Simple Fixes to Delay Diabetes

There is plenty of research and documentation on diabetes. The number of people who have diabetes keeps rising year after year. There are about 246 million adults world wide that have diabetes and this accounts for 6 percent of all global deaths. Type 2 diabetes accounts for about 90 percent of all diabetes and is closely linked to obesity and physical inactivity. The International Diabetes Federation estimates more than 380 million people will have a form of diabetes by 2025.

There is now new research that backs up my style of keeping healthy. Researchers stated that the study shows that lifestyle changes can make a big difference. Drinking less alcohol, eating more vegetables and exercising can prevent or delay the onset of diabetes.

"This study has shown that ... group-based interventions targeting lifestyle changes such as diet and exercise produce a durable and long-lasting reduction in incidence of type 2 diabetes," the researchers wrote.

This goes back to my five factors for a healthy lifestyle. Those factors are nutrition, supplementation, resistance training, cardiovascular training, and personal assistance. The fifth factor is what is mentioned in the previous comment by the researches of this latest study, "group-based interventions".

Diabetes can damage the eyes and kidneys, and also leads to heart disease, stroke and limb amputations. Does anyone really need any more reason than that to want to live a healthy lifestyle?

Calories in Water?

Since when does water have calories? I have been seeing all of these commercials on water that has less calories than another water. Why? Because every business is looking for an edge. Beverage companies are now adding flavors, vitamins, minerals and other things in water in order to increase their market share.

Water should have zero calories, zero fat, zero protien, zero carbohydrates, zero everything! Just plain old water is what your body needs. There are some waters that have flavorings. As long as they have zeroes on the nutrition label you are fine.

Now I am going to take this a little further. Sports drinks. The adds say "if you sweat you lose electrolites and they need to be replaced". That is not entirely accurate. If you work out for 20 to 30 minutes you should be sweating. but you do not sweat enough that you need to drink a sugary sports drink. Sports drinks are good if you work out for more than an hour. Even then I would recommend you drink the less sugary stuff like Gatorade's G2. The regular sports drinks are really made for athletes that work long and hard almost every day. Water is plenty good for the rest of us.

My recommendation for anyone trying to lose weight is to look at what you are drinking every day. Even drinking diet colas should be replaced with water. I like to use the guideline of one ounce of water for every pound of weight. For instance, if you weigh 180 pounds then you should drink 180 ounces of water every day. that equates to 11.25 16 ounce bottles of water. That is a lot of water but it is effective in keeping you hydrated when working out and will aid in losing weight. You could also be more conservative and figure out how many cans of soda you drink in a day and aim to drink that much in water instead.

The bottom line is plain water is the best thing for you. Never mind the hype.