I wanted to stop myself from writing it but tonight’s show Che Che Lazaro Presents (August 19-20, 2012, 11pm onwards) featured Obesity with Iza Calzado on the forefront of tonight’s presentation, convinced me to write this.

A survey by the National Statistics Coordination Board (NSCB) as of 2008 showed that 26.6% of Filipino adults are overweight, higher than 16.6% in 1993.

Of the number, 5.2% are obese.

From ABS-CBN News.com, Overweight Filipinos Increasing, Survey Shows (6 Nov. 2011)

Last Thursday, after the CrossFit experience, as part of our journey in the C-Lium Lose More, Live More experience, we met Miss Nadine Tengco as our nutritionist. She is also the resident chef and nutritionist of Pinoy Biggest Loser. She gave us a brief discussion about nutrition and diet.

She has this to ask, “Why do you need fiber?” Someone replied, “To lose weight.” To which she returned, “Why?” “To be more healthy.” And she went back and asked again, “Why?” She explains, “As long as we know the answer in why, then we will know how to make an excuse for it. Worse, we may seem to know but we actually do not.”

Ms. Nadine Tengco explains about fiber.

She shared further that the ones who are actually knowledgeable of these things are the ones who tend to abuse it; because they know how to get around with it.

And so we start with blood glucose/blood sugar. Know that: The purpose of blood sugar is to provide “food” for your body’s cells. Glucose is the sugar that provides energy to all cells in your body (Source: Yale Medical Group Q&A on Blood Sugar). Our blood sugar dictates what we eat and so we need to watch our blood sugar as it affects our diet.

Some would recommend the fad diets but you see these “easy-fix” may affect our blood sugar. We may see results in an instant but our weight could go back instantly too! We may not skip our meal to look forward to that buffet but the human body is created by God to be a smart “machine”: the last meal that we had will maximize its energy it can provide until our next meal. Therefore, the light headed sensation you feel while waiting for that “reward” is your blood sugar going down, making your metabolism slow down as well. And guess what: this will only encourage your body to store more what is enough.

On the other hand, eating a lot or binge eating shoots up your blood sugar level; makes you hyper for awhile and then later on makes you sluggish.

To understand this further: as food is broken down to glucose and the pancreas releases insulin, it works as a key so glucose can enter the cell and convert it to glycogen.

Insulin is the key to opening the cells.

The glycogen helps us convert glucose into energy for our body to work. With this, we have to watch what we eat.

We are then introduced to cortisol. Cortisol is a hormone released from the adrenal glands in response to normal body processes ranging from waking from sleep, to exercise, to dealing with stressful situations (Source: Livestrong on Cortisol and Nutrition by Andrea Johnson, 10 April 2011). Cortisol causes inflammatory of cells and when this happens, it can result to high blood sugar levels and obesity.

And so we established Cortisol can reduce the amount of glucose/blood sugar in our blood stream and therefore, slows down our metabolism or may affect our insulin level. This will result to obesity or type 2 diabetes.

So to help us monitor what we eat, Ms. Nadine recommended Quality and Quantity. Quality means to monitor what we eat; it should be nutrient dense, volumetric and whole foods. This will slow down digestion and fight inflammation. Quantity means to monitor how we eat; track calories not count it because tracking just results to misguided nutrition and accidental dieting.

And to supplement the nutrition, we need enough fiber to regulate how and what we eat.

Remember carbohydrates are burned first by the body, 2-3 hours after is protein, the last is fat.

Enough fiber can help regulate digestion and promote metabolism. With C-Lium Fibre, you can have as much as 14 times more fiber than oatmeal or cereal to help lower bad cholesterol, blood sugar levels and reduce excess weight.

Now I was inspired to write as helpful as I can, briefly explaining things about fiber and food intake trying to remember all the things I got from our lunch after CrossFit thanks to that program. I was actually moved how Ms. Che Che Lazaro narrated the alarms of being obese and as Ms. Iza Calzado narrates her story, I caught myself nodding.

When she said, “Dito sa Pilipinas, lagi nating pinagtatawanan o pinag-uusapan ang mga matataba. (Here in the Philippines, we would always ridicule those who are fat.)” I actually agreed. We usually take a second look when we see a horizontally challenged (let me use this term not to offend) person walk inside a place. We don’t know how they feel or even what they think when they are being looked down upon. It is in our culture to laugh about the people who are odd and in this manner, we include those who are larger than us.

As a result, self-doubt is a usual trait. They think that they cannot change themselves, that they will remain a comic relief. Some will resolve into quick fix and crash diets and may result to more risks in their lives. What we can do is help, support, encourage and inform them. Instead of mocking them, we have to learn to convince them that they can actually change for the better. How? Through education and fitness. We can only do as much because step 1 will still come from them. If they lack confidence, help them regain it or build it with them.

I have group mates from our running group, six:30 who used to be horizontally challenged but with proper exercise, good nutrition and motivated with running they are in great shape and are actually among the fastest during races! More friends from the running community can attest to this wonder and I wish this lifestyle can be promoted: healthy living through running and proper nutrition.

My sister can attest to this. She used to lead a not-so-healthy lifestyle, her excuse: she enjoys eating! But she realized she can still enjoy eating in moderation. I am proud of what she has become since she changed to active lifestyle. Look at us, 3-4 years ago versus now.

That’s me.

My sister (left: 2007 and right: now)

It’s not too late to change, try it because you just might like it. Lose more to live more!

Pictures came from Google search with keywords: cortisol, glucose, glycogen, metabolism and fiber. All credits go to the sources of these pictures. Disclaimer: Contents were taken from different sources and may not directly coming from Ms. Nadine Tengco’s lectures.