When it comes to health and nutrition, most people focus on visible, tangible results. How many inches or centimeters did you drop from your waistband? How many reps could you bench press?

These types of external milestones can be valuable motivators. But they aren’t the end-all be-all indicators of health. For a more holistic approach to health, you have to look inside and ask: How healthy are my cells?

Every living organism is made up of cells, and the human body is no exception. Your body—and everyone else’s—contains roughly 37.2 trillion cells. And just like your body as a whole, these cells can be healthy or, well, less healthy.

Fortunately, you don’t need a degree in human biology to take charge of your body’s cellular health. Keep reading to learn why telomere length helps you measure health and how to keep your cells healthy with four lifestyle habits that support cellular health.

How Do You Even Measure Cellular Health?

Before diving into the rest of this article, let’s take a quick, crash course in cell anatomy. Each cell in the human body has, at its center, a nucleus. The nucleus contains 23 chromosome pairs (for a total of 46 chromosomes).

At either end of each chromosome is a DNA structure called a telomere. As cells age and divide, telomere length becomes shorter and shorter until the cell eventually dies. It’s a natural and inevitable process. So what do telomeres have to do with cellular health?

Well, telomeres don’t shorten at a fixed rate. They get smaller each time a cell divides, sure, but certain lifestyle decisions can shorten telomere length more rapidly. In other words, your diet, exercise habits, and other activities can prematurely age your cells.

And remember, cells are the building blocks of your body. If they prematurely age, so will you. For this reason, many studies exploring cellular health use telomere length as one way of measuring a cell’s health.

Enough about unhealthy cells, let’s talk about prevention. After all, you’re not here for a science lesson—you’re here to learn how to keep your cells healthy.

How to Keep Your Cells Healthy: 4 Cellular Health Habits

There’s a lot of conventional wisdom surrounding healthy living: Drink plenty of water, exercise for 30 minutes each day, wear sunscreen, etc. And a lot of that advice is great. What you may not know, however, is that many of those same lifestyle tips apply to cellular health.

It turns out, a lot of health-promoting activities and habits are healthy because they support health on a cellular level. Makes sense, right? When your cells feel good, you feel good.

Let’s dive into four cellular health habits that will help keep your cells thriving.

  1. Maintain a Healthy Diet

“Healthy diet” is a vague term that gets thrown around a lot without explanation. And most people only have a vague idea of what constitutes a healthy diet. Fortunately, when it comes to your cells, eating right is pretty straightforward.

In one study, researchers explored the correlation between telomere length and an individual’s adherence to the Mediterranean Diet and other similar diets. These approaches encourage eating primarily whole grains, fruits, and vegetables. On the flip side, individuals following these diets tend to avoid high-sodium foods, sugars (especially processed sugars), and red meat.

The findings speak for themselves—for women, at least. The dietary habits mentioned above were linked to longer telomere lengths in women, but not men. This doesn’t mean men are off the hook, however. In the sample population used in the study, men tended to have worse diets in general and consumed more red meat—the adverse effects of those dietary choices likely “cancelled out” the benefits of healthy eating.

At this point, it’s established that dietary choices can impact cellular health. So, let’s take a look at why.

There are two factors at play: free radicals and antioxidants. There’s a lot to be said about both, but here’s the gist of it. Free radicals are substances that can damage and deteriorate cells. And antioxidants are the substances that protect the body from free radicals.

So where does the Mediterranean Diet come in? As the fat in red meat cooks, it oxidizes which can then introduce free radicals into the body. By reducing your red meat intake, you can help prevent damage to your cells. And when prevention doesn’t work, go for antioxidant support. Fresh fruits and vegetables are excellent sources of antioxidants. By eating plenty of produce, you can help maintain optimal cellular health.

  1. Exercise Regularly—And Yes, This Means Cardio

Sometimes even the most avid gym-goers avoid cardio. They’ll happily crank out set after set of curls, squats, and flies. But 30 minutes on the treadmill? Forget about it.

Resistance training (think traditional weight training) is a great way to improve strength and muscle definition, but it doesn’t do a whole lot to support telomere length. To reap the benefits of exercise on a cellular level, you have to include cardio in your workouts. It doesn’t matter if it’s endurance training (jogging, cycling, etc.) or high intensity interval training, just shoot for at least 30 minutes.

If you’re a cardio-phobe, don’t worry—you don’t even have to do it every day to see the benefits. In one study, participants did 45 minutes of cardio three times a week. After only six months, researchers observed longer average telomere lengths in that set of individuals than in subjects doing only resistance training or no exercise at all. That’s right! You can go for a run Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, take a nice, relaxing weekend, and still support your cellular health.

  1. Don’t Underestimate Sleep

If you ask a random passerby how much sleep is the “right” amount, they’ll probably tell you eight hours per night. And, according to most guidelines, they’d be correct. The amount of sleep a person needs varies, but for most people 7-9 hours a night is sufficient.

But what happens if you sleep less than that? You’ll probably feel pretty lousy—for starters—but consistently sleeping too little can also impact your health on a cellular level.

If you’re sleeping five hours or fewer a night, there’s a good chance your cells are being adversely affected—especially if you’re a man. In one study, the duration of sleep for men was linearly linked to telomere length. Put simply, the less sleep men get, the shorter their average telomere length. And, as mentioned above, shorter telomeres can mean prematurely aged cells.

While the effect of sleep on telomere length in women is less clear cut, it’s still a good idea to tuck in for plenty of sleep each night regardless of gender!

  1. Practice Mindfulness

Nobody likes being stressed out. It’s frustrating, exhausting, and, as it turns out, bad for your cells. At this point, you probably won’t be surprised to learn that excessive stress has been linked to shorter telomere lengths in adults.

But the effect of your mind on cellular health goes a step further. Not just stress, but a wandering mind—as opposed to being present in the moment—can have a negative effect on your cells, one study suggests. This, of course, can be difficult to measure. In the study, participants self-reported the degree and type of their day-to-day mind wandering. Those who reported more negative wandering—anxious, racing, and defensive thoughts—were found to have shorter telomeres.

If mind wandering is detrimental to cellular health, this raises another question: What can you do to counteract a wandering mind and maintain cellular health?

Let’s say mind wandering is one end of the spectrum—what’s at the other end? Presence of mind. Or, in other words, being present in the moment. There are a number of meditative practices that can help stave off mind wandering and ground you in the present moment, but one of the most popular is mindfulness.

Practicing mindfulness can help you stay present and reduce your stress, protecting your cells on two fronts! A win-win for your mental state and your cellular health.

Take Charge of Your Cellular Health

A healthy body starts with healthy cells. Fortunately for you, taking charge of your cellular health isn’t as complicated as it sounds. Now that you know how to keep your cells healthy, give these lifestyle practices a try. Start implementing one (or all) of the above tips in your life to keep your cells healthy and thriving.

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https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/practical-mindfulness/201907/how-focusing-the-present-can-keep-your-cells-healthy

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https://www.escardio.org/The-ESC/Press-Office/Press-releases/endurance-but-not-resistance-training-has-anti-aging-effects.

https://www.webmd.com/healthy-aging/news/20140729/healthy-habits-may-slow-cellular-signs-of-aging-study-finds#1

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https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2167702612460234

There are two sides to every vegetable—raw and cooked. You might happily crunch on a bag of fresh baby carrots, but gag at the thought of eating one boiled. And it turns out, cooking isn’t just a matter of taste. People often think of cooking as a way to enhance the flavor of  food—and it is. But, as you prepare your food, you may also want to think about the effect of cooking on nutrients.

With the growing popularity of raw food diets, you’ve likely heard something along these lines: Raw vegetables are the most nutritious; when you cook veggies, you lose nutrients. The same is sometimes said of meat, eggs, and just about every other food group. It’s a plausible claim, but is it true?

The short answer is sometimes. But let’s dive into the long answer. The original question presents a simple binary: Raw vs. cooked. In reality, the situation is much more complicated. There is, after all, more than one way to cook a vegetable. And various nutrients respond differently to each cooking method.

A Quick Overview of Nutrients

Broadly speaking, you’ll find two types of nutrients in food: macronutrients and micronutrients. Macronutrients are the well-known trio of fats, carbs, and proteins. They’re the main components of your diet and supply the body with energy and building blocks.

Micronutrients, on the other hand, are needed in smaller amounts. (But don’t let this deceive you! Micronutrients are just as important to your health as macronutrients.) Micronutrients include vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients (plant compounds). These nutrients help regulate and maintain healthy reactions within your body on a cellular level.

Most studies looking into the effect of cooking on nutrients focus on micronutrients—specifically vitamins. And for the purposes of this article, that’s largely the focus, too.

There are two types of vitamins: fat soluble (vitamins A, D, E, and K) and water soluble (vitamin C and the B vitamins). The difference is pretty straightforward. Vitamin C and the collection of B vitamins dissolve in water, whereas vitamins A, D, E, and K dissolve in fat. So what does this have to do with cooking?

Some cooking methods use water and others use fat. The solubility of a vitamin is one of the best indicators of how it will react to certain cooking methods. For instance, the quantity of vitamin C (a water soluble vitamin) in any given vegetable tends to decrease when that vegetable is boiled.

Solubility is a good starting point, but, of course, it gets more complicated. Let’s dig in.

The Effect of Cooking on Nutrients: What’s Happening on the Inside?

There’s no easy equation for choosing the best cooking method for nutrition. Not only do nutrients react differently to various types of cooking, but their reactions also vary across different types of vegetables. A boiled Brussels sprout, for example, loses some of its vitamin C. The levels of beta-carotene in chard, however, increase with cooking.

These variations are caused by the cellular structure of vegetables. Depending on where in the cell a nutrient is stored, cooking can do the following:

  • Make the nutrient more readily absorbed (as the cell wall softens)
  • Break down the nutrient itself
  • Kill off oxidizing agents that would otherwise reduce the quantity of that nutrient

Let’s revisit that initial claim: Cooking vegetables reduces their nutritional value. Clearly, this isn’t always the case. In instances where cooking softens the tissues of plant cells, certain vitamins are released, making extraction—and detection—easier. In other words, some vegetables become more vitamin-rich when cooked.

This means there are three factors to consider when looking at the effect of cooking on nutrition: the method of cooking, the vegetable being cooked, and the specific nutrient being measured.

Let’s take a look at several common vitamins to see how they respond to various cooking methods in a variety of vegetables.

Vitamin C

For most people, vitamin C brings citrus to mind—and the bright fruits are admittedly an excellent source of vitamin C. But you’re probably not cooking your oranges and lemons. The vegetables rich in vitamin C—think broccoli, Brussels sprouts, and spinach—are another story.

Boiling is one of the most popular ways to prepare broccoli and Brussels sprouts. But if you’re trying to get your daily vitamin C, you should opt for a different cooking method—one that doesn’t use water. Because vitamin C is water-soluble, it seeps out of the vegetables and into the water. And that water goes straight down the drain. (In many cases, boiling reduces the vitamin C content of vegetables by more than 50 percent!)

Vitamin C is also heat sensitive. Expose your vegetables to heat for too long and you’ll run into the same problem as boiling. So what does this mean for you and your kitchen habits?

There’s nothing wrong with boiling your broccoli—it’ll taste delicious—but if you’re trying to optimize vitamin C intake, you should choose a low heat, water-free cooking method. Think sautéing, microwaving, or, better yet, leave it raw.

Vitamin K

To remember the role of vitamin K in the body, remember the two Bs: blood and bones. Vitamin K is a fat-soluble nutrient that helps support your body’s normal blood clotting processes and maintain healthy bones. Vitamin K is found primarily in leafy greens like spinach, chard, beet greens, and kale.

Vitamin K is less fickle than some other vitamins. Spinach, for example, retains most of its vitamin K content regardless of how you cook it. And most cooking methods will actually increase the levels of available vitamin K in chard.

If you’re trying to up your vitamin K intake, don’t give too much thought to your cooking method. Focus instead on what you’re eating your veggies with. Remember, vitamin K is fat soluble. Preparing those veggies with olive oil or another source of beneficial fats will help your body absorb the essential nutrient.

Beta-Carotene (Vitamin A)

Strictly speaking, beta-carotene is a phytonutrient (a plant compound), which the body then converts into vitamin A. This essential vitamin then helps support the immune system and optimizes healthy retinal function (hence the adage that carrots are good for the eyes).

Beta-carotene is what makes carrots orange, so it should come as no surprise that those crunchy root veggies are packed with phytonutrients. Raw carrots are an excellent source of beta-carotene, but when they’re cooked—especially boiled lightly or steamed—your body can absorb more of that important phytonutrient.

The same can be said for spinach and chard—both (slightly less) excellent sources of beta-carotene. When boiled, these leafy greens show increased levels of available beta-carotene. (This is caused, as you might have guessed, by the softening of cell walls.)

Vitamin E

Vitamin E helps support your body’s protections from threats. As a powerful antioxidant, it helps neutralize free radicals—highly reactive molecules that can be harmful to cells. Vitamin E also helps maintain your immune system. Long story short, it’s something you want to have in your body.

Root vegetables (potatoes, carrots, etc.) and leafy greens (spinach, chard, and the like) contain vitamin E. But that’s where the similarities end.

No matter how you cook root vegetables, their levels of vitamin E will always decrease. That’s kind of a bummer, because who likes to eat raw potato? Leafy greens, however, are the opposite. When leafy greens are cooked, the quantities of available vitamin E increase significantly. And by now you know why—the breakdown of the cell walls.

So if it’s vitamin E you’re after, skip the raw potatoes and go for cooked greens.

What About the Effect of Cooking on Nutrients in Meat?

Enough about vegetables, let’s get to the meat of the story. Cooking meat properly is notoriously difficult. At its best, meat is tender, flavorful, and free from bacteria. Prepared wrong and it’s, well, the opposite—bland and tough.

And when you take health and nutrition into account, cooking meat only becomes more complicated.

Although meat is rich in  B vitamins, exposing it to high temperatures for too long can greatly reduce the essential nutrients’ overall availability. Some of the B vitamins are lost in the juices that drip from the meat, but if you collect and serve that juice as part of the dish, you’ll have a tasty sauce and retain valuable nutrients! That’s a win-win situation.

Unfortunately, when cooking meat, your biggest concern shouldn’t be the nutrients you’re losing, but rather the substances you are creating (and then eating). When the fats and juices from meat come in contact with cooking surfaces at high temperatures, they create smoke.

That smoke can contain harmful chemicals called heterocyclic amines (HCAs) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which becomes part of your food. To minimize your intake of PAHs and HCAs, avoid grilling and searing your meat. Instead opt for baking or broiling—both of which can have delicious results!

To Boil or Bake: Selecting the Best Cooking Method for Nutrition

If there’s one thing to take away from this article, it’s this: when it comes to cooking and nutrition, there isn’t an easy answer. Is raw better than cooked? Sometimes. It depends on what you’re cooking, how you’re cooking it, and the nutrient you’re measuring.

To ensure you’re getting the nutrients you need, eat a variety of vegetables prepared in a variety of ways. This approach will delight your taste buds, too.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6049644/

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/healthiest-way-to-cook-meat

https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/HealthyLiving/food-processing-and-nutrition

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14673607/

https://www.prevention.com/food-nutrition/g20514153/5-veggies-that-are-healthier-cooked-than-raw/

Cells are the building blocks of life, and they come in all shapes and sizes. Some cells are round and small, others are larger and web-like. No matter their look, the cells in your body are highly complex, elegant machines that make life possible.

The variety of cell shapes and sizes is essential. Your body always has a lot going on. Cells need to differentiate and specialize, channeling their energy toward specific tasks. Let’s explore the variety of cells in your body and learn more about their anatomy, function, and individual characteristics.

Go Deep Inside Your Cells

Diversity starts inside the cell— with cellular organelles. These teeny-tiny membrane assemblies fill your cell and help it perform its specific functions. There are many organelles, and you’ll read about a couple of the most important ones.

The organelles that operate inside of cells are necessary for completing designated assignments. Not every cell has every type of organelle. But all cells rely on these structures to work effectively.

Cell Membrane

The lipids that surround the cell and give it shape are organized into a two-layered barrier called a membrane. Cell membranes are made of fats and proteins. The fatty portions of the membrane keep water out of the cell, while the proteins allow nutrients and water to pass through.

Your cells need a membrane to stay organized, compact, and protect their contents from the surrounding body fluids. You can visualize a cell membrane by dropping a bit of oil into a cup of water. The micelles that form from mixing oil and water are a lot like the fatty membrane that encapsulates your cells.

Mitochondria

Mitochondria are the organelles that power the cell. It’s in and around the mitochondria that the food you eat is converted to cellular energy (or ATP as it’s known inside the cell).

Mitochondria are commonly referred to as the “powerhouses” of the cell. But these compact generators weren’t always stuck inside cells. Scientific research suggests that mitochondria were at one time their own cellular bodies. There is unique genetic information stored inside mitochondria. This material is called mitochondrial DNA.

As life evolved, it’s believed mitochondria were recruited by cells as an energy source. Now when cells divide, mitochondria replicate inside the cell along with the other organelles.

Here’s a fun fact: every cell in your body contains mitochondria except red blood cells.

Ribosomes

Cells need to be able to produce proteins. Ribosomes are the center of protein production inside the cell. They use specialized codes to read the information stored in RNA molecules (genetic directions for building proteins). Ribosomes create nucleic acids and proteins from the instructions found in RNA.

Nucleus

In the nucleus, you’ll find all the blueprints for a cell. The nucleus is the cell’s “brain.” It sends out instructions about how the cell should function, and it houses the DNA needed to replicate the cell.

This organelle is often depicted in images as the dark center of a cell. It’s densely packed with DNA that is sensitive to degradation and damage from the environment around it. A double-layered membrane surrounds the nucleus to protect the DNA stored inside.

Cell Types Explained

Now that you understand some of the crucial cellular operation centers, let’s zoom out to discuss different cell types. Hundreds of specialized cells are inside your body right now. A student of science like yourself could spend a lifetime learning about each and every cell type.

Instead of debating the minutia of each type, here are the basics about some of the most common varieties of cells in your body.

1. Skin and Epithelial Cells

The cells you can most easily see are your skin cells. That’s because the largest and outermost organ of your body is made entirely of special skin cells—also called epithelial cells. These epithelial cells that create the meshwork of your skin are the same type of cells that line your digestive tract, blood vessels, and hollow organs.

Skin cells have unique properties. These special attributes help explain the function of your epithelial cells. Here are a few ways skin cells can work in your body:

  • Skin cells come together to create tissues that can secrete mucus, sweat, and oil.
  • Epithelial cells harden through a process called keratinization to protect your body from invading pathogens and injuries.
  • They also pigment the skin. A protein (melanin) in your skin cells that influences your skin color, and whether or not you have freckles.
  • Skin cells also keep you hydrated. Those outermost skin cells protecting your softer insides are great at trapping water beneath your skin.
  • Inside your body epithelial cells secrete mucus. The lining of your esophagus, nasal passages, and intestines are all made of epithelial cells that lubricate these surfaces.

2. Blood Cells

Red and white blood cells circulate all over your body to deliver oxygen, carry away carbon dioxide waste, and play the starring role in your immune system. Their ubiquitous nature might make them seem simple, but there’s more to these blood cells than you might think.

Red blood cells (RBCs) are also called erythrocytes. They are unique because they do not have a nucleus (unlike most other cells). Because they lack a nucleus, RBCs are hollow in the center—kind of like a donut. Their unique shape makes them more efficient at exchanging and transporting oxygen molecules—their primary role in your body.

Without a nucleus and other organelle structures, RBCs cannot replicate on their own. Instead, your body generates new red blood cells in bone marrow tissue.

RBCs use a protein called hemoglobin to carry oxygen throughout your body. The hemoglobin inside RBCs gives blood its signature red color.

White blood cells (WBCs), or leukocytes, are agents of the immune system. They search for invading pathogens and initiate and complete your body’s immune responses.

There are two main classes of WBCs—granulocytes and mononuclear leukocytes:

  • As the name suggests, granulocytes are WBCs filled with granules. Inside each granule are proteins and enzymes that can digest and destroy pathogens. Granulocytes are responsible for the creation of pus, and they play an important role in allergies.
  • Mononuclear leukocytes don’t have granules. Instead, they have one large nucleus and special organelles called lysosomes. These lysosomes act like holding cells for microbes and other potential pathogens. Mononuclear leukocytes can use these lysosomes to trap and destroy invaders through a process called endocytosis.

3. Nerve and Brain Cells

The brain is full of spidery cells that allow you to think, read, move, and remember. Brain cells are the main components of your central nervous system. They use chemical messengers called neurotransmitters to communicate between other body cells.

Two kinds of brain cells exist in your body—neurons and glia. Both are necessary for efficient electro-chemical signaling throughout the body.

Neurons are web-shaped brain cells with a central body called a soma. All neurons have branched appendages called dendrites that can receive electro-chemical messages from neighboring neurons. A neuron can transmit signals along the longest portion of its cell body, called the axon.

Glial cells look a lot like neurons, but they differ in one important way: Glia cannot transmit electrical signals like neurons can. Their purpose is to support the transmission of electro-chemical signals from neurons by acting as insulation. Glial cells make it possible for tiny electro-chemical messages to travel the entire length of the body. Their insulating role speeds up signaling across long distances.

4. Muscle Cells

Your heart, hamstrings, and every other muscle in your body are composed of muscle cells—also known as muscle fibers. These fibers wrap tightly around each other like bundles of strong, stretchy cords to create your muscles.

Individual muscle fibers contain filamentous proteins that allow the fiber to lengthen and contract. These proteins are called actin, myosin, and titin. Each has a role in the contraction-relaxation cycle of a muscle fiber.

Nerve cells from the central and peripheral nervous system send messages to muscle fibers to coordinate your movements. Some muscle movements are voluntary, like lifting your hand to wave hello. Other muscle fiber contractions are unconscious or involuntary, such as the constriction of your pupils in bright light.

There are three main types of muscle fibers and muscle tissue, and each kind of tissue utilizes muscle fibers differently:

  • Skeletal muscle cells are under conscious control. These muscle fibers attach directly to bones via tendons. Skeletal muscle fibers are long and cylindrical, like tubes that bundle together. These muscle cells are also multi-nucleate, which means they have more than one nucleus.
  • Smooth muscles are made up of smooth muscle fibers. You can find smooth muscle fibers inside of the organs of your body. Your eyes, stomach, bladder, intestines, and blood vessels are all built with smooth muscle tissue. Unlike skeletal muscle, you do not have voluntary control over smooth muscle fibers.
  • What makes cardiac muscle cells unique is their location. These muscle fibers can only be found in one place—your heart. Cardiac muscle cells are ultra-strong, elastic cells that allow your heart to pump blood in one coordinated and efficient heartbeat.

5. Fat Cells

Fat storage is a sometimes-taboo topic. But the cells that house fat are extremely valuable to your body. Adipocytes are fat cells, and when they assemble together they make up fat tissue.

Try to break out of the “fat = bad” mindset for a minute. Your body stores fat just like a bank stores money. Having fat on hand is essential when your body needs energy. And adipocytes house the fat your body wants or needs to save for later use.

Brown adipocytes are sometimes called “baby fat.” These fat cells are so named because you have lots of brown fat cells during infancy. The primary role of brown fat is thermogenesis (heat) and these adipocytes maintain body heat because they are full of mitochondria. Infants depend on brown fat reserves because they lack the ability to shiver or use other means to warm themselves.

As you age, your supply of brown fat cells shrinks, but doesn’t go away entirely. Current scientific research suggests that the mitochondria that fill brown fat cells disappear as you get older, causing the brown fat you stored in infancy to resemble white fat cells.

The main function of white fat cells is energy storage. When glucose isn’t available from your diet, a process called gluconeogenesis kicks in. Through gluconeogenesis, fat can be broken down and converted to usable glucose molecules to power the rest of the cells in your body. Fat available for gluconeogenesis comes from the white adipocytes you may be trying to burn during exercise.

Cellular Health Comes First

You are the cells in your body, and it’s important to take good care of them. No matter the cellular type, complete nutrition is the best way to help your cells thrive. Focus your eating on foods that will deliver nourishing vitamins, minerals, and macronutrients to your cells. Be picky about what you put into your body. Steer clear of over-processed and nutrient-poor foods. Instead, build your meals with the quality nutrition of whole foods—lean proteins, plant-based fats, fiber, vegetables, and fruit.

Prioritizing the health of your cells will pay dividends in your overall wellness. When your cellular health is soaring, you feel great, too. Channel your energy into supporting your cells with a diet rich in essential vitamins and minerals. Whole nutrition from quality foods can optimize the health and wellbeing of the cells that make you.

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Nobody’s digestion is perfect. And finding the foods that won’t frustrate your gastrointestinal tract is often a game of trial and error. Dealing with digestive concerns like gas, bloating, abdominal pain, diarrhea, or constipation aren’t fun. These problems may be caused by the FODMAP foods you’re eating.

FODMAP stands for Fermentable Oligosaccharides, Disaccharides, Monosaccharides, and Polyols. (Saccharide is just another term for sugar.) These types of sugar can be minimized in the low-FODMAP diet some people adopt to support good digestive health.

Traditional health recommendations tell you to eat a large variety of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Research even shows a highly varied diet helps support a healthy gut and healthy microbiome. But no two people are exactly alike. Your diet may contain some normally healthy foods that your personal digestive system doesn’t work well with.

So, if you have digestive concerns, it might be worth limiting some of that variety in your diet. Low-FODMAP diets aim to eliminate or reduce the foods that most commonly feed into occasional indigestion and stomach discomfort.

What are FODMAPs?

To understand why you might be feeling the effects of FODMAPs in your diet, you first need a basic understanding of digestion in the gut. (Find a full recap of your digestive system here.)

After being broken down in your mouth and stomach, most of the food and liquid you eat is absorbed in your small intestine. Fiber and other waste products pass through the small intestine and into your large intestine.

The molecules that make it all the way into your large intestine become food for your microbiome. The sugars and carbohydrates that pass into the large intestine are fermented by bacteria. This fermentation process can create gas—and the accompanying feelings of bloating, cramping, and abdominal discomfort.

Due to individual digestive differences, you may have trouble breaking down and absorbing certain types of sugars and carbohydrates that others can absorb. This means more of the sugars pass into the large intestine, more fermentation takes place, and you’ll potentially feel more digestive discomfort.

The foods targeted by low-FODMAP diets are ones most frequently associated with poor digestion. They don’t need to be avoided by everyone, but some people do benefit from limiting or eliminating certain high-FODMAP foods.

The Chemistry of FODMAPs

As you learned above, FODMAP is an acronym for fermentable oligosaccharides, disaccharides, monosaccharides, and polyols. If you know the basic chemistry of carbohydrates, then you might be worried this is a far-reaching diet with a goal of eliminating all carbohydrates in your diet. But that’s not the case. A low-FODMAP diet only limits the intake of specific types of sugars within these carbohydrate categories.

For example, sucrose, lactose, and maltose are all disaccharides commonly found in the diet. Only fructose is limited in a low-FODMAP diet. So, you don’t need to worry about reducing all disaccharides in your diet.

These are the specific molecules targeted within each category of a low-FODMAP diet:

  • Fermentable oligosaccharides (polysaccharides): fructans and galactooligosaccharides
  • Disaccharides: lactose
  • Monosaccharides: fructose
  • Polyols: sorbitol, mannitol, and maltitol

You’ll discover your individual needs vary. For example, some fermentable oligosaccharides may need to be eliminated for a successful low-FODMAP diet, while the disaccharides and polyols foods can still be eaten, just in small amounts.

Unlike the other molecules targeted by a low-FODMAP diet, fructose isn’t limited to a threshold amount. Instead, it is limited in relationship to the amount of glucose you eat. That’s because glucose, when eaten together with fructose, helps increase the absorption of fructose in the small intestine.

When fructose is eaten alone or too much is eaten in relationship to glucose, then it will pass into the large intestine. Once in the large intestine, then fructose can cause some of the same problems as the other FODMAP molecules.

High and Low FODMAP Foods

A simple online search for “FODMAP foods” will help you find lots of lists and charts of foods to avoid or include in your diet. Below you will find a short sample list of some high-FODMAP foods (to avoid or limit), and others that are low (less likely to cause problems) in FODMAPs.

  • Fructans and galactooligosaccharides
    • High: wheat, rye, barley, onion, garlic, artichoke, asparagus, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, legumes
    • Low: corn, rice, quinoa, potatoes, bell pepper, cucumber, green beans,
  • Lactose
    • High: milk, yogurt, sour cream, ice cream
    • Low: lactose-free milk, almond milk, hard cheeses
  • Fructose
    • High: pears, apples, watermelon, honeydew, papaya, star fruit, fruit juices, agave nectar
    • Low: blueberries, strawberries, oranges, pineapple, cantaloupe, kiwi
  • Polyols
    • High: apples, apricots, avocados, foods sweetened with honey, sorbitol, mannitol, or maltitol
    • Low: dark chocolate, table sugar, maple syrup, brown sugar

Implementing a FODMAP Diet

Not everyone will benefit from avoiding FODMAP foods. But if you decide to try a low-FODMAP diet, it’s best to work through the list of foods systematically. It’s unlikely that all high-FODMAP foods are causing you problems.

Where possible, keep as many foods and as much variety as you can in your diet. The three-step approach below will help you find out which foods may be causing problems for you. Then you know which foods you can continue to enjoy.

1. Elimination and Restriction

The best way to start is by restricting or eliminating as many high-FODMAP foods as possible. After sticking to this strict diet for a few weeks, hopefully your digestive system will feel better.

If symptoms still haven’t improved, you should work with your doctor or dietician to develop a personal plan for you and look at foods outside the FODMAP list.

2. Reintroducing Foods

If the FODMAP foods elimination has helped, it’s time to start reintroducing some options you eliminated from your diet. Reintroduce foods one at a time, and only in small amounts.

By testing out foods one at a time, you will learn which ones are safe for you to eat, and which ones need to be either eliminated or only eaten in very small amounts. After testing out a food, wait one or two days to feel how you tolerate it.

Take your time with the reintroduction phase. You’re going to be tired of eating a restricted diet and anxious for some freedom in your food choices. If you try too many FODMAP foods at once or don’t wait enough time between testing new foods, then you won’t know which choices are responsible when problems arise again (and they probably will).

There may be times when you need to go back to step one and spend a couple of weeks with a more restricted diet, just to let your GI system settle down again. Then you can start testing new foods again.

3. A Personalized Diet

Just like the FODMAP foods lists and charts you’ll find online, it’s probably worth making your own list. It will help you clearly define which foods to avoid, limit, and can be safely eaten.

By following this process of elimination and reintroduction, you may even find foods that aren’t on traditional low-FODMAP lists. This will also help create a very personalized diet.

A low-FODMAP diet requires patience to figure out, and it isn’t a magic solution that will solve all your digestive-health concerns. But it is a tool that can help you on a path to better digestion, while still includes a beneficial variety of healthy foods in your diet.

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/fodmaps-101

https://www.fodmapformula.com/how-to-make-a-fodmap/

https://alittlebityummy.com/testing-fodmaps-how-does-the-reintroduction-phase-work/

To understand cellular nutrition, you can take the better part of a decade to earn a PhD in microbiology or you can set aside about six minutes to read this story.

Opting for the doctoral route means deeper knowledge, a nice degree to frame, and many fancy words to throw around. But reading on will simply answer four key questions to provide an actionable understanding of possibly the most important topic in nutrition.

And you’ll save a few hundred thousand dollars in the process. The choice is yours.

What’s the difference between cellular and regular nutrition?

One word—scale.

Most people talk about nutrition on a system-by-system or body-wide scale. (Examples: eating fiber helps you feel full and manage your weight, protein supports healthy muscles, or you should target immune-supporting foods in your diet.) But nutrition, like your overall health, starts in the cell.

In fact, properly nourishing your cells should be—and sneakily is—the real aim of all nutrition. The disconnect is that cellular nutrition happens on a microscopic scale, and involves intricate, complicated mechanisms.

More people will follow if you talk about nutrients for brain health or heart-smart snacks than if you wade into the intricacies of how your mighty mitochondria get properly fed. And that’s OK. Any understanding of nutrition is helpful and great for public health.

Just remember, when you’re talking about nutrition in any way, you’re actually discussing cell nutrition. You’re just doing it without drowning in the complexities and verbiage of PhD-level microbiology.

Why is cellular nutrition important?

Maintaining cellular health through proper nutrition is essential to optimizing your overall wellness. That sentence sounds stuffy, but the concept is pretty simple.

You’re made up of cells of different types. If they aren’t fed what’s needed to maintain health, it’s hard to imagine your body, as a whole, feeling great. Put another way: a building made of broken bricks doesn’t stand long.

Cell nutrition is the starting point for maintaining the health of all your large body systems and overall physical wellness. And supporting cellular nutrition doesn’t require a big shift in the usual dietary advice.

You still want the vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and macronutrients you find in healthy whole foods. (More on this below.) But while munching on your salad, you can think about how you’re doing it for your cells as much as your waistline.

I understand digestion, but it seems like there’s a few steps beyond the basics that help facilitate cell nutrition. So, how do nutrients from the diet eventually enter cells?

Each stage of digestion breaks your food down into smaller and smaller pieces that are more useable. After nutrient absorption happens in the small intestine and the molecules are distributed in the blood, your cells can start chowing down, too.

This part can become confusing, so let’s explore—as simply as possible—three of the main ways nutrients enter cells.

  • Route No. 1: The cell opens up a temporary mouth in its membrane and basically swallows what it wants. This process of cellular eating and drinking—usually reserved for bigger molecules—is called endocytosis.

Lipids and proteins in the cell membrane start to form up walls around the molecule trying to enter the cell. This literally looks like a mouth opening up—hence the mouth analogy. As the molecule pushes through the membrane, a bubble is formed around it. That protective coating is then broken down by special proteins in the cell and its nutrient contents are utilized for energy, growth, repair, or whatever the cells need.

  • Route No. 2: Nutrients hitch a ride on a carrier protein (such as albumin). This is like a nutrient having an usher accompany it through the membrane’s set of locked doors and into the cell. In more scientific terms, the carrier proteins latch onto the nutrient molecule and help it pass through into the intercellular space.
  • Route No.3: Hop into an express lane into the cell—formally referred to as a channel protein. As long as the nutrient molecules pass tests for size, charge, and other properties, it can enter fairly easily through the pores created by channel proteins. These entry avenues can help many more molecules per second pass through the membrane and into the cell than any other path.

No matter the route taken, once inside the cell, nutrient molecules are used for their appropriate purpose to support your health at the cellular level. The glucose from carbohydrates in your diet are broken up and used for energy. Fatty acids (lipids) and amino acids (protein parts) are used as building blocks or energy—depending on what’s needed.

What nutrients are vital for maintaining healthy cell nutrition?

Read enough about nutrition and you’ll experience informational déjà vu. That’s because the human body needs what it needs—most importantly, those nutrients labeled essential. And there are only so many ways to acquire it all.

You should be eating a varied, balanced diet full of whole fruits and vegetables, lean proteins, whole grains, and beneficial fats. That’s the best way to acquire the variety of essential vitamins, minerals, fatty acids, and amino acids your cells need. The “essential” label comes from your body’s inability to make certain substances. So they must be found in your diet. You’ll also contribute other nutrients that can help maintain your health, too.

Now that you know the most important nutrients for cell nutrition, let’s see why they’re so crucial for maintaining health. Taking in all those essential macro- and micronutrients help fill cell nutritional needs and support four basic mechanisms for maintaining cellular and overall health.

  1. Energy: You can dive deep into cellular energy production and ATP. But, for now, all you need to know is that your cells break the bonds of nutrient molecules to unleash energy.
  2. Structure (growth and repair): Proteins, fats, and some minerals are used by cells to build or repair cellular and bodily structures.
  3. Supporting Reactions: Vitamins and minerals act as cofactors for enzymes and support key reactions and processes that keep your body running optimally.
  4. Protection: Antioxidants can come in the form of vitamins or other nutritional compounds. Either way, they help maintain cellular health by neutralizing free radicals from metabolism and environmental elements.

It’s a lot to accomplish, but you’re made of amazing cells. Your job in the big machine of health is simple: feed your cells all the important nutrients they need to maintain overall health.

The modern diet and lifestyle can make this tricky. You may want to supplement your diet to optimize cellular health. If you choose to, target products with the right forms and amounts of the essential nutrients and beneficial dietary compounds you need most.

https://organismalbio.biosci.gatech.edu/nutrition-transport-and-homeostasis/nutrition-needs-and-adaptations/

https://sciencing.com/do-cells-need-food-5408572.html

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zs9krwx/revision/1

https://www.nigms.nih.gov/education/Inside-Life-Science/Pages/how-cells-eat-in.aspx

https://www.livestrong.com/article/420556-the-best-foods-to-eat-for-promoting-healthy-cells/

https://www.britannica.com/science/human-nutrition

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK9831/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK26815/

Your gut isn’t shy about letting you know when you’ve wronged it. The signs of strife can pop up anywhere along the digestive tract. Absent of obvious chaos, your level of digestive health may remain a bit of a mystery. If it’s working right, you might not notice. The nine-question digestive health quiz will paint a more vivid picture of your gastrointestinal wellness.

The dietary and lifestyle decisions you make shape your gut health. So the questions in this digestive health check will primarily focus on what you’re eating. Unless you keep a food journal, it may be hard to be completely accurate. That’s OK. Think about what you’ve eaten on an average day or week in the last month.

After the quiz, you’ll be able to see your score. You’ll also find extra information about what impacts your score and tips to help optimize your digestive health.

 

Your body is full of bacteria, viruses, and fungi. Trillions of these tiny microbes—collectively called your microbiome—exist mainly inside your intestines, in your mouth, and on your skin. They are with you from birth. And, surprisingly, that’s a good thing.

While some bacteria and microbes are potentially harmful, others are extremely important for supporting your health. Maintaining nutritional status, immunity, and the behavior of the brain are related to a healthy balance of these microbes.

Refresh your knowledge on the microbiome with these helpful stories:

Defining Microbiome: Meet Your Bacterial Buddies

The Gut-Brain Axis: Connecting Your Brain and Microbiome

Your Gut Microbiome’s Reaction to Dietary Fiber

How Your Complex Oral Microbiome Impacts Health

Why Your Skin Microbiome is Important—And 5 Ways to Protect It

Diversity is Key and Prebiotics and Probiotics Can Help

One established characteristic of a healthy gut environment is the variety or diversity of the microbes. The more diverse your microbial community is, the more resilient it is likely to be.

When your gut is loaded with a variety of friendly bacteria, there’s less empty space for the bad kind to take up permanent residence.

Environment, genetics, and other factors have some influence on your microbiome. But your diet determines what grows best and what microorganisms win the battle for space and resources.

Common modern diets are rich in sugars, saturated fats, and processed food. They also lack fiber. This tends to select for certain bacterial species to dominate. A vegetarian or Mediterranean diet, on the other hand, includes a lot of fiber, healthy fats, and is rich in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Different species of bacteria are known predominate in guts of people who regularly consume these diets.

The amount of prebiotic fiber (which feeds the microbiome) and probiotic foods (which provide live bacteria) are part of these dietary calculations, too. A varied diet rich in fiber, and its positive impact on the microbiome, is an important piece of the health puzzle. It’s just one reason health professionals emphasize abundant fruits, vegetables, legumes, and whole grains in your daily diet.

Putting the Focus on Prebiotics

The most effective way to influence your gut microbiome in the right direction is to consistently include a wide variety of fiber in your diet. Probiotics is a more well-known microbiome vocabulary word, and they’re important to health. But certain fibers, known as prebiotics, are just as important.

Prebiotics essentially act as a gut fertilizer. That’s because they are certain non-digestible carbohydrates (fiber) that nourish healthy microorganisms (probiotics). For example, prebiotics like inulin support the balance of healthy bifidobacteria (important gut bacteria in mammals) in the digestive tract. If you’re going to populate your gut with a variety of healthy microbes, you need a variety of fibers and prebiotics in your diet.

Here’s where you can find them. Check out the food sources that provide healthy fiber and prebiotics to your diet:

Chicory root – inulin

Dandelion Greens – fiber

Jerusalem Artichoke – inulin

Garlic – inulin and FOS (fructooligosaccharides)

Onions – inulin and FOS

Leeks – inulin

Asparagus – inulin

Bananas – inulin and resistant starch

Barley – beta-glucans

Oats – beta-glucans and resistant starch

Apples – pectins

Konjac root – glucomannan fiber

Burdock root – inulin and FOS

Flaxseeds – gums, cellulose, and lignans

Jicama – inulin

Wheat Bran – arabinoxylan oligosaccharides (AXOS)

Probiotics Can Help Change Bacteria’s Bad Reputation

Most people are taught to watch out for spoiled food, which is generally caused by an overgrowth of unhealthy bacteria or mold. It’s a legitimate concern. But certain types of bacteria help support your health and are safe in the proper balance. They’re called probiotics—meaning “for life.”

As mentioned above, these healthy bacterial probiotics support the balance and health of the intestinal environment in several different ways. This includes providing competition, supporting immune function, and communicating through chemical signals.

It’s much more complex than that, but that’s the basic idea. If you want to dive deeper, this recent review article will give you a more complete understanding of how probiotics work.

Acquiring probiotics from your diet is a matter of choosing and incorporating certain foods into your meals. You can find them in fermented dairy foods, like yogurt, buttermilk, kefir, and some types of cheese. Fermented soy products like tempeh, miso, and natto are also excellent sources. Even vegetables get into the act with kimchi, pickles, and sauerkraut. Another popular trend is making or drinking kombucha, which is made from fermenting a mixture of tea, yeast, and sugars.

Combining probiotics and prebiotics could multiply potential benefits. Some symbiotic fermented foods do that for you. Yogurt and kefir are two examples of foods that have living bacteria and prebiotic substances to feed them.

Answers to Common Prebiotic and Probiotic Supplement Questions

Under normal circumstances, diet is the most important factor in a healthy gut environment. Everyone should prioritize a healthy, balanced diet as a lifelong practice. But that’s often easier said than done.

Sometimes life and health just doesn’t go as planned, regardless of intent. In these cases, supplemental prebiotics and probiotics can help fill gaps where the diet may come up short. Take a look at some of the common questions about these dietary additives.

Why take a probiotic or prebiotic supplement?

Many realities of life can disrupt the stability of your gut environment. A few include: stress, a nutrient-poor diet, dehydration, unhealthy sleep patterns, certain medications, and exposure to new microbes when traveling.

Instability in the gut microbiome can even be associated with the normal aging process. A change in nutritional status and lifestyle can negatively influence gut health, especially in older adults.

In these situations—where your gut health can be in flux—a probiotic or prebiotic (or both) can help support the diversity and balance of your gut microbiome. Supporting a healthy diverse microbial environment can help you maintain normal digestion, which you need to utilize and metabolize energy and nutrients. In the same way your body needs essential vitamins, minerals, and other micronutrients on a daily basis, your gut needs the right nourishment every day to operate at its best.

When it comes to dosage or colony forming units (CFU), is higher always better?

Even at billions of colonies, the amounts of bacteria added through probiotics is minuscule in the context of the entire gut environment. In other words, rather than thinking of a product containing 50 billion CFU being four-times more than 12 billion, it’s more accurate to think of it as 50 billion out of trillions, versus 12 billion out of trillions.

The dosage that’s most appropriate for you depends on your health goals and the specific probiotics included in a particular formula. For general balance and maintenance of healthy microflora, products containing five to 20 billion CFU are typical. A product containing 50-billion CFU may be needed for certain probiotic strains or health concerns. Even higher dosages are sometimes used for intensive therapy or to restore flora to an optimal balance after illness.

So total CFU counts do matter, but so do your personal needs. It’s always a good idea to consult with your healthcare practitioner to determine the best CFU number for you.

Do probiotics survive the harsh environment of the stomach?

It’s true that stomach acid destroys much of the bacteria and microbes you ingest. But not all strains are wrecked by the acidic environment of the stomach. Food poisoning wouldn’t be an issue if stomach acid was 100-percent effective.

When searching for a probiotic supplement, look for strains known to survive the acidic environment of the stomach and the body’s bile. You may find this listed on the label or in company literature. A quick search on Google may also indicate whether the strain has been tested to survive the stomach environment.

Are more strains always better than fewer strains?

Because of the diversity of the microbiome, it is easy to assume that a probiotic containing many different strains is the best option. However, existing research suggests that most often the opposite is true.

The majority of compelling research papers revealing health benefits of probiotics involve single strain and two-strain probiotics. Why? Many factors determine whether a probiotic strain will be beneficial or not, including stability, ability to survive digestion, compatibility with your microbial environment, and formulation of the probiotic product itself.

What should I look for on the label of probiotics?

All probiotics should list the genus, species, and specific strain of bacteria. For example, Bifidobacterium animalis BB-12 is listed by genus (Bifidobacterium), species (animalis), and strain (BB-12). Strains are all different and have unique characteristics, and quality probiotic supplements will designate the specific strains that are included.

When and how is it best to take probiotics and prebiotics?

There really isn’t any solid evidence that timing is important in most cases. Probiotics can be taken in the morning, noon, or night—whenever it’s best for you. There’s also debate about whether it’s better to take probiotics with a meal or on an empty stomach. Unless there are specific product instructions to the contrary, you can take them with or without food.

The recommendation is much the same for prebiotics. Consistency is the most important recommendation, so take them whenever it works best for you to take them on a daily basis. They can be taken together with probiotics, and they are often included with probiotic products and foods.  But it isn’t necessary to combine them or take them together if it doesn’t work best for you.

What is the best form for a probiotic product?

The form and delivery system that is best depends on the specific microbes used, the intended purpose, and distribution of the product. Some probiotics require refrigeration to maintain viability, while others do not. Probiotics can come in capsules, powders, liquids, packets, tablets, or even in food products themselves. Stability and viability are important, so be sure to purchase probiotic products from a company or source you trust.

Who should NOT take probiotics?

Although probiotics are generally safe to use, there are reports linking probiotics to side effects in some people. The people most likely to have problems are those with compromised immunity, people who are critically ill, and those who’ve had recent surgery. If there is a question in these cases, it’s always best to consult a health professional.

Can children take probiotics? 

There are various reasons a child may benefit from probiotics. Most pediatricians are familiar with probiotics so it’s best to discuss the appropriate use and dosage in children with your health professional.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21598393

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31115599

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27682233

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5636929/

https://www.karger.com/Article/FullText/342079

Positive thinking isn’t just a great catchphrase. You can experience the scientific benefits of positivity. If optimism oozes from your every pore, cheers to you! But if your glass sometimes seems half empty, there’s good news—with a little effort, it’s relatively easy to trick your brain to be happy.

A positive outlook supports your immune system, aids in maintaining calm, and helps you adapt to change. Studies on the effects of positive thinking even show links to supporting long-term cardiovascular health.

Eric Kim, research fellow in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Harvard says, “Our new findings suggest that we should make efforts to boost optimism, which has been shown to be associated with healthier behaviors and healthier ways of coping with life challenges.”

Positive thinking activates happy brain chemicals that can optimize your health, coping skills, and quality of life.

How Positivity Affects the Brain: The Science

Positivity affects the brain through chemical messengers. Neurotransmitters—like dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin—play a major role in supporting your physical and mental health. They do this by sending instructions from brain cells to your muscles and organs. These chemicals help your brain and body work in tandem—so keeping them balanced is key.

The release of neurotransmitters has many triggers. And some may surprise you—like the plants that surround you. Multiple studies show indoor plants keep you feeling healthier and happier, but the benefits go both ways. You’ve probably heard talking to plants may help them grow better. But why? The theory is that plants may respond to the vibration and tones of the human voice (or music).

You aren’t so different. Just like plants, humans respond to vibration and tones. Life is a sea of rhythms that regulate several cardiac and neurological functions. Music and tones can support the activation of measurable stress-reducing pathways, and may even help maintain healthy heart rate, respiration, EEG measurements, body temperature, and blood pressure already in the normal range. Tones are also tied to immune and endocrine support, which may keep you feeling calm, energized, and in a good mood. All this explains what you already experience for your favorite songs. When you hear that perfect pitch, you feel it from your head to your toes.

If kind words and good vibrations—from music or positive talk—help plants grow, imagine what speaking kindly to yourself will do.

Physical Effects of Positive Thinking

When talking about the benefits of positive thinking, it’s not to encourage “toxic positivity”— invalidating what you’re experiencing by pretending everything is fine. But when a rough patch comes your way, finding the positives is better than allowing negative thoughts to run amok.

Even a few happy thoughts can evoke the following scientific benefits of positivity:

Support the immune system—When your body encounters occasional stress, these stressors can negatively impact your endocrine system and immune response. But your attitude toward stress also affects your immune response. It’s time to look at positivity as a tool that can help lead to health benefits.

Maintain calm—If anxiety is exacerbated by negative and intrusive thoughts, the opposite is also true. Expecting a positive outcome is a helpful formula to support calm, serenity, and balanced mood.

Optimizes resilience—How well you cope with problems defines your resilience. Rather than falling apart during challenges, positivity helps you to carry on and adapt to change.

Your positive thinking is reflected back to you in amazing ways. The next step is to train your brain to be happy, while respecting that all your feelings are valid.

3 Ways to Boost Your Bright Side

Living a healthy, happy life through the effects of positive thinking is appealing. But the world isn’t always hearts and flowers, and a positive frame of mind doesn’t come naturally for everyone.

Training your brain to be happy takes a little bit of work, but it’s your best go-to when life gives you lemons. Here are three ideas to spur positivity:

1. Trigger Your Happy Brain Chemicals

Tailor your lifestyle to fire up those neurotransmitters!

Use body movement to create positive thoughts—Certain body movements release happy brain chemicals. That’s why smiling, even if you don’t feel like it, can make you feel better. Even the simple gesture of holding both arms above your head in a victory stance sends happy signals to your brain. Move in ways that make you feel good—dance, swim, exercise, stand up straight, or just smile.

Listen to tones and music that help release neurotransmitters—Test key tonality and vibrations that work for you. Examples include music, laughter, or applause. To experience some funky tone therapy, listen to binaural beats by playing this Happiness Frequency track with headphones in both ears.

2. Keep a Grip on the Now

It’s easy to be so caught up in the daydream of your past and future that you forget that now is the only time there is. Teaching yourself to focus on the present is possible, and it offers plenty of benefits. It gives you time to calm down, prevents overthinking, and helps you make better decisions. To bring yourself into the moment:

  • Focus on your breath—Feel the air movement, watch your chest rise and fall, and count your breaths.
  • Pay attention to your senses—Focus on what you see, smell, touch, taste, or hear right now.
  • Meditate—Use guided meditation, sit quietly in a traditional way, or focus on white noise. Other ideas are to “feel” the energy in your hands, count the dishes you’re washing, or tally your steps.

3. Be Your Best Friend

Positivity is an inside job. Does the person in your head say nice things to you? Do you talk to yourself the way you would speak to your best friend? Jack Canfield, creator of Chicken Soup for the Soul, says “affirmations are to the mind what exercise is to the body.” And repeating affirmations helps to reprogram your unconscious mind for success.

Your positive self-talk should be simple and believable. Positive affirmations you don’t believe will get you nowhere. Try these techniques:

  • Start small and work your way up—Begin by telling yourself easy and general affirmations:

“I am enjoying the sunshine on my face.”

“All I need to do right now is breathe.”

“I have made it through hard times before.”

  • Get specific—As you become more confident in the positive reality you’ve created, you’re ready to move on to more personal affirmations:

“I welcome good things in my life.”

“I am healing.”

“I am worthy.”

“I can do this.”

Retraining your brain takes effort, but the effects of positive thinking last a lifetime. Even if life is not all roses and sunshine, learn to let the rain water your garden. Then you can sit back and watch your health blossom.

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/the-power-of-positive-thinking

https://medium.com/swlh/3-scientific-studies-that-prove-the-power-of-positive-thinking-616477838555

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2016/12/optistic-women-live-longer-are-healthier/

https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/stress-management/in-depth/positive-thinking/art-20043950

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/the-power-of-positive-thinking

https://www.verywellmind.com/benefits-of-positive-thinking-2794767

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4010966/

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.02030/full

https://www.goodnet.org/articles/6-ways-to-use-body-language-make-yourself-feel-great

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2016/12/optistic-women-live-longer-are-healthier/

The first part of the digestive story receives the most fawning attention. Everyone likes a beginning, and eating is a winning topic. The grinding, churning breakdown of digestion makes for an industrial middle section. Then there’s the end. “Waste is expelled.”

But everyone is a digestive magician whose failsafe trick is turning delicious food into poop. It’s normal. It’s essential. And it’s time the finale of the digestive story had its moment—it’s time to talk about what your poop means and what your poop says about your health.

Don’t cower from this poop talk or think yourself uncouth for your interest in the topic. Don’t hold it against yourself or scold your inner child for giggling. By the end, you’ll see that poop is important—if a little gross—to consider and discuss. You can handle the types of stool and what poop color means.

Poop can be a funny word, an uncivilized topic, and a key to understanding your health—all at once.

Look to the Large Intestine for Keys to Understanding What Your Poop Means

Poop is formed from the solid parts of food your body can’t absorb or use in another way. It’s purely waste—the scatological leftovers—collected and compressed in your large intestine.

And your colon is a great starting place for this indelicate discussion. That’s because various stool types and what your poop says about your health begins in the large intestine. Many of the factors broken down below have their origins here.

Before proceeding further, let’s explore a bit more about what makes up your poop. No matter the consistency, poop contains a lot of water—approximately 75 percent. You’ll also find undigested matter, which mainly means fiber. Stool also contains:

  • live and dead bacteria
  • intestinal mucus
  • proteins and fats
  • salts
  • a variety of other cells and discarded cell parts

This mashup of your body’s trash collects in your large intestine. It solidifies the longer the mixture stays here because water is absorbed through the large intestine.

When it’s time to go, your defecation reflex starts. The literal movement of your bowels is driven by peristalsis. These muscle contractions in the rectum, like those along the digestive conveyor belt, initiate the final act of digestion.

During your follow-up work in the bathroom, a lot of questions can pop up. The biggest one seems to be, “Is that normal?” People don’t regularly—no pun intended—talk about what their usual stool is like, so comparison is hard to come by.

That being said, you can look at the characteristics below and better understand what your poop means. The information you’ll receive from your own quick stool study won’t be medical quality, but it can begin to illuminate what your poop says about your health.

What Stool Color Means

The color palate of your poop should exist in shades of brown. The exact variations and hues are determined mostly by the raw materials of your diet.

The leftovers will look a lot like what you ate, so the exact color can change day by day. More leafy greens one day will add a touch of green. Beets can produce a shocking red. But brown remains dominant because that’s the color of used up digestive enzymes, bile, and bilirubin.

Divergences in poop color that are unexplained by your diet may be signals from your body. Here’s an explanation for what stool color means:

  • Black: Some iron supplements and copious amounts of black licorice could be the culprit. Outside of those explanations, black poop is a serious matter to bring to your doctor’s attention. It can mean bleeding is happening in your upper intestinal tract.
  • Red: Your first thought is blood. And, in the absence of red foods, you’re probably right. But, unlike black poop, the bleeding is happening later in the process—in the large intestine or rectum.
  • Really Green: If you skipped the spinach and still have very green poop, the issue lies with bile. Your body hasn’t had time to fully utilize and dismantle the bile before your bathroom break. That suggests your food’s cruise down the digestive highway is happening at higher-than-normal speeds.
  • Grey/White: Green means too much bile leftover, and grey or white is the opposite. This coloration may mean inadequate bile supplies earlier in the digestive process. Talk to your doctor about reasons this may be consistently happening.
  • Yellow: Fat is typically at fault for yellow-colored poop. If this is a persistent problem, you can talk to a health-care professional about potential absorption issues.

Fecal Firmness and Texture Tell You a Lot

You can feel when something is off about the firmness and texture of your poop.

Ideally, your stool is smooth, firm, soft—but not too soft—and passes without issue. Think of this as the center of a continuum. The further your feces strays from that middle point in either direction, the less healthy it is.

Moving left and away from the center, the stool types grow increasingly lumpy and firm. Some lumpiness is OK. The far-left side of the spectrum is poop that’s like hard, little, problematic pebbles.

The opposite is true for the far-right side of the stool spectrum. The further you go, the softer it becomes—ultimately hitting diarrhea at the extreme right end. A little softness in the stool is still accepted as healthy, but once you start seeing cloud-like pieces with ragged edges, you may be on the way to diarrhea.

There’s a lot of space between pebbly feces and a smooth stool, as well as diarrhea and the perfectly formed poop. Your bowel movements can and will slide along the spectrum depending on your diet and daily blips in digestive health.

Time spent in the colon is responsible for a lot of differences in texture and firmness. Poop hardens up when it spends too much time there, but it gets softer the faster it moves through.

This speed can tell you a bit about what’s going on in your digestive health. Hard, pebble-like stool signals constipation and might also be a sign of dehydration or a lack of fiber. On the other side, diarrhea is your body’s way of quickly ridding itself of unwanted items. Those can include bacteria, viruses, and foods it doesn’t easily tolerate.

Bigger digestive issues can be tied to the extremes of the stool spectrum. If issues persist, consult with your health-care provider.

Judging Your Bowel Movement’s Buoyancy

Unlike color or texture, buoyancy is simple, with no spectrums or charts. There are only two options—sink or float.

You want your poop to sink in the toilet bowl. That’s a sign of good density. It also means your stool doesn’t contain too much fat.

If your poop floats, you may consider cutting back on fat in your diet. Consistent floating issues after a dietary change might mean your body is having trouble absorbing fat—another point of discussion with your doctor.

What Your Poop Says About Your Health if There are Visible Food Particles

Don’t worry too much if you can identify some of the fibrous parts of your diet in your poop. Fiber isn’t able to be digested fully, and the insoluble sort may not change much on the digestive journey.

You can help your guts out by chewing your food better to give digestion an adequate head start. Breaking up fiber-rich vegetables in your mouth won’t make the indigestible parts break down fully. But it will at least make the end of the process less alarming.

Your Last Two Poop Properties to Consider: Size and Smell

No two poops are the same in size. If you eat more, you’ll poop a bit more—whether more frequently or in larger quantities.

It’s normal to poop up to three times a day and as infrequently as every couple of days. And your round, smooth-but-solid stools are ideally a few inches (several centimeters) each. The small, hard pebbles aren’t what you want. But if it’s a bit bigger, that’s not problematic in and of itself—especially if it was easy to pass.

Then there’s smell.

If your poop actually smells like flowers, that would be more abnormal than a bit of unpleasant odor. Poop stinks. And that’s because bacterial breakdown of food is a smelly business. But if the odor is often extremely pungent—to the point where you can’t stand it—you may want to check with your doctor about a potential infection or digestive issue.

A Few Words About Urine

While body waste is at the top of your mind, you might also wonder about urine. It’s another way your body is emptying the garbage. You can learn something about your health from your urine, too.

Pee color is often the first and best signal for hydration status. Properly hydrated people have pale, straw-colored urine. The darker the shade of yellow, the more water you need to start drinking.

Some vitamins may also impact the color of urine, turning it a brighter, more golden color. Medications and food coloration (including natural pigments or synthetic dyes) can make your urine blue, green, or brown. Red or pink urine could also be food related, but blood is often to blame. See your doctor if bloody urine persists outside of dietary factors.

Your pee can also smell different, depending on the balance of waste products and water in urine. If you haven’t eaten asparagus and your pee consistently and persistently smells strong and odd, it might warrant a conversation with a health-care professional.

Don’t Waste an Opportunity to Keep an Eye on Your Health

People’s trash tells interesting stories. You can learn a lot. Poop is your body taking out the garbage, and there’s much to glean from the types of stool you have. So stop shortchanging the end of the digestive story and pay a bit more attention to what your poop says about your health and your lifestyle.

But it’s easy to overreact to a peculiar poop. Your strange stool might have you rushing to the internet to dabble in self-diagnosis. Don’t do it.

What your poop says about your health is worth paying attention to. But clear signals tend to bear out in the long-term more than on a single occurrence. You should immediately address bleeding or black stool, and quickly deal with diarrhea or constipation. Other indications about what your poop means may change as quickly as the calendar flips from day to day, though.

If you’re looking for positive poop interventions, start with your diet and lifestyle. Changes in diet can upend your fecal expectations. Switching to a higher-fiber diet will make an impact you’ll see in the toilet bowl quickly. Same goes for lowering your fat intake. Other lifestyle tweaks to form more perfect poops include healthy hydration, regular exercise, and supporting a balanced microbiome.

https://www.webmd.com/digestive-disorders/ss/slideshow-poop-type-color

https://www.healthline.com/health/digestive-health/types-of-poop

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/320938

https://www.pennmedicine.org/updates/blogs/health-and-wellness/2019/march/poop

https://www.piedmont.org/living-better/what-your-stool-says-about-your-health

https://www.umassmemorialhealthcare.org/sites/umass-memorial-hospital/files/Documents/Services/Surgery/UMass_Colorectal_Inforgraphic_0316.pdf

https://www.mayoclinic.org/stool-color/expert-answers/faq-20058080

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/5-things-your-poop-can-tell-you-about-your-health

https://www.webmd.com/digestive-disorders/poop-chart-bristol-stool-scale

https://www.everydayhealth.com/digestive-health-pictures/icky-but-interesting-facts-about-poop.aspx

https://www.healthline.com/health/undigested-food-in-stool#causes

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/urine-color/symptoms-causes/syc-20367333

https://www.mayoclinic.org/symptoms/urine-odor/basics/causes/sym-20050704

Usually you can ignore the snack drawer. At a certain point in the day, though, those little treats start creeping into your mind. An hour later, the snacks summon you, pulling you closer like a tractor beam. When that happens, your best hope to avoid dietary disaster is learning smarter snacking concepts. That includes planning, learning how to snack smarter, and understanding what makes a snack healthy.

When you add up each of the eight key concepts below, you’ll have a base of practical knowledge about how to snack smarter. Follow along and you’ll start turning to healthy snacks in no time.

Smarter Snacking Has a Purpose

Purposeful action yields better results than an improvisational approach. Smarter snacking is no different. You don’t have to bounce from craving to craving.

Instead, learning how to snack smarter starts with your purpose for eating between meals. Consider your daily schedule to ascertain physical- and mental-energy needs. Is a snack required to prepare for a workout or recover after? Answering these kinds of questions lends purpose and direction to help you achieve smarter snacking.

Understand Your Snack Sensations

Part of identifying the purpose of snacking is examining your hunger. What’s making you want to eat? Are you hungry or is something else driving your urge—thirst, boredom, or an emotional response?

Thirst can easily be mistaken for the sensation of hunger. A glass of water may be all you need. If your craving is led by emotion or boredom, try an activity—walk, ride a bike, or do a home workout. After all that, if your body really needs calories or nutrition, focus on finding a healthy snack with skills you’ll learn below.

Think of Snacking as a Chance to Add More Nutrients

Once you grasp the purpose and understand your urge to eat, it’s time to think about what to snack on. The best advice starts not with a list of acceptable foods, but with a mentality to take into your smarter snacking.

Here it is: snacking is a nutritional opportunity, not just about satisfying a craving.

That means seeing your snack as a way take in more essential and beneficial nutrients. Use your snack to add fiber, plant-based fat, protein, specific micronutrients, prebiotics, probiotics, or water-rich foods to your daily diet. Start reframing snacking from chasing comforting flavors to gaining a nutritional leg-up.

How to Snack Smarter? Stay as Close to Whole Foods as Possible

Whole foods—especially fruits and vegetables—are key components of a healthy diet. Those same whole foods are also the bedrock of smarter snacking.

What makes a snack healthy can be as simple as its closeness to whole foods. An apple and some almonds? Those whole foods are absolutely healthy snacks. Spreading almond butter on apple slices instead is still good because you’ve stayed close to the original foods.

Seeing how far your snack has shifted from its whole-food origins can help you easily identify the healthy snacks to target.

Minimize Overly Processed Foods, Sugar, and Sodium

Stick close to whole foods helps avoid a lot of the pitfalls of overly processed snacks. But foods that are heavily processed often contain more fat, sugar, and sodium than you need—even though they’re convenient. And the calories these options pack also comes without much in the way of fiber or essential nutrients.

If whole foods aren’t available or easy to snack on—because ease is key when a snack attack happens—you can opt for minimally processed foods. Good options exist. You’ll recognize them by their simple ingredients and minimal sugar, low sodium, and no trans fats in the nutrition facts.

Fiber is the Friend of Smart Snackers

A simple and accurate answer to “what makes a snack healthy” could be one word—fiber. Whole fruits, vegetables, and grains have plenty of these key complex carbohydrates. And that fiber does so much for your body:

  • Helps support satiety (feeling full for longer)
  • Optimizes healthy digestion
  • Acts as a prebiotic to support a healthy gut microbiome
  • Plays a role in helping maintain heart health

There’s a lot more fiber benefits. But you already have an idea about the importance of including complex carb as part of your smarter snacking approach.

Keep Snacks in the Context of Your Daily Diet

Your body doesn’t recognize snacks as separate from your regular meals. Food is food. Snacks are digested and shipped to the body just like breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

Since there isn’t a special category for snack calories, you need to make sure they fit in your targeted calorie count for the day. Also pay attention to the amounts of macronutrients—fat, protein, and carbs—in your snacks.

Putting your snacks into your daily calorie and macronutrient counts keeps them in the right context—an important step when learning how to snack smarter.

Plan for Smarter Snacking Success by Budgeting

You know how many calories you need for your weight-management and lifestyle goals. (If you don’t there are resources to help.) And you already know you don’t want snacking to burst your caloric bubble.

That’s where you snack budget comes in. The concept piggybacks off of the advice above to put your snacks in the context of your full daily diet. It can help you plan out snacks before you hit the point where you’re ready to eat anything within reach. Proper planning—that’s easy to execute—will set you up for healthy, helpful snacking.

If you paid attention to the previous concepts, you won’t be surprised by the considerations for building a snack budget. Here’s what you should ask:

  • How many calories are available to allocate to snacks throughout the day?
  • What’s the amount of fiber, fat, and protein in the snacks compared to daily requirements or goals?
  • How many times a day do feel like a purposeful, healthy snack could be useful?
  • When is the best time to snack to optimize their impact?

With these answers, you’ll know your needs and you can start picking foods that fit into your daily budget. Making snacks part of your meal planning helps you scheme out your snacks for a week at a time, if you want.

Knowing How to Snack Smarter is Only Half the Battle

Turning what you’ve learned from these smarter snacking concepts into action is the next step. Fair warning: it can be a battle against your habits and cravings.

But you have the power to shift a potentially unhealthy habit into a powerful propellant toward your wellness goals. Start by understanding your needs, planning out your snacks, and identifying healthy options to reach for when cravings hit.

The last thing to remember is that—like developing any healthy habit—smarter snacking is a process. Don’t beat yourself up if a potato chip or two sneaks in now and then. Value the progress you make and you’ll learn to love eating healthy snacks.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4863261/

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/snacking-good-or-bad

https://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/features/best-and-worst-snacks

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/wellness/a-healthy-snack-needs-these-three-nutrients-plus-proper-planning/2018/10/04/1ea62c1e-c735-11e8-9b1c-a90f1daae309_story.html

https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/7-ways-to-snack-smarter