Hello everyone!
I m a scientist and global health coach with years of clinical experience ! Im specialized in anti-inflammatory nutrition. This is my first post on Steemit!
Today im going to address: "What is a healthy nutrition?"
First why would you want to have the answer to this question? ...Because everybody is getting sick... Im in Canada, here 41% of the population has lifestyle diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular diseases or auto-immune diseases, and 25% have more than 2 of those disease...and it is trending up. Nutrition is one of the health pillars that will help you to avoid to be part of the statistics!
So what is healthy nutrition?! It is a diversified, nutrient dense, highly digestible, low in toxins that is anti-inflammatory allowing optimal metabolism and detoxification!
In term of macronutrients, meaning lipids, proteins and carbohydrates, most people should be eating the following percentage of their daily calorie intake from each macronutrients: 25-30% from proteins, 35-40% from fats and 35-40% from carbohydrates. Let say you need 2000 calories/ day, that converts respectively in: 150g of protein (30%), 77 g of fat (35%), and 175 g of carbs (35%) There is a lot of controversy out there regarding whether or not you should count calories, or regarding the fat vs carbs amount etc. These are just numbers that work well in average for most people and depending on your specific needs you can play with that... But once you master it, you can take care of the rest...
Diversified and nutrient dense foods means to avoid processed foods which is very low in nutrients and has very poor diversity. They essentially contain sugar, and trans fat with a bunch of added chemicals to enhance flavour, addiction, and long term conservation of the product... By the way, sugar and trans fat (anything fried or desserts) are 2 very inflammatory and pro-aging foods you want to avoid. It also means to keep rotating the type of unprocessed/ natural food you eat....rotate the color of the veggies, rotate the type of proteins (vegetarian proteins vs animal proteins) and so on. On top of this you can add superfood to boost all. An exemple of this is spirulina, an algae that contains omega-3, proteins, and which is so dense in nutrients that it is almost like a multivitamin, plus it has also many antioxydants...
One of the most important and very often overlooked thing is digestion! If you dont digest well, you will develop lifestyle diseases sooner or later...It is that important....Probably one of the most important aspect you should care about! It starts with good mastication to make it easier for your body to digest. Stomach acidity is also super important for proper proteins digestion since any protein that can't be well digested may trigger inflammation, dysbiosis (gut flora unbalanced), and auto-immune diseases or contribute to any lifestyle diseases. This is particularly important since studies show that starting at the age of 30 years old, stomach acidity production decreases by 30%! Therefore, depending on each individuals, some will greatly benefits from supplementing with betaine HCL (acid supplement), and digestive enzymes to help their body to properly digest food.
Talking about proper digestion, you want to avoid any difficult food to digest such as gluten (protein found in wheat and related grains) and casein (a protein contained in dairy product).... Because of their structures our digestive enzymes are not adapted to digest those... Now we have many studies that show these protein are inflammatory, can cause dysbiosis and are involved in the development of chronic diseases!
Finally, most people are deficient in many nutrients, this should be tested with your health care provider. However, some nutrients are no brainers and we now know most people should take 800-1000 IU/day of vitamin D and 1000 mg per day of omega-3 (make sure it is NOT heat extracted).
I hope this help you guys to stay healthy!! This is my mission... Below is a link to a smoothie I make on my training days which is delicious and in congruence with what you now know as "healthy nutrition"
Do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions via my website: http://www.santeevolution.com/contact/
**Disclaimer: the information above is for educational purpose only. Using it for yourself is at your own risk. Note that before taking supplements or changing your nutrition you should consult with a healthcare professionals or with your Md. **