It is important to have great nutrition at any
point in your life, but it is even more important after a spinal
cord injury. Getting the right amount of protein, carbohydrates
and fiber will help your body stay strong and promote the healing
process. Read on to learn more!
Caloric Intake and Weight Control
Calories (or energy) are one of prime importance
to a person with a spinal cord injury. Your body may carry, gain,
or lose weight in a whole new way than it did before. Extra weight
will give you trouble when it comes to stranding or walking with
braces, or when you need to do transfers. Losing weight means you
are burning up more calories than you are eating, which can result
in poor health. For these reasons, you will need to be more aware
of your diet now so that you can stay healthy and function at your
best.
The way in which your body uses calories
may have changed, they include:
- Very high energy needs due to the injury
itself. Calories burn as your body works to repair an injury and
you feel the stress of this sudden change in your life. Stress
can cause loss of appetite or just decreased eating which in turn
will lead to weight loss.
- Even if your weight does not change, how
you carry your weight will. Muscle mass ( the bulk and size of
it) will decrease and fat may build up in the parts of your body
that are paralyzed. Fat tissues burn calories very poorly, and
therefore causes weight gain even though you are eating the same
amount of food you did before you were injured.
- The increased work you do in rehabilitation
may require you to eat more ( increase your calorie intake) to
give your body enough energy to meet the challenge. This is specially
true when you are involved in a though exercise program.
Protein
Protein is vital to all living cells and
helps build and repair all body tissues, skin, bone, hair, blood
and muscle.
If you take in 1500 calories a day, 225 calories should be protein.
Carbohydrates
Carbohydrates are our body's main source
of energy. Contrary to what most of us think, though, they are not
all fattening. Ounce for Ounce, they have the same amount of calories
as protein, only half the calories of fat.
There are two kinds of carbohydrates:
- Simple Carbohydrates. They include candy,
cakes and pies which are called "empty calorie" foods.
They are just full of sugar and your body does not need them.
- Complex Carbohydrates. They include breads,
rice, pasta, macaroni, potatoes, fruits and vegetables. These
are not fattening. It is what we put on these foods that is fattening.
55 to 60% of your calories should be complex
carbohydrates. If you are eating 1500 calories, 850 to 900 of them should be from
complex carbohydrates.
Fiber
Fiber is a complex carbohydrate. It is the
part of the plant that cannot be digested and absorbed into the
blood stream. Contrary to popular belief, fiber does not furnish
vitamins or minerals.
- Insoluble Fiber is found in wheat, corn
bran, dried beans and peas (legumes), nuts and most fruits and
vegetables (especially those eaten with their skins). This kind
of fiber passes through the digestive tract unchanged, giving
bulk to your stools and helping you keep your bowel movements
regular.
"Bulky" stools are specially helpful to persons with
spinal cord injuries. That muscles that push food through your
intestines may be weaker since your injury so bulk can make your
stool easier for those muscles to move, even if they aren't strong
enough to push hard. If you do not have bulk in your stool, the
process of passing food through your bowel will slow down and
might lead you to constipation or impactions.
Bulk also aids in the treatment of Diverticulitis, which is a
process where pockets develop in your colon and become inflamed.
Bulk may also reduce the risk of colon cancer.
- Water Soluble Fiber is found in oat bran,
barley bran, some fruits ( apples and oranges), dry beans and
legumes. By giving you a feeling of fullness and by helping slow
down digestion, this kind of fiber helps in weight control and
diabetes. It is also believed that water soluble fiber can help
lower cholesterol levels in the blood.
Guidelines to Success in Adding Fiber to Your Diet
- Add it slowly. Replace low fiber food
with high fiber a little at a time. This will give your digestive
tract chance to adjust.
- Choose carbohydrates in their natural
fiber coating. Use brown, whole grain rice instead of white; whole
grain flour instead of white. Use whole grain crackers, breads,
cereals and pasta. Look for words 100% whole grain or wheat.
- Eat more fresh fruits and vegetables.
Eat the skins too.
- With legumes, start on those that are
easy to digest. Legumes dried beans & peas) may be hard to
digest and can give you gas if you aren't used to eating them.
Start with the kinds that are easy to digest, like lentils, split
peas, and lima beans. Work up to other kinds such as navy, pinto,
and kidney beans and dried peas.
- Use Wheat Germ and Oat Bran. Wheat Germ
and Oat Bran are excellent sources of fiber. Try coating your
chicken or fish with them or use bran as a fiber in your meatloaf
or burger.
- Choose High Fiber Snacks. Snack on nuts,
popcorn, raw vegetables, unpeeled fruit, bran muffins, or oatmeal
cookies.
- Sprinkle Granola on Ice Cream.
A word of warning about fiber. Drink more
fluids when you eat more fiber, otherwise fiber can be constipating.
Fats
Fats have gotten a bum rap in our diets.
At the very mention of fats we either cringe in fear or skulk out
of the room in guilt! The truth is, cholesterol and saturated fat
have received a lot of press lately concerning their relationship
to heart disease and some cancers. But the truth also is, we do
need to have some fat in our diet each day. Fats are important to
cell membrane growth and play a big role in the structure of our
body tissues.
The problem is that even people who pass
up butter and margarine, and go easy on salad dressings, probably
eat far more fat than they think just because so much fat is hidden
in foods. For instance, one ounce of American Cheese has 106 calories,
and 81 of those are from fat!
How much fat do you need? A mere one tablespoon
a day helps us maintain good nutrition. Why, then do we eat so much
fat every day?
Guidelines for Success in using fats in Your Diet
- Choose lean cuts of meat. Check meat for
"marbling" - the white fat you can see running through
the red meat. Don't buy meats with a lot of marbling as they are
high in fat.
- Stay away from meats with high fat content.
These include frankfurter, bacon, sausage and luncheon meats.
- Trim off all fat you can see before cooking.
- Broil or roast meat, fish, poultry; do
not fry or stew them. Broiling allows the fat to drip off, so
you can then throw it away.
- Switch to low fat or skim milk products.
- Eat less lard and processed cheeses.
- Use egg whites instead of whole eggs.
In recipes that call for one or two eggs, use 2 egg whites for
1 whole egg, or 3 egg whites for 2 whole eggs.
- Use polyunsaturated margarine or vegetable
oils. These are fats that stay liquid/soft when cold. Any fats
that are hard when cold (butter, animal lard, etc.) should not
be used.
Contrary to Popular Nutritional Beliefs
Myth: Vitamins give you energy!
Vitamins do not give you energy. They simply supply added nutrients
for people who, for some reason, do not eat a balanced diet.
Myth: Brown eggs are superior that white.
There is absolutely no nutritional difference between and egg packed
in a brown shell and an egg packed in a white shell. It's just a
difference in the breed of the chicken that laid it.
Myth: Vitamin C cures colds.
After years of controlled studies, it has been found that those
who take extra Vitamin C have, at most, only one tenth fewer colds
per year that those who don't. These statistics do not confirm a
cure of the common cold.
Vitamin C is a water soluble vitamin. This means that the body can
only hold so much Vitamin C and the rest is passed our of your body
in urine. It's just a waste of hard earned money to go out and buy
a lot of Vitamin C, thinking that it will kill a cold, when in fact
your body can't hold that much Vitamin C in the first place.
Myth: Margarine has fewer calories than butter.
Margarine and butter have the exactly the same amount of calories.
Where the two spreads differ is in the types of fat they contain.
Butter is highly saturated fat. This is the kind that is linked
to arteriosclerosis and high cholesterol.
Margarine is made from polyunsaturated vegetable oils such as corn,
soybean, or safflower which can actually help lower cholesterol
levels in the blood.
Myth: Grapefruit burns fat. There is no truth
to that statement. Grapefruit is high in Vitamin C and fiber and
low in calories but has no "burning" power!
Guidelines to Success (if you are trying to loose weight)
Weight loss is partly what you eat,
but it is mostly how you eat.
- Do not skip meals. If you skip a meal
you will tend to eat too much at the next meal.
- Do not eat just one meal a day. Your
body burns food and uses the energy from it much better when it
comes in small, frequent portions. A single large meal burns slowly,
gives you one burst of energy, and then leaves you dry for the
rest of the day.
- Eat only when you are hungry.
- Eat less fat and fried foods.
- Cur out foods full of sugar. This doesn't
mean cutting out foods that are sweet, though. Fruit contains
sugar that is good for you. Any foods that you know are likely
to have been made with processed sugar a re full of empty calories.
- Watch how many and what kinds of snacks
you eat. Popcorn (without butter) is a great snack. It's low in
calories and high in fiber!
- Be forgiving if you fall of the wagon.
No one is perfect. If you fall of your diet for one meal, jump
right back on the next.
Guidelines to Success (if you need to gain weight)
As with weight loss, gaining weight is partly
what you eat, but mostly how you eat.
- Eat at least three balanced meals a day.
If you have lost your appetite, eat 6 small meals per day.
- Eat food that have high calorie content.
Whole milk, milkshakes, eggnog, and cream soups are all perfect
sources of calories.
- Add extra margarine, peanut butter, Jelly
or jam to bread and crackers.
- Use thick gravies and cream sauces.
- Eat high calorie snacks between meals.
These include dried fruit, nuts, ice cream, and milkshakes. If
you are busy during the day, carry snacks with you.
- Plan ahead for mealtime to be a relaxed,
pleasant event. Eating with a friend often helps make the meal
more of an event.
- Make meals that look good and are tasty.
- Avoid arguments during mealtime. This
may spoil your appetite because of the stress ( or because you
stormed out of the room!)
- Hold foods that fill you up quickly until
the end of the meal. For instance, drink liquids and high fiber
foods ( salads, vegetables, fruits) after you have eaten al the
high calorie foods.