Too much weight before and during pregnancy can have serious health consequences not only for the mother, but for her child’s health for many years, new research shows.

“While it’s pretty well-known a healthy weight is crucial to a healthy and long life, new research is showing that if a woman is overweight while pregnant, her baby is more likely to be overweight,” said Alan R. Fleischman, M.D., March of Dimes medical director. These health risks continue into childhood, with a higher risk of developing insulin resistance, high blood pressure and high cholesterol, all of which can lead to heart disease and diabetes.

Food for many has become a battleground; it exists in a way beyond nourishment into fulfillment. Sometimes we actively eat to satiate something other than hunger. We eat to feel better, to forget, to be in control, to relax and let go. The list goes on. It is when we for anything other than hunger that we have created this struggle, this battle with food. It is a habit formed to help ourselves to deal with something bigger, more “powerful”, than we can cope with. So we resort to food as a way to put it off. Food is not the problem; it is not bigger than what it is. It is what we have allocated to eating; it is the power we have given it in our lives.

Food exists simply to nourish our bodies; it is when we replace that by emotions and thoughts that we lose the simplicity of it. Have you ever found yourself eating simply to eat?

In a sea of anorexic Hollywood starlets, it’s good to see a woman who is not afraid to flaunt a little bit of curves. Imagine my surprise when I read an article in Life & Style Magazine published last Spring on how self-conscious she is of her body.

Okay …. so maybe I’m a little *behind* on my celebrity gossip and this is probably very old news by now but I feel that the lovely Kim deserves a little bit of credit.

SHE’S THE ULTIMATE PEAR