Did you know that reading 5 minutes before your breakfast can help you improve your wellness throughout the day?
Did you know that reading 5 minutes before your breakfast can help you improve your wellness throughout the day ? How is this possible? Read your nutrition facts. Reading your nutritional facts will give you an idea of the quantity, food types and ingredients in the food you eat everyday. This will help you know how much calories, carbohydrate, fat, protein and sodium is in the food you eat.
You can compare different types of breakfast cereals and decide which one would give you the most energy for the day without adding too much stress to your health. Today, I am going to compare two breakfast cereals.
Quickly looking at the mini frosted wheats, each serving size contains 10 mg of sodium without milk, 210 calories , dietary fiber 6g, potassium 160 mg, and added sugar, 12g. Will just grab it and eat it or compare it to another cereal? Here is how it compares with Brans breakfast.
Each serving size of Brans flakes breakfast contains 110 calories, 110 mg of sodium without milk, 7 g of fiber and 4g of added sugar. Though bran flakes has only 110mg of sodium , when add milk to it your sodium intake per serving will increase. This can be compared with the mini wheats that has 85 mg of mini wheats that contains with milk, while bran flakes breakfast contains 110 mg of sodium.
Physiologically sodium which is the main component of salt draws in water wherever it is found in the body. This means that if you do not watch your total sodium intake, you may unwittingly expose yourself to increase in your blood pressure and daily fluctuations in your weight, depending on how much water you retain.
On the other hand mini wheats contains 12 g of added sugar , compared to Bran flakes , that contains 4g of added sugar. Bran flakes has 110 calories , while mini wheats has 210 calories. Which one will you choose between the two?
Here is my suggestion. If you have high blood pressure, you may be more concerned about sodium which can increase your blood pressure, then mini wheats would be a better option for you, since it contains less sodium per serving. However, if you are diabetic and you are more concerned about sugar, then bran flakes for breakfast, would be a better option, since it contains 4g of added sugar, compared to mini wheats which contains 12 g of , added sugar.
The other thing to remember when making your choice , is that we usually eat more than the Nutrition Facts serving of any meal we are eating. This means that for a mini wheat breakfast, instead of eating 12 g of sugar per serving size, you may end up eating up to 36 g of sugar, if you eat 3 servings.
Hope this helped. Next time you want to eat your breakfast or any other meal , do your 5 minute reading and improve your health and wellness. Failing to read or use your nutritional facts is like going to a fancy restaurant and ordering your food without reading the menu? How will you know if the food you are ordering is what you like or what you will enjoy eating?
By reading your food facts you will know how much sodium each choice you make will add to daily intake of sodium. This why we say that 5 minutes of reading before your meal is 5 minutes of improved wellness! This type of knowledge will ultimately help you to control your sodium intake and reduce your blood pressure without putting too much effort into it. After all, knowledge is power. The more you know about the daily factors that can affect your health, and take action, the more will be able to eat healthy in a way that works for you without getting on torture diets.
