Bite Into a Healthy Lifestyle

Each year, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics launches a nutrition and education campaign to encourage you to make informed food choices and develop healthy eating and physical activity habits. The theme for 2015 is "Bite into a Healthy Lifestyle."

This theme reflects the importance of what we eat in our quest for healthy living. We can be physically active, but if we don’t make changes in our diet, our weight loss and overall health won’t see meaningful change.

Eating healthy means enjoying a variety of nutritious foods and beverages, especially vegetables, fruits, low and fat-free dairy products, and whole grains; limiting the intake of saturated fats, added sugars, and sodium; keeping trans-fat intake as low as possible; and balancing caloric intake with calories burned to manage body weight. Eating healthy also helps reduce your risk for heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, osteoporosis, several types of cancer, and helps you get and maintain a healthy body weight.

Healthy eating is necessary for a healthy lifestyle, and physical activity supports the benefits of your healthy eating habits. According to the National Prevention Strategy’s Fact Sheet “Active Living,” physical activity strengthens bones and muscles, reduces stress and depression, and makes it easier to maintain a healthy body weight or to reduce weight if overweight or obese.  The Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans state that adults should engage in at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity activity each week, and children and teenagers should engage in at least one hour of activity each day.

Active living can help set people on the right course; regular physical activity helps people of all ages protect and improve their health. TRICARE offers tips on living your healthiest life, including benefit information on the “Live Well” section of the TRICARE website. Operation Live Well, the Department of Defense wide initiative also offers tools and resources to help you.