Healthy Eating: Fighting the Urge to Rely On Comfort Foods

Healthy Eating: Fighting the Urge to Rely On Comfort Foods

Too often people eat to make themselves feel better rather than to satisfy their hunger. When you

eat for this reason, the foods you crave are usually those loaded with sugar or fat rather than

healthy fruits and veggies. In order to develop healthy eating habits, the reliance on comfort

foods needs to be reduced or eliminated completely.

Reflect On Why You Eat

Before reaching for a candy bar when you’re in line at the grocery store, ask yourself if you

really need some chocolate and why. If you’ve had a stressful day at work or you’ve been under

emotional strain, put the candy back and try to find a healthier way to make yourself feel better.

Replacing exercise with eating will not only maximize any weight loss goals, it will increase

your endorphins and give you a huge self esteem boost.

Healthy Eating For Dessert

A delicious dessert at the end of a hard day can be the highlight of the evening for a lot of

people. Rather than eating a piece of cake or bowl of ice cream, have a fresh bowl fruit salad or

some low-fat frozen yogurt. Substituting your high calorie desserts for something a little

healthier can be a guilt free way to finish your day.

Clear Out Your Cupboards

Keeping chips and cookies in the cupboards is too tempting for most people, especially after a

rough day. Throw out all your junk food and when a craving hits you, you won’t be tempted by

fatty snack foods and you’ll be more likely to munch on something much better for you.

Willpower can only take you so far in your healthy eating goals, so avoid the candy aisles and

don’t even look in the vending machines you walk past until you’ve trained yourself to resist

your junk food cravings.

Don’t Negotiate

It’s easy to talk yourself into having just one piece of cake or thinking that because you’ve had a

rough day you deserve it. After eating that one piece it’s pretty likely that you’ll feel guilty for

doing so and you may end up feeling worse than you did before. By just being strict and laying

down the law, you’ll probably feel much prouder of yourself for choosing the apple instead of

the cookie.

How Does the Patella Cause Knee Pain?

Patellofemoral Pain Syndrome is also called Anterior Knee Pain. It is a condition that results from abnormal movement of the kneecap when we straighten and bend our knee. It is usually aggravated by activities that involve this movement while we are weight bearing. Climbing or descending stairs is a good example.

The Patella’s job is to protect the quadriceps muscle as it crosses over the knee joint. It moves up and down as we flex our knee and it is contained within a groove at the bottom of the thigh bone. In normal movement the patella glides smoothly and is centered in the groove.

This animation shows the normal movement of the patella in the groove, looking down the thigh from above.

 

Patella braces push directly on the kneecap, guiding it back towards the inside of the groove and reducing the symptoms of pain and swelling.

Patella knee braces are able to reduce the pressure straight away and with each step causing less aggravation, the pain begins to fade. It is important to use them as part of the complete program with Physical Therapy vital for long term results. In severe cases, when people find the prescribed exercises painful, a brace can help you get started by allowing you to complete your exercise program without stirring up your knee.