away with the candy, sodas and fries, never gaining a pound. Teens losing weight so often take a radical approach, cutting their calories dramatically, thinking this is the only answer. In this instance, a better approach might be to simply cut out the junk foods, for the most part, and instead load up on the healthy foods to your hearts content. You may shed all the weight necessary, using the less sugar, less fat strategy.

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What is a Balanced Diet?

I have often heard that the key to good health and fitness is combining regular exercise with a balanced diet. Sounds easy enough, but when I stop and think about it, what exactly is a balanced diet?

When I was a child, they told me there were four food groups. Eating well meant eating an equal amount from each food group, I suppose. Actually, they were never very clear about that. The food groups seemed to be more about categorizing food items than about eating a balanced diet. But four is such a balanced number, so somehow it made sense, at the time.

By the time I became an adult and actually had to start caring about nutrition and a balanced diet, the four food groups were a thing of the past. Instead, we had the food pyramid, again a very balanced graphic representation of food. Pyramids don’t fall over, after all. They are well balanced. The food pyramid indicated that bread and other carbohydrates should make up the bulk of our diet. Hence it was at the bottom of the pyramid. Above carbohydrates on the pyramid were proteins, then at the top were fats and sugars. So instead of eating the same amount of each food group, now we were to understand that a balanced diet demanded that we favor breads, cereals, pasta and rice.

Of course, that notion of the balanced diet went out the window pretty quickly, when we were told by diet experts that carbs were the enemy. Eating all those starches would make us fat, the new wisdom dictated. We wanted to eat protein and fat, and lots of it. At least, that’s what the Atkins diet recommended. On the other hand, some experts claimed that we should eat a diet made up of 40% carbs, 30% protein and 30% fat. Sounds quite balanced, doesn’s it? Then the South Beach Diet came out, and insisted that not all carbs are equal. We must eat only low glycemic carbs, whatever that means! According to that approach, the balance in a balanced diet has nothing to do with food groups and everything to do with something called the glycemic index. It was getting too complicated for me.

After years of experimenting with every kind of balance, I’ve discovered that eating a balanced diet is not complicated at all. It just means that you don’t eat too much of any one thing, and you don’t completely cut out any one thing. You know that wisdom your mother and grandmother taught you, so many years ago? Eat your vegetables. Don’t snack between meals. Don’t pig out. Skip dessert most of the time. Next thing you know, you find that your’e eating a balanced diet after all.

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