BBQ Season!

Appraising Your Success
The end of the week is a good time to review the past week of your SWEET Life and count up your accomplishments. Your goal is 5-6 times per week for each aspect of the SWEET Life: Sleep, Water, Eating, Exercise, and Tranquility. If you didn’t achieve some of your goals for the week, then next week, focus on those areas more and think about how to fulfill them more consistently.
How do you feel at the end of this week? Are you better rested? Do you feel relaxed? Are you more energetic? Do you feel generally healthier? Continue with the SWEET Life and you’ll experience all of these feelings!

Topic of the Week – BBQ Season!

Memorial Day Weekend is the unofficial beginning of the summer and barbeque season. That conjures up images of hot days, grilling meat, hanging out with friends, and drinking beer. Ironically, I don’t think meat and beer are great on a hot day because they are filling and heavy. I’d much rather have a cool salad and lemonade (with mango rum) on a hot day, but those aren’t the images we have when thinking: bbq. Because bbq’s generally involve lots of meat and beer, how can we enjoy ourselves at a bbq and still live the SWEET Life?

First, a little aside: always wear sunscreen. Apply it 30 min. before going out in the sun and reapply every couple hours.

Now, back to bbqs:

SLEEP: Hanging out in the sun, eating heavy foods, and drinking alcohol make us tired, so sleeping after a bbq is not a problem.

WATER: It’s very easy to get dehydrated at a bbq because you are outside in the sun, drinking alcohol. Try to alternate beer with a glass of water or drink a cup of water every hour you are there.

EATING: This is what a bbq is all about! I always try to bring either fruit or vegetables to a bbq because those are usually lacking. Some easy things to bring are a green salad, a fruit salad, veggies sticks & hummus dip, veggies to grill, or corn.

In order not to go overboard on eating at a bbq, especially at a potluck bbq, it’s important to have a game plan. You don’t want to feel deprived or “dieting”, but you don’t want to regret what you eat either. If it’s a simple bbq with 4-5 dishes, I’ll take a little scoop of each and enjoy my meal. On the other hand, if it’s a potluck and there are many delectable dishes to choose from, I have to set stricter limits because eating a scoop of 10-15 dishes is a huge amount of food!

1. I don’t limit fruits and vegetables, because no one got fat eating fruits and vegetables.

2. I limit myself to one serving of meat, which means I might have to select from a variety of them. What’s a serving? A serving of meat is the size of the palm of your hand. If it’s tough to decide which meat, I’ll eat one I haven’t eaten for a while. (I do that at restaurants, too.) I might take a half-serving of a couple meats instead.

3. I limit myself to a couple servings of grains, like one hamburger bun, a few slices of French bread, or a scoop of pasta salad.

4. I don’t really think of dairy and bbq, but I do like cheese on my burgers. Cubes of cheese or a cheese plate with French bread or crackers is common at some bbqs, but I remember that a one-inch cube of cheese is a 1 oz. serving and about 100 calories! I need to pay attention to how many of those I’m popping in my mouth!

5. All the unhealthy stuff: I’ll eat a couple bites of anything that looks really appealing. However, I don’t take a little of everything “just to be polite” and I don’t eat anything that doesn’t taste good on the first bite. It’s amazing how much we eat just because “it’s there.” Remember: you are not a garbage disposer!

EXERCISE: Bbqs don’t involve any exercise besides putting fork to mouth, and since they tend to be calorie-heavy meals, it’s a good idea to burn off some calories ahead of time. If you decide, instead, to burn off the calories after the bbq, with all that protein in your body, you are ready for a good strength-training workout.

TRANQUILITY: Bbqs are all about tranquility: hanging out with friends and being outside on a beautiful day are great ways to release stress and relax.

Welcome to bbq season! Enjoy!

Look for another topic next week, and keep living the SWEET Life!

Suzanne
Weekly Encouragement history: http://sweetlifeweekly.blogspot.com/
The SWEET Life of Suzanne blog: http://thesweetlifeofsuzanne.blogspot.com/
Website: http://livingthesweetlife.net/

Copyright © 2008 Suzanne Fong. All rights reserved.

Appraising Your Success
The end of the week is a good time to review the past week of your SWEET Life and count up your accomplishments. Your goal is 5-6 times per week for each aspect of the SWEET Life: Sleep, Water, Eating, Exercise, and Tranquility. If you didn’t achieve some of your goals for the week, then next week, focus on those areas more and think about how to fulfill them more consistently.
How do you feel at the end of this week? Are you better rested? Do you feel relaxed? Are you more energetic? Do you feel generally healthier? Continue with the SWEET Life and you’ll experience all of these feelings!

Topic of the week– Chocolate’s Health Benefits

Since Valentine’s Day is this week I thought I’d write about chocolate. Besides, I love chocolate! If you love chocolate as much as I do, you know there has been recent research showing that it provides certain health benefits.

Chocolate contains flavanols, which, studies have shown, lower blood pressure, increase blood flow and promote a healthier heart. It’s also high in antioxidants, which attack cancer-causing free radicals. These flavanols are present in higher quantities in dark chocolate than in other types of chocolate. However, processing kills the flavanols, so producers are developing new methods to preserve the flavanols during processing.

Different studies use different types of chocolate and different quantities. For example, one study used one cup of hot cocoa, another used 30 g of dark vs. white chocolate, and yet another used 100 g of dark vs. milk chocolate. A typical American candy bar is about 2 oz. or 60 g. All the studies I read concluded that dark chocolate has more health benefits than milk or white chocolate and that the unhealthy, saturated fat in chocolate candy definitely compensates for any health benefits. However, hot cocoa made with water or skim milk contains almost no saturated fat.

In the end, it goes back to two things I always say: everything in moderation, and if you’re going to eat chocolate, make it good quality chocolate! Although the studies did not discuss the quality of the chocolate, high quality chocolate contains higher quantities of cocoa liquor and cocoa butter, no corn syrup and partially-hydrogenated oil and fewer preservatives and chemicals.

I think you’ll agree that very good quality, dark chocolate in a smaller amount is much better than a lot of cheap chocolate! Make sure your sweetie knows this before buying your Valentine’s chocolates!

At the same time, flowers and a hand-written card are calorie and fat free, and the card lasts forever.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chocolate#Chocolate_liquor

http://www.chocolate.org/health/antioxidants.html

http://www.immunesupport.com/library/showarticle.cfm/ID/3464/

http://www.medicationsense.com/articles/july_sept_03/chocolate.html

Look for another topic next week, and keep living the SWEET Life!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Suzanne

How to Have a SWEET Christmas

Appraising Your Success
The end of the week is a good time to review the past week of your SWEET Life and count up your accomplishments. Your goal is 5-6 times per week for each aspect of the SWEET Life: Sleep, Water, Eating, Exercise, and Tranquility. If you didn’t achieve some of your goals for the week, then next week, focus on those areas more and think about how to fulfill them more consistently.
How do you feel at the end of this week? Are you better rested? Do you feel relaxed? Are you more energetic? Do you feel generally healthier? Continue with the SWEET Life and you’ll experience all of these feelings!

Topic of the week - How to Have a SWEET Christmas

Here, I expose my religious orientation, which is Christian. If you do not celebrate Christmas, you might be able to apply these ideas to a holiday that you do celebrate. If you do celebrate Christmas, here are some suggestions for how to have a SWEET Merry Christmas.

Sleep
If you have kids, tell them to go to bed early because the earlier they to go sleep, the earlier Santa will come. Also tell them they can’t leave their bedrooms until it’s light outside (~7:00 a.m.). Once it’s light, they should wake you up and only open their stockings before you are there (or whatever other restrictions you want to set). At the same time, you should also have your visit with Santa as early as possible (remember, gifts from Santa aren’t necessarily wrapped) so that you can go to bed early too. And don’t eat Santa’s cookies & milk just before bed because the sugar could give you strange dreams and disrupt your sleep.

Water
It’s easy to forget and to be too busy to drink water on Christmas day. Here are a few suggestions that might help you remember to hydrate yourself:
· Drink water each time you eat
· Drink water between alcoholic drinks
· If you’ll be at your own home, have a cup in the bathroom and drink some water each time you go in there.

Eating
Don’t “save up” and only eat Christmas dinner because of the “interest” that accrues when you starve yourself. You always hear that you’ll eat more at that one meal if you starve yourself beforehand. Well, I always thought that made sense because the extra calories at that one meal make up for not eating breakfast or lunch. However, what actually happens is that you “accrue interest” and end up eating more total daily calories and more fat, salt and sugar calories when you starve yourself then gorge yourself on one meal. Besides that, you will feel stuffed and uncomfortable for several hours after eating a huge meal.

Now that I’ve convinced you not to starve yourself all Christmas day, be conscientious to eat nutritiously during the other meals of the day. Eat small, simple meals of fruits and veggies and whole grains. These foods have a low glycemic index and a high nutrient content, which means they will keep your blood sugar (i.e., energy) level consistent and add the vitamins and minerals that you might miss in your big, Christmas dinner.

At the same time, and most importantly, enjoy your Christmas dinner! Like I said at Thanksgiving, serve yourself just a few bites-worth of each dish. If you don’t like something, don’t waste stomach space and calories by eating it. Just leave the rest, which will only be 1-2 bites-worth anyway. Holiday feasts tend to be high in protein, fat and high-calorie, low-nutrient carbs. Therefore, load up on any fruits and veggies that you can to get some balance in your nutritional load.

Another way to help control your eating is to wear close-fitting clothes with a belt to prevent yourself from eating too much. Remember the Hawaiians: they wore loose-fitting muumuus and weighed 300 lb. Don’t eat like a Hawaiian.

You’ll feel more comfortable and consume fewer calories and more healthy nutrients if you do the above.

Exercise
My first thought is: skip it; it’s Christmas!
However, my husband’s family likes to take a walk together after a noontime Christmas dinner. It’s actually very nice to get out in the fresh air and move around a bit after sitting around and eating so much. If the weather continues as is, we should have a beautiful sunny day for taking a nice family walk.

Tranquility
Tranquility could be an easy, natural part of Christmas.
Or Christmas could be stressful due to family relations, having too much to do, having too much to cook and prepare for the family, etc. If Christmas = stress, then you definitely need to plan some Tranquility into your day. It’s a great Christmas gift to yourself. Tell your family you need ½ hr. (or 1 hr.), so they know to leave you alone. Consider your schedule for the day, and decide if, mentally, you need it before the onslaught of Christmas or after it, in order to unwind from the day. Here are some examples:
· Go to church; ‘tis the reason for the season.
· Morning: take a bath with nice bath oil or salts, a candle, and peaceful Christmas music to start your day.
· Noon: After opening gifts with your immediate family and before your afternoon or evening extended family gathering, take a walk, or have a family “Quiet time” when everyone does something quietly, like read a book, newspaper, or magazine; play with new, quiet toys; watch a football game, etc.
· Evening: If your Christmas celebration ends by the early evening, it’s a good time to take a walk and enjoy the Christmas lights in your neighborhood, watch a Christmas movie, use a Christmas gift (if you received anything relaxing), etc.

Christmas should be a fun, happy celebration. It’s up to you to make sure you have a SWEET, wonderful day.

Merry Christmas!

Suzanne

Conquering Holiday Feasts & Goodies

Appraising Your Success
The end of the week is a good time to review the past week of your SWEET Life and count up your accomplishments. Your goal is 5-6 times per week for each aspect of the SWEET Life: Sleep, Water, Eating, Exercise, and Tranquility. If you didn’t achieve some of your goals for the week, then next week, focus on those areas more and think about how to fulfill them more consistently.
How do you feel at the end of this week? Are you better rested? Do you feel relaxed? Are you more energetic? Do you feel generally healthier? Continue with the SWEET Life and you’ll experience all of these feelings!

Topic of the week -- Conquering Holiday Feasts & Goodies
The two months between Halloween and New Year’s Day are filled with special foods and sweets. As such, you need to make a plan for how you are going to face all those temptations. Don’t deprive yourself of these special holiday indulgences, but go in with a plan.

One holiday control plan is to enjoy each holiday, but to maintain your regular healthy eating plan, along with the other elements of the SWEET Life, all the other days in between holidays. That makes about four days of being gluttonous, depending on which holidays you celebrate, rather than 60 days! In the scope of 60 days, those four days will be insignificant.

Some “at the moment” ideas for holiday party control are the following:
· Don’t starve yourself all day to “save up” calories. You’ll be so hungry by the time you eat that you’ll eat more than you would have if you’d eaten a regular meal a few hours beforehand.
· Serve or offer to bring “relishes” as an appetizer. Carrot, celery, and cucumber sticks; cherry tomatoes, radishes, bell pepper strips, etc. with hummus for dipping are a healthy way to stave off those hunger pangs while waiting for people to gather and the meal to begin.
· “Select,” don’t “select all,” at the buffet. Make yourself a meal of protein, grains and vegetables, rather than a little bit of everything. Think of a buffet like a deli counter: as much as everything looks good, you only choose a few things to make your meal.
· Only serve yourself 2-3 bites of each food. That way, if you don’t like something, you can leave the rest without wasting a lot of food. It also allows you to try more foods, if you’re so inclined.
· Thanksgiving is typically weak in vegetables, so eat all you can.
· Don’t waste stomach space and calories on bad food. If you have kids, you know that food they don’t like immediately comes back out. As adults, we are polite enough to swallow that bite, but don’t go thinking the second bite will somehow taste better.
· Don’t “eat all you can” (unless it’s veggies).

What about all those sweets people give you when they drop by? Pay them forward: Serve them to guests who drop by or take them to people’s houses that you visit. Just because people give them to you doesn’t mean that you, personally, have to eat them all!

Have a SWEET week!

Suzanne

Enjoying Halloween without eating all the candy

Appraising Your Success
The end of the week is a good time to review the past week of your SWEET Life and count up your accomplishments. Your goal is 5-6 times per week for each aspect of the SWEET Life: Sleep, Water, Eating, Exercise, and Tranquility. If you didn’t achieve some of your goals for the week, then next week, focus on those areas more and think about how to fulfill them more consistently.

How do you feel at the end of this week? Are you better rested? Do you feel relaxed? Are you more energetic? Do you feel generally healthier? Continue with the SWEET Life and you’ll experience all of these feelings!

Topic of the week -- Enjoying Halloween without eating all the candy

As a Personal Trainer, you might expect me to say not to eat any Halloween candy. However, if you know me personally, you know I love chocolate! I always say, “Everything in moderation, with the emphasis on everything.” That includes Halloween candy.

Halloween, however, is merely the beginning of the two-month-long holiday season, ending on New Year’s Day. As such, this is the beginning of making a holiday plan for health maintenance, so that you don’t gain any holiday weight. Making a plan now, and following it for the next two months, will prevent you from having that dreaded feeling on New Year’s Day that you have to start a health kick.

However, this week we are going to focus on Halloween. There are many ways to avoid overindulging on Halloween candy. You don’t need to follow every idea, just decide which idea(s) will work best for you and follow through.

It’s important to consider both the amount of candy you are going to eat and the amount of time you will give yourself to eat it. You might decide that since October 31 is the actual holiday, you will only indulge in candy on that day. At the same time, you can go intensive or extensive, for example, all the candy you want to eat, but only on Halloween day vs. one piece of candy a day for a week following Halloween. Do whatever works for you, but decide on your plan in advance and follow through.

If you’re single and don’t live in an area with kids, you don’t have to worry about Halloween candy, right? No kids come to your door, and you’re probably out at a party where you are more likely drinking than eating candy anyway. Why don’t you have to worry about eating too much candy? Because it’s for the kids.

Remembering that the candy is for the trick-or-treaters might help you avoid eating too much. That being said, don’t steal your kids’ candy! Set a good example, if you have kids, of not eating too much, of sharing, and of not stealing other people’s candy. That means, you ask your child politely for a piece, just like you would want your child to ask, and you don’t sneak into another room to eat some, just like you wouldn’t want your child to do. Those things will definitely prevent you from overindulging!

Another thing to do to avoid eating Halloween candy is to buy candy you don’t like; then there’s no temptation.

November 1, to prevent the temptation of candy at home, many people will take it to the office. That’s a great way to get it out of the house; however, remember that it’s basically someone else’s trash. It’s not there for you to eat; it’s there to prevent someone else from eating it at home. And it’s usually not the good stuff; that’s already saved or gone; it’s the junk candy that no one in the house likes, so don’t eat someone else’s junk. Only eat good Halloween candy.

Finally, probably the best idea is to donate your leftover Halloween candy to hospitalized kids who couldn’t go trick-or-treating. Find out from your local hospital how you can do this. The kids will be thrilled, and you’ll feel good too.

The next two months of holidays are filled with special foods and sweets. Plan now how you are going to face all those temptations. Don’t deprive yourself, but make a plan and follow your plan.
Have a SWEET week!

Suzanne