95% of People Don't Get Enough Fiber —These 6 Dietitian-Approved Tips Helped Me
Most Americans are not eating enough fiber, a nutrient which is important for our health.
There are several ways you can incorporate fiber-rich foods throughout the day to increase your intake.
The key is eating a variety of different high-fiber foods daily to best meet your needs.Only 1 out of 20 Americans are consuming the recommended amount of dietary fiber each day. Yes, you read that number correctly: 1 out of 20. Fiber is a type of indigestible carbohydrate. The fact that it's nondigestible is a good thing because it helps things move through your digestive tract, feeds your beneficial gut bacteria and helps prevent constipation. In other words, it keeps you regular. Fiber also helps us regulate our blood sugar levels, helps balance cholesterol levels, lowers the risk of certain cancers such as colon, assists our digestive health and helps us feel satisfied from what we're eating. There are two main categories of fiber:
Soluble fiber that dissolves in water and can be metabolized by the 'good' bacteria in the gut.
Insoluble fiber that does not dissolve in water and adds bulk to our stool.
We need both types, and a total daily intake of about 25 to 30 grams per day for adults. Many people are simply not consuming enough, and if you are only consuming a side of veggies at dinner, it may not be enough to meet your needs. For example, 1 cup of cooked broccoli has about 3.8 grams of fiber—only about 14% of your daily needs. The key is to add various foods throughout your day in order to meet your fiber requirement.
Even as a dietitian, I have to put some effort into making sure that I get enough fiber each day. These are six small changes that have helped me reach my goals.
1. Don't Fear Fruit
Many people try to avoid fruit because of the sugar content. However, fruit is your friend because though it is naturally sweet, it contains numerous vitamins and minerals as well as fiber. I always find ways to add fruit during the day, and this helps with my fiber intake goals. For instance, I add fruit to yogurt, cereal, smoothies and salads, and I snack on fruit on its own. One Fuji apple with the skin has 2 grams of fiber. One cup of blackberries has about 8 grams of fiber. Fruits can vary in the amount of fiber they contain, so consuming a variety is your best bet.
2. Add Beans to Your Meals
Beans are a great way to get in more fiber daily. There is a variety to choose from, and opting for canned beans can save you time compared to preparing them from dried. They are also great for those looking for a plant-based protein option. Black beans happen to be my favorite and have about 7 grams of fiber per ½ cup. I love adding black beans to my baked potatoes and also in my soups and salads. Chickpeas (aka garbanzo beans) are also a great option to add to salads, pasta dishes or even roasted as a snack. One half-cup of chickpeas will provide about 7 grams of fiber for your day.
3. Start Your Day with Oats
I am a big fan of oatmeal, and it can be a great way to start the day. I love the versatility of flavors and ingredients I can add to customize it. Plus, one half-cup of old-fashioned rolled oats provides about 10 grams of fiber—about one-third of your daily needs. Oats are often thought of as a warm and comforting type of porridge, but you can also make overnight oats, which are perfect to prep ahead so you can grab and go in the morning. Adding fruit to your oats can also increase the fiber they contain. For example, topping your oatmeal with ½ cup of raspberries will add almost 5 more grams of fiber.
4. Opt for Whole Grains
I will never give up pasta, and you don't have to either. One reason I love pasta so much is that it's easy to add ingredients, such as beans and vegetables, to increase the fiber content. But to take it a step further, I try to choose a whole-wheat or whole-grain pasta noodle when I can. One cup of whole-grain pasta provides about 5 grams of fiber, compared to about 2 grams per cup in pastas that are not made with whole grains. Be thoughtful about the protein content in your pasta toppers as well. If you are not ready to go completely plant-based, you can add white beans in addition to another protein source like meatballs to increase your fiber intake. One half-cup of canned white beans provides about 7 grams of fiber.
5. Snack Smart
Snacks can also be a great way to up your fiber intake. I mentioned fruit above, but there are some other high-fiber foods that make great snacks as well. Sometimes I'll make my own trail mix with grains, nuts and seeds, which is not only tasty and satisfying, but also gives me a boost in fiber for my day. For example, if you mix together 3 cups of microwave-popped popcorn, 1 ounce of pumpkin seeds and 1 ounce of almonds, you'll have a snack with about 8 grams of fiber. To round out the flavors, I like to add something to sweeten it, such as dried cranberries or chocolate chips.
6. Eat More Vegetables
Like fruits, vegetables provide us with a variety of vitamins, minerals and fiber—and different types of vegetables offer different benefits. It's recommended to consume about five servings daily, which can be spaced out throughout the day. I like adding leafy green vegetables to smoothies and omelets for a boost of nutrients and fiber in the morning. Salads, pastas, soups and sauces can be other great ways to get in more vegetables. And including a veggie side at dinner can be helpful, too. A half-cup of cooked Brussels sprouts provides about 3 grams of fiber. Even starchy vegetables contain fiber. One ear of corn will add 2 grams to your day. The key is to make vegetables a regular part of your meals, and to consume a variety to meet your needs.
Our Expert Take
Several foods can contribute fiber to your diet, which is why it's important to find ways to incorporate them throughout the day. This could include oats in the morning, nuts as a snack, whole-grain pasta for dinner and various fruits and vegetables throughout the day. The key is variety and finding ways to add in high-fiber foods that you enjoy. That way, your fiber intake can gradually increase in a way that feels sustainable for you. Nutrition is also more nuanced than being told not to eat a certain food or to concentrate on only one food group. Except in cases of allergy or intolerance, no one food can cause disease or illness, and no one food will cure it. They all work in harmony together, and there are a lot of ways to meet your needs.
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Insomnia is a global epidemic. How do we fix it?
On a special episode (first released on July 24th) of The Excerpt podcast: The question is: Why do we struggle to sleep? Jennifer Senior, a staff writer at The Atlantic, joins The Excerpt to talk about insomnia and what we can do about solving our sleep issues. Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text. Podcasts: True crime, in-depth interviews and more USA TODAY podcasts right here Taylor Wilson: Hello, I'm Taylor Wilson, and this is a special episode of the Excerpt. According to a report released by the American Medical Association earlier this year, one-third of American adults experience acute insomnia, an inability to fall or stay asleep for several days at a time, but one in 10 adults suffer from chronic insomnia. That's an inability to fall or stay asleep three nights a week for three months or more. The condition has potentially debilitating health impacts, including an increased risk of depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and even car accidents. So the question is, why can't we sleep? Here to help me dig into the issue is Jennifer Senior, a staff writer at The Atlantic who recently went on her own journey to solve her insomnia and who shared her story in the magazine. Thank you for joining me, Jennifer. Jennifer Senior: Thanks for having me. Taylor Wilson: So let's start with I guess a 30,000-foot view of the issue. I know you spoke with a lot of sleep specialists, did a lot of independent research for your piece. Jennifer, what's the big picture here on American's trouble with sleep? Jennifer Senior: Right. Yeah. What's funny, I think the story was a little misnamed. I mean, this is really more story about, well, if you can't sleep, don't feel awful about it because there are so many shaming stories about people, whatever solutions people seek out. I do talk in the beginning about the way that the modern world absolutely conspires against sleep, that it just lays waste to your circadian rhythms. That people work two jobs, 16.4% of us work non-standard hours. If you're a white collar kind of professional, you've got these woodpecker like peck, peck, peck, incursions into your life all night and weekend long from your boss's work sort of never ends. I mean, we're just no longer yoked to the rhythms of the earth anymore. We're just part of this whirl of a wired world. Taylor Wilson: In the course of doing your research, was there something in particular that surprised you most about the problem? Jennifer Senior: I'll tell you what surprised me most, just generally. Whenever I interviewed any expert about this, and it didn't matter what species of expert, they could be an epidemiologist, they could be a neurologist, they could be a psychiatrist, they could be a clinician. Most of them said the same thing. There is a slight misconception that you need eight hours of sleep. There is some data saying this. There is another equally robust data set saying 6.5 to 7.4 is associated with the best health outcomes. Now it's very hard to tell. These studies are observational. They're not randomized. There was all sorts of confounds and problems with this, but this one study in particular had a million people in it. It's been replicated. There are plenty of people who believe this data and people vary. And over the course of a lifetime, your individual sleep capacity could change. In a funny way, that was what surprised me most. Right? This mantra, which is kind of a tyranny, get eight hours or else. Taylor Wilson: Well, you talked Jennifer about the modern world conspiring against us and our sleep, and I guess let's try to outline a few of the possible causes of what you call a public health emergency, right? What can you share with us here on this? Jennifer Senior: About other causes, you mean besides the kind of modernity itself and kids working on... Kids being assigned homework online, kids socializing online. I mean, adolescents are desperate for sleep. They're so hungry for it, and modern high schools and middle schools have them waking up preposterously early when their circadian rhythms are pitched forward. We've got a substantial sandwich generation that's taking care of young kids and their elderly parents. That's going to conspire against it. These are all immutable things. Also, there are elevated levels of anxiety now in our world, and anxiety itself is a huge source of... Or can be a source of sleeplessness, certainly can make one prone. So I mean, those are additional examples I suppose. Taylor Wilson: Let's talk through your story a bit here. When did you first realize that you had an issue with sleep? And walk us through your experience with insomnia. Jennifer Senior: It was 25 years ago and it was a very mysterious onset. I cannot tell you what brought it on to this day. It is a mystery. I had this extremely well-regulated kind of circadian clock. I fell asleep every night at 1:00. I woke up every day at 9:00. I lost my alarm clock. I still woke up at those times. I didn't have to buy a new alarm clock until I had an early flight one day, and yet sometime very close to my 29th birthday when virtually no circumstances in my life had changed one iota, I had a bad night, fell asleep at like 5:00. Thought nothing of it until they became more regular, and then I started doing all-nighters involuntarily, and I felt like I'd been poisoned. And to this day, I don't know what happened, but once that happens, the whole cycle starts to happen, then people suddenly become very afraid of not falling asleep and whatever kicked it off whether it's mysterious or known becomes irrelevant because then what you do is you start getting very agitated and going, oh my God, I'm not sleeping. Oh my God, I'm still not sleeping. Now it's 3:00 in the morning. Now it's 4:00 in the morning. Now it's 5:00 in the morning. Oh my God, I have one more hour, et cetera. Taylor Wilson: Well, you did write in the piece about the many different recommendations that she tried to solve your own sleep issues. What were some of them, Jennifer, and did any of them help? Jennifer Senior: Oh God, I tried all the things. This is before I sought real professional help, but I did all the things. I would took Tylenol PM, which did not work. I did acupuncture, which were lovely, but did not work. I listened to a meditation tape that a friend gave me, did not work. I listened to another one that was for sleep only that did not work. I ran. I always was a runner, but I ran extra, did not work. Gosh, changed my diet. I don't remember. I did all sorts of things. I tried different supplements, Valerian root, all these things. Melatonin, nothing, nothing. Taylor Wilson: You wrote in depth about one therapy that was recommended to you, and that was CBTI. That's cognitive based therapy for insomnia. Jennifer, first, what is this? And second, did you find any success by using this? Jennifer Senior: So cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, as you said, is the gold standard for treating insomnia. It's portable. You can take it with you. It's not like if you leave your sleep meds at home. The main tent pole of it, which is sleep restriction, which I'll get to in a minute, is very hard to do. I found it murder, the kind of easier parts, although they're still in a funny way, kind of paradoxical, are you have to change your thinking around this is the cognitive piece around sleeping and insomnia. You have to decide, okay, I'm not sleeping. So what? Now, this is kind of funny because there's this din surrounding us that says, oh my God, you're not sleeping. You're going to die of a heart attack. You're going to die of an immune disease. You're going to get cancer. All these things, right? You have to set that all aside and decide one more night's sleep that I can't sleep. So what? Right. That's one thing. You have to change your behaviors, deciding that you are going to consistently go to bed at the same time, wake up at the same time, all that, and not use your bed for anything other than just for sleeping and sex. The hard part and the most powerful part that I found it brutal was the part that said you have to restrict your sleep. If you had only five hours of sleep, but you're in bed for nine hours, you have to choose a wake-up time. Let's say it's 7:00 and then you have to go to bed five hours earlier, 2:00 to s7:00. That's all you can give yourself, and you cannot stop with that schedule until you've slept for the majority of those hours. That's very hard for a sleepless person. And then once you've succeeded, all you get to add on is 15 more minutes of sleep, and then you have to sleep the majority of those hours for three nights running. This is always for three nights running, and the idea is to build up a enough sleep pressure to regularize yourself. You basically capitulate to exhaustion and you start to develop a rhythm. I couldn't stick with it. I was so kind of stupid and depressed with sleeplessness by the time I started it that it probably was impractical and I refused to take drugs to help me fall asleep at the exact right hour, which many clinics recommend. 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They're hooked on sleeping pills. It's framed as addiction, and no one says that someone is addicted to their Ozempic, even though a lifestyle change could perhaps obviate the need. No one says that they are addicted... Oh, that person is totally addicted to their blood pressure medication, even though maybe a change in lifestyle would help change that. Or that they're addicted to their statins, So I sort of bristle. And those who prescribe these medicines say like, look, if the benefit outweighs the risk and they're used properly, sometimes the real side effect is just being dependent on these drugs, and there's a difference between dependence and addiction. A surprisingly small number of people who take these drugs regularly, like benzodiazepines, like Ativan and Ambien and Klonopin, all these things, a surprisingly small number, like 7% increase their doses if they take it every night. So that's very small. However, there are cognitive decrements over time... Or not decrements. 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