Growing Healthy Bodies

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Now that summer is nearing an end, the school year is about to start. Make sure that Herbalife is part of your schedule as this is time well spent on growing healthy bodies.

Everyone should strive to obtain and maintain a healthy body.
But we also need to manage our children's healthy growth. Unfortunately, some people think that just because their kids are young, they don't need to think about bulging bodies. But scientific reports released in the last few months support the opposite-our children are overweight, sedentary and eat the wrong foods.

Whether you have children or not, these findings reflect on the greater society we live in. In fact, during the last 100 years we have lost control over our food source and become more sedentary.

Let's start with how physically easy our life has become:
When I was a child we had a knob on our television that had to be turned to change channels. Now we have remote control. This modern luxury has taken away the potential to get up, change the channel and burn up to five calories.

• Think about how our cars used to have roll-up windows, which when wound vigorously could burn up to two calories.

• What about garage doors? We used to have manually operated doors. Today, most of us now have remote-operated door-openers.

With modern conveniences, life has become much easier physically.
Along with these luxuries, we have taken away opportunities to burn calories throughout the day. Decreases in our physical demands have led to a sedentary lifestyle and an increasingly overweight population.

Children today are growing up with these luxuries. They are normal to them. Additionally, with addiction to television, video games and computers, children are much more inactive than at any other time in history. In the early 1960's children were active about 4.5 hours a day-this was taken up with walking or riding bikes to school, recess, after-school sports programs and playing. Today's children are active less than 30 minutes a day!

Our children are struggling to maintain healthy weights.
Inactivity combined with the prevalence of junk food is a lethal combination! These two factors contribute to an increasing percentage of children who are obese and never before have we had such a large percentage of fat children. Obesity is a one of the major risk factors associated with many of our chronic diseases. If this rate continues, we could start seeing a higher percentage of these chronic diseases affecting younger and younger people.

Statistics that should frighten us into action:

• 10 to 15% of American children are seriously overweight

• 25% are at serious risk for obesity, have elevated cholesterol levels, elevated blood pressure and the development of type II diabetes.

So what about the food we eat today?

• We no longer grow our own foods.

• We rely on outside sources to provide it to us.

• Food is harvested green, shipped long distances, stored for months. When it makes its way to the grocery stores, it is not as nutrient-dense as when it was first harvested.

Reports also point out that we are going out to eat more often than ever before. And when we go out to eat, we have a tendency to eat foods that we would not normally eat at home. Often these foods are loaded with extra calories.

Then what about those fast-food places that have crept up on every corner of the planet? Think about it:

• When I was a kid, fast-food restaurants were around but we did not frequent them.

• Today, on average, children eat fast foods four times a week!

• The majority of fast foods provide high fat, high salt, high cholesterol, low vitamins, low minerals and low fiber!

I always say that every time a child eats fast food, he or she is missing the opportunity to grow a healthy body.

Reality Check:
In the ideal world, children would not eat fast food. But with the huge media influences today, children get a warped view of eating. They whine and beg to go to fast food restaurants. They think that it is a treat. They get their little meal with the toy and are so happy.

I challenge us not to use going to fast food restaurants as a treat for children doing chores or getting good grades. Instead, let's make the effort to nurture healthy lifestyles that will lead to healthy habits. As adults, we must work with our young and help them enjoy activity and nutritious foods.

• Take walks with your children.

• Enroll them in a sports program.

• Take time to watch them when they compete in sports.

• Play an active roll in their lives.

I know that most of us work and time is very limited, but we must be responsible in helping our children to grow healthy bodies. And by setting good examples for your children, you will increase their health potential too.
As far as the food side of the equation is concerned, give your children some of the responsibility of preparing one meal a week. Each child thinks up the meal, learns to read recipes and prepares the meal. Even the very young can get involved.

• Let your two-year-old stir.

• Nurture interest by letting your three-year-old pick the vegetable one week and the meat/protein the next.

• As the child grows, so does the responsibility. Around age six, start introducing nutrition information.

• As the child improves his or her reading abilities, help him or her understand food labels and balancing the meal with a vegetable, protein source and a grain product.

With early involvement in meal planning and food content, children will grow up with a better understanding of food and how it not only pleases the taste buds but also feeds the body.

Activity and nutritious foods are a big part in growing healthy bodies!

Herbalife can assist in helping to grow healthy bodies because we have a great children's products in Multivites and Kids Shakes that tastes great, are easy to take and can assist in providing your children with essential nutrients.

I always say at Distributor trainings that Mark Hughes named the company right. He did not name our company "HerbaDiet." He named it Herbalife. And Herbalife is for the family for life.

by Heather Livingston, M.Sc. Herbalife Medical Advisory Board

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