Five Daily Oral Health Practices to Teach Your Kids

 

Just because your child’s first teeth will eventually fall out does not mean you should shirk your duty to teach them the best oral health habits. The sooner they learn how to care for their teeth, the better prepared they’ll be for their final set as it slowly grows in.

 

Eating Healthy

While brushing and flossing are probably the first things thought about when asked about oral hygiene, eating healthy is just as important. Fast foods, sugars and other unhealthy snacks promote the growth of bacteria and can open up the mouth to serious problems like cavities and gum disease. Teaching your child healthy eating now will ensure that once they start making food choices on their own, they’ll make the right ones.

 

Flossing Regularly

This is arguably one of the most neglected aspects of dental health when, in reality, it should be one of the most important. Flossing allows your child to disrupt the growth of any harmful bacteria trying to eat through the enamel of their teeth. Dentists recommend teaching kids how to do this only when their primary teeth start growing in.

 

Brushing Properly

The best brush technique is with soft bristles and a pressure no harder than you would use to brush a tomato without breaking its skin. This is because brushing exists to merely wick away external bacteria. If there is too much pressure, damage is done to the teeth and gums. Also, remember to only use a pea-sized drop of toothpaste. That is all that is necessary to obtain a good clean.

 

Drinking Water

Saliva is a very important aspect of our mouths that is often overlooked. Made up from water, it keeps the mouth moist, fights germs, prevents bad breath and contains essential minerals and proteins that naturally prevent gum disease and tooth decay. By drinking enough water, your children are making sure their first line of defense is always strong.

 

Visiting the Dentist

Finally, teach your child that dentist visits are necessary for deep cleans and spotting any potential problems. They are also great resources to discuss your current methods of cleaning your teeth and if what you’re doing is enough. One visit every six months from your child’s first tooth eruption is believed to be the optimal schedule.

 

Take time to show your kids these healthy daily practices to guarantee they will have nothing but beautiful smiles as they get older. Good dental health habits can be life-long, especially with a good childhood foundation.

 

Informational Credit to Advanced Family Dental Care LLC

Categories: Child, daily, dental health, eating healthy, Gum Disease, health, health habits, Kids, nbsp, oral health, teach, teeth

Bulk Up: Advice For Women Who Actually Want to Put On Weight

For women, wellness advice is often tailored towards losing weight, slimming down and looking after your overall wellbeing. While these are all solid goals, what happens if you’re a woman who wants to actually gain weight and build muscle? This seems like an odd goal to a lot of people, which means that the advice out there is scarce. There’s plenty of information on fat loss for women and muscle building for men, but not much for women who want to get bigger. That said, implementing the same basic muscle-building recommendations for men into your nutritional and workout programme can work for you too.

 

When you start weight training, most women assume their eating enough calories. Women who want to lose or maintain their weight often underestimate their daily calorie intake, but women who want to bulk up often overestimate their daily intake of calories. Therefore, being honest with yourself about the number of calories you consume daily is your primary hurdle to overcome. For this, a common weight loss tip can easily be applied; keep a food journal. While dieters should keep a journal to find out exactly what they’re eating and where they can cut calories, you should keep a food journal for several days to see what you are eating, the times you are eating, and the gaps in your daily meals.

 

Another way in which you have to be honest with yourself is to realise that you need to eat in order to grow and put on muscle. As a woman, you can be reluctant to consume carbohydrates and worried about getting fat, but you have to consume an adequate amount of proteins, carbohydrates and fats to build muscle. When using your food journal, add up your total calories at the end of each day – including those that come from carbs, proteins and fats – and see where you can add in more. Yes, eating more of these foods will add on a little fat, but without this fat you are never going to put on muscle. You need to be in a caloric surplus, and so you need to take steps to gradually accomplish this.

 

The reason why we say you have to go slowly is that suddenly adding a load of calories to your diet will cause you to gain too much unwanted body fat. For the best results, you should begin by adding an additional 200-300 daily calories for a week, preferably from carbohydrates. If you currently consume 1,600 calories a day, for example, you should increase this to 1,800 calories every day for a week. After this week is up, take a look and evaluate your progress. You should aim for a weight gain of one to one-and-a-half pounds a week, but certainly no more than two pounds weekly. This is a slow process for sure, and it can be frustrating, but in the long run you will be more satisfied.

 

In order to see results, you need to stick to your increased caloric intake for at least thirty days, if not more. The slow progress may make you want to give up, but stick with it! At the very least, it’s worth giving a month of your life to see what might happen. Another foodie tip to consider is to have the best possible pre-workout meal, as this is a great place to add in those extra calories. A pre-workout snack of 20 grams of whey protein and some fast carbs such as a big bowl of cream of rice or a white bagel, for example, will help you to bulk up and work hard. Remember, you will grow outside of the gym not in it.

Categories: Build Muscle, calorie consumption, calories, daily, Food Journal, Muscle, muscle building, Pre-Workout, weight, weight gain, Women

How to Make Exercise Part of Your Daily Routine

Many daily household activities could actually be as good for helping you lose weight as a regular fitness routine, according to a recent study. This looked into the effects of normal household chores such as gardening and home repairs on people’s wellness and wellbeing, and showed that being active with various daily chores may dramatically reduce your chances of having a heart attack or suffering from a stroke.

 

Not only that, sex may also be considered a type of exercise, according to the study. The researchers found that men can burn around 4.2 calories for every minute of a sexual workout, and women can burn 3.1 calories a minute.

 

This all goes to prove that getting into a good fitness routine, and sticking to it, is just a case of finding something that you enjoy and that works as part of your daily life.

 

Don’t cancel that gym membership just yet, though, as a bit of light cleaning is not going to fulfil your entire calorie burn requirement for the week. This is one of the dangers of calling daily activities ‘exercise’, as it may lead people into a false sense of security, where they go about their lives convincing themselves that they are actually doing exercise, when in fact they are not active enough to keep themselves healthy and to burn enough calories.

 

In other words, whilst the chores and the sex do count as exercise, they are probably not going to be all the exercise you need. You should schedule in some traditional workouts too, and make sure that you think carefully about how you are going to maintain this schedule long term.

 

Getting hold of an exercise buddy is an excellent way to make sure that you stick to a fitness routine, as you feel indebted to them to go to the gym, even when you don’t particularly feel like it, and the company can also make it seem more fun and less like a chore.

Categories: burn, chores, daily, exercise, fitness routine, nbsp, Routine, Sex

Think Yourself Thin: How to Lose Weight Using Your Mind

If you want to lose weight and boost your fitness, a large part of the battle is not with your body, but with your mind. Your wellness and wellbeing is linked to the way you think in a much stronger way than you may understand. If you really want to get in shape, it’s time to change the way that you think about your everyday chores. When you stop thinking about them as daily activities and start thinking about them as ways to burn calories.

 

The truth is, exercise has a powerful effect on your mental health, and not just because of the serotonin (happy hormones) that it releases. Just by thinking you are doing something good for your health, a sort of ‘placebo effect’ occurs, where your mind is lifted and real physiological effects occur like lower blood pressure and weight loss. The trick is, then, to find a way of training your brain to believe that when you are doing daily activities, you are actually exercising.

 

A recent study backs up this theory. Researchers divided a group into two sections. The first section were given daily household chores to do, but they were not told that these chores were exercise. The second section were given the same chores, but they were told that these chores qualified as exercise. At the end of the four week trial period, the two groups had a medical test. The results showed that the group who believed that they had done exercise for the past four weeks had lower blood pressure and a lower BMI than the group that believed they had done no exercise.

 

This proves that when people think that their daily chores, such as hoovering, dusting and cleaning the floors count as exercise, these chores then actually make them healthier – so change the way you think about your daily routine!

Categories: blood pressure, chores, daily, daily activities, exercise, group, Lose weight, mind, nbsp, thin, weight

Three Simple Kitchen Ingredients to Improve Your Wellness

If you are looking to improve your wellness through diet and nutrition, there are three key ingredients that you should not ignore. These common household staples can make a real difference to your wellbeing, if taken on a daily basis. They are: garlic, honey and apple cider vinegar.

 

When used every day, these three simple products could actually cure many common health problems. You could either take them alone or you can mix them together, and you can either take them ‘neat’ on a daily basis or you can simply ensure that you include them as ingredients in things that you cook on a daily basis.

 

Apple cider vinegar is packed full of minerals and has trace elements of calcium, potassium, phosphorous, magnesium, sodium, chlorine, copper, sulfur, silicon, iron and fluorine. It’s also rich in vitamins A, C and E as well as B1, B2 and B6 and is packed with amino acids and beta carotene. It has been used for centuries as a cleansing agent and healing elixir.

 

It can boost your metabolism, reduce your cholesterol, regulate your blood pressure and improve your circulation. It can also help with allergies, sinus infections, flu, acne, chronic fatigue, sore throats, gout and arthritis. It’s great for breaking down fats too and can be used for weight loss.

 

Garlic is well known for lowering bad cholesterol. It can help your body to prevent the formation of fatty deposits within the arteries, thus warding off heart disease. Regular garlic can also help you to fight off colds and other infections.

 

Honey is great for boosting the natural energy reserves and supporting a healthy immune system. It is frequently used as a very effective remedy for the symptoms of a cold such as sore throat, cough and respiratory problems.

Categories: apple cider, basis, cider vinegar, daily, daily basis, garlic, health, improve, ingredients, kitchen, nbsp

How to Satisfy Your Need for Extra Magnesium Past Age 30

As you age, your body becomes less and less able to absorb minerals, which can threaten your wellness with a magnesium deficiency. This can lead to calf cramps, diabetes, high blood pressure, osteoporosis, atherosclerosis, muscle weakness and metabolic disorders, so you can see how essential it is to get enough magnesium in your diet on a daily basis. After the age of 30, your daily requirement for this mineral increases to 420mg for men and 320mg for women, so how on earth do you get all that magnesium in your diet?

 

1. Beans: There’s a good amount of magnesium in raw lima beans, which the great northern bean contains 340mg per cup – so that’s more than your daily allowance in one go (if you’re a woman). However, as cooked beans lessen in magnesium value by more than half, you should avoid cooking them, or try to cook them as little as possible.

 

2. Artichokes: These unusual vegetables are amazing sources of magnesium, containing 73mg in a medium artichoke. This is 18% of your daily value, and the vegetables will retain their nutritional value even if you boil them. When it comes to other cooking methods, the wellness experts are split on what to recommend for magnesium retention, so just stick with boiling.

 

3. Spinach: Almost every diet and nutrition article gives a special shout out to dark, leafy vegetables, as they are known for their incredible nutritive content. All of these veggies contain magnesium, but spinach leaves (pun not intended) them all behind. In a single cup of spinach, you can get a whopping 150mg of magnesium, making it one of the best sources. Still, the downside of spinach is that it contains a high concentration of oxalic acid, which can cause kidney-related diseases, so don’t consume it more than once a week.

 

4. Oysters: If you’re a seafood person then here’s some good news for you: adding oysters to your meal can give you an added 81mg magnesium boost. Whether you love them raw, steamed, stewed, roasted, broiled, sautéed, baked or poached, you can get plenty of the mineral in your diet. However, the bacteria associated with oysters have been known to cause gastrointestinal problems, so it’s recommended that you cook them to 140 degrees.

 

5. Dark chocolate: Here’s one for all the chocoholics out there: cocoa powder has a number of health benefits, one of which being a great magnesium content. In 100g of cocoa powder, you’ll find 499mg of the mineral, and when that powder is part of your favourite dark chocolate, you can expect up to 330mg of magnesium in 100g. You hardly need an excuse to eat more chocolate, but it helps! Just remember not to overdo it as chocolate still contains a lot of weight-gain-and-diabetes-inducing sugar.

 

6. Dairy products: Your body easily absorbs milk and its products, which makes it an excellent way to attain your daily magnesium needs. Milk and yoghurt are the best dairy sources of magnesium and potassium, and their calcium content is also beneficial as you age to prevent bone diseases like osteoporosis.

 

7. Cereals: Why not have cereal with your milk or yoghurt in the morning and get a magnesium two-for-one special? The best cereal sources of magnesium are the ones that are high in fibre, so opt for one with wheat, oats, buckwheat, rice and barley.

 

8. Banana: This fruit is a great source of magnesium and, if added to your breakfast bowl, can make a magnesium triple threat! In 100g of banana there’s a good 27mg of the mineral, which can help you get a quick magnesium fix when you’re on-the-go. However, if you’re diabetic or on an anti-cholesterol diet, you should perhaps avoid getting your magnesium needs from this fruit.

Categories: cereals, cocoa powder, daily, diet, Magnesium, mineral, nbsp, spinach

Warning: Your Daily Vitamins May Cause Health Problems

You are probably the sort of person who is invested in their own wellness and well-being. Perhaps you eat healthy and exercise daily. You may even take vitamins, minerals and supplements on a regular basis. But what if we told you that this daily vitamin pill could actually be damaging your health?

 

Vitamins are a big business, ranging from liquid vitamins for babies, chewable vitamins for children and then a whole range of vitamins for adults, tailored for specific health problems, such as high doses of vitamin C for those who are suffering problems with their immune system, essential oils for those struggling with illnesses of the joints and vitamins tailored for men and women going through various stages of life (such as exercising healthily or going through menopause).

 

The data, however, has shown that many types of vitamins and supplements can be harmful to your health. Fish oil capsules, for example, have now been linked to increased incidents of prostate cancer, which is devastating news for the millions of people who take fish oil capsules on a daily basis in an attempt to help ease their joint pain, improve the health of their heart and fight against mental decline.

 

Carried out with more than 2,000 men, the study showed that men who had high levels of omega-3 in their blood samples were around 71 percent more likely to contract the most serious and lethal form of prostate cancer, and 44 percent more likely to get the milder kind, too.

 

It’s not just omega-3; researchers have found that multivitamins may also be doing more harm than good. For a start, there is very little evidence that multivitamins or vitamins of any kind have a significant effect on protecting you against any diseases, whereas further research seems to indicate that taking multivitamins can lead to premature death.

Categories: daily, fish oil, health, health problems, Multivitamins, nbsp, oil capsules, Omega, prostate cancer, vitamins

Six Ways To Boost Your Fitness As Part Of Everyday Life

Everybody knows that fitness is a vital part of wellbeing, but sometimes the thought of putting on a tracksuit and heading down to the gym can be very unappealing indeed! The good news is that there are lots of little things you can do to improve your wellness, as well as your overall fitness, and you can do them on a daily basis without thinking about them too much.

We’ve compiled a list of small tips that you can take on board that will help to improve your life.

First of all, in order to enjoy fitness as part of your life then you need to make sure that you do not suffer from any injuries or accidents while exercising. As soon as you hurt yourself, you will then be unable to exercise and your fitness will be negatively impacted. It might sound like a small thing, but having a good pair of trainers can really make a big difference. You may feel like your trainers are fine, but often people use the same pair for years, not realising that there are much better options out there.

When you first get a new pair of shoes, write the date on the sole of the trainer. That way you will be aware of how long you have had the shoes, so will know when the time is right to replace them.

An easy way to tone muscle without even really thinking about it is to swing your arms as you walk along. This helps to strengthen the arms, improve muscle tone, improve your posture and help to burn calories.

Standing on one foot is another good way of incorporating a little easy fitness into your day. Stand on one foot for a minute, holding onto a chair or wall for support if you need it. Breathe deeply and then change feet after one minute. This can help build your balance and coordination, which will help you in all areas of your fitness.

Six Ways To Boost Your Fitness As Part Of Everyday Life

Categories: Boost, daily, fitness