Every January US News and World Report lists the top diets. These are vetted by legitimate nutrition professionals. This year they are the:
- Mediterranean Diet
- Dash Diet
- Flexitarian Diet
- MIND Diet
What do all of these “diets” have in common? They limit sugar and other processed foods. They include plenty of vegetables and fruit, legumes, nuts and whole grains. Whole foods are the focus. All of these “diets” put the quality of the food first.
What do whole foods get us? A longer life! IN 2022 a study was released (PLOS Medicine Fadness et al 2/8/22) that indicated that at age 20 if you switch from a Standard American Diet (SAD Diet) to a “optimized diet” you can add 10 and 13 years to your life expectancy for females and males respectively. We aren’t 20 anymore. But at age 60 switching from the SAD diet to an optimized diet results in 8 additional years for women and 9 for men. Even changing to a “healthy” diet at age 80 resulted in 3.5 extra years of life. The biggest gains came from adding legumes, whole grains and nuts and limiting processed foods.
Are you focusing on whole foods. Keep track of the number of meals that contain only whole foods. We will skip snacks for now. These would be meals where ideally you don’t open a package to eat or prepare the food. If you do open a package, the food that comes out looks close to the food that went into it, for example, tomato sauce and frozen veggies. Fruit gummies pressed in the shape of a fruit does not count. Neither does a TV dinner. But 100% whole grain bread is ok. And if you make your own salad dressing instead of opening a bottle, give yourself an extra point. See how close to 21 meals you get.
Remember Self Care, IS Health Care,
Kim