Is Your Diet Healthy? Find out Here…

healthy food

How do we know if we’re consuming a healthy diet?

A healthy diet provides the nutrients needed to support proper growth, development, and maintenance of the body, so we feel well as we carry out our daily activities.

Stable energy, good digestion, maintaining a healthy weight, and experiencing good recovery when stressed, exercising, or ill are all daily physical indicators that the body is receiving the nutrients necessary for maintenance and repair.

• Stable energy throughout the day relies on balanced blood sugar levels.  Insulin, the hormone that moves sugar (glucose) from the blood into tissues, elevates with excessive simple carbohydrate intake (1).  As insulin does its job and blood sugar drops below the normal range, this crash causes tiredness.  Pairing carbohydrates with protein (like eggs, legumes, or chicken) and healthy fats (like nuts, avocado, or dairy if tolerated) helps to slow digestion for longer-lasting energy throughout the day.

• Good digestion occurs when the body breaks down the food we eat into the nutrients it contains and then absorbs those nutrients for the cells to use for energy, growth, and cell repair (2).  This process should occur free from pain, bloating, gas, or disrupted bowel habits. 

• A healthy weight is supported when the body receives the nutrients necessary for proper function (3).  Reducing or eliminating foods that encourage weight gain, such as refined sugars and flours, seed oils, and highly processed foods, while adding more whole foods such as vegetables, fruits, lean meat, eggs, and legumes, helps to keep the body in balance for a healthier weight.

• Good recovery from daily stressors, workouts, and injuries requires nutrients like protein for rebuilding, carbohydrates to refuel, micronutrients like vitamin C for collagen production, zinc for immune support, and water to carry the nutrients throughout the body and flush out waste products to reduce the body's toxic burden.

Core dietary principles

Core principles of a healthy diet include diversity (variety), nutrient density, balance, and staying well hydrated each day.

• A diverse diet includes a variety of clean, whole foods that provide the nutrients necessary for proper body function. A diverse whole food diet includes many different foods from groups such as vegetables like spinach, tomatoes, and bok choy, fruits like apples, avocados, and blueberries, whole grains like rice, millet, and spelt, legumes like beans, peas, and lentils, meat, poultry, fish, nuts and seeds, and dairy, when tolerated (4).

• A nutrient-dense diet is focused on whole foods that supply vitamins, minerals, fiber, phytochemicals, and the correct balance of macronutrients for your body.  Nutrients drive cellular metabolism, and when they are lacking, cells become stressed, which can lead to tissue damage and metabolic syndromes (5).

• A balanced diet provides the body with the essential nutrients it needs to carry out daily activities, stay healthy, and maintain optimal energy levels.  Further, it’s about consuming the correct macronutrient balance for your body and getting the necessary micronutrients and phytochemicals through a varied whole-food diet (6).

• Proper hydration is necessary because water is essential for life.  Water makes up about 60-75% of body weight, and our cells rely on it to function (7).  Water is needed by body cells for important functions such as producing energy, communicating, repairing, maintaining blood pressure, and regulating body temperature.

Mental and behavioral signs

When core dietary principles (above) are in place, and an individual receives the proper nutrients through a whole-food diet, body chemistry balances and related mental and behavioral signs diminish (8).

Nutrients such as omega-3 fatty acids, magnesium, and folate are responsible for proper brain structure and function, as well as for hormones, neurotransmitters, and neuropeptides that play key roles in stress and inflammatory pathways that impact mental health and well-being (8).

Depression, a common mental disorder, can present with nutrient deficiencies in protein, B vitamins, vitamin D, magnesium, iron, zinc, selenium, calcium, and omega-3 fatty acids, as nutrients impact the function of the brain and nervous system (9). 

Studies show that a diet rich in whole foods such as vegetables, fruits, whole grains, legumes, nuts, fish, and high-quality protein, while limiting or excluding highly processed foods and simple sugars, supports mental health (9).

Further evaluation of your current diet

• Tracking daily food intake can be a useful tool in evaluating whether you are receiving all the essential nutrients for proper body function.  Tracking for at least 3-5 days can provide helpful data on which nutrients you may be lacking.

Apps like Cronometer can be useful tools in tracking daily food intake and essential nutrient levels (10).

Dietary data alone may not be sufficient, as the digestion, absorption, and assimilation of nutrients differ from person to person.

• When nutrient deficiencies are suspected, testing (blood, urine, etc.) can help to provide further data on potential nutrient deficiencies (11).

For example, a complete blood count (CBC) can help screen for anemia – often tied to iron, vitamin B12, or folate deficiencies

• Medical and nutrition professionals can help identify physical signs of malnourishment, such as pale gums, cracked corners of the lips, or dry, brittle hair, which can indicate deficiencies in essential nutrients like zinc, vitamin C, B vitamins, and omega-3 fatty acids (12).