Getting Started - Changing your diet Recipe: Low Fat, Low Sugar

Any move towards the low sugar / low fat diet will help you improve your health and fitness. It is not an all or nothing diet, and it doesn't have to be adopted in full all at once unless there are urgent medical reasons for doing so.

It's even better if you don't change too quickly! The digestive system needs time to adapt to the new improved regime and to new foods. But start by ending your consumption of sugar / fat mixtures such as biscuits, cake and pastry, and replace them with a portion of fresh fruit.

Try to establish a pattern of regular eating with three meals a day: Breakfast, lunch and an evening meal. Don't eat out of habit, and don't eat everything just because it is offered to you. Drink whenever you are thirsty, clean water is always the best way to quench a thirst.

The next step is to substitute the whole meal bread, potatoes and whole grain cereals as the foundation of your diet, but again, take two weeks to change your diet to the new pattern.

Next ensure that your fat intake is reduced to the new low levels, and then reduce your intake of concentrated protein - meat, fish, cheese, beans to the recommended portion.

Slowly increase the amount of exercise that you take. It need only be by a couple of minutes each day.

But you must set your target for being on your new diet, and staying there. Four weeks should give you enough time to move completely to the new diet and adopt the exercise regime that you can sustain.

This is a healthy diet for the whole family, so why not move everyone onto the new diet at the same time!

Copyright Peter Thomson 2012-February-9