How to Gain Weight

1. One of the difficult things about keeping our weight in check is the sheer misinformation we have been given about the health benefits of foods. We often don't get the most reliable information to work with, as even governments aren't too keen to harm entire industries. The U.S. government has therefore subsidized greatly certain agricultural crops such as corn, soybeans, wheat and tobacco, but little for green vegetables, for instance. These are easy to grow foods, but not particularly nutritious in comparison, and some can even be harmful.

   Much of it has to do with marketing; companies have promoted foods such as Splenda and Equal or Nutrasweet as ways to cut calories. The artificial sweetener aspartame was initially approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 1974 amid controversy of conflict of interest. It still is a controversial subject among health officials, and if you are really into a healthy diet it's something you may not take chances with.

   Some other areas of misinformation that you really have to consider for a healthy diet are:

   1. All calories are created equal. Simply counting calories, making sure you expend more than you take in, may or may not make you lose weight. It depends on if you're consuming the wrong type of calories. Studies have shown that from a metabolic standpoint the quality of calorie intake is going to have an effect on the number of calories expended.

   I'm sure we would all agree that eating 100 calories of sugared water or French fries is not the same as consuming 100 grams of broccoli or lentils. But the marketers of those sugar drinks say that it doesn't matter if you simply work off those 100 calories of Gatorade.

   2. Avoid saturated fats at all costs. Saturated fats fill an impressive list of needs for the human body. Such important factors as improved liver health, stronger bones, healthier lungs, a stronger immune system, and yes even for improving cardiovascular risk factors. It is a fact that the brain is made up mainly of fat and cholesterol, and most of the fatty acids in the brain are saturated fats. If we eliminate saturated fats from our diet, how will the brain get the raw materials it needs for optimum functionality?

   3. Cholesterol causes heart attacks and should be eliminated. Having cholesterol levels that are too high or too low have health ramifications, but there is substantial evidence that cholesterol isn't the devil to our health that it is portrayed to be. But statins, drugs that can lower your cholesterol marketed as Lipitor and Zocor can be sold at a greater rate if more people have "cholesterol issues".

   4. All sugars are the same. There is no doubt that fructose and glucose are not metabolized the same way in the body. Every cell in the body burns glucose, while fructose is turned into mostly fat. It also taxes the liver, because the fructose has to be metabolized entirely by the liver. It has been found that for every 120 calories of glucose consumed, less than one calorie is stored as fat. In comparison, with fructose the same amount of calories of fructose turns into 40 calories stored as fat.
   Eating a healthy diet not only means adding healthy foods to your diet such as honey, but staying away from certain types of foods. Read more on our website http://healtheybalanceddiet.com/. And so many of the things that give us these healthy joints are the same things that keep our liver healthy, and you can read more on our website http://liverissues.com/. Rich Carroll is a writer and avid health advocate now living in Chicago.
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