How Your Spouse Impacts Your Diet

September 23rd, 2011

The Huffington Post

By: Catherine Pearson

When you say “I do,” you are not just signing up for a lifetime of togetherness — you’re also, apparently, signing up for shared eating habits.

Researchers analyzed the eating patterns of more than 3,000 participants in the ongoing Framingham Heart Study to determine whether social ties influence eating behaviors and exactly how they do so. They considered the role that spouses, friends, brothers and sisters played over the course of 10 years. Overall, the analysis, published Thursday in the American Journal of Public Health, found that couples had the greatest impact on one another’s dietary patterns.

“The hypothesis is that your eating behavior is going to be affected by those around you,” said Paul F. Jacques, D.Sc., director of the Nutritional Epidemiology Program at Tufts University and one of the study’s authors.

“With spouses, it has a lot to do with the stronger shared environment,” he added. “One person is probably preparing food for the other frequently.”

But it wasn’t just couples who influenced one another; friends also appeared to share certain eating patterns, particularly when it came to regular consumption of alcohol and snacks. (For purposes of analysis, the researchers grouped the individuals into seven distinct patterns, including meat and soda eaters, sweets eaters and those who avoid caffeine.)

Indeed, the researchers found that in terms of influential eating types, the “alcohol and snacks” pattern reigned supreme, influence-wise. Across all of the social relationship types, it was the most likely eating pattern to be shared.

According to the authors, one reason for this is that drinking and snacking tend to be more social in nature.

“Items in this food pattern are easy to share and often require less of a time commitment relative to meals,” they write. “In addition, in American society, alcohol is culturally associated with sociability.”

Conversely, the light eating pattern — which consisted of lower average food consumption throughout the week, even of healthier foods like vegetables, fruits and grains — was the least likely to be shared across the various social relationships.

Jessica Crandall, a registered dietitian and spokeswoman for the American Dietitian Association, said that research like this is important for people to be aware of so that they can monitor their own eating patterns. Other recent studies have found that marriage influences weight gain in women.

Crandall explained that when she begins working with clients looking to lose weight, one of the first things she stresses is the importance of having friends, family and particularly a spouse on board. While this might not necessarily mean they adopt your new eating habits, they should be cognizant of, say, ripping open a bag of chips in front of you, or bringing you a muffin as a thoughtful gesture.

Crandall said her clients get the support they are looking for much of the time. One couple, she said, not only changed what they ate, they got off the couch and started square and swing dancing.

But about half of the time, she estimated, her clients don’t get that support, which can make it difficult to change eating habits given the crucial role relationships can play.

“You get very accustomed to being in that environment of ‘let’s go grab a bite, or a coffee, or a drink,” Crandall said. “When you try to change what your typical habits are, that can impact your spouse or friends, and they may not be ready to change.”

Click here for the full report from The Huffington Post

Using Cash Could Lead To Healthier Eating Habits

July 12, 2011

Huffington Post

Using debit and credit cards have become second nature to most people who don’t want to run to the bank every time they’re out of cash, but new research shows that cash could help your eating habits.

Over a six-month spread researchers looked at the register receipts of a random sample of 1,000 loyal shoppers at a Northeastern supermarket chain and analyzed what they bought and how they paid for it, reports MSNBC.

The study published in the Journal of Consumer Research found that shoppers were more likely to buy items considered “unhealthy” when they paid with credit or debit cards than if they paid with cash, and that weekend shoppers were more likely to stick to a list.

Researchers say they were surprised to find that debit cards had the same psychological effect as credit cards, since money is deducted from bank accounts immediately, but with any kind of plastic payment seems people are willing to spend more.

But to make sure that the spending patters weren’t more related to penny pinchers versus those who like to live large, the study also analyzed 125 students in a computer simulated shopping task.

Click here to read the full report from Huffington Post.

 

Avandia: The Death Medicine

September 24, 2010

Natural News

Mike Adams

The diabetes drug Avandia, shown to raise heart attack risk by 40 percent in a paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine, was banned today across many European countries in a coordinated global announcement. The FDA didn’t quite ban the drug but placed it under severe restrictions that will all but guarantee the drug’s sales in the United States drop to almost zero.

Specifically, the FDA’s new restrictions require that doctors and patients first “try every other diabetes medication” before turning to Avandia as a last resort. And even then, they must acknowledge being made aware of the drug’s serious risks.

The Avandia scam

Avandia has been the subject of seemingly endless accusations and criticisms from both alternative and conventional medicine practitioners. Just here on NaturalNews.com, we reported how the FDA’s own scientists backing Avandia’s so-called “safety” had financial ties to the drug manufacturer (http://www.naturalnews.com/029268_f…).

We exposed the Avandia fraud (http://www.naturalnews.com/029252_A…) and revealed how GSK hid evidence that Avandia was harming users (http://www.naturalnews.com/028233_G…). We reported how California suedGlaxoSmithKline for false advertising over the drug (http://www.naturalnews.com/028918_f…) and how even the FDA knew of Avandia’sdangers years ago but did nothing (http://www.naturalnews.com/021864.html).

Notably, some of these stories were published as far back as 2007. The FDA, we now know, knew about the dangers of Avandia as early as 2003 but chose to ignore the drug’s dangers in a bid to protect the profits of the drug industry.

Tens of thousands likely died

There’s no telling exactly how many diabetes patients actually died from the FDA’s lack of enforcement action on this drug, but realistic estimates based on Cleveland Clinic cardiologist Steven Nissen’s work point to many tens of thousands of people dying needlessly from heart attacks.

Meanwhile, Avandia hasn’t cured a single case of diabetes. That’s because the drug doesn’t really cure anything. It only suppresses symptoms of diabetes while ignoring the underlying causes of diabetes.

Today’s decision by the FDA is seven years too late for all those likely tens of thousands of people who are dead. And even today, after all the evidence that has surfaced and all the shocking revelations about this drug, the FDA still can’t bring itself to ban the drug because it’s just too deeply in bed with Big Pharma.

European regulators have simply banned it. They don’t want their people dying from a drug that exhibits a scientifically-validated and highly significant increase in heart attacks. But the FDA, it seems, is always willing to sacrifice a few thousand more lives for the benefit of Big Pharma profits. There’s almost never a drug too dangerous for the FDA to keep on the market in one way or another.

The role of patients

Still, you can’t blame the drug companies and the FDA for everything. Patients who died from Avandia side effects have a role in their own deaths, too.

The typical diabetes patient (but not everyone) is an overweight, sedentary dead foods eater who won’t exercise, won’t eat healthy foods and lives on high sugar, processed dead foods. (Most of the, by the way, drink diet soda laced with aspartame, too.) Astonishingly, many have been convinced by doctors and pharmaceutical advertising that they can counteract their atrocious lifestyle choices by popping a chemical pill.

Most of these patients foolishly believe that their health rests in the hands of their doctor and not their own actions. They believe they can keep eating junk foods and liquid sugars while somehow a magic little pill will warp the rules of the universe and exclude them from the laws of biological cause and effect.

In that way, these diabetes patients who rely on medications play an often overlooked role in their own disease. Sure, Big Pharma and the FDA are at fault for misleading people, but people can’t put all the blame on pharma when they are the ones swallowing these lies, pretending they can keep pursuing a diabetes-causing lifestyle while somehow escaping the consequences of their actions.

People who were victimized by Avandia and GSK allowed themselves to become victims. No one forced them to swallow any pills. They did so willingly and often quite eagerly. They chose to take medications instead of eating right as others have done to reverse their diabetes. Drew Carey, for example, reversed his diabetes through changes in diet and exercise, not by taking chemical medications.

As adults, people have the responsibility to check the safety of what they swallow. One search of “Avandia safety” on Google at a public library would have turned up an enormous amount of information warning people not to take this drug, even as far back as 2006.

And frankly, any person who still trusts Big Pharma and the FDA today — after all the scandals, scams and corruption that has been reported in the media — is probably living in a fantasy land and needs a reality check.

To swallow anything made by a pharmaceutical company is to swallow one great big lie. And that lie may very well kill you.

Click Here For Full Report

Eating Nuts Daily Lowers Cholesterol

May 11, 2010

Reuters

By Anne Harding

Studies in men and women from different countries have shown that “nuts do lower cholesterol, so it’s pretty much universal,” Dr. Joan Sabate of Loma Linda University in California, told Reuters Health.

Nuts contain a number of healthful substances, including “good” fats, fiber, and antioxidants. In 2003, the US Food and Drug Administration stated that eating 1.5 ounces a day of certain nuts might help reduce heart disease risk.

To further examine the cholesterol-lowering effects of nuts and whether this effect might be strengthened or weakened by a person’s overall diet, body size or other factors, Sabate and colleagues pooled data from 25 studies from seven countries including 583 men and women, some with high cholesterol, some with normal cholesterol.

They found that eating an average of 67 grams (about 2.4 ounces) of nuts daily brought people’s total cholesterol levels down by 11 points (a 5 percent reduction); reduced their harmful LDL cholesterol levels by 10 points (a 7 percent drop); and shifted the ratio of total cholesterol or LDL cholesterol to “good” HDL cholesterol in a favorable direction. The benefits were seen both in people with normal cholesterol levels and those with high cholesterol.

But while nuts reduced triglyceride levels by 21 points in people whose triglycerides were too high (150 milligrams per deciliter or higher), they didn’t affect triglycerides in people with normal levels.

Click here for the full report.

The Kevin Trudeau Show: 2-3-10

Today, Kevin educates you on the scary facts behind MSG’s and how many excitotoxins you are putting in your body just by eating a can of soup!

The MSG Report
Cocaine Found in Water Supply
Rocket Fuel in Nation’s Drinking Water
World Economic Forum’s Security Chief Found Dead After ‘Suicide’
Doctors Are Addicted To Every Drug Under The Sun
Bill Gates in Vaccine Game
UK Hospitals Tried to Gag Whistleblowers
Man Boob Reduction Surgeries on the Rise

Take Trudeau on the Go! Click here to download this show to your iPod, mp3 player, or PC through iTunes!

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My “Do Nots” of Weight Loss!

I always try and give you the do’s of weight loss, but a lot of people have been asking me, “Kevin, I know the DO’s, but what are the DO NOT’s?”

• Do not eat after 6 p.m.
Do the best you can on this, however, the good news is you can virtually eat like a pig all day long, and if you stop eating after six you will still lose weight!

• Absolutely NO aspartame or any artifical sweeteners
Aspartame, which goes by the name NutraSweet, will make you fat. All other artificial sweeteners including saccharin, Splenda, or anything else, should be avoided.

• Absolutely NO Monosodium Glutamate (MSG)
MSG is an excitotoxin. It makes you fat, causes all kinds of medical problems, and can affect your mood making you depressed. It also can be physically addicting, like Aspartame, and actually make you hungrier.

• Absolutely NO diet sodas or diet food
Diet sodas have been called the “new crack” because they appear to be so physically addicting. They actually make you fat. The reason they are promoted so heavily is because people become physically addicted to them and they are cheaper to make than regular sodas.

• NO fast food or chain restaurants
Any restaurant that is a chain, a franchise that sells fast food, produces their food in such a way that it will absolutely make you fat. You can actually eat french fries and cheeseburgers and lose weight, provided that the ingredients that you use are all organic and contain no chemical additives. It is virtually impossible to eat food in a chain or franchise restaurant where the food has not been processed to last for years without spoiling. The food has to be produced as cheaply as possible for the companies to make money. They must add chemicals to make the food taste great and get you physically addicted. This food also has been produced to increase your appetite and make you fatter. Remember, these are businesses whose only objective is to make a profit. If the food tastes amazing, becomes physically addicting, increases your appetite, and makes you fat, the restaurant is assured of success. They are like drug dealers getting their customers hooked on their product.

• NO high fructose corn syrup
This sweetener makes you fat and is physically addictive. Just stop buying food at the supermarket, go to a health food store instead. Do not buy food that is manufactured by large publicly traded companies. Do not buy brand name food. The profit motive is so high you can be assured that it is not good for you. The sweeteners that are used in food produced in a natural way include organic honey, organic molasses, organic fruit juice, organic dates, the herb stevia, evaporated sugar cane juice. Simply read the labels and if you can’t pronounce it, don’t buy it.

• NO white sugar or white flour
White sugar is in fact physically addicting and makes you fat. White flour, as I have mentioned previously, when mixed with water, makes paste. Eating white flour makes you fat; it can also be addicting, and clogs up your digestive system, slowing down your metabolism. Use organic whole-grain flours that have not been processed or stripped of the fiber.

• Limit dairy products
If you are going to consume milk, cheese, butter, or any dairy products, eat only organic products that have not been pasteurized or homogenized. The dairy products should be labeled “organic and raw.” It may be hard to find raw dairy products in some parts of the country. The next best option is organic, not homogenized, but that has been pasteurized. Your last option is organic that has been both pasteurized and homogenized. Ideally, if you want to lose weight, reduce dairy regardless of what you are getting. Definitely, absolutely, do not consume any dairy products that are not organic because they will have growth hormone in them and slow your weight loss.

• Reduce or eliminate the “uncontrollable” urge to eat when you are not hungry
Remember, censorship is alive and well in America. The Federal Trade commission has forbidden me from saying my opinions on how a person can eliminate addictions and uncontrollable urges to eat. And you thought there was free speech in America. If the First Amendment were true, I would be able to state my opinions and conclusions. I cannot. However, if you are an emotional eater and have uncontrollable urges and compulsions to eat when you are not hungry, get the book Tapping The Healer Within: How to Instantly Conquer Fears, Anxieties, and Emotional Distress.

Have a great week,
Kevin

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