RIO Fitness Chicago® Exercise & Nutrition Blog

RIO Fitness Chicago® Tip:

Can't lose those last ten pounds? It may not be because of your exercise & nutrition, but chemicals you're eating & drinking unintentionally. They’re called endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs), and many of these chemicals work by mimicking estrogen; the hormone that doctors DON’T want women taking anymore due to increased risk of heart disease, breast cancer, stroke, blood clots and abnormal mammograms. Three simple ways you can avoid eating/drinking a lot of EDCs:

1) GO ORGANIC. Organic foods can be expensive. But not all organics are created equal; many foods have such low levels of pesticides that buying organic just isn’t worth it. High pesticide foods are celery, peaches, strawberries, apples, blueberries (domestic), nectarines, sweet bell peppers, spinach, kale/collard greens, cherries, potatoes and grapes (imported). Low pesticide foods are onions, avocado, sweet corn (frozen), pineapples, mango, sweet peas (frozen), asparagus, kiwi fruit, cabbage, eggplant, cantaloupe (domestic), watermelon, grapefruit, sweet potatoes and honeydew melon.

2) GO LEAN. Always choose pasture-raised meats, which have less fat than their confined, grain-fed counterparts and none of the weight-promoting hormones. Plus, grass-fed beef contains 60% more omega-3s, 200% more vitamin E and two to three times more conjugated linoleic acid (a nutrient that helps ward off heart disease, cancer and diabetes, and can help you lose body fat). For fish, avoid ahi or bigeye tuna, tilefish, swordfish, shark, king mackerel, marlin and orange roughy. Focus on smaller fish like anchovies, Atlantic herring and mackerel, and wild-caught Alaskan salmon. When you cook the fish, broil, poach, grill, boil or bake instead of pan-frying; this will allow contaminants from the fatty portions of fish to drain out.

3) FILTER YOUR WATER. The best way to eliminate EDCs from your tap water is an activated carbon water filter. Available for faucets and pitchers, and as under-the-sink units, these filters remove most pesticides and industrial pollutants. if you have perchlorate (a component of rocket fuel!) in your water (you can find out by asking your municipal water supplier for a copy of its most recent water-quality report) you’ll need a reverse osmosis filter. These filters range from $28-$60.