LIVING WELL

A passion in my life – and one of my goals – is to help families get healthy.

We cannot be productive individuals in our communities, schools, and churches if we are not healthy. We need to take personal responsibility for our health and the health of our families, to provide information and to teach how important it is to look at food as fuel and building material, not something that merely fills a void.

Food plays a major role in disease prevention. Some doctors will say that 70 percent of disease can be prevented by what we eat and drink. I believe that now more than ever.

Here are some tips that can help you get started.

READ YOUR LABELS…Many packaged foods contain harmful ingredients. Here are the top seven ingredients you should try to avoid at all cost.

Sugar – Depresses immunity, promotes cravings, promotes heart disease, sours behavior, affects attention and learning.

Aspartame – (NutraSweet) Aspartame is in all diet drinks and there are so many health issues related to Aspartame that I wouldn’t be able to list them all. When methyl alcohol, a component of aspartame, enters your body, it turns into formaldehyde. Formaldehyde is toxic and cancer-causing. Scientist uses it as a preservative…THEY DON’T DRINK IT!

Monosodium Glutamate – (MSG) causes damage to neurons in the brain and has possible links to Parkinson’s Disease, Alzheimer’s, and many others.

Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein – created through a series of chemical processes; first boiling vegetables in sulfuric acid for several hours, then neutralizing the acid with caustic soda (a agent often used to make soap), and then drying the results in brown sludge.

Hydrogenated Fats (trans fats) – This is horrible for your heart. Need I say more?

Refined, Enriched and Fortified – Enriched is often a tip that something good was taken out of the food, requiring another process to put some of the good stuff back in. Whole wheat is much better for you.

Nitrates and nitrites – These are preservatives added to food, especially processed meats. They are bad for you and have a long list of side effects.

If you would like more information on why you shouldn’t eat these foods, please feel free to join our nutrition class every Thursday and Friday. (Call for more information on times and individual classes.)

Lynn Pass is owner of The Gym in Oneonta. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Health and Human Performance from Auburn University and personal training and aerobic certifications in ACE, AFFA, and ACSM.