Music, measuring tape and me

On Sat­ur­day evening my sweet­heart and I were invited to a music recital and jam. The stu­dents were not play­ing “Twin­kle Twin­kle” and other basic favorites on the piano. Instead they were strum­ming gui­tars and play­ing fid­dles. One very tal­ented young girl played a penny whis­tle as well as two other instruments.

The Blue­grass and Celtic jam that fol­lowed was only made more per­fect by the carry-in sup­per eaten under a blue sky with a slight breeze. It was a per­fect night.

On my bucket list of things to do before I die is to play the stand up bass in a Blue­grass band. I do not own one and have no idea how to play the large instru­ment but it looks like fun. It will take a lot of time and practice.

Instead I spend my time learn­ing more about nutri­tion and related top­ics. In my spare time this week I have read some very inter­est­ing sci­en­tific articles.

The con­cept of eat­ing at night has been debated for years in the weight loss com­mu­nity. A new study pub­lished in the Jour­nal of Cell Metab­o­lism sug­gests that los­ing weight may have less to do with watch­ing calo­ries and more to do with timing.

Pro­fes­sors from research think tanks around the nation are prov­ing that dur­ing the past 100 years not only has obe­sity increased but so has eat­ing dur­ing the night. Stud­ies report that a day start­ing with break­fast upon wak­ing and a time-restricted eat­ing pat­tern through out the day is the best way to restrict calo­ries and con­trol weight.

Activ­ity through­out the day uses the calo­ries eaten. There is a con­nec­tion to the sup­ply and demand for food that is the key to a healthy weight.

My mother always taught me to not eat after din­ner. An occa­sional treat in the evening was the excep­tion. The prob­lem with many peo­ple is that the occa­sional after din­ner treat is now a rou­tine and treats add even more calories.

This strange hobby of read­ing nutri­tion research proves to me once again that my dear mother was right all along. I have no idea how she got to be so smart.

Another arti­cle that caught my eye may cause some of my read­ers to march right to their bath­rooms, pick up their scale and pitch it in the trash. For years peo­ple have been obsessed with the num­bers. I have spent decades of my life try­ing to con­vince peo­ple that those num­bers were a tool, not a verdict.

Stop jump­ing on that guilt pro­duc­ing mea­sure­ment devise. Go to the sewing box and pull out a mea­sur­ing tape.

New research from the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion reports that keep­ing the cir­cum­fer­ence of your waist to less than half of your height can help increase life expectancy for every per­son in the world.

It is as sim­ple as that. Mea­sure your waist, mul­ti­ply by 2 and that’s how tall you should be. If you want to be healthy, either grow taller or lose inches.

Some­day I will play bass in a Blue­grass band, but for today, I’m get­ting out my mea­sur­ing tape. I need to be healthy for a long time if I plan on accom­plish­ing every­thing on that bucket list.

Bob­bie Ran­dall is a cer­ti­fied dia­betes edu­ca­tor, reg­is­tered, licensed dietit­ian. She super­vises a dia­betes self-management train­ing pro­gram at Aultman-Orrville Hos­pi­tal, Orrville. Con­tact her at bobbie.randall@aultmanorrville.org, 330–684-4776.

Posted by Bobbie Randall on Jun 20 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.