"Only 1 in 10 Americans eat enough fruits and veggies."
--CDC study
Did you grow up with your mother telling you to eat your
vegetables? Turns out your mom was
right about those vegetables. Foods that grow from the earth (vegetables, fruit, legumes, whole grains) contain fiber, that substance that give them shape. Like bones in animals.
Fiber is really good for us. It fills us up and prevents us from
overeating. The bad news is that most Americans don’t eat enough of it. Maybe 1 or 2 in 10 people get enough fiber.
Are there consequences to not consuming enough fiber? You bet. Diabetes and obesity, for
starters. Colon cancer for another.
A good place to start is to become aware of how much
fiber you eat now. Read the “nutrition facts”
labels on prepared and packaged food and look for what a serving size is and how
many grams of dietary fiber it has. Just
do the math for a day or two and you will figure out if you are low in
fiber. If your daily total is less than
around 35 grams a day, then you are probably fiber deficient.
Start with your personal inventory of dietary fiber. In the next issue of Wellness Wednesdays, I’ll
share how a couple of my favorite meals stack up!
With love and kindness,
Nancy Heinrich, MPH
Founder and Wellness Architect
