OBSTACLE 1: Barriers to Healthy Eating

If you want to get the correct diet for long term health, a desirable weight and for peak performance in sports it is definately worth taking heed of the five top obstacles to a healthy diet.

It can be hard organising a healthy diet when time constraints in today's hectic lifestyle can lead us to selecting the wrong foods and following erratic meal patterns. Over the next few days I will be publishing on the blog some of the common obstacles that can

cause you to make poor food choices and more importantly how they can be avoided.

Obstacle 1: Blood Sugar Swings

Blood sugar swings can lead us to making bad food choices and hence suffer poor energy levels. If we consistently choose sugary high glycaemic snacks such as cakes or chocolate bars our blood sugar levels will shoot up providing us with a very temporary high which can become very addictive. The problem with this is that there is only one way for blood sugars to go next and that is down, which has a knock on effect of causing fatigue, lack of concentration, more sugar cravings and that horrible weak, shaky feeling.

One of the tricks to avoid blood sugar lows is to choose low gylcaemic foods as snacks which have a slower release of glucose into the bloodstream causing the blood sugar levels to remain nice and consistent as the graph shows.

Another key method in avoiding peaks and troughs in your blood sugar levels is to split your calorie intake into small frequent meals instead of the standard three meals per day.

Studies show that by eating small frequent meals individuals have a much lower chance of weight gain and obesity compared to those who eat the standard

three or fewer meals daily. Including a portion or protein at each meal will also give a sensation of fullness therefore lengthening the time until you get the hunger cravings again. Including fibre rich foods at each

meal will also will also help to slow down the glucose response so a healthy helping of grains, fruits or vegetables will help keep those sugar cravings away.

Next obstacle to be covered is the dieters problem of "NOT EATING ENOUGH"