Change is Good and Hard Making a Difference is What Matters

by Healthy Latina in the City

I hope you enjoyed last month’s article where I talked about my experience working with young girls and exercise. I have decided that I want to focus my stories on real life in a way that I feel can contribute to your health and the health of the Latino community.

I know I started out all about veganism. But I think our health goes beyond that now. While I do think it is beneficial to our health, I think there are so many other things that we need to tackle and understand first in order to take care of our overall health. Of course I learned this through my own journey and personal experience.

I have gone back to eating meat, in small quantities. I decided to do this because I gained 9 pounds which was not making me feel healthy or happy. So I will ditch the vegan diet and talk for now about what is going on in today’s communities about health and healthy living. As I talked about in my first article, I am on this Journey of personal health and fitness and I wanted to take you along, well this is part of my journey. The journey of trying to be the healthiest that I can be, which is not always easy, and I get it.

Moving forward I will still continue to talk about my journey and my personal health experiments but I think it is more important for me to talk about issues and ideas that may help everyone, not just things that I am doing in my own life. Because I realize that my life doesn’t fit everyone’s life.

So a great place to start is where I left off last month talking about children and health because they are the future and the more we can help them now with their health the better we can set them up for their future.

The reason I wanted to stay on this trend is because I recently read the September issue of Latina Magazine with Rosario Dawson on the cover (http://www.latina.com/). In this issue there is an interview with First Lady Michelle Obama where she talks about fighting childhood obesity. I thought it was a great interview because she talks about her own experiences in getting her family to eat healthy while also acknowledging that communities are lacking healthy food choices and how families can deal with this. She also touched on how we (Latinos) can still enjoy foods that play a role in our culture (I think this is a challenge for so many of us, at least for me). She also talked about theUS school lunch program, the Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act, which ensure children in US schools get fresh healthy food, which is extremely important in today’s economy.

The Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act provides all children with healthy food in schools.

“Increasingly schools are playing a central role in children’s health. Over 31 million children receive meals through the school lunch program and many children receive most, if not all, of their meals at school. With over seventeen million children living in food insecure households and one out of every three children in America now considered overweight or obese, schools often are on the front lines of our national challenge to combat childhood obesity and improve children’s overall health. This legislation includes significant improvements that will help provide children with healthier and more nutritious food options, educate children about making healthy food choices, and teach children healthy habits that can last a lifetime”

Whether or not Barack is your candidate of choice for this November’s 2012 presidential election, we should all make it a priority to educate ourselves and our communities about staying healthy especially since it greatly affects the Latino community.

“While childhood obesity rates are considerably higher than they were a generation ago among the general population, children from certain racial and ethnic communities have been disproportionately affected. Sharply higher rates of overweight and obesity have occurred among Latino, African-American and American Indian and Alaska Native children and adolescents.”

I hope to be able to provide some insight and resources that are available for children and communities in need so we can ensure all children are given an equal chance at a healthy life

Resources:

For parents:

http://www.choosemyplate.gov/
http://www.choosemyplate.gov/en-espanol.html (Espanol)
http://www.letsmove.gov/lets-move-outside

For parents and schools

Works Cited

Healthy Latina in the City is a contributing writer with a personal passion for nutrition and healthy living. While she is not a nutritionist, doctor, or personal trainer she wants to take you on her journey to live a healthy lifestyle and share tips that have worked for her to incorporate good health and nutrition into your life.