Now You Know

A possible down side to your participation in this challenge is that with your growth in knowledge of nutrition and the effects food have on your overall health comes a growth in responsibility.  Responsibility to do the best you can for yourself and your family when it comes to nutrition.  This is a huge responsibility!

Many of you have already started to look at what people are eating and think to yourself, "I wonder if they know how bad that is for them,"  or otherwise make judgements about how people eat.  It's human nature.  We are not suggesting you smack the food out of their hand and start yelling about the insulin, blood sugar roller coaster, or that you become that guy.  But you now have a responsibility to yourself and your family to do all that you can to provide quality nutrition for them.

I(Paul) was at the playground one day this past summer and I overheard a conversation a group of mothers had about car seats. The whole group seemed to be in agreement that you were an irresponsible parent if you did not have this top of the line, $200 car seat.  The reasoning was that their children were too important and that cost was not an issue when it came to safety.

Well, snack time came around and out popped the Cheetos, Oreo's, and juice boxes.  I did not judge, although several of the young children already had that puffy look I associate with inflammation. I truly believe that most people do not know the powerful effect food has on the body, both in a positive and negative way, but you do.  I did find it amazing and somewhat ironic that while these Moms obviously cared for their kids there was, seemingly, no link made to their health and what food they chose to feed them.

As we head into the final stages of the challenge you may be thinking about the opportunity to indulge in one of the "unfriendly" foods  you have been denying yourself and you should.  We will give you tips on how to reintroduce some of the non-friendly foods back into your eating, but understand that if your goal is health and longevity, your ways of eating have changed forever.  This does not mean the occasional treat is banned, just that you make the core of your nutritional practices line up with foods that we know make you more healthy.

You are fighting an uphill battle, friends, family, and the media will all push back hard against your efforts.  Stay strong, because now you know.

For some Friday informative reading this week we head over to Marks Daily Apple.  If you have not book marked his site yet you are missing out.  I don't know how he does it, but he pumps out several quality posts a week.  He recently completed a series on inflammation and his latest post on his top 6 anti inflammatory foods is a well worth the read.

It is the last weekend of the challenge, enjoy the good feelings and quality sleep.  Next weekend I plan on drinking wine until my lips turn purple and that usually results in poor sleep.  We will pepper in posts about how to come off of the challenge over the weekend and into next week.  If you started with us at the beginning, your challenge ends on Wednesday Feb. 1st.  Stay strong!  and see this thing through till the end.