-National Nutrition Month-

“Put Your Best Fork Forward”

Tips for a Healthier You!

Watch Your Calories

Individuals recovering from spinal or other injuries heal quicker when they avoid carrying excess weight. This is especially true if the injury has sidelined them from normal physical exercise. A diet with few excess calories offers the dual benefit of helping you avoid packing on the pounds, and helping you heal faster. -Practice Portion Control-

Eating All of Your Vegetables

Vegetables such as spinach, cabbage, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, and broccoli have been shown to help inhibit the growth of cancer cells. They also have been shown to assist your immune system in acting more effectively!

Make Protein a Priority

Muscle injuries are one of the more popular reasons why people visit a chiropractor. Protein helps build and heal muscle tissue; thus helping it to renew itself back to a pre-injury state. If your daily intake of protein is low, it can hinder the healing process and can ultimately stand in the way of chiropractic visits giving you maximum results. Fish and lean meats are the foods that offer the most amount of protein. Some vegetarian options are tofu, soy beans, eggs, milk, and nuts.

Knowing Your Fats (The Good from the Bad)

Healthy fats are needed to nourish our body’s brain, heart, and cells, as well as our hair, skin, and nails. Foods that are rich in certain omega-3 fats called EPA and DHA are particularly important and can help to reduce cardiovascular disease, improve moods, and help prevent dementia. Try and incorporate monounsaturated fats that derive from plant oils. These oils include olive oil, as well as avocados, nuts (like almonds, hazelnuts, and pecans), and seeds (such as pumpkin, sesame). Also, try and add in polyunsaturated fats. These include Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids, found in fatty fish such as salmon, herring, mackerel, anchovies, sardines, and some cold water fish oil supplements, flaxseed oils, and walnuts. Another healthier fat is saturated fats. These are found primarily in animal sources including red meat and whole milk dairy products. Overall, try and eliminate or cut back on trans fats. These types of fats are found in vegetable shortenings, some margarines, crackers, candies, cookies, snack foods, fried foods, baked goods, and other processed foods made with partially hydrogenated vegetable oils.

Get Your Vitamin D!

Vitamin D is essential for building strong bones and teeth because it helps your body to absorb calcium. If you don’t get enough Vitamin D you risk developing bones that are soft and brittle! This can lead to a condition called rickets (occurs in adolescents), and osteomalacia (occurs in adults).

Vitamin D also helps your body to protect itself from chronic disease and illness by helping to improve your body’s response to infections.

Staying Hydrated

If you wish to promote healing, it’s imperative to drink enough water every day! Yes, everyday. Water provides an entire slew of benefits, from transporting those important nutrients to where they need to be, to flushing harmful toxins out of the body. Getting into this habit will boost your overall health, and will help to promote healing of injuries and other medical conditions.

Avoid Alcohol

It’s no secret that alcohol isn’t a health food. And while most chiropractic patients are very proactive when it comes to health, they may not realize the impact that alcohol can have on one’s body. Alcohol can cause your immune function to plummet, which can then cause you to be more susceptible to illness. If you’re looking to help your immune system to function at its absolute best, avoiding alcohol is one of your best bets.