CHANGE MAGAZINE, December 2, 2010
Learn to avoid annual weight gain and digestive issues with
The Healthy Gut Workbook
By Victor S. Sierpina, MD
As we approach the holidays our hearts and minds turn to many things: family, friends, traditions, gifts…and food! Like going on a cruise, getting through the holidays just about guarantees we gain some extra pounds. With abundant parties, pastries and feasts of every description, it is hard to imagine otherwise. In fact, such mid-winter holidays were essential to our ancestors who faced a long winter, possibly on starvation rations. The holidays were a chance to revel in the joy of life (and of food) while packing away stored calories to meet the demands of the harsh months ahead.
Such is history. Unlike our ancestors, we have no lack of abundant calories through the winter. We are not challenged by weather conditions and the need for heavy exercise like hunting, gathering and farming just to survive. This explains why, each January when I go to my regular gym workout, I find a much bigger crowd than usual. With holiday weight gain and New Year’s resolutions in place, well-intended folks pack the place seeking fitness and eager to shed the few pounds their ancestors coveted. By late February, the locker room, elliptical machines and weight room clear out to include, once again, just regular fitness buffs. The others, it seems, return to life as usual.
The cycle of weight gain, frustration, and weight loss occurs over and over for most of us. It has got to be better than this!
In my new book, The Healthy Gut Workbook, I offer some serious, scientifically based options to this unhealthy pattern. I encourage enjoying food—celebrating it in fact. I explain how food choices, eating patterns and portion size, plus sensitivities to foods or cravings, can identify dietary and lifestyle factors leading to inflammation, obesity, heart disease, diabetes and even Alzheimer’s. Mindfulness and the awareness of how stress and other emotions affect our gut and overall health is another important topic explored in depth. These are all necessary aspects of breaking socially conditioned and personal habits of unhealthy eating.
The Healthy Gut Workbook offers a substantial and practical number of surveys, tips and guides to help with self-diagnosis and natural ways to treat digestive difficulties. Common problems like heartburn, gastritis, ulcers, irritable bowel, inflammatory bowel, diverticulosis, constipation, hemorrhoids and more are explored.
The gut has to process over 30 tons of food over our lifetime. Its absorptive surface is the size of a tennis court! Yet, this mighty organ is often ignored as we are conditioned to focus on other organs like the heart, lungs, brain and sexual organs when we think of health issues.
Our health begins with good digestion and the food and drink choices we make; plus many genetic, lifestyle and social factors. Knowing these will help keep you and your gut healthy. Get a copy of The Healthy Gut Workbook for yourself and as a gift for others who need this information.
After reading The Healthy Gut Workbook, you’ll be armed with information to get through the holidays without bellyaching and to rationally manage your food intake while enjoying good times with family and friends—plus actually improving your health!
Find The Healthy Gut Workbook at www.amazon.com/Healthy-Gut-Workbook-Constipation-Diverticulosis/dp/1572248440).
Dr. Sierpina is a professor of integrative and family medicine and a UT Distinguished Teaching Professor at the University of Texas Medical Branch.