Finding a way to balance nutrition and exercise can make a lasting impression on your life
Teaching people to eat right and exercise, especially the younger generation, has never been and never will be an easy task, says Deb Myers, M.S., R.D., L.D., associate professor of dietetics and director of Bluffton University’s dietetics program. Flashing fast-food billboards, radio and television commercials and Internet pop-up ads, coupled with an increasingly hurried pace of life make it difficult to get across the importance of making time for healthy living. “Hitting home with the younger generation is tough,” she says, “because they feel as though they will live forever and eat whatever they want forever.”
That “forever” rarely happens though, says Myers, and many students, not realizing that their activity levels and food-consumption rates are now different than their high-school days, begin seeing a weight gain during their college years. This is due in part to less activity and the amount of foods available to them, says Myers, foods they may not have had available at home.
Junior Angela Streb, from Dalton, Ohio, says making a conscious effort to eat nutritional foods is important to her. “Eating junk food all the time isn’t very energizing for me. I love feeling my best, so I want to eat foods that will make me feel good and energized.”
Eating nutritionally is important for a variety of reasons, says Myers, most significantly because it can stave off weight gain, one of the underlying contributors of diabetes, heart disease and hypertension—all lifestyle diseases typically related to weight. “Over the years, we’ve accepted the fact that 60 percent of adults are obese, and yet research clearly shows that people who are at a normal weight—not thin, but normal range—are able to delay a lot of chronic problems well into their 80s.”
The American Heart Association notes that inactive people lose muscle fiber at a rate of three to five percent every decade after age 30, adding up to a 15 percent loss by age 60. “Our metabolisms peak in our early 20s,” says Myers. “Most research says starting at age 30, there’s a five percent decline in metabolism which correlates to a five percent decline in calorie needs per decade. There is hope, however, in eating right and exercising.”
Exercising and being physically active is a significant part of living a healthy lifestyle, says Tami Forbes, associate professor of recreation and chair of the health, physical education and recreation (HPER) department, and students at Bluffton have ample opportunities to do both. Bluffton offers its students varsity athletics, intramurals, clubs such as Ultimate Frisbee™, a weight room, a nature preserve with walking and jogging paths and plenty of open spaces for moving around. “At Bluffton, we want to identify lifetime behaviors and teach them so that students can stay active and healthy,” says Forbes.
Active as a youngster, Streb’s physical activities have evolved during her college years as she turned to running with friends, pilates and kickboxing. “Staying active helps keep me alert,” she says. “I believe that the way we treat our bodies is important because God lives through us and our bodies.” Streb also says that being active is a great stress reliever and she enjoys challenging herself physically by setting fitness goals.
Since 1997, Bluffton’s HPER department has been offering adventure courses, providing students with a non-traditional view of being active. Past courses have included downhill skiing, white-water rafting, fly fishing and charter fishing. Depending upon the semester, students can take pilates, cardio kickboxing, yoga and other various fitness courses.
Becoming active and remaining active are contingent upon finding activities that suit each individual, says Forbes. “We want to make students aware of not only exercise, but total well being,” she says. “There’s a positive psychological aspect involved when a person experiences life satisfaction. It’s important to find something that you like to do. Find a recreational activity that brings you satisfaction. That will, in turn, increase your life satisfaction.”
For Amy (Rodabaugh ’04) Blackburn, cardio kickboxing was that activity. “I didn’t become physically active until after high school when a couple of my friends introduced me to cardio kickboxing,” she says. She soon began filling in as a substitute instructor at Bluffton Family Recreation in Bluffton, Ohio, and eventually earned her certification as a kickboxing instructor. She now tries to work out six days a week, alternating weight lifting and cardiovascular activities.
When it comes to being healthy, Myers and Forbes both stress the importance of eating nutritionally and being active and learning how to do both at a young age to reap the benefits all throughout life. “Nutrition and exercise are two of the basic standards of good health and wellness,” says Myers. “Every time you see a list of ‘10 things you need to do to be healthy,’ you’ll see 1) Eat a healthy diet; 2) Be active…and it really is true. It really comes down to the basics.”
by Jill A. Duling
