WELLNESS WEDNESDAYS: Teaching Kids about Real Food

"The most important fact about Spaceship Earth:  An instruction book didn't come with it."  

                                                          --Buckminster Fuller

When you buy a new TV, you get an instruction manual. When you get a new video game, you get an instruction manual.  So how come when you have a baby, there is no instruction manual?  

In a recent class with some wonderful 2^nd and 3^rd graders, the kids were kind of surprised to learn that parents don't get an instruction manual for children.  We talked about how kids can learn about real food and then teach their own parents.  They listened intently when I taught them about why eating vegetables and fruits that are the colors of the rainbows is a clue for identifying real food.  I brought several rainbow foods to the class for them to sample:  cucumbers, orange bell peppers and some beautiful grapes.  

At the beginning of the lesson, the kids were all focused on the grapes.  As we talked and I showed them my really cool tool for slicing cucumbers, they all wanted to taste the cucumbers.  Then they wanted more cucumbers.  One of the volunteers created artistically arranged plates of vegetables for each table.  As the kids continued munching on their healthy snacks, the noise level continued to rise in the room.  Staff at the after school program popped in to see what the noise was coming from our classroom.  All they saw when they peaked in was children having fun, laughing and eating vegetables.  Can you imagine!?!  They were surprised.  They smiled.  They laughed, too!   

Here are 4 tips for teaching your own kids about real food:

1. When you go food shopping, encourage your kids to pick out a new vegetable.
2. Google the vegetable to look at the health benefits. My favorite site for nutrition facts about vegetables and fruits is The World's Healthiest Foods: click here. 
3. Teach your kids how to cut up the vegetable (when they are old enough to use a knife).  There is no substitute for the hands-on experience of playing with your food!
4. Read food labels with your kids and look for ingredients that end in "-ose". That is a sugar.  Choose something with less grams of added sugars per serving. 

In gratitude,

Nancy Heinrich

Founder, Growing Healthy Kids, Inc. 

WELLNESS WEDNESDAYS: Happiness and Health

"Happiness is not something ready made.  It comes from your own actions."   -- Dalai Lama XIV

How do you define happiness? 

Do happy people live longer?  Do happy people enjoy better health?  When someone is chronically depressed, how does that affect their health and their happiness?  Is there a relationship between happiness and blood pressure?  Happiness and heart health? Happiness and gut health? 

Recently, a client said to me, “You are always smiling.”  I decided a long time ago that life is so much better when you are happy about what you do every day, when you treat people with kindness, and you work hard to make the world a better place. When I wake in the morning and see the trees gently dancing in my back yard, I smile and my heart sings.  When I see the glow of the fading sun at the end of the day turn the sky into a brilliant shade of soft orange and yellow, I smile and my body relaxes.   For me, happiness is defined by my relationship with nature, my family and friends. What makes YOUR heart sing?

There is an ultimate relationship between happiness and health.  I see it every day.  Working with parents and children around the country who are dealing with diabetes, I hear their stories about what they would like to change about themselves.  I hear about their daily struggles with depression as they learn what to do about out-of-control blood sugars.  Many diseases are the cause, or the result, of depression.  Diabetes is one of them.  Being overweight is another.  

Whenever I talk with an adult at a healthy weight now who was overweight or obese as a child, I hear the pain in their voices when they share how they still suffer from depression because they never stopped thinking of themselves as fat.  There is a sadness that reveals itself when I have a deep conversation with someone who was fat as a child or teenager, even though they might be a very successful corporate CEO now and it was 30 years ago when they were overweight. 

This is why the work of GROWING HEALTHY KIDS, INC. is so important.   We have an opportunity to impact the future happiness of our children by actively learning what we need to know to give them access to the right foods and other tools for great health.

As parents, we have a responsibility to provide our children with good, healthy foods.  One of the keys to happiness starts with being as physically healthy as possible.  Physical health is connected to mental and emotional health.  When we feel good about ourselves, when we have fresh plant-based foods to eat, and we know how to get a good night’s sleep, then we are on the path to happiness.

Please pass the brussels sprouts. To learn more about the wonderful nutritional value of these little gems, click here. 

In gratitude,

Nancy Heinrich

Founder, Growing Healthy Kids, Inc. 

WELLNESS WEDNESDAYS: Feeding Your Brain

"Your sense of humor is one of the most powerful tools you have to make certain that your daily mood and emotional state support good health."  --Paul E. McGhee, Ph.D.

After seniors watched a funny video in a 2014 study, their cortisol levels dropped and they did better on memory tests. "No matter your age, anything that lowers stress will improve memory."  --Majid Fotuhi, MD, author of Boost Your Brain

Last week’s Wellness Wednesdays’ article was about what happened in a controlled situation when the added sugars consumed by 43 obese children were replaced with the same amount of calories from carbohydrates that were not in the form of high fructose corn syrup and other forms of added sugars.  The results were pretty amazing.  The study, conducted by Dr. Robert Lustig, found that ALL of the 43 children showed improvements in their blood pressure, blood cholesterol and blood sugar. 

Considering that we now know that Alzheimer’s starts decades before the first symptom appears, there are millions of reasons – our children – to ensure that all kids have access to healthy foods.  Does food play a role in the development of Alzheimer’s?  Yes.  Given the increasing number of Americans with Alzheimer’s and the devastation and havoc it has on an individual and their family, the obesity epidemic in children is the canary in the coal mine.  Consuming too many calories, especially calories from added sugars with no nutritional value found in products such as sodas and sweet treats made with high fructose corn syrup, leads to obesity which leads to high blood pressure, high blood sugar, and high cholesterol.   Controlling blood sugars and preventing diabetes is critical to the long term health of our brains.  So is watching sodium intake and controlling blood pressure.  Increased blood pressure is a risk factor for strokes, which is a heart attack in the brain. 

Food matters to the health of our brains.  So does getting a good night's sleep, keeping stress in check, exercising, enjoying the company of family and friends, and the joys of a good laugh or two or five every day. 

There is one common denominator in every workshop conducted by Growing Healthy Kids:  the message about the importance of avoiding all foods and drinks containing high fructose corn syrup because of its negative effect on health.  Focusing on making this one change can set our children’s health on an entirely new – and healthier – path.  Given what we know now about foods that are good for brain health, such as olive oil, wild salmon, dark berries, nuts, and green vegetables, let’s all agree to make the change and be role models.  Please put down the high fructose corn syrup and pass the spinach.

In gratitude,

Nancy Heinrich 
Founder, Growing Healthy Kids, Inc.