Mind, Body & Health: June 2019

You’re right that fiber is extremely important—and not only for your gastrointestinal system. It can help with cholesterol and weight management, too.

A study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine found that women who ate the most fiber (around 25 grams a day) were 22 percent less likely to die from any cause, compared with women who ate just 10 grams.

But some people do develop gas and bloating when they up their fiber intake. One trick is to start slowly: Let your body get used to increased fiber in small amounts, rather than loading up on the stuff all at once.

RELATED: 7 Health Benefits of Kale

As your digestive system adjusts, it may be helpful to keep in mind that foods with soluble fiber (such as fruit, oats, beans and peas, and nuts and seeds) tend to produce more gas than foods with insoluble fiber (a.k.a. roughage, including whole grains and veggies).

But don’t give up on fiber! Your body needs both types. With time and experimentation, you will find high-fiber foods that agree with you.

RELATED: 6 Health Benefits of Mangoes

Until you hit your fiber mark (the daily value is 25 grams), taking a probiotic may help with regularity. Sticking to an exercise routine and drinking more water should make a difference too.

Health’s medical editor, Roshini Rajapaksa, MD, is an associate professor of medicine at the NYU School of Medicine and a cofounder of TULA Skincare.

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from Nutrition - Health.com http://bit.ly/2WIAeq4

Wednesday, 12 June 2019

This Woman Started Lactating From Her Vulva After Childbirth—Here’s How That Can Happen

Tuesday, 11 June 2019

What Nike’s Plus-Size Mannequin Means for All Women, Even Tanya Gold

This Is the Best Kind of Exercise, According to Jillian Michaels

Monday, 10 June 2019

Mom Kicked Out of Golden Corral for Crop Top Says She Was Discriminated Against Because of Weight

Can the Satiating Diet Help You Lose Weight? Here's What a Nutritionist Thinks

This 30-Day Arms Challenge Will Transform Your Upper Body In Just 4 Weeks

Hit All Your Major Muscles With This 6-Move Kettlebell Workout

How Does ASMR Work? The Science Behind Those Brain-Tingling Sounds

Saturday, 8 June 2019

6 Health Benefits of Cranberries

PSA: Nerdy Outdoor Sandals Are Officially a Thing—Here's the One Pair You Should Buy

Nike Just Introduced Curvy Mannequins

Thursday, 6 June 2019

The Popular Diet One Neurosurgeon Swears By as a Way to Boost Your Brainpower

In this excerpt from his new book Neurofitness, Dr. Jandial—a college dropout turned neurosurgeon—explains why intermittent fasting is so good for the brain.

Perhaps there is a reason why most of the world’s major religions call for periodic fasting. Intermittent hunger clears the mind, awakens the senses, and improves brain functioning. Plus it lowers your blood sugar, reduces your insulin levels, and helps you lose weight by reducing total calories. What’s not to love?

Well, the hunger. But it only lasts for a short time!

Consider our prehistoric ancestors, the hunters and gatherers who survived through feast and famine, abundance and scarcity. The real “Paleo diet” didn’t consist of just large hunks of meat. Many were the days and weeks they failed to catch an auroch or boar and went to sleep hungry.

But with the hunger pangs come benefits. Going without food for even a day increases your brain’s natural growth factors, which support the survival and growth of neurons. Evolution designed our bodies and brains to perform at their peak as hybrid vehicles. Metabolic switching between glucose and ketones is when cognition is best and degenerative diseases are kept at bay. As a recent paper in Nature Reviews Neuroscience put it: “Metabolic switching impacts multiple signaling pathways that promote neuroplasticity and resistance of the brain to injury and disease.”

So how do you do it? Not by overloading on glucose or ketones [the energy source produced when the liver burns fat], but by altering the cadence of eating and letting the body do what it was designed to do during times of food scarcity.

I’m not talking about caloric restriction, which extends longevity in animals and may well do the same in humans. People who follow a serious caloric restriction diet, eating as little as a thousand calories per day, are always hungry. I’m talking about being intermittently hungry by forcing your body to burn its fat reserves once or twice a week. The exhaust from this, ketones, will not only keep your brain going during those periods of fasting and hunger but will actually improve cognition, grow the connections between neurons, and stave off neurodegeneration.

I follow (or at least try to) an intermittent fasting diet, and I recommend it for anyone who wants to improve their mood and hit peak cognition. Here is my plan:

Fast twice a week

The goal is to hit two stretches of sixteen-hour periods without food. So choose two days, not back to back, and skip breakfast and lunch or lunch and dinner. When you add in the hours you sleep, it’s relatively easy to get to sixteen hours. Every Monday and Thursday, I skip breakfast and lunch and only eat dinner. Whatever my wife and sons are having, that’s what I have.

No breakfast

I’m not talking about just on fasting days; I’m talking about avoiding breakfast almost every day! Some people insist that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, but there’s no good evidence for that. The only time I eat breakfast is occasionally on the weekends, with my boys, just to hang out and be in the moment with them.

Salad for lunch

I rarely eat a sandwich or burger or anything with carbs. My routine is to have a salad for lunch. It’s a little painful.

No late-night snacks

This one is hard for me, especially after a long day or when I have fasted. But I try.

Please keep in mind, I’m no extremist. I do go out to eat with family and friends, often. Sometimes I’m invited to a breakfast meeting and go with the flow. But I have made intermittent fasting part of my routine.

On days when I am operating, in fact, I eat nothing until late afternoon. I don’t even have a cup of coffee, because once I enter the OR, there is no skipping out to the bathroom. I am routinely in there working for eight hours straight without a break. It may sound surprising that I’m not dragging from lack of food, but quite the opposite: I find it keeps me more alert.

Excerpted from Neurofitness: A Brain Surgeon’s Secrets to Boost Performance and Unleash Creativity © 2019 by Rahul Jandial, MD, PhD. Reproduced by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.

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from Nutrition - Health.com http://bit.ly/2HW8buh

Grilled Peaches With Gingersnap Crumble

Don’t turn on the oven—even dessert can be grilled. A cinnamon syrup gives these peaches a lovely, complex flavor. Simple whipped cream and crushed store-bought gingersnaps take this low-effort dessert over the top. Tip: Let the grilled peaches cool for a few minutes before topping them with the whipped cream. That way the cream won’t melt on contact.

from Recipes - Health.com http://bit.ly/2Mxi6uZ

Firecracker Chicken

We love chicken thighs for grilling since they stay juicier than breasts. These are glazed with an irresistible spicy-sweet sauce and served with colorful peppers and asparagus. Plus, the veggies stay snappy even after a few minutes on the grill.

from Recipes - Health.com http://bit.ly/2Iti95M

Grilled Flank Steak And Watermelon Salad

Grilled watermelon is a revelation—sweet and smoky and still full of vitamin C and the antioxidant lycopene. Serve it with protein-rich beef and a zippy cucumber salsa for a lighter, brighter steak dinner.

from Recipes - Health.com http://bit.ly/2HYYtYr

Grilled Salmon Burgers with Poblano Cream

Switch up your burgers: These salmon cakes, served with pickled onions and peppery greens, are rich in omega-3 fatty acids. Wild salmon from Alaska, home to some of the world’s most sustainable fisheries, is in season now. Snap it up if you can. If you don’t have a gas burner to char the poblano pepper, you can use the broiler.

from Recipes - Health.com http://bit.ly/2WtMoDe

Grilled Ratatouille

A fantastic vegetarian main or hearty side dish to virtually any grilled meat, this vibrant ratatouille is a delicious vehicle for your farmers’ market bounty. It would also be a hit over farro or whole-wheat pasta.

from Recipes - Health.com http://bit.ly/2WgskiU

Fetal Tissue Research Facts and Why It's so Controversial

Wednesday, 5 June 2019

The Photo of This Dude’s Broken Toe Is so Gross—but His Wife Turned It Into the Most Hilarious Thing Ever

Rosemary Pork Chops With Grilled Leeks

This dish comes together in about a half hour—and good thing, because you’ll want it on repeat all summer long. Juicy pork is paired with crunchy hazelnuts and a pop of creamy blue cheese. The subtly sweet leeks add even more flavor, plus gut-friendly prebiotics. Rinsing the leeks just before grilling removes dirt, and the residual water helps soften them as they cook.

from Recipes - Health.com http://bit.ly/2XtkJ1M

Tuesday, 4 June 2019

Energy Drinks May Cause Heart Problems—Here’s How to Get a Natural Boost Instead

Monday, 3 June 2019

What Is Face Yoga? Here’s Everything to Know About the Wrinkle-Reducing Exercise Craze

8 Health Benefits of Carrots

I Started Using CBD Oil Every Day—and This Is How It Changed My Life

Better sleep, energy for workouts, and a compliment from my husband make it all worthwhile.

I’m not well-schooled in the ways of cannabis—figuring out what is CBD took some time. I don’t know my hemp from my weed; THC, CBD ... IDK. For me, it’s like trying to get the square root of a number: If I concentrate for a minute, I can figure it all out, but mostly, I just don’t care to.

But then my friend started selling CBD oil. She’s a SAHM-turned-yoga instructor and a total straight-laced health nut. I thought that if she was into it, maybe I should learn more. So I learned that CBD oil is made up of cannabidiol, a natural extract from the flowers and leaves of the cannabis plant. Unlike marijuana, CBD does not get you high (that’s where THC comes in—it’s another naturally occurring chemical that does bring the high).

What CBD does do, as far as science knows (and there are still plenty more studies to be done), is act like neurotransmitters in your body called endocannabinoids (think of them as cousins, of a sort). In doing so, CBD has the potential to reduce inflammation, improve sleep, bring a sense of calm, boost energy, help those coping with anxiety, and more. (Scientists are still figuring out exactly how much of an impact CBD can have.)

I wanted all of those things. Inflammation can cause everything from acne to aches and pains, and I’m happy to get rid of both. Since my husband and son have nicknamed me Yelly Melly, I figured I could do with a better sense of calm, too. And hey, I’m a busy working mom, so sure, I’ll take more energy!

There are a lot of CBD oils on the market right now, but I gravitated toward Beam for a few reasons: It’s organic, it’s 100 percent CBD (I’ve learned that some other companies don’t filter out traces of THC—and I’m not here to get high, people), and it’s full-spectrum, which means that other beneficial natural plant compounds are left in the extract (I’m all for more bennies).

After all my research, I started taking a dropperful of the CBD oil morning and night. I held it under my tongue for a minute or so, in order for the cannabidiol to seep straight into my bloodstream instead of being digested (which is also a good delivery system—just not as direct). It tasted fine—sort of neutral, with a hint of plant life.

A few days later, I took my first barre class. I haven’t worked out in a year, thanks to a shoulder injury, and I was definitely nervous that I’d be in serious pain after (especially in my shoulder). But it wasn’t too bad. So then the next day I took a yoga class (all hail Groupon), and that didn’t leave me extra sore or strained either—and I like to think my inflammation was kept in check by my new CBD oil regimen.

I also stopped having nightmares. Weirdly, I get them a lot—bizarre ones, like I’m driving down the road and suddenly I’m in the ocean. But since I’ve started taking CBD oil, the nightmares are gone—and since my daily stressors remain the same but my stress symptoms have lessened, I’m totally giving Beam the credit.

Inspired by my lack of chronic pain and newly stress-free slumber, I also started getting up at 5:50 a.m. for a brisk 2-mile walk with my neighbor every morning. And yeah, I’m still taking barre class and yoga. I’ve got energy for everything!

The most concrete proof that the CBD oil is doing good things for me came the other night, though. I hadn’t mentioned my new CBD routine to my husband, in part because I wanted to assess for myself whether it had an impact. But out of the blue one night, while watching TV, he turned to me and said, “Hey, I’d like to thank you for not getting so frustrated lately with me and the boy. I appreciate it.” Thanks to CBD oil, Yelly Melly has left the building.

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from Mind & Body - Health.com http://bit.ly/318xKQr