Dr. Marilyn Glenville is the Former President of the Food and Health Forum at The Royal Society of Medicine and patron of the Daisy Network, a premature menopause support group. She runs a number of clinics in London, Kent and also Dublin.

There are so many mixed messages about heart disease, diabetes, cancer, obesity and changing body shapes and fat around the middle. Dr Marilyn Glenville helps unravel the truth and give us some practical tips and advice about how to be healthy.

Your diet can change the quality of your life.

Think of our bodies as a holistic mechanism. Treat the cause rather than just address the symptoms. We need to change the underlying physiology.

The way we are living our lives today is having a big impact on our health.

The root cause of many diseases now – heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity – is being caused by inflammation. It just manifests itself differently with each person depending on family weaknesses or sensitivities of that person.

As a society, we don’t spend the majority of our income on food but on gadgets and other things. We are choosing gadgets over nutrition in our lives.

This gadget fast-paced society we now live in creates a constant stress response. Stress creates inflammation itself so our bodies are living in this constant state of inflammatory response. Sometimes it’s obvious like athritis and joint pain, but can be going on the inside like damaging the heart or with cancer.

Stress hormones and our ongoing environment

Stress hormones are usually released when we’re in danger. When the stress hormones are released, it causes inflammation. Normally that’s not a bad thing as it tells our body how to fight it off, it’s short-lived and we move on.

But living under chronic stress, it’s causing this chronic level of low-grade inflammation all the time. Stress hormones should only be short-lived. Stress hormones can also be released by a pattern of eating. So if we miss meals, or living on a quick fix or a cup of coffee or some chocolate biscuits to get through the day – the stress hormones are being released from that.

We know that each time we have a quick fix, it also causes a severe drop in blood sugar once the sugar goes quickly through our system. At every drop in blood sugar, our body releases that stress-hormone and tells it to release our sugar stores, which then produces more insulin. Unfortunately by producing more insulin, the pancreas is having to over work, and then we become resistant to insulin, and then we end up with a diagnosis of diabetes or heart disease. This is not something that happens overnight. This has been going on slowly in our bodies for years.

What about sugar?

We need to take out added sugar of our food. On average – not including the sugar we put in our tea or coffee – we consume 46 teaspoons of added sugar a day in the processed foods we eat. Not even in just the sweet foods, but in salad dressings or ketchups and other sauces. Added sugar can even come in cheeses and processed meats.That is one of the biggest driving forces and it’s in many foods that people aren’t aware of. It bulks up the food, creates cravings  so we eat more of them, and then becomes a vicious circle.

Are artificial sweeteners ok?

Studies have now shown that people who use artificial sweeteners have an increase in appetite and also gain more weight, especially around the middle of the body.

Artificial sweeteners are very sweet. When we’re normally getting that sweetness it comes with a bulk of calories. But when we get that sweetness without the calories, they send the body off to get the calories from somewhere else which then increases the appetite.  Obviously with an increase in appetite, people eat more and gain weight.

We need to get back to the natural sweetness in natural foods. It really comes down to the choices we make.

Why don’t people make that choice to eat a better diet?

A large part of it is the confusion on the mixed messages on what we see in the media. These messages can change from week to week. For the consumer it’s information overload. Too many mixed messages

If the experts aren’t even agreeing -then what’s right to choose? So people just carry on eating as they always have. We also haven’t made clear the benefits that would come with making better choices with diet.

Diet and weight loss

Our diets need to be that every day is a healthy diet. Healthy means losing 1 to 2 pounds a week. If you’er losing more, you’re losing water and muscle weight. When we just measure only weight, you can’t differentiate between fat and muscle. That’s why these “lose a stone in two weeks” diets don’t work.

Exercise the right way

The way people exercise can make a huge difference with losing weight – specifically fat. Women tend to jump on a trainer or treadmill while men tend to go straight for the weights. While the treadmill will help some, it’s really more about weight training. The more muscle we have, the more muscle we burn. Change exercise by putting in more weight resistance which will add a bit more muscle. This will change your shape. You may weigh the same, but you’ll lose inches and fat.

Dr Glenville is the award winning author of eleven internationally bestselling books including, ‘Fat around the Middle’, ‘Getting Pregnant Faster’. ‘Natural Solutions to the Menopause’ and ‘The Natural Health Bible for Women’. For more information, you can visit www.marilynglenville.com