HealthyCoderz

Drinking water can be a major source of toxins. Some cities add fluoride which is a chemical and may contribute to health problems such as neurological problems, heart issues, cognitive development in children, thyroid issues. Water can contain bacteria, parasites, lead, radiation, etc. The best way to make sure your drinking water is safe is to purify it yourself or buy bottled water. My water is from a gravity fed spring, but has had coliform and parasite issues in the past, so I double filter it. First it's filtered with a countertop Doulton filter that attaches to the faucet. That gets filtered into a LifeStraw countertop water pitcher . I've used Brita and Pur in the past, but they won't filter out parasites. The LifeStraw is supposed to. I prefer the simple, portable option of a countertop pitcher and faucet attachment, but there are whole house systems that might be a better option for some people. Another option is to distill your own water. There are countertop ...

Breathing in chemicals from household items is an important part of improving your health. These chemicals cause health problems like headaches, dizziness, nausea, an overall sense of feeling unwell, etc. Essential oils are a great alternative to chemical filled air fresheners. Essential oils are the extracted oils from parts of plants and flowers using distillation. They are very concentrated. I discovered essential oils when my son was little. He was sick and refused to drink anything I tried to give him, so I went in search of non-invasive ways to help him feel better and came across aromatherapy. Aromatherapy involves adding a few drops of an essential oil or a combination of different oils to a diffuser . A diffuser is filled with water and the essential oil drops added to it. The diffuser breaks down the essential oils into smaller molecules and disperses them into the air. I've also just added a drop or two of essential oil to a paper towel. Vaporizer's will also work....

Sleep is one of the most important requirements for better health. Some doctors think it is the most important requirement. 7 - 9 hours every night is the optimal amount. Lack of sleep leads to lower brain function. Studies show that when a person sleeps a brain cleaning system called the glymphatic system, wakes up, refreshes and clears out the toxins accumulated during the day. I know if I don't get enough sleep, I don't function nearly as well the next day as I do when I have slept great. Some people don't make sleep a priority because they view it as a waste of time. The funny thing is when you don't get enough sleep you go through the day tired, but thinking you are getting more done. Really, you're not because getting optimal sleep lets you breeze through tasks easier. You're not sluggish, always taking breaks to doom scroll. It's easier to get into a flow state. Your brain is just functioning better, you have more energy and doing things is just smoo...

Learning new skills and hobbies adds variety and makes the days more fun and interesting. Research also shows it benefits the brain. Learning new skills helps grow more neural pathways by increasing the density of myelin, a protective white matter in the brain. The denser the myelin, the better the brain functions. Improvements include thinking faster, better long and short term memory and comprehension. Decreased myelin has been linked to health issues like alzheimers, dementia and multiple sclerosis. Learning a new language is a popular recommendation. I learned French in school, took a little German, but never learned Spanish. I installed a free language learning app on my phone called Duolingo and now spend five minutes a day after dinner learning Spanish. Over time, it adds up. There are a lot of websites that offer free online courses. Some are even from top universities like Harvard and Stanford . Some of these websites include Coursera , Udemy , edx , lynda . freeCodeCamp has...

Vitamin/mineral supplements are a key part of my health plan. There are so many supplements on the market though, it's hard to know what to take. I focus on simple, single purpose vitamin/mineral supplements. These would be: Vitamin D3 - 15 minutes of sitting in the sun before noon is the best way to get Vitamin D. For supplementing, get your Vitamin D level checked by a doctor, so you know what amount to start off with. It can vary depending on the season, lower in the winter if spending more time indoors and higher in the summer if spending more time outdoors. The Endocrine Society recommends 1,000-2,000IU of Vitamin D per day to maintain healthy bones, teeth, muscles and immune function. I take 5000IU every other day, but don't spend a lot of time outdoors. Vitamin C - This helps with bleeding gum issues. It's also good to take when sick to help fight off illnesses like colds and flu. Magnesium - A large majority of people are low in magnesium because today...

In addition to diet and exercise, eliminating toxins is important for improving your health. Toxins are everywhere. They are in soaps, lotions, detergents, cosmetics, food packaging. Toxins can also be breathed in, like mold and byproducts from burning candles. These chemicals can cause skin irritations, disrupt hormones, cause allergic reactions, contribute to asthma. It's probably impossible to completely eliminate them, but cutting down on them will make a difference. There is usually a healthier version of something that's not good for you. It's just a matter of finding the better alternative. Things that are used just once in a while are not as important to eliminate in the beginning as the things that are used daily. Some things that might be used daily and should be swapped for healthier versions include products like: Soaps including bar, liquid, dish soap, laundry detergent, shampoos and conditioners, lotions, skin creams and hair styling products are full of chemi...

Body weight exercises are exercises that use your body to build strength and gain muscle. They are the perfect type of workout. They are free and don't require any equipment. You can do them anyplace and at any time. Resistance is slowly increased over time as you get stronger and add more reps. Some body weight exercises include push ups, planks, squats, burpees, lunges, sit ups, mountain climbers, jumping jacks. It's pretty easy to set up a workout using just body weight exercises. Pick a set amount of time to exercise for. Pick a set of body weight exercises. Alternate exercises based on the body part they work, for example do push ups and then lunges, planks and then squats. Don't do pushups, planks, lunges and then squats. Do between 8 and 10 reps of each exercise. Wait about 15 - 30 seconds or longer in between each exercise type. Then just keep cycling through the routine until the designated amount of time has passed. Picking even one or two bodyweight exercises ca...

Many jobs these days, including mine, involve sitting all day. However, sitting all day long is terrible for the body. The longer I sit, the more tired I get. I try to move around for a few minutes at least every 1 - 2 hours. The recommendation is to move around every 30 minutes, which breaks the workflow, so I push it out a little further. More than that is just too much sitting at once where I can just feel it's been too long. I either start getting antsy or fall asleep depending on the day. On the other hand, it's also not good to stand all day long. The best approach is to alternate short lengths of time doing equal amounts of sitting and standing. Standing burns a few more calories over sitting, but over time they add up. Standing also helps improve blood flow which means better heart health. It helps decrease the risk of heart attack and stroke and boosts metabolism. It will lead to more energy and less disease. It's also an improvement to your health that can be don...

After sugar, seed oils like canola, safflower, sunflower, peanut, corn, soybean, cottonseed, palm and vegetable are next on the list of ingredients to avoid. They cause inflammation and are just as terrible for you. I've never really worried about them because I don't eat too much processed food to begin with. I stopped using oil when I bake a long time ago too. A recent visit to an alternative wellness doctor, detected I was having a sensitivity to seed oils. It wasn't there in the visits in previous months. I realized I had switched up my breakfast and was now eating sunflower seeds almost daily. That's not a bad thing, but after reviewing the ingredient list, realized they were roasted in vegetable oil, so be sure to check labels. Don't just assume a product is healthy. I've been fooled many times. Sunflower seeds are, but not when they are roasted and coated in seed oils. I replaced them with organic, unroasted, raw sunflower seeds. I've been very dilige...

Traditional baked goods like cakes, donuts, cookies and pies are full of sugar, starchy flour and seed oils like vegetable and canola oils. They are super bad for your health. I love baking and dessert. Being gluten free to avoid getting hives made it easier to give up traditionally made desserts. Since then, I've discovered there are ways to still enjoy dessert only with healthier ingredients. A lot of traditional recipes can be modified to be better for you. A few key ways I have used to adapt traditional recipes are the following: Flour Swap flour out for 1 to 1 gluten free baking flours like King Arthur, Walmart or Bob's Red Mill. They all have gluten free flours that can be used as 1 to 1 substitutes. They are gluten free and won't cause the inflammation gluten flours do. The drawback is they tend to be made with potato, rice and tapioca flours/starches which will still spike your blood sugar. Better, but not the best. A further upgrade is to use other flours made f...

Most of the days' calories should be eaten during the day with a light dinner eaten a few hours before dinner. Eating a heavy dinner close to bedtime can make it harder to sleep. I tend to stick with some sort of protein, like chicken, turkey/ground turkey, ground beef/steak or black beans with a small salad, a cooked vegetable and sweet potato. Once in a while I substitute gluten free pasta for the sweet potato. Gluten free pasta made from quinoa or brown rice is a better choice than gluten free pasta made from corn and potatoes, so be sure to read the labels. Aldi's has spiral and penne gluten free pasta made from quinoa. I also like red lentil spaghetti noodles. Spiralized zucchini is also a great alternative to traditional or gluten free pasta. A simple, small salad might consist of quality dark greens like spinach and/or spring mix, cucumber, green/red/orange or yellow bell pepper, red or yellow onion, tomatoes, avocado and/or black or green olives, all drizzled with oliv...

Regularly making lunch yourself over eating takeout is the best way to go. It will save money and you control the ingredients. During the week, I like a quick lunch that I can just heat up and eat without thinking about what I'm going to have and spending a lot of time preparing it. On Sundays, I use the crockpot to make soup, stew or chili. I make something that is full of vegetables and some sort of vegetarian protein, usually red or green lentils, chickpeas, split peas or black beans. I add broth which is usually vegetable or chicken bone broth. I top it off with a bunch of healthy spices. It's good, quick and nutritious. Adding meat instead of beans and beef broth instead of chicken or vegetable broth would also work. I also make a salad for dinner the night before and save half of it for lunch. The salad usually consists of spinach and/or mixed greens, cucumber, pepper (no seeds), red or yellow onion, olives or avocado, black pepper. I sometimes add in tomatoes (no seeds -...

I've been eating morning and afternoon snacks for years. Snacks help prevent blood sugar drops in between meals preventing a drop in energy. They also help get a little more nutrition into your diet, provided the snacks are healthy. They also help prevent overeating at meal times. The key to snacking is to eat them a few hours after meals and to make sure they include healthy fats, protein and fiber. A sugar filled candy bar and bag of chips will only make you feel worse and will not provide any nutritional benefit. Some healthy snack ideas to get started with are: handful of nuts smoothie with protein powder, spinaach, berries and almond or coconut milk an apple with some sort of butter like peanut, almond, sunflower or pumpkin seed string cheese and a small piece of fruit a homemade granola bar or breakfast cookie provided you can tolerate grains and it uses a low glycemic sweetener like honey, maple syrup or coconut sugar nice cream that uses a banana as a...

Eating breakfast is part of my morning routine. I usually eat after exercising. If I don't eat breakfast, I tend to get tired, headaches and my brain just doesn't think as clearly. Eating a healthy breakfast gives the body nutrition to start the day with. Studies have also shown that kids who eat breakfast, do better in school. Unfortunately, most breakfast foods are high in carbohydrates and full of sugar. Pancakes, french toast and waffles drenched in butter and maple syrup with bacon and a runny egg are my favorite. Those days are over though except for eggs which are a good, non carb protein choice and are versatile. They can be hard boiled, poached, fried in coconut oil or grass fed butter or scrambled with vegetables. During the week, I like quick things like a bowl of cereal and an egg. Unfortunately, box cereals are full of sugar and milk will also add to a blood sugar spike. Even oatmeal and quinoa aren't the greatest for blood sugar control. Lately, I've been...

HIIT High intensity interval training (HIIT) and strength training are great ways to get started working out without having to go to the gym. HIIT workouts involve short bursts of exercise with short rest periods in between. For example, run in place at full speed for 30 seconds and then rest for 60 seconds, repeat. HIIT workouts are shorter and still beneficial. Even just a 10 minute workout has been found to improve heart health. A typical HIIT workout averages about 20 - 30 minutes. Strength training Building muscle is a key component to improving insulin resistance. Muscle will help pull in glucose from the blood, which leads to less circulating in the blood causing damage. Muscle also burns more calories than fat. A combination of increasing lean muscle and reducing body fat will help improve blood sugar. Some examples of strength training workouts include body weight exercises (which, btw are completely free), lifting weights or using resistance bands. Household items such as...

I'm a big fan of having a morning routine. It sets the tone for the day. For me, not having a routine makes the day feel out of control and like nothing was accomplished. Anything important I absolutely want to get done, I do in the morning. That way if something else comes up, it's done and I don't have to worry about fitting it in later. During the week, my morning routine consists of wake up, shower, exercise, eat breakfast, brush my teeth, fix my hair, take the kids to school and start work. Pretty simple. Weekends I swap out work for cleaning the house or cooking. I exercise in the morning to make sure I get a workout in and don't have to worry about it later. I also try get up roughly the same time every day. Some other morning routine ideas include: write in a journal meditate go for a walk read spend a few minutes cleaning the house make your bed It's important to start slow and add healthy habits to your routine a little ...

When I discovered my blood sugar and cholesterol were out of control, my doctor gave me a food list and recommended the Mediterranean diet. I modified it slightly to be gluten free and low glycemic. 11 years later, I've stuck to it and so far it has worked well. The Mediterranean diet focuses on whole foods like whole grains, nuts, seeds, beans/legumes, good fats like avocado and olive oil, red meat once or twice a month in small amounts, eggs/cheese/poultry in small amounts, omega 3 rich fish like sardines and salmon, lots of non starchy vegetables especially leafy greens, fruit in moderation, herbs, spices, a glass of red wine per day, green tea, coffee and water. Processed foods like cookies, chips, packaged cereals, sugar, refined carbohydrates like white rice, white bread are all avoided Low glycemic whole grains include oats, brown rice, rye, barley, buckwheat, bulgur and quinoa. I stick with gluten free whole grains like oats, quinoa, corn and brown rice. Whole grains will ...

Years ago, I worked with a couple of guys who would meditate together after work. They would invite me, but I always declined. I didn't know anything about it and just thought it was a bit strange. Fast forward to today and I now faithfully do it 5 to 6 times a week. I try to do 5 - 15 minutes per day. I've been doing it so long that I don't even remember when I started or why I started it. There were times where I would stop and would just feel different, ok, but just off, so I would start doing it again and feel better. It has really helped regain control of anxiety a few times. The first time was mid March in 2020. A family friend had just been killed, schools had just closed, I wasn't feeling the greatest, wasn't sleeping well because of the covid stress. I was working through a 10 Percent Happier meditation challenge. A guided Joe Goldstein meditation came up. I really focused on it and after 20 minutes the stress and anxiety seemed to just fall away. Another t...

One of the things I have learned over the years is that stress is just as bad as a poor diet for your health. Years ago, several things happened at once including being laid off from my job. I had 2 little kids and had very little support and financial help. I took a job with no benefits and an $8 an hour pay cut, so I could learn web development. Times were tough to say the least. Months later, I had a tooth suddenly fracture and ended up having it removed. I've had random cavities, but nothing major like that. I came to the conclusion that it was probably due to a build up of stress. Since then I've really tried to reduce my stress load as much as possible. Here is a list of some things I try to do for stress relief: avoid doing things I don't like doing if possible. meditate, which changes the brain and makes it easier to deal with stress when it does happen. take magnesium which helps with anxiety and staying calm. unplug from the internet as much as pos...