I've been tracking my Calories!- My Nutrition Analysis

From September 15-17, I have started to track my food intake to see if I reach my target intake (2200 calories) of carbohydrates, vegetables, fruits, dairy, and protein with 30-60 minutes of physical exercise. To my surprise I did not meet my target from most of the food groups on any day. For Day 1, the only one that I am not under is fruits and that’s only because I had fruits for breakfast. For Day 2, I was under for each category, even though my intake was the most balanced of all the days, with an average of 50% intake for each intake. For Day 3, however I was “OK” for grains and vegetables and under 10% for the other three categories I was 37% for dairy, and under 5% for fruits and protein. Because I am a vegetarian, it was hard to keep up my protein and on Day 3 the only form of protein I had was from the hazelnuts from the Nutella I had on my bread- and we all know that nutella doesn’t really have hazelnuts. On Day 2, I had specifically go search for protein to increase my protein intake, so I digged up some old Macadamia nuts I had in the back of my pantry and even that wasn’t enough. And because I dislike regular milk and I drink almond milk instead, my dairy intake was low too - but the almond milk did increase my protein intake. To get the right amount of fruits without increasing any other category, I had to substitute a grainy snack for plain fruits.

There are multiple ways that I can improve my died. I could eat a more mixed arrangement of nuts to increase my protein intake and eat a cup of yogurt each day or add cheese to my diet - but those would have to be an extra item instead of substituting it for something else. And maybe I could pack a box of fruits for snack to school, again another extra item instead of substituting. I think my vegetables and grains are on the right track and I get enough of those because I eat a lot of those for dinner, as I mentioned in my previous blog post about health.

I think I made smart decisions at the Falcon Market activity for example I choose to drink tea instead of coffee which significantly reduces my fat and sugar calories. Since I don’t actually eat too much frozen foods, I need not be worried about all the consequences of frozen food because fresh food is much healthier. My mom shops at the local farmer’s market every Saturday so half of our vegetable and fruit produce at home is organic and seasonal. My glycemic index is intermediate, which is good because a high GI meal will increase blood sugar.  My BMI of 18.88 is also in the normal percentile, but what BMI neglects is the amount of muscle fat a person has. I also don’t consume too much of preserved snacks and if it all I do, my mom makes sure to get whatever is organic. The only major thing I have to worry about is that I have not been prioritizing protein, which I’ll try to do in the future by buying more proteins, I also don’t eat fast food other than Chipotle, which is a pretty healthy option if eaten in moderate (once a week for me).

If I had the chance to coach someone on proper health and nutrition I would not because I don’t think I hold a good example, but if I had the opportunity I would warn them to be aware of keeping up their protein, dairy, and fruit intake just like I have to. I would tell tell to reduce their intake of sugary foods, like cookies and cake and instead eat fresh seasonal foods instead.

Day 1 09/15/15-

Day 2 09/16/15-

Day 3 09/17/15-

Why is Health important to me?

Maintaining my health has probably been one of my constant battles especially within the past two years. I can attribute that to stress, one of the pillars of health. I define health as combination of mental, physical, and social well-being as well as being free of illness and disorder. Health is a dynamic condition resulting from a body's constant adjustment and adaptation in response to stresses and changes in the environment for maintaining an inner equilibrium called homeostasis. The five pillars of health are nutrition, exercise, sleep, stress, and social happiness. The hardest pillar to uphold for me would be nutrition because I tend to down carbohydrates in response to the excess stress and lack of sleep especially in junior year. Because of I have severe and immediate allergies to heat, pollen, and dust and must take a lot of medication for it, my body feels constantly exhausted. This has taken a negative effect on my exercise regiment. I have been Bollywood dancing since elementary but had to quit last year because I was so fatigued from dancing and allergies that I couldn't focus on school work. But despite all the setbacks, this year I have started dancing again and I hope that will keep my fitness high because it is a very cardio active sport. Because of my mom and all the well balanced meals she cooks for me, my nutrition is also not that great of a problem. Even though I do eat a lot of carbohydrates my dance will allow me to burn them.

The Five Pillars of Health

 

Types of Tissue- Under the Microscope

Histology is the study of tissues and to learn more about the subject in class we did a exploratory lab, by examining various tissue types under a microscope. The four types of tissues are epithelial, connective, muscle, and nervous. We studies three types of epithelial tissues, tissues that cover a body surface or lines a body cavity  (organs). Some characteristics that help define epithelial tissues are continuous sheets, avascular, basal lamina and be classified by their shape and layers; simple, stratified, pseudostratified, squamous, cubodial, and columnar. Connective tissue, cells that fill the spaces between organs and tissues, and provides structural and metabolic support for other tissues and organs, can be broken down into two branches; proper and specialized. Under the microscope, it was easy to determine dense regular/irregular, loose adipose, bone, blood, and cartilage knowing the characteristics of each type of connective cells, like for example adipose cells are big and white because of their large vacuoles used to store fat. There are types of muscle tissue, skeletal, cardiac, and smooth and each was easy to determine because of their characteristics, like for example smooth cells are elliptical in shape and non-striated. Because of their dendrites, axons, and large nuclei, nervous tissue is also easy to determine.

Unit 1 Reflection

This unit was mainly about histology,the study of tissues, and an overall general introduction into anatomy and physiology. This included topics such as how to use to use anatomical terms to precisely describe the location of features in an organism, an introduction to homeostasis and the systems of the human body,the hierarchy from atom to biosphere, the four biological macromolecules, and a breif overview of the structure and functions of the organelles in a cell.
One essential question of this unit was how does the structure of a tissue- or anything- relate to it's physiology. There are different ways to classify epithelial cells depending on their structure (simple/ stratified/ squamous/ cubodial/ columnar) they have different structures. For example pseudostratified columnar cells are good at maximizing diffusion.
In general one can say form fits function when relating anatomy to physiology.
I had known that cells make up tissues and that there are different types of tissue ( I recall that from freshman biology and APBiology) but through this unit I learned that there are four types of tissues epithelial, connective, muscle, and nervous. I hadn't even know about the various classifications of epithelial tissues until this unit.
But I still don't full understand how I can determine what type of epithelial tissue it is given a microscope sample. I hard to differentiate between cubodial and squamous and when it is stratified or pseudostratified. It seems simple in drawings but once you look at the real thing it is kind of confusing. The Quizlet terms were hard to differentiate and I was only able to figure out my memorizing the color of the dyes. For the next unit I will ask the teacher if I am confused about an issue before the test.
In a real world application I think knowing the anatomical terms would be beneficial to become a surgeon (the type of doctor I want to be). As a surgeon, one would need to know how to cut a human body using terms like midsagital, transverse, frontal, and/or oblique. I have heard surgeons in the show "Grey's Anatomy" use terms like that.