Why We All Need to Eat More like Mediterranean Cultures

1. Healthier brain Who doesn’t want a healthier brain? Eating a Mediterranean diet helps improve your cognition and memory, and gives you superio…

The older I’ve gotten the more I’ve noticed the effect my diet has had on my health, and the positive and negative benefits it can have on my health, if handled well.

Among the health issues I have noticed in my life; leaky gut, inflammation, high blood sugar, the vast majority can be rectified with little to no adjustment in the way I eat.

Enter the Mediterranean diet. It’s a diet that mostly contains fruit and veg, legumes, tubers, fish and seafood, herbs and spices, healthy fats, and small amounts of whole grains.

And experts love the Mediterranean diet, because eating a diet that focuses on these food groups, and skips a lot processed and refined foods, has a lot of positive benefits.

Here are a few:

 

1. Healthier brain

Who doesn’t want a healthier brain? Eating a Mediterranean diet helps improve your cognition and memory, and gives you superior attention and focus. For seniors it helps fight against brain deterioration due to aging.

2. Longevity

Speaking of aging, did you know food can help you age better? Apparently eating the Mediterranean diet can actually make you live longer and live happier.

3. Lower risk of diabetes and heart disease

While there isn’t really anything you can do to eliminate the risk of lifestyle diseases, you can do things to reduce the risk. The Mediterranean diet has proven to reduce risk of death by heart disease and because it contains a lot of monounsaturated fats and high fibre food, it has been effective in lowering blood sugar and cholesterol in those with diabetes.

4. Weight loss

This is a diet that isn’t all about cutting out all sorts of foods, which makes it a lot easier to follow and stick to. Long-term commitment to this lifestyle, along with a regular exercise regime, can lead to steady weight-loss.

5. Anti-inflammatory

The Mediterranean diet has been shown to help to reduce and regulate inflammation biomarkers so that many of the conditions that are due to chronic inflammation. If you were unaware, chronic inflammation can lead to DNA damage, tissue death, and internal scarring, which in turn cause a variety of lifestyle diseases, such as type 2 diabetes, obesity, asthma, and heart disease (Healthline).

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