Americans Are Eating More Poorly, Despite Warnings

Our staff here at Root Cause Medical Clinic were shocked to hear this news: the day before Thanksgiving a Gallup poll was released stating that Americans are eating less healthy in 2013 than the year prior.

In every month of 2013, 500 adults who report each day about their eating habits as part of a national poll stated they were eating less well than they did the year before. Not only that but when it comes to ‘healthy eating’, most months of this year have been reported to be the lowest since 2008.

Specifically, fewer Americans are eating at least five servings of fruits and vegetables for at least four days per week. Five servings, in my opinion, is a bare minimum, let alone eating them for only half the week.

Here at Root Cause Medical Clinic, we recommend nine servings/day, EVERY day – that’s 63 servings of vegetables and fruits per week vs the 20 that are considered ‘healthy’ by this polls standards. That equates to only 32% of what we recommend and most Americans don’t even do that.

Despite more frequent warnings of the link between unhealthy food, obesity, and higher risk for degenerative disease, Americans don’t seem able to help themselves. The poll revealed that 66% of Americans received information about a healthy diet from their doctor. That ‘advice’ obviously didn’t reflect any change in behavior based on the above statistics. So the real question is why?

Why Don’t We Do What We Know is Good for Us?

If you think of the ‘messages’ that we receive on a given day through media, radio, TV, and the internet, the vast majority of them are unhealthy.

Turning on the morning news you can watch your favorite newscaster enjoying their morning cup of coffee while often featuring some ‘yummy’ recipe or food item. They may joke about the calorie count of the ridiculously unhealthy item that they’re promoting but they’re still promoting it. And then there are the radio and internet ads for fast food, drugs, etc. And then there’s always the justification. Do these sounds familiar?

• You only live once.

• A little won’t hurt.

• This is not something you should eat every day, but when you need a treat…

• Go ahead, you deserve it.

Even if you go to your favorite coffee shop or tea shop for a healthy green tea, you’ll be barraged by the pictures of peppermint mochas or pumpkin spice lattes or, in the warmer months, frozen mochas.

You know them. It’s those drinks that easily have the caloric intake of dinner!! And there’s not a fruit nor a vegetable in sight. Going out to eat is another issue. It’s not only the temptation of the menu or the speed of fast food, but it’s the portion sizes.

Americans are served at least a third to a half more than they should eat at any given restaurant. If you’ve ever been to certain European countries, you’ll quickly notice that their serving sizes are quite a bit smaller than ours, so are their waistlines!

Okay, enough complaining about what’s wrong, let’s strategize about what we can do to make it right.

Strategy to Make 2014 Your Healthiest Year Ever!

Let’s pretend that we are one of those 500 individuals who are part of the Gallup poll. Each day we report what we ate plus other lifestyle activities. How are we going to make ourselves successful? We at Root Cause Medical Clinic recommend that you try these steps:

1. Realize that each day is a fresh start. If you did well yesterday, congratulate yourself and try to do the same today. If yesterday was a bad day, leave it in the past. It’s today that matters.

2. Have a plan. You can’t start your day out with a healthy smoothie or egg scramble, as an example, if there’s no food in the house. Stock up your fridge. Cooking at home not only saves you money, but it’ll also save your health too. The beauty about cooking, or in the above smoothie example blending, at home is that you know what you’re eating. You know the quality, you know the freshness and your body will feel better because of it.

3. Don’t know how to cook? Well if your mother never taught you, don’t worry. There’s a lovely channel called the Food Network that has some nice basic shows, plus YouTube also has many videos that will literally teach you the fundamentals, fast.

4. Make a decision. There’s a lot of power in those 3 words. Let’s break down what I mean as it applies to diet and lifestyle. What I mean is that each day, every day, you need to DECIDE what your plan is.

Are you going to make the effort to get those nine servings of fruits and vegetables or are you going to eat like a typical American? Are you going to drink 8 to 10- glasses of pure water or are you going to drink coffee and soda? The former decision moves you towards health, a slimmer waistline, and away from disease. The latter moves you exactly in the opposite direction.

Each day is a decision. The decision comes first, the actions follow it.

5. Have you ever been sick? Whether it was the flu or you were in pain from something like a headache or backache, have you ever just felt so bad that you were ready to do whatever it took to not feel that way again?

Sometimes it takes getting to that point of just feeling so bad yourself or looking at your family, particularly your older relatives, and deciding that you don’t want to be like them. You don’t want the heart disease that makes them tired or diabetes that makes them overweight and near-blind.

Whatever your ‘go’ button, many people often need to get to a critical point in order to decide they are truly ready for change.

6. After the decision comes to the execution – every day you need to go into action on your decision. And the last point is to continue. Continue making the decision and continue executing a healthy lifestyle each morning when you arise and several times throughout the day. Are you going to be perfect? Heck no! Reread step 1 above.

Every day is a fresh start, but if you keep these steps in mind you’ll find yourself healthier at the end of 2014 than you are now.

7. Finally, there’s always the need for personalized help. I wish there was a ‘one size fits all’ diet and lifestyle regimen, I really do. While we know some basics that are good for everyone, ultimately it comes down to some tailor-made assistance when you really want to get the job done.

Have you ever wished that someone would hand you the ‘Care and Feeding Manual’ for your body? Well, as a clinical nutritionist, that’s what I do for my patients. When you’re ready for this step, consider contacting us for a free health analysis – call 408-733-0400. Our destination clinic treats patients from across the country and internationally. We are here to help!

I hope this was helpful to you. Personally, it made my heart sad to see the results of this poll. It was like watching someone you love to make a mistake that you knew was going to harm them for a long time to come. I have a mission; I want sane, effective, safe healthcare for everyone. I want people to know how good it feels to be healthy and experience the joy of a body and mind that functions the way it’s designed to. Please let me know if I can assist you. As I mentioned above, we are always happy to offer you a free health analysis.