Feb 12, 2018

If you’ve ever had a bad night’s sleep, you’ll know how much it can affect your day.

You feel grumpy, groggy, more sensitive, are unable to concentrate properly and you may even feel a whole lot hungrier — leading you to grab comfort foods like chocolate, cookies and chips.

New research has shown the amount of sleep women have is linked to obesity and mental health. While these findings only looked at women, there have been several studies which support this evidence for both males and females.

“What our studies showed was that the amount of sleep women have — and how well they sleep — is linked to the foods they eat and their risk of weight gain and poor mental health,” Michelle Blumfield, accredited practising dietitian and researcher from Monash University, told The Huffington Post Australia.

Women who don’t get enough sleep are more likely to reach for those fattier, junk foods throughout the day due to two main reasons, according to Blumfield.

“Firstly, there’s an environmental relationship here, so not getting enough sleep can mean there’s more time awake for people to eat, and that increased tiredness can make it harder for them to resist those unhealthy, higher energy, fattier foods,” she said.

“And we also know there’s a physiological reason. How our body works is also affected by our sleep, so when our sleep is disrupted or we don’t get enough sleep, it can affect the hormones that control our appetite.”

The hormones at play here are leptin (the “satiety hormone”) and ghrelin (the “hunger hormone”).

“We know insufficient or poor sleep has been linked to a decrease in leptin, a hormone that tells our brain we’re full and that we can stop eating. But we also get an increase in ghrelin, which is the hormone that stimulates hunger. So, on one hand you’re getting more hormones that stimulate hunger and, on the other hand, less of the hormones that’s telling us we’re full. You can see it’s quite a downward slope,” Blumfield said.

According to Blumfield, getting enough sleep and being a healthy weight is extremely important for women of childbearing age as obesity can affect the health of their future children.

“Almost half of Australian women will enter pregnancy either overweight or obese, so these findings are really important for not only women’s health but also the health of their future children down the track,” Blumfield said.

“If we can get women to have a good night’s sleep and try to promote a healthier weight before pregnancy, that’s going to have a long-lasting effect.”

When looking at the link between poor sleep and mental health, Blumfield said one affects the other.

“The association we found between insufficient sleep and mental health has been of great interest,” Blumfield told HuffPost Australia.

“It is widely recognised that poor sleep in adults can actually be a risk factor for mental health and this relationship has been found to be bidirectional, so either poor sleep can influence mental health, or mental health can influence poor sleep — either can be a cause or a result of each other. This is because they’re very closely linked.

“People can have certain predispositions and there’s social factors and environmental factors that can all play a role in the onset of poor sleep and mental health.”

To help reduce this risk of poorer physical and mental health, the obvious answer is to sleep more but, as often is the case, it’s easier said than done. However, there are various lifestyle and dietary choices that can help you sleep — and feel — better.

1. Sleep hygiene

“What people can do is try to have a regular bedtime and avoid napping,” Blumfield said.

“A high variability in the length of sleep each night and an increase in napping during the day is strongly associated with obesity. This relationship is independent of how long you sleep each night.

“If we can’t have around eight hours of good quality sleep, trying to go to bed at the same time and avoid napping is a good first step.”

2. Exercise

Exercise also plays an important role in good sleep and reducing the risk of obesity.

“Exercise can also promote a good night’s sleep, and we’re all well aware of how exercise can reduce the risk of obesity. While also helping to ‘burn off’ the extra food you’ve eaten, relaxing exercise like yin yoga close to bedtime can help initiate sleep, too,” Blumfield said.

3. Diet

Lastly, of course, is diet.

“Improving the quality of our diets is always going to be a good option,” Blumfield said.

“Choose a wide variety of foods — lots of fruits and vegetables, whole grain breads and cereals, lean meats, reduced-fat dairy and healthy fats from avocado, nuts and olive oil. Those traditional, healthy dietary messages are always going to go a long way in increasing a good quality diet and reducing obesity.”

Oct 13, 2017

As soon as women announce “I’m having a baby!”, the congratulations are quickly followed by long lists of dos and don’ts about food. Try ginger for morning sickness. Avoid soft cheese because of listeria. Eat more meat to boost your iron. Eat this fish – but not that one, because of mercury.

Pregnant women are understandably confused. So, how do you strike the balance between nutrition and safety, when so many things are off the menu?

During pregnancy, women need to consume a variety of different foods and need more of the main pregnancy nutrients: protein, folate, calcium, iron, zinc, iodine, and fibre. Here’s a quick guide to the best sources.

Protein: lean meat, chicken, seafood, dairy products, legumes, nuts, eggs

Folate: fortified bread and breakfast cereal, green leafy vegetables, legumes, seeds, chicken, eggs, oranges

Calcium: dairy foods, fortified soy milks, green leafy vegetables, nuts, seeds, canned fish with bones

Iron: red meat, fortified cereals, egg yolks, green leafy vegetables, legumes, nuts

Zinc: meat, eggs, seafood, nuts, tofu, miso, legumes, wheat germ, wholegrain foods

Iodine: canned salmon and tuna, other fish, oysters, bread fortified with iodine

Fibre: wholemeal and wholegrain breads and high fibre cereals, oats, vegetables and fruit with the skin on.

We have recently shown that a moderate intake of protein (18-20% of a total energy intake) allows pregnant women to eat the best range of foods across all the healthy core groups in the Australian Guide to Healthy Eating, while optimising vitamin and mineral intakes.

Interestingly, the protein to carbohydrate ratio was related to the amount of muscle and fat tissue in the developing baby. While more research is needed, it may contribute to the risk of developing diabetes in the future.

How much?

The Australian dietary guidelines advise pregnant women to consume the following number of servings from the five core food groups each day.

Vegetables and legumes/beans: five servings. One serve = 75g or 100-350kJ, for example, half a cup cooked green or orange vegetables, one cup of raw salad vegetables, half a medium potato, one tomato.

Fruit: two servings. One serve = 150g or 350kJ, for example, one medium piece (apple, banana, orange), two small pieces (apricots, kiwi fruit), one cup diced or canned fruit.

Grain (cereal) foods, mostly wholegrain or high-fibre varieties: eight-and-a-half servings. One serve = 500kJ, for example, one slice of bread, half a cup of cooked rice, pasta or porridge, one-quarter of a cup muesli, three crispbreads.

Lean meats and poultry, fish, eggs, tofu, nuts and seeds, legumes and beans: three-and-a-half servings. One serve = 500-600kJ, for example, 65g cooked lean meat, 80g cooked lean poultry, 100g cooked fish, two eggs, 170g tofu, 30g nuts, one cup of cooked beans.

Milk, yoghurt, cheese or alternatives, mostly reduced fat: two-and-a-half servings. One serve = 500-600kJ, for example, 250ml milk, 200g yoghurt, two slices (40g) of cheese.

Morning (noon and night) sickness

Nausea and vomiting affects about three in four pregnancies. While the data on fetal risks associated with drug treatment are controversial, non-drug approaches are a good place to start.

Eating small snacks rather than big meals can help alleviate morning sickness.
Limit exposure to food odours by having foods that do not smell as much during cooking or by reducing cooking time, with stir-frys or a BBQ cooked outdoors.

Nausea can be worse in the presence of hunger, so avoid an empty stomach by having small, frequent meals and snacks comprised of foods that you can tolerate and don’t have much smell, such as fruit or nuts, or raisin bread or sandwiches, or yoghurt. Very cold drinks can help with the nausea and prevent dehydration.

You could try ginger as a ginger tablet, cold ginger beer or ginger cordial. While only some evidence supports the use of ginger and/or vitamin B6 supplements to relieve nausea of pregnancy, they’re unlikely to cause harm.

Mercury and fish

Fish and seafood are important sources of protein and minerals. They are low in saturated fat and are a major source of omega-3 fatty acids.

During pregnancy, omega-3s play an important role in the baby’s developing central nervous system, the brain and retina in eyes. Research shows that maternal omega-3 fatty acid consumption during pregnancy reduces the risk of preterm birth, and increases the length of gestation and therefore birth weight.*

Deficiency of omega-3s is associated with irreversible visual and behaviours deficits in children, as well as an increased risk of depression, pre-eclampsia and pregnancy hypertension in the mother.

Pregnant women eat less fish than is recommended. Population surveys in the United Kingdom and United States show that pregnant women don’t eat enough fish and therefore omega-3s, partly due to fears about adverse effects of mercury and other toxins (such as polychlorinated biphenyls).

We have shown that pregnant women in Australia also eat less fish than is recommended. But when we estimated what their weekly exposure to mercury would be from eating two to three serves a week, it was well below the targets. Pregnant women in Australia can safely eat fish.

Listeria risk

Due to changes in the immune system during pregnancy, women are more susceptible to food poisoning. But by avoiding all foods that carry a risk for harbouring listeria, women are consuming fewer nutrients.

You don’t have to go without. For every item on the “no” list, there are a number of alternatives:

Avoid pre-packaged cold meats. This includes deli meats and sandwich bars. Instead, choose freshly cooked seafood one to two times per week and/or canned fish up to four times a week. Choose home-cooked meat instead and make it into homemade sandwiches.

Avoid ready-to-eat pre-cooked chicken pieces, especially if cold. Instead, choose home-cooked chicken or hot take-away whole chicken or large pieces – but eat it immediately.

Avoid raw and chilled seafood including oysters, sashimi or sushi, smoked salmon, ready-to-eat peeled prawns, prawn cocktails, sandwich fillings, and prawn salads. Don’t eat shark (flake) or billfish (swordfish, broadbill and marlin). Limit orange roughy (deep sea perch) or catfish to once per week. Instead choose other fish species, including canned salmon and tuna two to three times a week.

Avoid salads (fruit and vegetables) that are pre-prepared or pre-packaged or from salad bars or smorgasbords. Instead, choose freshly prepared homemade salads (with leafy greens or other salad vegetables), fresh fruit, or canned or frozen fruits and vegetables.

Avoid soft, semi-soft and surface-ripened cheeses such as brie, Camembert, ricotta, feta and blue cheese. Instead, choose hard cheeses such as Cheddar or tasty, processed cheese, cheese spreads, or plain cottage cheese if packaged by the manufacturer.
Avoid soft serve ice cream and unpasteurised dairy products such as raw goat’s milk. Instead choose packaged frozen ice cream and pasteurised dairy products such as milk, yoghurt, custard and dairy desserts.

Listeria can live in lower temperatures, so take extra care with foods served cold, and avoid buffets and smorgasbords altogether. Cooking, however, kills listeria but the food needs to be heated until steam rises. And remember to always wash your hands before handling food or starting to prepare foods.

Constipation

Up to 40% of pregnant women develop constipation. This is caused by rising levels of progesterone and oestrogen, and the relaxation of muscles of the bowel. Low fluid and fibre intakes can also play a role.

Mild constipation can be self-treated by increasing high-fibre foods, including soluble (oats, lentils, dried peas and beans, psyllium) and insoluble (wholemeal and wholegrain breads and cereals, wheat bran, vegetables and fruit) fibres. To counter constipation in pregnancy aim for 25 to 28 grams of fibre per day, drink plenty of water (1.5 to two litres per day) and exercise regularly.

Some oral iron supplements can cause constipation. If medication is required, only use what your doctor prescribes as not all laxatives are safe during pregnancy.

Multivitamins

Women planning or in early pregnancy are likely to need a folic acid supplement to reduce the risk of the baby having a neural-tube defect, and iodine for the developing brain and nervous system.

Multivitamin supplements may be recommended when there is a fairly high chance of not meeting nutrient needs from food. This is more likely for pregnant adolescents, vegetarians, those on pre-existing special diets, individuals with drug, tobacco and alcohol addictions, or obese pregnant women on medically restricted diets to limit weight gain.

Pregnancy is an important time to focus on what you eat. The food-based recommendations in the Australian Dietary Guidelines will help you enjoy a variety of foods while getting the best mix of nutrients important at this time.

* This article originally said omega-3 fatty acid consumption during pregnancy was associated with increased birth weight and improve brain development in the child. This has been updated to better reflect the evidence.

Oct 13, 2017

This chocolate and raspberry tart is so delicious that we’ve had to constantly keep one in the fridge!  It’s that perfect combination of smooth chocolatey goodness, whilst also containing chickpeas that provide lots of important nutrients like protein, fibre, folate and iron.

This recipe is refined sugar free, dairy free, wheat free, nut free and vegan. But most importantly, it takes just 10 minutes to make and we guarantee it won’t last long!
Serves 12

Ingredients

Base

¼ cup rolled oats
¼ cup raw buckwheat
1 cup desiccated coconut
1 tbs ground linseeds
3 tbs rice malt syrup
2 tbs cacao powder

Filling

480g canned chickpeas (2 x cans drained)
2/3 cup rice malt syrup
¼ cup cacao powder
¼ cup coconut oil
2 tbs almond or other nut milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions

Line a 20cm round tart tin with baking paper.

To make the base, place all the base ingredients in a high-powered food processor and blend until the mixture sticks together well. Press into tart tin and place in the freezer while you make the filling.

To make the filling, place all filling ingredients in a clean food processor bowl and blend on high for 5 minutes until smooth.  Pour the mixture into the base and top with fresh raspberries.

Place tart in the fridge for 2-3 hours to set.  Serve chilled.

Note: For a completely raw dessert, use raw chickpeas soaked overnight and rinsed.  To speed up the setting process, freeze tart for 1.5 hours then serve.

Nutritional Information (Per serve)

Energy 1116kJ  |  Protein 4.8g  |  Fat 12.2g  |  Sat Fat 9.8g  |  Carb 32.0g  |  Fibre 5.3g  |  Sodium 108mg