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| THE CASUAL GARDENER, Shawna Coronado How to Lose Weight and Get Healthy In The Garden = = = = = = = = = = = = Dear Casual Gardener, You’ve mentioned your desire to get people healthy in the garden. I need to get healthy! I’m a 38 year old man who is approximately 100 pounds overweight and I am frustrated with traditional diets and exercise plans. I own a club membership and never go to exercise as everyone there is skinny and it depresses me more to see them making it look so easy when it really isn’t easy. I am unhappy and depressed with the stress I deal with from work and think I may be overeating for “comfort”. My wife and I have been married for 17 years and frankly, it’s turned into a boring routine. We stay at home and don’t go outside much. I guess I just feel unhappy and eating fills a hole in my life. We have an old home and an old beat-up yard. I’m thinking maybe I can garden and improve a few things but don’t know where to start. Can you help me? Signed, Sad and Overweight With No Garden = = = = = = = = = = = = Dear Sad, I CAN HELP YOU! Your letter really touched me. I’m sorry you feel the way you do and want you to feel better! You should understand you have just described a lot of people’s lives – you are not alone. I’m sure there will be many people who identify with your predicament. No one wants to be overweight and feel depressed, but somehow it’s easy to fall into bad habits. There are many things to address in your routine which can help you lose weight, but MORE IMPORTANTLY help you FEEL BETTER! I’d like to stress before you try any health plan you speak with your doctor about your physical and emotional health. Your doctor knows your health history and can let you know if “Shawna’s Health Plan” is the perfect fit for your life. You mentioned that you feel depressed and eat for “comfort”. I am a firm believer in discovering and understanding what is REALLY bothering you. Then you can address other issues in your life (your weight for instance) and solve them being armed with a better emotional attitude. Perhaps it’s a childhood issue. Perhaps it’s your relationship with other people in your life. Perhaps you’re unhappy with your job. Whatever it is that is making you seek comfort in food, finding a solution to what’s disturbing you emotionally is often the trigger which allows you to change your lifestyle to a healthier and more positive model. Some people can only solve their problems by going to a counselor or other professional. I whole heartedly endorse this. Others find their solution through de-stressing techniques like meditation. It allows a person to take the time to “think-out” his problems and come to a better self awareness. This is where gardening comes in for me personally. Working in the garden, particularly simple and repetitive chores, helps put me in a relaxed meditative state. After I consulted with multiple doctors, they all mentioned the healthful benefits of gardening are distinctly tied into the meditative quality of the work performed. Therefore, my first suggestion is to clean up that “beat-up yard” you mentioned. The acts of cleaning and weeding are repetitive and will give you quiet time outdoors to start thinking things through. Weeding is therapy! Decide what you want your life to become. Start thinking your way through the stress that is bothering you. Be sure to start with simple tasks that do not overwhelm you. It is easy to get out in the daylight for only 20 minutes every day. You can do it in the early evening after work – or do it before work. It’s important to not be too strenuous when you first start – just get out there and do SOMETHING. Then gradually work up to heavier projects. Perhaps after you clean up the mess you can consider building a garden. Fall is the perfect time to build a garden. The plants have access to far more moisture than in the hot dry Summer and it’s a cooler time to work in the yard. When Winter comes around you can walk for 20 minutes a day outside. Cold? YES! So bundle up and get outside for a bit every day - it’s very good for you to be out in the daylight and fresh air to increase your Serotonin levels and feel better naturally. You’ve heard me discuss “Serotonin” previously. As I’ve mentioned before, according to the medical community, increasing your serotonin level is one of the key ways to feel better every day. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter important for brain function. It is one of the key chemicals used in your brain and acts as a feel great endorphin raising your energy level and making you feel better about yourself. Stress, poor health, sedentary lifestyles, lack of sunlight and inappropriate vitamins as well as poor eating habits all contribute to lower serotonin levels. It is easy to improve your serotonin levels and improve your health! You can raise your serotonin levels by increasing your exposure to sunlight and nature, exercising regularly, taking vitamins and eating better. It’s a very simple answer to solve a very complex chemical problem in your brain. As you have discovered, short-term diets do not work well. It is easy to see why this is true – once you lose the weight you go back to old habits and put all the weight back on. Losing weight and keeping it off is a lifestyle change. Losing weight is quite possible if you follow my health plan as you’ll see yourself gaining more energy and will want to do even more outside. Hence my addiction to gardening – it makes me feel great. I can’t wait to get out and garden! Eating nutritionally is a very important part of “Shawna’s Health Plan” – it’s allowing your body to have very evenly spaced sugar processing. Eating small meals evenly throughout the day means you will “gorge” less and have a more even emotional temperament. A good guide is this – a serving of food is the size of your fist. Do not eat giant meals which make you feel stuffed afterwards. There is no rule that says you have to eat those giant portions restaurants serve! Eat in moderation – using “the size of your fist” to gauge how much a helping should be. It’s long been proven that emotional swings can occur when you have uneven sugar processing or an inadequate nutritional diet. Depression can be caused by many things. Correcting what you have power over – your sugar and nutritional intake for example – can help you feel significantly better emotionally without starving yourself in a fad diet. My personal diet is based on “all things in moderation.” Having debilitating allergies has forced me to change my diet for good. I am allergic to molds and must avoid cheese, bread, mushrooms, beer and wine. I don’t suggest you cut out all of these things like I have had to – I have learned to substitute other proteins and carbs and have a healthy diet. Reducing your intake of fatty foods like cheeses and whole milk is a great idea. You can substitute with other lower fat milk products to keep your bones strong. Switching your carbohydrate intake to be more “whole grains” and eating carbs in moderation is also a good idea. Why not try cutting these items in half while increasing the number of meals you eat per day to be smaller, but healthier for you? Do not think of this as a diet – think of this as a permanent change. To keep the weight off you must eat healthy every day. Cheating is allowed because this is not a strict diet, it’s a lifestyle change. Remember – this is your life – you have to LIVE it. By following the concept of “all things in moderation”, having a snack or dessert isn’t that big of a deal. What IS a big deal is if you spend every night eating an entire box of cookies or ice cream. That’s gluttony and “gorging” and isn’t healthy for you. Also, take vitamins every day! Your doctor can better recommend which vitamins will be right for you. I take a multi-vitamin made for women, a B-Complex vitamin and St. John’s Wort, an herbal supplement. I’m sure I could take far more, but remember my philosophy – all things in moderation. For me, this is the perfect combination of vitamins. It works. You’ll find a combination that works too and will be surprised by how much better you feel every day because of increased energy. Many people ask me why massage is a part of my health plan. To answer this question you only have to go online to one of the thousands of websites on this issue. Doctors and other medical professionals agree that as a society, we are touch deprived and this can lead to disease or emotional dysfunction. From the cradle to the nursing home, tactile stimulation and the emotional assurance of caring touch bring about a sense of well- being and security. It has been quite an education for me to study the studies, compare notes and consult with doctors on this issue. It seems clear that massage and touch is an important part of being connected with other human beings. Sometimes a simple hug is enough to make you feel better and make your entire day. Imagine having that feeling regularly through massage? Feeling close to others and a part of the natural cycle of life is good for everyone – at all ages and stages within our lives. Gardening, like massage, is something that can make you feel a part of the larger community. If you are a part of your local community, you make more friends. You can have these friends help you lose weight by gardening or exercising with you. Perhaps you can have a more subtle approach by having them build your self-esteem just by being your friends. As you can see, weight loss is a complicated issue. It’s not as simple as hopping on to the latest fad diet. What IS important is changing your lifestyle for the positive. Gardening, with its meditative qualities, community-centric nature and outdoor exposure can be the first step to living a healthier lifestyle. Please follow Shawna’s Health Plan below for eight weeks and let me know your results. I’ve had many people tell me that the most important part of the health plan is the daily walking or gardening, come rain or shine. For these people it has been the most amazing energizing experience. I want everyone to feel this energy. It is a lifestyle change for the better - an incredibly easy way to feel and look great!! Shawna’s Health Plan: • Exercise aerobically, preferably outdoors in the garden, for at least 20 minutes every day, breathing deeply. (Walking seems to be a great aerobic exercise choice during the Winter season.) • Expose yourself to daylight without sunglasses for 20 minutes every day • Take vitamins (particularly B vitamins) • Eat nutritionally between 3 and 5 meals/snacks every day spaced apart as evenly as possible. Be sure these meals are small to moderate and have some form of a high-quality, low fat protein and “whole-grain” type carb • Get regular massage – either from family, a friend or a professional • Regularly do helpful things for others and/or for the community and environment (start with conservation in your own back yard) Happy Gardening to you all – BE HEALTHY! Love life! Please send your healthy gardening questions for The Casual Gardener to dearshawna@thecasualgardener. com or The Casual Gardener, P.O. Box 358, Warrenville, IL 60555. www.thecasualgardener.com |
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