Michelle Ricker RDN

Tag Archive: Vitality Travel Tips

  1. A Smart Cup that can tell What You are Drinking?!

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    In 2015 we will know what is in EACH sip we are putting in our body. Vessyl is some crazy technology!! “Recently we’ve seen activity trackers become an important part of people’s daily lives.70-411
    But the fact is, what we consume is an even bigger part of the equation when it comes to our overall health,” says Justin Lee, CEO of Mark One, the company that created the Vessyl. “By helping you automatically track what you are consuming in real time, we will empower you to make better decisions when it comes to your health.” If you’re indulging in a soda, you already know what brand of fizzy dark liquid you’ve poured into the cup. But the Vessyl also calculates the caloric makeup of the liquid and the total grams of sugar, fat, protein, sodium, and caffeine. The cup display can be individually customized to show only the metric most important to you. It also sends the liquid’s nutritional data directly to the Vessyl’s iOS or Android app through built-in Bluetooth technology. That kind of functionality is handy for helping people reach certain health goals, such as losing weight by monitoring calorie intake or regulating sugar consumption. Now, the question is…. will knowing what is in our drink impact whether we actually drink it or not?! Yet to be determined. 😉70-642

  2. Greens to Go

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    Vitality Travel Tips… Travel can be brutal on the body due to changes in sleep patterns, time changes, the stress of meeting flight times, getting around a new city, etc. And, on top of it all, add to the mix being off of your normal eating pattern! If you can keep your digestive system healthy while ‘on the go’, you can stay WAY ahead of the game. You will find that your energy will stay up, you won’t be as susceptible to all the sickness floating around and you will be able to keep your antioxidants high so to minimize cell damage (aka: the aging process). A few tips for Vitality Travel: * Take some Greens to Go I like to carry a powdered green drink with me since finding greens out & about is super difficult. One of my favorites is Mighty Maca. http://www.mightymaca.com/ This little green concoction, when taken daily, will give you all the phytonutrients to keep your gut happy, your immune system strong and help minimize any inflammatory affects the stress of travel will have on your body. *Bring your own Bars When you are in a pinch and all that seems to be available is junk, fast food or airplane treats, I say grab a bar to get you thru til you can have some nutritious real food. Bars that I like are Quest, Clif Builder Bars, Elemental Raw Bars *Emergen-C Keep your Vitamin C levels topped-off during travel to ensure electrolyte balance and to minimize risk for catching some random bug floating in the air. *Stay hydrated! Carry a water bottle with you – especially on the plane. *Bag-o-Nuts It may seem silly to cart around a bag of nuts in your bag, but let me tell you, they can be a life saver. Nuts not only travel well due to their durability & extended shelf life, but they will give you the Omega-3’s and vitamins you will most likely be lacking when eating out or eating ‘local’ food. Due to the good fat content of nuts, they will also keep your blood sugar under control for an extended period of time which will allow you to not have to hunt down food as often.

    Safe travels, Your Friendly Dietitian

  3. Let’s Move!

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    No… Really… Let”s Move! It”s a bit frustrating to me (and to Dr. David Katz as well as you will see below), that we have not taken heed to the research stating movement is beneficial for LIFE. There is conclusive evidence now that a person can be more healthy and live longer if they did at least 30 minutes of exercise daily. Remind me again, why we are not using the time we have kid”s undivided attention in schools to help them understand this?! Have I mentioned how much a love Dr. Katz?! Well, here is what he has to say on the subject: “We already knew that sitting too much shortens our lives; and that sitting a bit less each day can extend them. And still our prevailing cultural inclination is to send our naturally rambunctious kids to school and bolt them to chairs all day, until they grow up to become adults we can’t get off couches with crowbars. And if, along the way, that rambunctiousness mobile casino ever rebels against the incarceration- well, we’ve got medication for that. We already knew that sedentariness now counts as a leading cause of premature death globally. We already knew that lack of physical activity was established among the top three causes of premature death in the United States, and that going from sedentary to routinely active could reduce the lifetime risk of all major chronic disease by 50%. We already knew that routine physical activity also turns up on the very short list of factors that exert so profound an influence on medical destiny that they actually alter the behavior and expression of our genes, nurturing our nature at the level of DNA. We already know that 20 minutes of physical activity 5 times a week could defend a high percentage of at-risk kids from developing type 2 diabetes.” Let”s Move! 😉 http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130524194014-23027997-let-s-move-more-than-our-lips