Tiredness after eating

"I am always so tired in the afternoon. I feel so drowsy as soon as I eat." I told my mom on the Skype yesterday. And mom said that my eating habits might be the main cause of tiredness. 


In the article "Why am I so tired after eat", the writer Judd Handler said that following eating habits could be the causes of fatigue:

• Not eating all three macro-nutrients at every meal (protein, natural dietary fat, and slow-burning, low starch carbohydrates)
• Interval between meals is too long
• Not eating enough or eating too much
• Eating too much sugar

In fact, I am guilty of at least three of those followings. I usually eat only two meals in a day. Because I prefer sleeping to eating, I always skip breakfast and go to classes in the morning. For me, I would rather save  few more minutes for sleeping than get up earlier for the breakfast. Sometimes I even skip the lunch because I am so lazy to go to the Student Union. And because I did not eat enough, I look for some snacks like chocolate chip cookie, which contains a lot of sugar. 

And then I started to concern about my health. Fortunately, the article said, "Small changes in nutrition and eating habits can make a huge difference". 

1. Eat balanced meals. It helps people to regulate blood sugar levels and prevent energy crashes. 

2. Eat within 5 hours. Stay five hours without eating will make you crash. 

3. Eat less sugar. Jonah Lehrer, writing for Wired, points out that orexin - a brain chemical that keeps you feeling awake -  is inhibited when you consume sugar.

Although feeling tired after eating is not a serious symptom, it would be better for people's health if they eat balanced food, and eat more regularly.

Coca Cola vs. Coca Cola zero

       Yesterday night, I was looking at the Facebook Newsfeed as usual and saw a video called "Coca Cola vs. Coca Cola zero sugar test". As a person who prefer Coca Cola over its zero, I thought the video was very interesting, but later I was disappointed by the results.
       The person in the video started to boil both Coca Cola and Coca Cola zero, and stirred them until all the water was evaporated.

      After some bubbles formed, the water finally evaporated completely. And the result was astonishing. As the picture shown below, compare to Coca Cola zero (on the right), which had few sugars remain, Coca Cola (on the left) left with a lot of sugars after the evaporation.
       To find out exact sugar content in the drinks, i looked up the nutrition facts of Coca Cola and Coca Cola zero in the www.cocacola.com.

        The picture with the black background is the nutrition facts of Coke Zero, and the one with the red background is nutrition facts of Coca Cola. Even though both of them have same serving sizes (240mL), the sugar contents are differ by great percentage. In contrast to Coca Cola zero, which contains 0% of sugar, Coca Cola contains more than one fifth (22%) of sugars. On the other hand, coca cola zero has the higher contents of sodium.
          I was confused how Coca Cola could taste similar to regular Coca Cola without that much sugars. In fact, according to the article written by Elizabeth Wolfenden "Coke Zero Health Risk", Coca Cola zero adds aspartame instead of sugars to make it sweet (Aspartame, popularly known as NutraSweet, is a sugar substitute found in many no-calorie, no-sugar sodas).
         Because coke zero does not contain any calories, fat, carbohydrates, cholesterol or sugars, a lot of people prefer Coca Cola zero. However, it also has certain number of health risks:

• A 2005 European study conducted by the European Ramazzini Foundation suggested there may be a link between aspartame and cancer.
• The drink does not provide any nutrition benefits: it does not contain any protein, fiber, vitamin C, vitamin A, calcium or ion.
• The caffeine in coke zero may cause some side effects, such as restlessness, irritability and difficulty sleeping.

        Drinking Coca Cola zero would not likely to pose any potential health risks for healthy people, but you should still consider more before drinking too much. If you drink Coca Cola zero for a diet purpose, it would be better for you to drink low in calorie but nutrient-rich beverages such as Gatorade. Also, drinking pure water is a good choice for your body.

What are low fat, reduced fat, and fat-free?

http://inlightimes.com/old_site/archives2
/2011/08/Fat-Free-Food.html

The most time I spend in Walmart is when I stand in the aisle and hesitate to choose among the low fat, reduced fat, and fat-free string cheese. What I always think is that “What do low fat, reduced fat, and fat-free really mean?” “Are they really different from each other?” or "Do I gain less fat if I eat fat-free cheese?" In fact, I always end up choosing the “original” one.

          The only thing I knew was that FAT is the most useless nutrition (this is my own opinion). And for any kinds of foods, the low fat, reduced fat, and fat free are “healthier” than the original one. But I had no idea how they actually work.

          Penny Klatell, in his article “What’s the difference between Low fat, Reduced Fat, Light, Lean”, stated that Fat Labels includes total amount of fat, saturated fat and unsaturated fat.

·       Low fat means 3 grams of fat or less per serving (or per 100 grams of food)

·       Reduced fat means the food product contains 50% (or less) of the fat found in the regular version

·       Less fat means 25% or less fat than the comparison food

·       Fat free means the product has less than 0.5 grams of fat per serving, with no added fat or meal

In other words, the percentage of fat in each fat labels are different. The order of fat from the highest percentage to lowest percentage is original, reduced fat, less fat, low fat, and fat free. 

http://www.everydayhealth.com/sexual-health/
1024/milk-and-cheese-birth-control-for-men.aspx

In fact, I avoid eat fat-free foods because I cannot imagine how does fat free version of fat and cream-based foods taste like. And I don’t think eating fat-free ice cream, cheeses, milk, and butter can be called eating “healthy”. I would rather eat apple or carrot with full-fat ranch sauce instead of eat fat-free chocolate ice cream.