Essay Nutrition: Nutrition and Healthy Eating Plan

Submitted By vincentvantrease
Words: 1423
Pages: 6

Running Head: My Healthy Eating Plan

My Healthy Eating Plan
Axia College

When one is thinking about what they are going to eat, most do not think about the essential nutrients that are in the food they are craving. Eating healthy is the farthest things from the mind. Many of us do not know how to eat healthy, do not have the money to eat healthy or simply do not have the time. How important is it to eat healthy? This subject will be examined throughout this paper along with examining my eating habits. Eating healthy helps to provide nutrients to your body. Nutrients help to keep you active, your muscles moving and your heart to beat correctly. There are three essential nutrients that are needed to help one’s body function properly; protein, fats and carbohydrates. Each one of these nutrients has a different role in keeping our body working. Protein is essential for energy. It also helps to build and repair body cells. It is also part of various enzymes, hormones, antibodies. Various meats, poultry and fish are good sources of protein. Carbohydrates are excellent for brain function and red blood cells. Good sources of carbohydrates are bread, rice, pasta, veggies and fruit. Lastly, fats provide energy. Sources for fats are meat, poultry, fish, milk and milk products, nuts and seeds. In addition to providing nutrients to your body, healthy eating also helps to prevent disease. According to Web MD( 2005-2009), “Healthy foods can help you prevent and treat disease. Eating more fruits and vegetables as part of a heart-healthy diet can help lower blood pressure. Eating more fruits and vegetables may also lower your risk of lung, oral, esophageal, stomach, and colon cancer. And eating less saturated fat may also lower your risk for cancer and heart disease” (para 6). My current eating plan is to eat whatever is wanted at that time. Whether it hamburgers from Mcdonald’s or Wendy’s, or chicken from any fast food restaurant. My menu on a daily basis includes the following:
Breakfast
Small 8oz coffee
Sausage biscuit sandwich
Hash browns
Lunch
Big mac meal (burger, fries and coke)
Dinner
Some type of fast food ( pizza, chicken, chinease food, home cooked meal sometime)
This is my menu Monday through Friday. On the weekends lunch and dinner are pretty much the same. Breakfast is usually cooked at home and it includes any of the following; sausage, bacon, eggs, and fruit loops cereal. Notice there is not any mention of vegetables or fruits in my menu, which means my diet lacks carbohydrates. My diet includes meat, but not the right kind, which means it lacks protein. In early October, it was a personal goal of mine to lose eight inches. While watching the Tyra Banks show, she had four young women on her show that were trying out this diet called the Nivea Skinny Jeans Challenge. It involved healthy eating along with exercise for four weeks. They gave a detailed menu and also specific exercises. While watching the show, it came to me that this is something to consider doing myself since my diet is very poor, my daily routine does not involve any physical activities besides sleeping and watching television, and I find myself constantly exhausted. So I took on the challenge. This was the best four weeks of my life! It was like all of this energy came out of nowhere. My exhaustion went away, and my digestive system was so much better. Even though my personal goal was to lose eight inches, because of lack of exercise, only two inches were lost. But I still felt better than I have since I was a teen. Despite all of the positives of eating healthy I fell back into my old eating habits in week three. It became very expensive to maintain all of the foods listed on the menu, and scheduling my meals became a problem. But most of all, the junk food that was usually eaten, was really missed. There snacks that were listed were not a good supplement to make me forget about my junk food cravings. Preparing for this assignment