Obesity and diabetes health tips

Beat obesity in the long run with Ayurveda

Obesity not only makes you feel shy about yourself in social gatherings, but also brings other health problems like joint pain and heart attack. In the market you’ll find many shortcuts to lose weight, but are big failures in the long run and unsafe. Ayurveda believes, it is a condition of abnormal body weight caused due to imbalance of kapha, vata and pitha, and suggests panchakarma, proper diet and healthy lifestyle for healthy wellbeing of the individual.

Cut prosperity, protect your bones

Surprised? Many people consider obesity as an expression of prosperity, but what they don’t know is, it can cause bone loss and arthritis! Our body is supported by a framework of bones called skeleton with a certain capacity to bear load. When the bodyweight increases, bones and joints take the toll resulting in arthritis and fracture. Maintaining healthy bodyweight ensures healthier bones.

Include fibrous foods, eliminate toxins

Fibrous food is essential to induce digestion of foods, absorption of nutrients and elimination of wastes. Impaired digestion leads to health problems like constipation, abnormal accumulation of fats, improper digestion, and vomiting. These days you’ll find canned foods containing gluten with little or no fibrous content; your favorite noodles, bread, macaroni or burger come under this category. Following healthy diet regimen containing fibre-rich diet health is a must to maintain a healthy digestive system.

Exercise regularly, keep your heart safe

Leading a couch potato life, gorging on junk food exposes you to cardiac health problems. Exercising regularly burns fat and pumps in good hormones to keep your heart healthy. It also fine tunes your body making your blood vessels work efficiently eliminating risks that need surgical interventions like angioplasty to save life.

Bitter gourd can reduce diabetes risk

Health problems like diabetes can make you permanently dependant on regular insulin shots. Do you know, one of most avoided vegetable like bitter gourd can save your life? Bitter gourd contains a compound called charantin that reduces blood glucose by increasing insulin level. Insulin breaks down glucose thus helping you avoid dependency on regular insulin shots for controlling glucose surges.

Say No to Saliva Contaminated Food

Say No to Saliva Contaminated Food

Recently, I was watching this Hollywood movie “The 13th Warrior” with friends and in this particular scene, the warriors spat and blew their noses into a communal water basin and drank from it, my stomach wriggled. That scene also reminded me of a birthday party in a media company where people shared the cake tasted by others, a saliva contaminated one !!!

Sharing foods is not a bad idea, when it is for the needy ones and is hygienic. But occasions such as party, especially the ones involving close friends and acquaintances, are potential situations where saliva contamination can occur. Sometimes, a management’s interested in advertising their fun office culture, or people considering it as a way to develop closer bonds.

I am of the view that consuming saliva contaminated foods is risky as saliva harbors harmful bacteria and viruses. It need not be only through foods bitten by others, but also through hands or fingers that hold the foods and reach the mouth. I have always been an avid follower of topics related to science, medicine and hygiene, and unhygienic food habits make me wonder if people truly are aware of health risks or not.

Some may or may not feel the same way, but the medical facts about diseases that spread through saliva are here to stay. But I am confident, there are millions who share the same view as of mine.

Cultures & their influence

Cultures affect people’s lifestyles and you can see them in their peculiar behaviors & traditions. Recent trends in changing lifestyles show that the world is gradually drifting towards west. Here are some surprising ones.

• Japanese bowing at each other to greet and use chopsticks to eat.

• African tribals rub each others’ nose to greet.

• Americans shake hands, hug or make each others’ cheeks touch to greet (but sometime go overboard like Mr. Obama kissed Aung San Suu Kyi).

• Indians fold their palms to convey ‘namaskar.’

Hygienic habits such as washing hands, keeping surroundings clean are better ways to keep disease at bay, whereas spitting pan on walls, urinating in public places, so on are dirty and can become breeding grounds of diseases!!!

Saliva contains bacteria and viruses that can potentially carry health problems such as cold, fever (glandular), herpes infection, meningococcal disease, hepatitis B, warts and so on. Saliva contamination or unhygienic health conditions or water can also cause jaundice.

How it can happen?

Saliva exchange can happen in many ways – kissing, sharing foods, so on… Some may find them as ways to connect with people, but potential dangers wait for their turn to take control of your body resistance!

Remedy

As is obvious from the above situations that there’s no substitute for hygienic food habits and lifestyle. Practice healthy lifestyle and keep diseases at bay.