Juicing vs. Blending, Fixing Joint Pain, Post-Meal Walks, and More!
In this episode, we’re back with another round of listener Q&A—our favorite kind of episode where we get to hang out and tackle your biggest health and nutrition questions! We break down whether blending, juicing, cooking, or even just chewing your food affects its nutritional value (spoiler: Eddie drops some serious anatomy knowledge on us). We also talk about how to keep your joints strong and healthy, why post-meal walks are so effective, and share some mantras that keep us motivated on our own health journeys. We can't wait for you to hear this one!
-
Juna: Eddie, do you know what time it is? It's 6:30 PM Okay. Technically yes. ? No. Eddie? No. It is time for a
q and a Q. Oh boy. Q, Q and A. I'm gonna make this a song, .
Eddie: Yes, it is. That time, it doesn't matter what time of day it is. This is my favorite type of episode. We get to hang out together and go through these questions that our listeners have. You guys have some crazy questions. You know, I thought I was coming up with questions.
You guys come up with
Juna: questions
Eddie: and we're going to tackle a bunch of them today.
Juna: You guys are making us do our research. We can't just come on here with no prep anymore. We have to be doing all this research. Well, we
Eddie: try to make it sound like that, but we're doing a lot of research in the background.
Juna: So on today's episode, we're going to talk about whether blending, juicing, cooking, or even chewing your food Affects how healthy it is one of the most important things you can do to keep your joints healthy Eddie gives us an anatomy lesson guys.
It was crazy. I made a really good point about elbows and knees Eddie ignored that and then he just kept going. I'm just kidding. And then we also talk about some mantras that have kept us going on either a weight loss journey or any other sort of health journey. And of course, we talked about when should you be taking that walk after your meals that we always talk about.
Is it too long to clean up the kitchen and then go on your walk? Big questions. Important answers, you guys. I'm Yuna Yata.
Eddie: And I'm Dr. Eddie Phillips. associate professor at Harvard Medical School.
Juna: And you're listening to Food We Need to Talk, the only health podcast that has been scientifically proven to increase the nutrients in your food, to make your joints so much healthier, and to improve the healthiness of your post meal walk.
Juna (2): Just by listening. Just
Juna: by listening!
First, let's start by shouting out one of our favorite reviews of the week. As you guys know, our goal is to get 2, 000 reviews. We are literally so freaking close. So, thank you to everyone who has chosen to leave a review. And this is one review closer, you guys. So, Eddie, do you want to do the honors?
Eddie: Yes, Yuna.
This review comes from R. A. K. 49 exclamation point!
Juna: I love, like, decoding. What is R. A. K.? Is it their initials?
Eddie: I don't know. It's 49. We'll never know. Maybe, uh, maybe they're 49 and they're excited. I've been listening since the beginning. I really appreciate listening to a science and evidence based podcast that focuses on so many of the health topics I'm interested in food and exercise.
You guys cut through all the ambient noise and food. We need to talk is a fun. Listen to,
Juna: thank you. Rack 49. Thank you. Rack 49 exclamation. I feel like we're in like the early 2000s when everybody had like AIM usernames, you know. Anyways, guys, as you know, reviews not only make us feel good and give us a chance to shout you out on the Potter and make you famous, but they also tell Apple that this is a good podcast, that other people should listen to it, that Apple should send it out to other people.
And so we really appreciate that. One last thing is that we have. A newsletter!
Eddie: A newsletter? Why would we need a newsletter? Oh my
Juna: god, why?
Eddie: I mean, we're so clear, but we speak so quickly, and you guys might be busy while you're listening to us. One of
Juna: us speaks so quickly.
Eddie: Are you gardening? That would be great.
Are you cooking? Are you going for a walk? Are you trying to fall asleep with this podcast? Whatever it is, when something comes up and you want to see it printed out in front of you, you can subscribe to our newsletter. Here's the deal, you go to foodweneedtotalk. com forward slash email, tell us who you are and then we will send you a newsletter that is absolutely free, has no advertising, we don't spam, we
Juna: don't get paid,
Eddie: we just summarize what goes on here.
You can share it with your friends, with your loved ones, even people you don't like, if it's something of value to them.
Juna: Send this to the haters. And now to the episode. So, Eddie, do you want to do the honors of reading us our first question from Jeff?
Eddie: Yes. Jeff asks, Would love to hear more about the impact of, quote, processing food in the home kitchen.
Juna: Mm hmm.
Eddie: He wants to know, compare to what, I hear you ask.
Juna: Compare to what? Com Ha
Eddie: ha ha. Pick an ingredient, compare fresh and raw to the other ways we might prepare it. You could juice it, blend it, preserve it, roast it, sauté it. In particular, if it's better whole than blended, Doesn't that imply we shouldn't chew?
Wait, that doesn't sound right. Jeff, great question. That
Juna: is a great question. All right,
Eddie: so let's, let's take the easy one. Una, should you chew your food?
Juna: Yes, Jeff, chew your food. It's very important. It starts the digestion process. Right, Eddie, is that right?
Eddie: Yeah, absolutely, yeah. And you want to chew thoroughly, and maybe not be I don't chew at
Juna: all, I just swallow, but And maybe
Eddie: not be, like, talking while you're chewing, and really taste the food.
And as Eunice said, so you're starting to, um, as we say in the medical field, masticate.
Juna (2): Whoa. I don't like that.
Eddie: So you're, and, and even mixing together your saliva.
Juna (2): Yeah.
Eddie: There are enzymes that start to break down the food, so definitely whatever it is you're eating. Be sure to chew it. But if you're starting to talk about actually processing in your kitchen, then you're bringing up questions like, okay, uh, we have an apple, right?
As it comes from nature, it's got the skin on it. It's got the seeds inside. You got, okay. Um, how does that compare to, oh, I don't know, putting it into a processor and coming up with applesauce or, or, or, or, well, you could blend it, I guess that would break it up. Even more.
Juna (2): Mm-hmm .
Eddie: And then what about juicing it?
Juna: Whoa.
Eddie: So,
Juna: or cooking it, roasting it, putting
Eddie: it in a pie or roasting it. . Well then we can start adding all sorts of other things. But if you're just talking about the absolute, like Apple alone
Juna (2): Yeah.
Eddie: Your best bet is to eat it closest to the way it came.
Juna (2): Yeah.
Eddie: Meaning. You're going to include the skin. If you really don't want the skin, you can take it off, but there are nutrients in the skin.
You're going to chew it thoroughly. You're going to hopefully enjoy it. If you go ahead and make applesauce, which is great. You know, like I love applesauce, you can keep the skin in and you're going to get a little bit extra fiber from that. It's also going to be digested, well, actually a lot quicker, um, because things have sort of already broken down.
If you went so far as to be drinking the juice, then we're congratulating you for having something natural, but your blood sugars are more likely to spike. Because when you have the apple and you eat it whole, you're actually taking some time to digest it, the apple juice kind of spikes the sugar as quickly and not as good.
So we try to kind of discourage that.
Juna: So on the spectrum, Jeff, when you're thinking about this, we have different levels of processing, right? Like from the apple to juicing. Blending is kind of in between so when you blend a fruit or vegetable it does mechanically break down the food Which leads to it being faster digested and you absorbing the sugar faster, but it does lead to you actually retaining the fiber So if I had to choose between blending and juicing I would tend to lean on the more because when you juice something, you like literally take out all the fiber, which is the part of the fruit or vegetable that slows down digestion and stops your blood sugar from spiking.
And then I'm not going to say it's the same as drinking sugar water because it's not because you get extra vitamins and minerals. But in terms of like the way your blood sugar response, it is the same as if you just like mix sugar into water. It's just that you also have added vitamins and minerals, right?
So Cool. I would say like on the spectrum, blending is probably a better way to go than juicing, but the best way to go is going to be to have it as a whole apple. But,
Eddie: but you know, let's talk about some foods maybe other than an apple. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where maybe cooking actually helps, right. One that comes to mind might be, um, tomatoes.
You can certainly enjoy a raw tomato and you can cut it up and there's, wow. It just seems like a gazillion different types of tomatoes to get. I'm obsessed
Juna: with tomatoes. So,
Eddie: but do you like to roast them or sauté them? Dude, I literally eat them
Juna: so raw. You don't even understand. You don't even understand how raw I eat tomatoes.
But what about
Eddie: when you throw the, uh, the little cherry tomatoes in the oven? They know they're so
Juna: good. And
Eddie: they, and they kind of like caramelize and they're like, like nature's candy. I mean, they're. Yeah.
Juna: So cooking can help to make it easier to absorb certain vitamins and minerals. I always see this with broccoli.
I think broccoli raw can be like quite hard to digest and in my opinion It's a lot less tasty but so cooking a lot of vegetables especially the ones that like have a lot of fiber can help you digest them more easily and Increases nutrient absorption. So I think in that sense like cooking was one of the biggest have you seen like that graph of like Human development and like when humans discover fire, the growth of their brain and their bodies just like skyrockets up because cooking just made so many nutrients more bioavailable and made us able to eat more.
Like imagine eating how much raw broccoli you can eat and then imagine how much cooked broccoli you can eat, for example, right? So it's like cooking does make it easier to eat a lot of things that we should eat. Well, we're
Eddie: probably getting it to animal protein when we're talking about. Uh, discovering how to cook.
Yeah,
Juna: we have to cook that.
Eddie: Yeah, I mean, Yeah, well, I'll leave it at that. You're going to be wanting to, if you're choosing to eat animal protein, you're going to want to cook that so it becomes more digestible and actually safer to eat. However, you could go too far. When you're cooking your animal proteins over high grilling temperatures and actually get some potential carcinogens.
Juna: And this is true for vegetables too, right, Eddie? Like if you burn your vegetables, you're also creating carcinogens. So I would say just like, be careful not to burn things. Like I'm calling out my dad. My dad loves grilling things, Eddie. He will like. Grill a bell pepper till like the skin is black. Like, and like, it actually good.
I love the taste. I love the taste. It's really, really good, but it is obviously a more carcinogenic food.
Eddie: But if you go at moderate temperatures, uh, there are some antioxidants that are in the vegetables that are actually going to be better preserved. By doing, like, kind of more the moderate temperatures, not, not the, uh, Yuna's dad technique.
Um, and, you know, in the end, if someone writes in or I have a patient who says, like, well, but can't I just, like, boil my vegetables? I'm like, uh, uh, better than not having them.
Juna (2): Yeah. So,
Eddie: you know, it's all, it's all a continuum and sometimes. The easiest thing is to boil the vegetables or to, um, Did you know that I learned how to blanch vegetables?
Juna: Oh, that's exciting. You like put them in super hot water and then super cold water, right? I've actually never done it. I've just seen it. It's actually,
Eddie: so, so for the listeners, um, because, you know, I was like duly impressed that I could, that I know the name of a cooking technique. I learned that when I went to the Healthy Kitchens, Healthy Lives course out in Napa Valley.
You do exactly that. You sort of like boil it like briefly and then you throw it into ice water. And it's enough that it sort of preserves the vegetables. They actually brighten up, which is really cool. And less chance of them rotting in your, in your refrigerator.
Juna: Yes.
Eddie: So, you know, what about some other ways of sort of like mildly processing in your own kitchen?
Like Um, we have tried some fermenting.
Juna: Oh, yeah.
Eddie: Kimchi central. I mean, I'm not Kimchi
Juna: is very good for you.
Eddie: It's and why is it so good for you?
Juna: Oh my god, I guys, every doctor that like specializes in the gut, they're like obsessed with kimchi because of all the probiotics, prebiotics, probiotics, I don't even know, all the bacteria you create when you ferment.
I will say, Eddie, it is actually like quite Uh, I don't want to say difficult, but like if you do it yourself, you have to be very careful because you can do it wrong and then like grow. I don't know, is it fungi? What grows on it if you do it badly? I know it's like very dangerous and you have to be very careful with how you like fermenting your foods.
Eddie: Even if you were to buy some commercial kimchi, in that case it's sort of like a fermented cabbage and other vegetables in there, um, you actually do have to be careful to put a fresh fork in each time.
Juna: Yeah.
Eddie: Because otherwise it's, it's basically like a petri dish. Oh my
Juna: god, Jesus, yeah. So,
Eddie: um, but the fermenting is, um, A way of, again, preserving the food.
So if it is Napa cabbage season. And you belong to, like, a CSA, Community Supported Agriculture, and you're bringing home more cabbage than you want to eat in the next two weeks, um, one of the things you can actually do that helps, as we're talking about, is to try the fermenting. It is fun, it's relatively easy.
And again, you know, we're back still answering Jeff's question. It is a processing that you're doing in your, in your own kitchen. So, Youna, what about something like drying your food?
Juna: Okay, so Eddie, one might assume when you dry your food, right, a lot of the water goes away. So that means that a lot of the water soluble vitamins, so the vitamins that like need water, they will degrade over time.
But you preserve all the other vitamins that are not water soluble. So that's another great option. Although I've never dried my own food. I don't know if you need like a dehydrator for that. I don't even know how you dry it.
Eddie: Um, we have a never used dehydrator in our house. Oh my god. That's like the
Juna: ha What percentage of dehydrators in households are used?
Eddie: Let's, let's have the audience I think it's like
Juna: 7%, I would guess.
Eddie: Um, I think you're being, um, generous. Very generous. Um, we, we got a, not a freeze dryer. What do they call those things? An air fryer. Air fryer. Yeah. Freeze dryer, air fryer. We have an air fryer, and one of the settings is actually dehydrate. Oh, okay, cool.
I have not tried that yet. Yeah. But basically, yes, you're trying to Remove much of the water. So now you've gotten down to your apricot. Your grape has turned into a raisin. My
Juna: goodness.
Eddie: Your delicious, juicy piece of, I don't know, pear is now a dried pear. Um, we have, um, a friend who was cutting up apples and.
Just put them out on strings across her kitchen. What? It was so beautiful and smelled so good. And so you can do it very simply and ended up with her apple rings. So it's, it's another way of, I don't know, gently processing. Um, you're going to have a greater concentration of sweets in there.
Juna: But,
Eddie: um, that could also be enjoyable.
Juna: Wait, one thing I was also going to say is that when it comes to cooking, just to go back. A smidge. When it comes to cooking, the safest form of cooking is wet heat, not dry heat. So, for example, things like boiling or steaming are going to cook something with the least amount of carcinogens created than something like sautéing, frying.
Obviously deep frying, of course, um, stuff like that. I will just say, like, boiling and steaming just make things taste way worse, in my opinion. That's why I, like, sauté everything. But, if you want it to be extra safe, then, like, wet heat is the way to go.
Eddie: But, on the other hand, um, if you're eating more vegetables because they're sautéed, I think Yeah, exactly.
I think you're ahead. No,
Juna: that's for sure, that's
Eddie: So, the next question that I think comes from Jeff. is, you know, at what point does it become ultra processed? And we've certainly spoken about this on, on other episodes. And I'll just give you like my understanding is that ultra processed food, which we're generally trying to avoid, is something that you cannot do in your own kitchen.
Juna: Mm hmm. And
Eddie: we're talking about a normal kitchen.
Juna: Yeah, average person's kitchen.
Eddie: Right. So, you know, we've talked about all these other techniques, but things like extrusion, or putting in additives, or hydrogenation, and, uh I mean, that's, that's the stuff of food scientists and, and, and there's an intentionality to it because very often the ultra processing is creating something that you would not find in nature that is hyper palatable, which is fancy talk for it just tastes so good and it's got the sugar and it's got the sweet in it.
It's got the salt in it. It's got the oil, which you don't find in nature and you've got those potato chips that you cannot. Quite put down once you start eating them. Mm
Juna (2): hmm.
Eddie: I mean that that's the kind of ultra Processing and you end up with unhealthy compounds. You've lost the fiber. The food structure is different It
Juna: tastes way better
Eddie: And you you might end up with some trans fats, which are way out.
Yeah, not good for you
Juna: Yeah, you have all these additives.
Eddie: So we're gonna generally try to avoid that
Juna: so I think the general consensus is that Closest to raw for certain foods is probably the best way to go, but cooking is also a great way to be able to eat more vegetables, and a lot of vegetables and fruits are easier to eat cooked than they are raw.
So, I think like within reason, Jeff, whatever you're doing is probably fine. And I would just say the big asterisk is on juicing because I know so many people think juicing is really good for you because that's kind of like the branding it has, but that does remove all the fiber and does spike your blood sugar the same way drinking, like, any juice from the store would or any sweet drink would.
And also the other thing about juicing is that you can intake way more sugar than you would if you were eating the fruit. So like, People actually do put three apples in their juices and they can drink that juice in one sitting versus like you'd never be able to eat three apples back to back because there's so much fiber.
It'd be really hard. You'd feel really full. And so I think that's like a big asterisk. Should we move on to the next question?
Eddie: I think so.
Juna: So this question comes from Lori, if you want to read it for the listeners.
Eddie: Sure. Lori asks, would love to hear about joint care. How to strengthen joints and keep them healthy, especially shoulders and elbows.
Juna: Oh my god.
Eddie: Have we just walked into my, have we just walked into my sweet spot?
Juna: Wait, no, I was gonna say, has Lori read my mind and is asking questions for, on my behalf?
Eddie: What, what ails, what ails you, my friend?
Juna: You guys, since starting jiu jitsu, I've literally had a myriad of injuries and just like, Horrible things like I've torn a ligament in my finger partially torn.
I partially tore my elbow ligaments two weeks ago at a jiu jitsu competition
Eddie: These are so assisted by other people applying Yes,
Juna: I feel like it's not exactly the same thing but still I'm having joint problems Eddie anyways, so this is your wheelhouse, so please tell us what we can do to better take care of our joints.
Eddie: All right, I'm going to kind of set this up the way I would with a patient sitting in my office, um, after I've said hello to them, shook their hands, walked in, done a basic physical exam, and I start at the beginning and say like, seems like your brain is working. Enough that you can send some signals down your nerves, or down your spinal cord, out to your nerves, which are then triggering your muscles to contract, and then finally The joints move.
So the joints are at the end of the line. They are passive. They don't move unless the muscles What
Juna: is your joint?
Eddie: What is a joint?
Juna: Yeah, I don't even get it. I know it's like two bones in me. Yeah, so But which part counts as the joint? Like just the The place where they meet?
Eddie: Pretty much, and actually that's a really good question.
It is kind of the whole area. So the proper kind of anatomic joint, and for instance, as I look at your sore elbow from across the studio here, it's, that's one of the simpler joints in your body. It's a hinge.
Juna (2): Yeah.
Eddie: There are two, actually a third bone that meets there in your elbow and it simply bends or extends.
Juna (2): Okay, yeah. So
Eddie: you've got, you know, you can go all the way straight, you don't want to go beyond straight and then you can bend it so that you bring your hand all the way up to your shoulder.
Juna (2): Yep.
Eddie: That is the proper mechanical, uh, bony joint. However.
Juna: I know where you're going to go.
Eddie: Where are we going? The ball and
Juna: socket joints?
Well,
Eddie: we're not going to go through all of them, but for the listeners, those would include something like your shoulder or your hip for the ball and socket. Yeah, those are
Juna: quite confusing.
Eddie: They're much more confusing. Elbows are really, really simple. The good news Eddie, the
Juna: elbows are the knees of your upper body, sorry.
Have you noticed that? Eddie. Eddie, look. Your hands are like your feet. Yeah, yeah, good. Your knees are like your elbows. Yeah, yes. Your hips are like your shoulders. Do you get it? It, like, makes a lot of sense.
Eddie: Absolutely, yeah. Maybe it's because
Juna: we were, like, on four legs at first. Well, most species
Eddie: are. Yeah.
Yeah. So, yes. And there are some differences between your elbows and your knees. Your knees are more complex. I'm going to stick with the elbow for now. Yes, yes. It's about the simplest joint, which is good because it's really simple. And it's really easy to sort of keep it just extending and flexing. It's bad because if something goes wrong with it, you don't have a lot of other options.
Juna (2): Yeah. Like you
Eddie: could hurt your shoulder. And there's a gazillion different ways you can get your right hand to get your hand up to your mouth.
Juna: Yeah.
Eddie: It doesn't really matter. You just want to get that food into your mouth. So, the joints are at the end of the line. Okay, sorry. I
Juna: really derailed us.
Eddie: No, no, hardly.
Um, the muscles turn into tendons. That's kind of like the grizzle if you're choosing to eat meat. Oh. That's like, like the white kind of like, like how much My God. How much did we pay for this steak? I can't eat that. That's muscles turned into tendons, the tendons attached to the bone. Now, if you were to want to align the bones so they just stay together, that's where the ligaments come in.
So ligaments are completely passive.
Juna: So is it like a rubber band? Like what do they look like?
Eddie: They're, they're like a really like dense rubbery material. Okay. And it's just meant, so if we were putting together Oh, this is kind of a fun Halloween type activity. Yeah. You get a pile of bones in the box from Amazon, and you're supposed to put it together to look like a skeleton, and you find the parts that go together, and then you have to attach them.
That's what the ligaments are.
Juna (2): Okay.
Eddie: Now, to make a move, now we're up to the muscles and the tendons.
Juna (2): Yeah.
Eddie: When, let's say you're working out too much, if you're working out too much, your muscles can get sore. I think we'll talk about that in just a minute. If you're going further, You can actually get a stress where the muscles turn into tendons and then where the tendons attach to the bone.
Juna: Mm hmm.
Eddie: That I would still call the joint.
Juna: Right.
Eddie: Okay? When I went to medical school, I had this wonderful misguided notion that our bodies were just perfect. Right? You know, that all these things we can do. Oh, Eddie,
Juna: you naive, naively. Oh, my God.
Eddie: And then I, and then I learned that, well, all right, there's the most stress.
Where a muscle turns into a tendon and a tendon attaches to the bone.
Juna: Yeah.
Eddie: And yet that's where there's like, it's the poorest blood supply.
Juna: That's why they don't heal! That's what the doctor told me. The doctor said they take forever to heal, ligaments take forever to heal because they get the least blood supply.
Eddie: Well, so ligaments are even more passive. The muscles, so yes, ligaments take longer. It's so sad. Okay, so where are we?
Juna: I know, we've done like a 20 minute, okay, anatomy lecture. So Eddie, how do we keep these joints healthy? You keep
Eddie: your muscles strong. Okay. All right, so I'll give you the other not so extreme example.
You have chosen to, I don't know, go, what would you want to do? I know! Snowboarding after paying a gazillion dollars for a lift ticket and it's four o'clock and the lift is about to close and you want to get one more run in.
Juna (2): Yep.
Eddie: And you want to be the last one on the lift and you've got the whole mountain down.
below you, and your muscles are just, you've been at it all day long, and your muscles, and then you hit a bump, and the muscles can no longer absorb the shock, and the stress goes where? The joint! Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. And this can happen with, with running or with any other sports. If you overexert and your muscles give out, it's, okay, let's take something practical, like someone walks into my office and they go like, I've got some arthritis in my knees.
Um, you know, what can I do? And it's like, uh, the stronger you get your legs,
Juna: the more
Eddie: the muscles are going to protect
Juna: the
Eddie: movement around there.
Juna: Yep. That makes sense. And another thing I wanted to also add is that I've heard other Orthopedic surgeons talk about how when their patients come to them with like really severe arthritis, something they also do is actually look at their diet because you have, if you have a highly inflammatory diet, it can really make joint pain worse.
And so I don't know what kind of joint pain you have, Lori, if it's just like a regular person's joint pain, in which case it probably just Does need to be more muscle strengthening. Um, but if it's like more severe then I would also encourage you to look at your diet and see if you're eating any highly Inflammatory foods like added sugar is a highly inflammatory food and that can worsen Symptoms of arthritis.
Eddie: You know, I think we're ready to blow this joint and let's take a short break.
Juna: Oh my goodness Eddie that was a seamless transition. Yeah, right. Yeah, we'll be back right after a short break
Eddie: Welcome back everyone to our question and answer session. This is where you and I just get to like, you guys pitch them in and we try to bat them out of the park here. We get to
Juna: chat
Eddie: about your questions. So this one comes from Jocelyn, who describes herself as a Weight Watchers coach in Connecticut. We just got through a technique on self compassion.
Juna: Ooh.
Eddie: Amen.
Juna: Amen.
Eddie: That's, that's us saying the amen. So much of what I do focuses on helping folks when they get discouraged by the slowness of their weight loss and maintenance journey. Weight health in the WW parlance. Do you have any favorite mantras, self talk, or rituals that you use when you're discouraged or disappointed?
I have a special fondness for, quote, it's not magic, it's practice. You know, this is a personal question to us. Share your mantra. I mean, you're not supposed to share your mantra.
Juna: Yeah, I don't like, I really don't have a mantra. This is the thing. This is why I don't focus on weight loss, because weight loss to me is so discouraging.
And like, it's always up and down. And especially for women, it fluctuates throughout the month with your cycle, if you still have your cycle. Um, so I feel like to me. Easier things to focus on are things that are in your control. So for example, instead of focusing on like, did I lose five pounds this month?
I'd say like, did I, um, follow my meal plan or whatever I was doing every day? It's like, how many days did I follow this month? How many days did I go to the gym this month? And those things are 100 percent in my control. So instead of being so results oriented, I'm much more like effort oriented. And then that way it's always something that I have.
like it's always up to me how well I do versus like your weight. I really feel like it has so many genetic factors and environmental factors and if you're super stressed you're not going to lose weight if you're not getting enough sleep you're not going to lose weight so it's like there's all these things that are kind of out of your control but I know Weight Watchers obviously is focused on weight so I don't know how that applies to Weight Watchers but I'd say like if you're still doing your best and you're like on your routine and doing really well and Don't lose any weight.
I still feel like you have to give yourself props because you still went through all the effort of trying to achieve your goal.
Eddie: So um, I would love to kind of share the idea of like just curiosity. And sort of like doing an experiment and this comes out of the, the coaching world and I'll share a, uh, you and I, you and I were talking about, you know, I, I tried a continuous glucose monitor.
Oh, yes. Recently, um, because my blood sugars were kind of creeping up. And I wanted to just kind of learn more, and I tried to look at it like a series of experiments, rather than restriction.
Juna (2): So I guess
Eddie: that's my mantra, like, I don't want to say like, oh my god, I can't eat for the next 12 hours. I, I, you know, my approach or my, maybe it is a mantra, is just like, I wonder what I would feel like
Juna: if
Eddie: I actually tried to do that.
And in this case, I actually have the glucose monitor, because, you know, I, at some point, even though I, this was not rational, but I thought like, Oh, if I don't eat for 12 hours, my blood sugar is going to plummet. I'm going to, you know, having to wake up to have, I don't know, some apple juice to get my blood sugar up right away.
So, I like to kind of do it as an experiment, um, and I think, you know, the result may be. That some weight comes off, but if not, you know, I've learned something.
Juna: I love that, Eddie. That makes so much sense. I feel like seeing it as an experiment, it's like, let's see what happens if. Or like, I wonder what happens if, is like, so much more empowering than like, Oh my god, I can't eat for 12 hours.
Oh, but I'm so hungry. I'm so hungry. Oh, no, no, no You know what I mean? Like that sort of thinking and then also I was gonna say like if you can find a way to Treat it almost like a science experiment and not be so emotionally attached to the goal of weight loss I don't know. There's something about like if I think like lose weight good gain weight bad There's all these emotions
Juna (2): that are
Juna: really tied into it.
And then it's like, if the scale goes up, my day is a bad day and it just like weighs on me emotionally versus if you just look at them as like objective numbers and you're like trying to get to a numerical goal, I don't know. There's something about like looking at it as data instead of as personal failures that helps me detach from it.
Like I said, I don't track my weight, so I don't, like, do this with weight loss, but I just, like, even, for example, I get a DEXA scan once a year, which is where they, um, you go into, like, this x ray machine, kind of, and then you get really exact numbers for how much muscle mass you have, how much fat mass you have, your visceral fat, all these things, and even with that, it's, like, seeing it all written out as just numbers, and, like, oh my gosh, this is just an objective tissue in your body.
It's not like something that dictates your moral failings or successes as a human, right? So I think detaching your own self worth or your own emotions from the weight will also help you to sustain weight loss in the long term. Because if you're going to see every time you gain weight as like a failure, then you're going to be much less likely to stick to whatever plan you're on.
Eddie: Um, another one that I like to revert to in some ways is a little bit like, I think we've talked about the parallels between financial health and kind of our. Personal health in, in that if you set a saving goal, you're going to put away, it could be 10 bucks a week. It could be a thousand dollars a month.
Depends on where you are in life. Um, over time, your savings will increase, right? There's ups and downs, but over time it's going to increase. Like look at your results of that effort as sort of like maybe they're a rolling average or where am I in a month from now? And the parallel is that in the world of weight, like every morning, the scale is going to be, you know, up or down a few pounds.
Yeah. And you can drive yourself nuts. It would be like me trying to follow the stock market on a daily basis. And do I feel better because, you know, the stock market is up? Yeah, I guess so, but am I supposed to feel bad the next day? Over time, you're gonna do fine. You
Juna: can't look at the stock market day to day, guys.
That's like number one rule of investing, right? Right, just stay the course. It's a long term investment. So,
Eddie: when we say stay the course, in this case, it's like, okay. If you choose to join WW, and your goal is weight loss, like, it is a slow process. Yeah, and
Juna: if it's fast, by the way, it means it's probably not going to be long, right?
So it's like, things that burn, what's it, things that burn hot, burn fast, or something like that. So, if you lose a lot of weight really fast, it's so much more likely to come back. Like, in some ways, it's actually the slower the better with weight loss, because it means that you're actually creating habits that are actually sustainable for you in the long term.
If it's something super fast, it probably came from behavior that's very drastic, and that means that you're not going to be able to maintain that. And, and
Eddie: again, it follows in the financial example.
Juna: Yeah.
Eddie: Get rich quick.
Juna: Yeah. Lose it quick.
Eddie: Get poor quick. Get poor quick, as opposed to like, I'm going to put away ten bucks a week, and, and it will, it will grow.
Juna: Yeah.
Eddie: Any other, uh, mantras or mind, like a, any other growth mindsets that you're applying here?
Juna: One more thing to think about is reframing setbacks. So if you get a setback in your weight loss journey, instead of thinking about it as like, this is a personal feeling, which I used to think about all the time, like I said earlier, I feel like it's more just looking at it as another data point of like, this is something that doesn't work for me, and it might work for other people, but it doesn't work for me.
So I think like, keeping track of those things is actually, really important and it's just really important to detach it from like you failed as a person versus like this thing just didn't work for me if that makes sense because you're going to try so many things and like some of them are going to work some of them aren't it's such a long process and especially with weight loss right whatever behavior you're choosing to lose weight that's a behavior you're going to have to be comfortable doing for the rest of your life and so if it's something that You don't like or something that causes failure often, it's probably not something that you're going to want to do forever, right?
So I think like going about it as slow as possible is actually the best way and finding things that you can do for your whole life and not being so laser focused on the scale. Because even if the scale isn't moving for a bit, you're probably still growing in other ways and you're still like learning new things about yourself and what works for you.
So I think those are all. I'd say my, they're not really mantras, but those are all the things I think about.
Eddie: And, and for those people listening who are triggered by this whole conversation about weight loss, because I know a lot of people come to Food We Need to Talk where we generally don't talk about weight loss, although we are trying to our best to answer Jocelyn's question, I would go back to something that you mentioned earlier, you know, which is maybe like give up the scale and focus on, huh, I've changed my behavior, it's an experiment, but wow, I have more energy, my strength has improved.
My habits have improved. I'm sleeping better. I'm happier. What more could you ask for?
Juna: Yes. Those are all great things to focus on that are beyond the scale. Okay, Eddie, do you want to read our last question now from Karen?
Eddie: Yes. I've heard from you, well, you've been listening, and others about the benefits of taking a short walk after meals, especially dinner.
My question is around the best timing to do this. What is the optimal window of opportunity? In our household, there's usually some after dinner conversation followed by kitchen cleanup. About 45 minutes could pass between the last bite and the first step of the post meal walk. Is this too long a gap? At what point in time?
After the last bite, does one gain the maximal benefits of this practice?
Juna: Oh, I love this question! I love this question because it's like, people are like, really listening, and they're like, really taking it seriously, and it's just so sweet. Thank you, Karen, for this great question. So, Eddie, can you talk about why We have advocated for taking a post meal walk.
Well,
Eddie: it's not just us, but yes, Yuna and I are advocating for post meal We
Juna: are at the head of this, this
Eddie: And you know, in many cultures, it's actually an, uh, sort of a common thing to do. And the wisdom to it is that you have your food, the food hits your, your stomach, it starts to get digested, actually, of course, you're starting, and the chewing, as we talked about earlier, and then About 45 minutes later, your blood sugars are going to start to respond.
So it takes that long, if you're eating good food with lots of fiber, it takes that long as opposed to the juices and certainly avoiding sugar sweetened beverages. So it takes about 45 minutes for the Uh, sugar to start to go out into your bloodstream. And then your body has the task of storing away this energy.
Juna: Right.
Eddie: At that point, if you were to be moving large muscles in your body, a. k. a. your thighs.
Juna (2): Ooh. And
Eddie: your hamstrings, and that's part of your walking, they are now triggered to sort of accept the glucose more readily. So that's, and there's something like reducing glucose spikes by something like 22 percent and aiding in digestion by doing the modest walking, you know, in some period after your meal.
Juna: And you know, something else that I've heard is, I've heard some doctors call muscles sugar sponges, which I just like to think of them that way. So that's another thing too. That's so
Eddie: sweet. Yeah,
Juna: isn't that sweet? So when you move, like your muscles can help to take out some of that sugar in your bloodstream.
That's why it's like also helpful. And it helps with your digestion because when your legs are moving, it kind of like helps to move the stuff along in your intestines too. But the question is, how long after? So this is a great question. Sooner is better. So, The sooner after a meal that you take your walk, the more it's going to help in reducing the blood sugar spike and the digestion.
However, even something like 45 minutes after you're still going to help with that reaction. And if you guys are cleaning up the kitchen, keep in mind like you're still standing and like moving your arms and stuff. So it is a little bit better than just sitting, but I know you guys have your post dinner discussion.
I would say like Don't like disturb something that's also really important for your health, which is a post dinner discussion, right? Because that's like some of the best parts of meals is chatting after the meal. So I would say like don't become like a drill sergeant and be like, all right We gotta go!
We gotta go on a walk! Shut up! You know, because that's not gonna, not gonna go over well either. But I think like if you guys can find a way even for example Like if you could find a way to do the walk and the discussion during the walk after dinner and then come back and clean That's something that me and my roommate used to do, is like, we would leave stuff to clean for after our walk.
So I think that could be one way of navigating that, but the best time would be 0 to 30 minutes right after your dinner, but even like 45, you're still going to be doing a lot of benefit for yourself. And
Eddie: I'll hold by what you just said. I think the dishes can always wait.
Juna (2): Of
Juna: course you do!
Eddie: I mean, I'm gonna end up doing them at some point, but like, it's just, get them off the table and you'll worry about the rest later.
Juna: And with that, thank you so much to everyone that submitted questions this round. If you want to submit your questions, you can do so on our Instagram, at foodweneedtotalk, when we put up our Q& A story, or you can just DM them to us. You can also email them to us gmail. com You can send them in on our membership So a lot of these questions guys came from our members over on patreon if you want to hear the rest of this Q& A where we talk about how to Reduce muscle soreness or what if you're having muscle soreness for a super long time after you exercise And what the heck is insulin resistance?
I know it's a very confusing thing. Like, I don't know if I still know what insulin resistance is, but I know Eddie knows. You can head over to foodwetotalk. com slash membership, or you can click the link in our show notes. Thank you everyone for your incredible questions. And you can find me at the official Younot on Instagram and you can find Eddie
Eddie: taking a walk after dinner.
Juna: Oh my goodness! I don't usually, I don't do
Eddie: it enough. Well,
Juna: it's getting warmer now, so now we can finally do it.
Eddie: Ah, even, yes, even less excuses. It
Juna: was so cold out. Food We Need to Talk is produced by Rebecca Seidel and is distributed by PRX.
Eddie: Our mix engineer is Rebecca Seidel.
Juna: We were co created by Carrie Goldberg, George Hicks, Eddie Phillips, and me.
Eddie: For any personal health questions, please consult your health provider. To find out more, go to foodweneedtotalk. com. Thanks for listening!
