Making Changes At Home Impacts Everyone – Including Your Children

What’s not available in your house you can’t eat! Don’t make your bad habit foods available for yourself. In times of weakness, you will eat them. It’s harder if you have children, but you should not feed them all the junk either. Otherwise they will struggle with their diet as adults just like you are.

Food Substitutions at Home

• It Texas, tortillas are a staple. However, you can get low-carb tortillas that taste great. My children even eat peanut butter and jelly on them.
• Switch to Stevia. It’s 100% better than artificial sweeteners like aspartame or saccharine. Cook with it. Use it in your drinks.
• Many baked goods can be made with apple sauce instead of sugar. You still get some carbs and sugar, but significantly less than if your dessert is made with refined sugar.
• Pasta is an easy switch. Go with whole grain pasta, or now you can find pasta made from beans and lentils. Google it! I’m not sure if it qualifies as pasta anymore, but it replaces pasta, has fewer carbs, and lots of fiber.
• No fruit juice. It’s horrible for you. You drink in extreme amounts of carbs and sugars. It’ not good for you or your family. Make your own fruit infused water. As a novelty, get everyone in your household one of the super cool infuser bottles and make fruity tasting water. It adds to the buy in. I posted a link to the bottles at the end of the article.

Train Your Body Off Of Sugar & Carbs

Your body actually becomes addicted, addicted to carbs and sugar.

A study in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (2013) measured brain activity when high glycemic carbs were given to men who ranged in age from 18-35. Brain activity in regions that involve reward and craving lit up thus showing that foods like potatoes, sugar, and processed grains are highly addictive. Your brain actually rewards you for eating them. The same regions of your brain light up when you have addictions to nicotine and narcotics.

Interesting!

How Long Does It Take?

It could take months or even a year, but the health benefits are worth it. In one study by The European Journal of Psychology (2009), researchers found that on average automaticity was reached after 66 days, but for long-term habits it could take as long as 254 days. It really depends on your mindset. You must plan and be mindful about your choices so you don’t fall back into bad habits.

READ Junk Food and Its Impacts on Brain: Junk Food Addiction

Consistency counts. Over time, you will not crave carbs and sugar in the amounts that you once did. As a matter of fact, the foods you once thought were delicious don’t taste the same, and you may decide you don’t like them anymore.

Conclusion

The diet roller coaster is full of ups and downs. It’s time to get off the ride for good. It’s all about making small strides every day that lead to longevity as far as your health is concerned. The long-term benefits of a healthy lifestyle far outweigh the temporary satisfaction that some foods seem to bring. Start making permanent changes so that you don’t deal with the consequences of an unhealthy life in the future.