Nutrition is the key to wellness. If you’re looking to improve your health and overall sense of well-being, then you’ve no doubt thought a bit about nutrition. Unfortunately, the internet is full of celebrity-endorsed diets that you should probably avoid.
This is where functional nutrition is different. Functional and integrative nutrition takes the focus away from fad dieting and puts it on eating for overall health and wellness.
Let’s take a closer look at exactly what functional nutrition is and how it can help you.
What Is Functional Nutrition?
Functional nutrition is based on the same ideas as functional medicine. It stems from the ideas behind Ayurvedic medicine as a means of disease management.
The philosophy behind most Western medicine is that you cure an ailment. You wait for the problem and then you address it.
Functional nutrition is different. It explores why problems have arisen and then looks at changing an individual’s nutrition so that they don’t occur again. Put simply, instead of trying to diet to lose unwanted weight, it’s better to eat in a way that stops you from gaining that weight in the first place.
But functional nutrition is about much more than maintaining a healthy weight. What we eat affects our energy levels, how we think, our immune system, and much more. By utilizing functional nutrition you are eating in a way that allows your brain and body to operate at their optimum levels.
While functional nutrition can help ensure that you stay healthy, it can also be used as a means to treat existing conditions. For example, you could use functional nutrition as a natural remedy for arthritis pain.
How Does It Work?
Functional nutrition is a much more holistic approach to nutrition. A functional nutritionist will explore how your body responds to certain foods as well the levels of vitamins and minerals present in your body.
A functional nutritionist will also touch upon other areas of your life such as your activity levels, stress, and sleep.
With this information, a functional nutritionist can help to start constructing a nutrition guide tailored for you. This will include eliminating foods that might be behind underlying problems.
They will add foods to your diet to ensure you have a balanced intake of vitamins and minerals. They may also make lifestyle suggestions to help complement your nutrition guide.
How to Practice Functional Nutrition
If you have a specific issue, then it’s recommended that you visit a functional nutritionist. This way they can identify any underlying issues and help you to use functional nutrition as a disease treatment. This doesn’t mean that you can’t practice functional nutrition yourself though.
While a functional nutrition plan will be tailored to each individual’s needs, there a few aspects of functional nutrition that can be applied to everyone.
Eat Real Food
One of the biggest problems with Western diets is the sheer amount of processed foods. Processed food is often high in sugar, sodium, and fat. Regular consumption of these foods can lead to several health problems including obesity, heart disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes.
One of the easiest ways to adopt a functional nutrition approach to your diet is to replace processed foods with real, whole foods. Whole foods are the perfect source of all the vitamins and minerals your body needs.
They contain high-quality proteins and fats too. Processed foods are likely to aggravate symptoms whereas whole foods provide the body with what it needs to function properly.
Support a Healthy Gut Environment
Did you know that 70% of your immune system resides in your gut? It’s no surprise that poor diets result in poor immune systems. One of the easiest ways to support your gut health is to cut out processed foods, but there are other things you can do too.
In addition to eating plenty of whole grains, nuts, vegetables, and fresh fruits, you can also support your gut health with probiotics. Probiotics can be taken as a supplement or found in foods such as yogurt or fermented foods such as sauerkraut.
Probiotics help to restore the balance of bacteria in your digestive system. This will improve how your body absorbs vital nutrients from the food you eat. It will also help your digestive system work more effectively. This will also help how your body eliminates waste from your body.
Live Healthy As Well as Eating Healthy
Functional nutrition is part of a holistic approach to health and well-being. Good, nutrient-dense foods are one of the key parts of staying healthy, but their other things you should be doing.
The things we do in our lives have a surprising impact on how our body processes food, so it’s important to focus on the whole.
Getting regular exercise promotes healthy digestion. It also is responsible for releasing endorphins.
Endorphins are feel-good chemicals. Sugary foods are also linked to the release of endorphins.
People who are trying to diet can struggle when trying to cut out sugary foods due to the simple fact that they’re craving the endorphin release more than the sugar itself. Adding regular exercise to your daily wellness regimen can help provide the body with endorphins and help ease those sugar cravings.
Stress is another big part of your well-being. Stress produces cortisol which has a detrimental effect on how the body processes food. It’s important to take a look at your life as a whole and see how you can reduce stressors in your daily life.
Last, but by no means least, is sleep. Sleep is one of the most commonly overlooked aspects of health. We live in busy times and 1 in 3 American adults report not getting enough sleep.
You should aim for 7-8 hours of good quality sleep each night. This allows your body to repair itself from the previous day.
Living a Life of Integrative Nutrition
Unlike dieting, functional nutrition is something that should be part of your way of life. By eating the right foods for your body type, you will help your body fight off illnesses and stay well. When balanced with a healthy lifestyle, functional nutrition is an investment in longevity.
For more health information and advice be sure to take a look at our other articles.