by Aaron Grayson

Created on: February 27, 2009

The American diet is as diverse as America itself. There are millions of Americans who are health nuts, monitoring everything they eat and counting calories and grams of fat religiously. There are also millions of Americans whose eating habits are traditional, with three distinct square meals each and every day. Then, there are those who live on fast food meals, candy bars, and carbonated beverages.

Our eating habits usually are the result of our lifestyles. A big part of our lifestyle is our career, and our careers often dictate our eating habits. Most of us do not have the luxury of hour-long meal breaks, so as a result we are forced to scarf down less-than-nutritious fast food meals. Most of our workplaces are not equipped with kitchens, so many of us are also limited to whatever can be quickly cooked in a microwave.

Our eating habits are also the result of our income. With millions of Americans struggling to pay their bills, it is often impossible to get the recommended amounts of fruits and vegetables in our diets. Chances are, the fruits and vegetables we eat are processed, canned, or frozen. Those of us who are pressed for time and strapped for cash usually don't spend much time perusing the fresh produce section at the local grocery store.

The sad fact is that it costs alot more to eat healthy food than it does to eat junk food. For ten dollars, we can load up our shopping carts with tv dinners, bags of potato chips, and a few bottles of cola. On the other hand, ten dollars will not get you very far if you are shopping for lean meat, fresh vegetables, and bottled water.

The effects of our unhealthy diets are compounded by our sedentary lifestyles. Very few of us get the exercise we need, and this, when coupled with our lousy eating habits, lead to obesity, heart disease, and a plethora of other conditions. If we as a society were generally more active, some of our eating habits could be forgiveable and their adverse effects negated.

With all of the hectic madness in our lives, many of us are likely to skip meals, eat fast food dinners, eat too quickly, or eat at undesireable times. All of these eating habits have unwanted consequences. The food we eat is highly processed and refined, which robs the food of vital nutrients. The food we eat is high in sodium, high in calories and high in fat, yet low in nutrients and low in flavor. The days of home-cooked meals are long over, and our busy schedules require us to eat food that makes us look and feel miserable.

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