Eating right

You’re late again! Rushing from home you pick up a Chinese roll at the shop for breakfas and make a beeline to work. Lunch? There’s simply no time for it. Finally, dinner; time for a breather and a meal to make up for the stressful hectic day you just whizzed through by treating yourself to a large scrumptious takeout and decadently delicious dessert. If this routine sounds typical, the ominous truth is that you’re inadvertently sabotaging your health.

In fact, you’re probably adding on pounds and are completely flummoxed as to where the calories come from; after all, your food intake has dropped drastically, right? Well, according to senior dietician and author of the weight loss guide ‘Losers are Winners’, Sigrid. S. de Silva, cutting down on food intake won’t help you shed pounds as effectively as eating right, and may even be the culprit for weight-gain.

Dr. Sigrid. S. de Silva

“Young people tend to take their health for granted. Apart from weight gain their deteriorating health isn’t obvious”, says Sigrid. “Unhealthy eating habits and erratic meals can lead to problems such as liver enzymes being eradicated, elevated lipid profile or cholesterol as well as elevated blood sugar levels, which weren’t a problem a decade ago”, she elaborates, explaining how the modern lifestyles of urban and suburban youth are compromising their health.

A rampant problem among young females is sub-fertility (irregular periods) that can be prevented by healthy eating habits, according to the doctor.

To counter these problems, she recommends an inverted pyramid style of meals; a large breakfast, a moderately sized lunch and even less for dinner. But hold up! There’s more to a healthy diet that the quantity you consume. You have to watch what you eat. Sigrid vouches for traditional Sri Lankan food. “Even if it’s rice three times a day, it’s good”, she says but also suggesting “stringhoppers, pulses, cereal and fruit. And if you don’t have time for those there’s the alternative of kanji, kola kanda, roast paan and curry.”

Explaining why breakfast should be the largest meal of the day, she says the meal prepares you for the hectic day ahead and you tend to burn out the calories. She also adds that it’s important to have breakfast at least 3 hours from waking up and no later.

When it comes to lunch, rice is the best she says, “even if it’s a bath-packet”. Describing an ideal lunch she says the meal must have an assortment of vegetables, the more colourful your plate looks the better. “Vegetables contain fiber, essential vitamins and minerals. And the more colourful vegetables contain more anti-oxidants”, she shares.

Lunch down, don’t wait till dinner time to eat something next. Sigrid recommends having a snack around 4pm, even if it’s a piece of cake, unless of course you’re a diabetic, in which case lay off the sweets and have something else instead.

Lastly, dinner. Here again traditional meals are a safe bet, but be sure to cut it down to less than the traditional serving. She also stresses that dinner should be eaten by 8pm the latest. A heavy and late dinner will cause weight again as you turn in for the night and your body stores away the calories.
You can complement your healthy diet by consuming 2 ½ litres of water on average, throughout the day. Water and fluid intake are not the same, she says pointing out that “people sometimes have juices instead of water, but there are calories in juice, so it isn’t a replacement for water”.

With Sigrid’s dietary recommendations it’s easy to see that healthier eating habits aren’t impossible. So drop those fancy celebrity diets of skipping meals and ‘lose-weight’ supplements, and try some good ol’ traditional food in proper quantities and you’ll be on your way to a healthier lifestyle.