Vitamins and Nutrition Blog

LIQUID QUALMS- Those super- potent energy drinks you see on display at your gym- do they really help boost your workout? And are they safe?
The short answer to both question is –Hard to tell. The safety of drinks like Amp, Pimp Juice (no, we did not make that one up), and Red Bull, is still under debate, because so little research has been done on their unconventional combinations of ingredients, says Scott Trappe, Ph.D.’ director of the Human Performance Laboratory of Ball State University. Some of these sugary, high-powered beverages pack up to 80 milligrams of caffeine (about the same amount in a cup of coffee), as well as amino acids and herbal supplements.
If you haven’t had a reaction to downing caffeine and /or sugar before a  work out. You will probably be fine chugging an energy drink. But combinations of ingredients like taurine, guarana, and ginseng have not been studied in depth and could turn these products into a potential witch’s brew. We say stick with water to be safe-100 to 200 ml Every 15 minutes while you exercise, to be exact. Substitute Electral or a sports drink like Gatorade when you work out longer than an hour, or in hot and humid weather. But if you are so exhausted that you need a major jolt to get moving, skip the gym and hit the couch for a nap.

Dieting has become a multi-millionaire dollar venture, if not multi-billion. There are a host of people who will gladly shell out a fortune just to lose weight and gain a measure of self-respect in the process.
The South Beach Diet is one of those that have gained popularity in the country. The reviews are good. It really does work… if you have the money to enroll under the program. But South Beach Diet can be availed for free. One needs only to have the determination to see the diet through.
South Beach Diet involves three phases. The first phase is the strictest of the three, where dieters are asked to cut off carbohydrates. This will mean eliminating fruit, bread, rice, potatoes, pasta, alcohol, cereals and especially baked goods from your diet for two weeks. You are only allowed to eat meat, chicken, turkey, fish and shellfish as well as vegetables eggs, cheese, nuts and salads. During the second phase of the South Beach Diet, you can already incorporate carbohydrates in moderation. The second phase can last until you reach your desired weight. The third phase is the least restrictive. Having gone through the first two phases, the South Beach Diet will have changed the way your body craves for food. Your eating will become not only a diet program but a way of life. With the third stage of the South Beach Diet, you can actually eat whatever you want but the catch is… what you want will no longer be the food that you wanted before the diet!
Be committed. Getting the South Beach Diet for free to work will mean having the self-control to actually follow with the plan especially during the challenging first phase of the program. You can actually do it yourself and make it work if you are really committed.
Know your diet. Another thing that you can do to get a South Beach Diet for free is to know all about the diet. Research over the Internet or read up books in the library. Get to know the different strategies that the program employs. More importantly, know what foods you can and cannot eat when on a South Beach Diet.
Get another to monitor. Have a friend or a member of your family monitor your free South Beach Diet program! It would be easy to revert back to your original pre-diet if you do not have someone at home who can work with you.

Not all types of diets are meant to help a person lose weight. There are some specialized types of diet that a physician may require a patient to undergo to help the treatment of a certain medical condition. An example of this particular diet is the candida diet.
Candida diet, or sometimes pertained to as the anti-candida diet, is a food restriction process for people who have the candida albicans. A stable amount of candida is found in the body to help maintain the immune system. But when candida becomes a yeast infection that mutates to its fungal form, it irritates the lining of the intestine that can lead to a series of health problems. When a person is afflicted with candida, he or she may experience bladder infections, energy loss, cravings for different types of food, insomnia, hyperactivity, migraine, mouth infections, rashes, sore throat and thyroid problems.
Anti-fungal drugs are usually administered to patients with this problem. Even so, patients who went through the candida diet found it beneficial and effective. After two to four weeks of following the candida diet, patients observed and experienced significant changes in their over-all health. The candida diet is mainly an elimination diet based on the severity of problems brought about by the infection to the person. The goal of the candida diet is to restrict the patient from ingesting the types of food that promotes the growth of candida in their body. A person’s menu is usually restricted to certain types of food that he or she should strictly follow. The candida diet may be difficult to practice for a while for people who are not used to eating a restricted food list but they need not to worry. After laboratory tests have proven that they are free of the fungus, they can bring back the foods that have been controlled from their menu by the candida diet.
There are a lot of foods which are not allowed in candida diet, because elimination of yeast and food that will heighten candida growth in the body is the main and foremost objective if this diet. One need not to fret because other alternatives are available and offered in the absence of these candid diet restricted foods.
The candida diet restricts a person from drinking alcoholic drinks because they too contain sugar. Coffee and tea are also not allowed in the candida diet. During a candida infection, a person needs all the energy from its immune system to deal with this health problem. Processing these beverages causes burden to the body’s stress-coping mechanisms thus weakening the immune system. A healthier option to these beverages that is suggested by the candida diet is water. Aside from helping the body to detoxify, water does not contain any sugar or yeast whatsoever. Vegetable broth, fresh vegetable juice and herbal teas, can also be drank instead of water.

Move It Or Lose It
Girls build six times more bone strength from exercise than from calcium, finds a decade-long study of 80 girls, ages 12 to 22, at Pennsylvania State of University and Johns Hopkins University. So you would be mistaken if you think the only thing you have to do is get your kids to drink their milk. They need regular weight-bearing activities like walking, dancing, and participating in organized sports. Thirty minutes at least every day would prove beneficial. Females develop 40 % of their bone mass between the age of 12 and 16; they start to lose it in their mid 30s. That means attaining optimal bone mass and strength in adolescence may ultimately ward off osteoporosis. Previous studies, which looked at bone density, had suggested that calcium was key. But these researchers measured bone strength – now recognized as the more critical measurement.

Calcium Mineral Information
Calcium deficiency - rickets

You will find that the eating protein in the evening will give you better results. The reason is because the body scavenges for energy when you are asleep. If you eat carbohydrates at night before going to bed your body will use the available fuel in the carbohydrates to replenish its energy reserves. If you eat protein your body will not be able to get the reserves from the meal and instead will draw more heavily on the fat stored in the body. So, generally speaking it’s better to eat protein at night if you are really trying to do everything right.