Kidney Beans vs Pinto Beans – Which is Healthier?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Our Verdict
When comparing kidney beans to pinto beans, we picked the pinto.
Why?
Looking at the macros first, pinto beans have slightly more protein and carbs, and a lot more fiber, making them the all-round “more food per food” choice.
In the vitamins category, kidney beans have more of vitamins B3, C, and K, while pinto beans have more of vitamins B1, B2, B6, B9, E, and choline; another win for pinto beans. In kidney beans’ defense though, with the exception of vitamin E (31x more in pinto beans) the margins of difference are small for the rest of these vitamins, making kidney beans a close runner-up. Still, at least a nominal win for pinto beans here, by the numbers.
When it comes to minerals, kidney beans are not higher in any minerals, while pinto beans have more calcium, copper, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, potassium, and selenium. In kidney beans’ defense, though, with the exception of selenium (5–6x more in pinto beans) the margins of difference are small for the rest of these minerals, making kidney beans a fine choice here too. Once again though, a winner is declarable here by the numbers, and it’s pinto beans.
Adding up the three wins makes for one big win for pinto beans. Still, enjoy either or both, because kidney beans are great too, and so is diversity!
Want to learn more?
You might like to read:
What’s Your Plant Diversity Score?
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
The 4 Bad Habits That Cause The Most Falls While Walking
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
The risk of falling becomes greater (both in probability and in severity of consequences) as we get older. But, many people who do fall do so for the same reasons, some of which are avoidable. Dr. Doug Weiss has advice based on extensive second-hand experience:
Best foot forward!
If any of these prompt a “surely nobody does that” response, then, good for you to not have that habit, but Dr. Weiss has seen many patients who thusly erred. And if any of these do describe how you walk, then well, you’re not alone—time to fix it, though!
- Walking with Stiff Legs: walking with a hyperextended (straight) knee instead of a slight bend (5-15°) makes it harder to adjust balance, increasing the risk of falls. This can also put extra pressure on the joints, potentially leading to osteoarthritis.
- Crossing Legs While Turning: turning by crossing one leg over the other is a common cause of falls, particularly in the elderly. To avoid this, when turning step first with the foot that is on the side you are going to go. If you have the bad habit, this may feel strange at first, but you will soon adapt.
- Looking Down While Walking: focusing only on the ground directly in front of you can cause you to miss obstacles ahead, leading to falls. Instead, practice “scanning”, alternating between looking down at the ground and looking up to maintain awareness of your surroundings.
- Shuffling Instead of Tandem Walking: shuffling with feet far apart, rather than walking with one foot in front of the other, reduces balance and increases the risk of tripping. Tandem walking, where one foot is placed directly in front of the other, is the safer and more balanced way to walk.
It also helps disguise your numbers.
For more details on all of these, plus visual demonstrations, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
Fall Special (How To Not Fall, And How To Minimize Injury If You Do) ← this never seems like an urgent thing to learn, but trust us, it’s more fun to read it now, than from your hospital bed later
Take care!
Share This Post
-
Biological Age Test: Can You Pass These 3?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Alisa Szyman gives us some insight:
On your feet!
In fact, biological age is not one thing but quite a lot of things, each of which can age at different rates.
See for example: Age & Aging: What Can (And Can’t) We Do About It?
Today we’re focusing on “functional aging”, that is to say, “how much is aging affecting your ability to physically perform critical movements?”.
With that in mind, here are the three functional aging tests and what they actually tell us:
- Sit-to-rise test: lower yourself to the floor and stand back up, without using your hands, knees, or arms, starting from 10 points and subtracting 1 for each support used and 0.5 for loss of balance, with scores of 8–10 indicating strong overall function, 6–7 showing mild decline, 3–5 signalling significant decline, and below 3 linked to up to a 5x higher mortality risk, while each 1-point improvement is associated with a 21% reduction in all-cause mortality.
- Single-leg balance test: stand on one leg with your hands on your hips, and time how long you can hold it (eyes open, then closed), where poorer performance—especially with eyes closed—indicates declines in your vestibular system and proprioception, both key components of neuromuscular aging and strong predictors of mortality. Not least of all because of the old “fall over, break a hip, decline rapidly and die” factor.
- Deep squat hold test: hold a full deep squat with your heels flat on the floor and your chest upright for 10–30 seconds, where success reflects good hip, knee, ankle, and spine mobility, while compensations (heels lifting, falling backwards, rounding your lower back, or inability to squat) show up specific joint or mobility limitations that you might want to work on.
Passing all three (while over the age of 40) suggests your biological age is younger than your chronological age, passing two highlights one weak area to improve, and passing one or none indicates multiple declining systems—but all are highly trainable regardless of age.
For more on all of this plus visual demonstrations, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like:
Mobility For Now & For Later: Train For The Marathon That Is Your Life!
Take care!
Share This Post
-
Is white rice bad for me? Can I make it lower GI or healthier?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Rice is a culinary staple in Australia and around the world.
It might seem like a given that brown rice is healthier than white and official public health resources often recommend brown rice instead of white as a “healthy swap”.
But Australians definitely prefer white rice over brown. So, what’s the difference, and what do we need to know when choosing rice?
Dragne Marius/Unsplash What makes rice white or brown?
Rice “grains” are technically seeds. A complete, whole rice seed is called a “paddy”, which has multiple parts:
- the “hull” is the hard outer layer which protects the seed
- the “bran”, which is a softer protective layer containing the seed coat
- the “germ” or the embryo, which is the part of the seed that would develop into a new plant if was germinated
- the “endosperm”, which makes up most of the seed and is essentially the store of nutrients that feeds the developing plant as a seed grows into a plant.
Rice needs to be processed for humans to eat it.
Along with cleaning and drying, the hard hulls are removed since we can’t digest them. This is how brown rice is made, with the other three parts of the rice remaining intact. This means brown rice is regarded as a “wholegrain”.
White rice, however, is a “refined” grain, as it is further polished to remove the bran and germ, leaving just the endosperm. This is a mechanical and not a chemical process.
What’s the difference, nutritionally?
Keeping the bran and the germ means brown rice has more magnesium, phosphorus, potassium B vitamins (niacin, folate, riboflavin and pyridoxine), iron, zinc and fibre.
The germ and the bran also contain more bioactives (compounds in foods that aren’t essential nutrients but have health benefits), like oryzanols and phenolic compounds which have antioxidant effects.
Brown rice is cleaned and dried and the hard hulls are removed. Sung Min/Shutterstock But that doesn’t mean white rice is just empty calories. It still contains vitamins, minerals and some fibre, and is low in fat and salt, and is naturally gluten-free.
White and brown rice actually have similar amounts of calories (or kilojoules) and total carbohydrates.
There are studies that show eating more white rice is linked to a higher risk of type 2 diabetes. But it is difficult to know if this is down to the rice itself, or other related factors such as socioeconomic variables or other dietary patterns.
What about the glycaemic index?
The higher fibre means brown rice has a lower glycaemic index (GI), meaning it raises blood sugar levels more slowly. But this is highly variable between different rices within the white and brown categories.
The GI system uses low (less than 55), medium (55–70) and high (above 70) categories. Brown rices fall into the low and medium categories. White rices fall in the medium and high.
There are specific low-GI types available for both white and brown types. You can also lower the GI of rice by heating and then cooling it. This process converts some of the “available carbohydrates” into “resistant starch”, which then functions like dietary fibre.
Are there any benefits to white rice?
The taste and textural qualities of white and brown rices differ. White rice tends to have a softer texture and more mild or neutral flavour. Brown rice has a chewier texture and nuttier flavour.
So, while you can technically substitute brown rice into most recipes, the experience will be different. Or other ingredients may need to be added or changed to create the desired texture.
Removing more of the outer layers may also reduce the levels of contaminants such as pesticides.
We don’t just eat rice
You’ll likely have vegetables and protein with your rice. Chay_Tee/Shutterstock Comparing white and brown rice seems like an easy way to boost nutritional value. But just because one food (brown rice) is more nutrient-dense doesn’t make the other food (white rice) “bad”.
Ultimately, it’s not often that we eat just rice, so we don’t need the rice we choose to be the perfect one. Rice is typically the staple base of a more complex dish. So, it’s probably more important to think about what we eat with rice.
Adding vegetables and lean proteins to rice-based dishes can easily add the micronutrients, bioactives and fibre that white rice is comparatively lacking, and this can likely do more to contribute to diet quality than eating brown rice instead.
Emma Beckett, Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Nutrition, Dietetics & Food Innovation – School of Health Sciences, UNSW Sydney
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Share This Post
Related Posts
-
You can train your nose – and 4 other surprising facts about your sense of smell
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Would you give up your sense of smell to keep your hair? What about your phone?
A 2022 US study compared smell to other senses (sight and hearing) and personally prized commodities (including money, a pet or hair) to see what people valued more.
The researchers found smell was viewed as much less important than sight and hearing, and valued less than many commodities. For example, half the women surveyed said they’d choose to keep their hair over sense of smell.
Smell often goes under the radar as one of the least valued senses. But it is one of the first sensory systems vertebrates developed and is linked to your mental health, memory and more.
Here are five fascinating facts about your olfactory system.
DimaBerlin/Shutterstock 1. Smell is linked to memory and emotion
Why can the waft of fresh baking trigger joyful childhood memories? And why might a certain perfume jolt you back to a painful breakup?
Smell is directly linked to both your memory and emotions. This connection was first established by American psychologist Donald Laird in 1935 (although French novelist Marcel Proust had already made it famous in his reverie about the scent of madeleines baking.)
Odours are first captured by special olfactory nerve cells inside your nose. These cells extend upwards from the roof of your nose towards the smell-processing centre of your brain, called the olfactory bulb.
Smells are first detected by nerve cells in the nose. Axel_Kock/Shutterstock From the olfactory bulb they form direct connection with the brain’s limbic system. This includes the amygdala, where emotions are generated, and the hippocampus, where memories are created.
Other senses – such as sight and hearing – aren’t directly connected to the lymbic system.
One 2004 study used functional magnetic resonance imaging to demonstrate odours trigger a much stronger emotional and memory response in the brain than a visual cue.
2. Your sense of smell constantly regenerates
You can lose your ability to smell due to injury or infection – for example during and after a COVID infection. This is known as olfactory dysfunction. In most cases it’s temporary, returning to normal within a few weeks.
This is because every few months your olfactory nerve cells die and are replaced by new cells.
We’re not entirely sure how this occurs, but it likely involves your nose’s stem cells, the olfactory bulb and other cells in the olfactory nerves.
Other areas of your nervous system – including your brain and spinal cord – cannot regenerate and repair after an injury.
Constant regeneration may be a protective mechanism, as the olfactory nerves are vulnerable to damage caused by the external environment, including toxins (such as cigarette smoke), chemicals and pathogens (such as the flu virus).
But following a COVID infection some people might continue to experience a loss of smell. Studies suggest the virus and a long-term immune response damages the cells that allow the olfactory system to regenerate.
3. Smell is linked to mental health
Around 5% of the global population suffer from anosmia – total loss of smell. An estimated 15-20% suffer partial loss, known as hyposmia.
Given smell loss is often a primary and long-term symptom of COVID, these numbers are likely to be higher since the pandemic.
Yet in Australia, the prevalence of olfactory dysfunction remains surprisingly understudied.
Losing your sense of smell is shown to impact your personal and social relationships. For example, it can mean you miss out on shared eating experiences, or cause changes in sexual desire and behaviour.
In older people, declining ability to smell is associated with a higher risk of depression and even death, although we still don’t know why.
Losing your sense of smell can have a major impact on mental health. Halfpoint/Shutterstock 4. Loss of smell can help identify neurodegenerative diseases
Partial or full loss of smell is often an early indicator for a range of neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases.
Patients frequently report losing their sense of smell years before any symptoms show in body or brain function. However many people are not aware they are losing their sense of smell.
There are ways you can determine if you have smell loss and to what extent. You may be able to visit a formal smell testing centre or do a self-test at home, which assesses your ability to identify household items like coffee, wine or soap.
5. You can train your nose back into smelling
“Smell training” is emerging as a promising experimental treatment option for olfactory dysfunction. For people experiencing smell loss after COVID, it’s been show to improve the ability to detect and differentiate odours.
Smell training (or “olfactory training”) was first tested in 2009 in a German psychology study. It involves sniffing robust odours — such as floral, citrus, aromatic or fruity scents — at least twice a day for 10—20 seconds at a time, usually over a 3—6 month period.
Participants are asked to focus on the memory of the smell while sniffing and recall information about the odour and its intensity. This is believed to help reorganise the nerve connections in the brain, although the exact mechanism behind it is unclear.
Some studies recommend using a single set of scents, while others recommend switching to a new set of odours after a certain amount of time. However both methods show significant improvement in smelling.
This training has also been shown to alleviate depressive symptoms and improve cognitive decline both in older adults and those suffering from dementia.
Just like physiotherapy after a physical injury, olfactory training is thought to act like rehabilitation for your sense of smell. It retrains the nerves in your nose and the connections it forms within the brain, allowing you to correctly detect, process and interpret odours.
Lynn Nazareth, Research Scientist in Olfactory Biology, CSIRO
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
What is rejection sensitive dysphoria in ADHD? And how can you manage it?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Imagine your friend hasn’t replied to a message in a few hours. Most people might think, “they are probably just busy”.
But someone with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) might spiral into a flood of thoughts like, “they must hate me!” or “I’ve ruined the friendship!”
These intense emotional reactions to real or imagined rejection are part of what’s called rejection sensitive dysphoria.
The term isn’t a formal diagnosis, but it’s gaining traction in both research and clinical work, especially among adults seeking to understand themselves better.
So, what is rejection sensitive dysphoria, how does it relate to ADHD, and how can we handle it with more compassion?
Vitalii Khodzinskyi/Unsplash It’s more than just disliking criticism
Everyone feels hurt when they’re criticised or left out. But rejection sensitivity dysphoria isn’t just about “not liking” feedback. The word dysphoria refers to intense emotional distress.
People with rejection sensitivity dysphoria describe overwhelming reactions to perceived rejection, even if no one actually said or did anything cruel.
A passing comment such as “I thought you were going to do it this way” can trigger feelings of shame, embarrassment or self-doubt.
The emotional pain often feels immediate and consuming, leading some people to withdraw, over-apologise or lash out to protect themselves.
The ADHD brain and emotional hypersensitivity
ADHD is often associated with attention or impulsivity, but one major (and often overlooked) component is emotional dysregulation: difficulty managing and recovering from strong emotional responses.
This isn’t a character flaw; it’s a neurological difference. Brain imaging studies show people with ADHD tend to have differences in how their amygdala (the brain’s emotional alarm system) and prefrontal cortex (which regulates impulses and emotions) work together.
The amygdala is the brain’s emotional alarm system. The prefrontal cortex regulates emotions. chaiyo12/Shutterstock The result? Emotional experiences hit harder and take longer to settle.
A 2018 study highlights this imbalance in emotional control circuits in people with ADHD, explaining why intense feelings can seem to “take over” before logical thinking kicks in.
What does the research say?
Recent research from 2024 reports a strong link between ADHD symptoms and rejection sensitivity. It found students with higher ADHD symptom levels also reported significantly more rejection sensitivity, including a heightened fear of being negatively evaluated or criticised.
Further evidence comes from a 2018 study which showed adolescents with ADHD symptoms were far more sensitive to peer feedback than their peers. Their brain activity revealed they were more emotionally reactive to both praise and criticism, suggesting they may perceive neutral social cues as emotionally charged.
This reflects what I see daily in my clinic. One 13-year-old boy I work with is creative, empathetic and full of potential, yet social anxiety tied to a deep fear of rejection often holds him back. He once told me, “if I say no, they won’t like me anymore”. That fear drives him to go along with things he later regrets, simply to keep the peace and avoid losing connection.
This constant social hypervigilance is mentally draining. Without support, it can spiral into shame, low confidence and ongoing mental health struggles.
Adults with ADHD aren’t immune either. A 2022 study explored how adults with ADHD experience criticism and found many linked it to persistent feelings of failure, low self-worth and emotional reactivity – even when the criticism was constructive or mild.
One client I support – a high-achieving professional diagnosed in her 50s – described learning about rejection sensitive dysphoria as “finding the missing piece of the puzzle”.
Despite consistently excelling in every role, she had long felt anxious about how she was perceived by colleagues. When she received a minor, formal complaint at work, she spiralled into intense self-doubt and shame.
Instead of brushing it off, she thought: “I’m too much”. This belief had been silently reinforced for years by her emotional sensitivity to feedback.
What helps?
If you experience rejection sensitivity dysphoria, you’re not alone, and you’re not broken.
Here are some tools that may help:
- name it. Saying to yourself, “This feels like rejection sensitivity,” can give you distance from the emotional flood
- pause before reacting. Taking slow breaths, counting backwards, or stepping outside are simple grounding strategies that help calm the body’s stress response and restore balance to your nervous system. Research shows slowing your breath and grounding your senses can help shift your body out of fight-or-flight mode, supporting clearer thinking and emotional regulation
- challenge the story. Ask yourself, “What else could be true?” or “How would I speak to a friend feeling this way?”
- consider therapy. Working with a psychologist who understands ADHD and rejection sensitivity dysphoria can help untangle these reactions and develop healthy, self-compassionate responses. The Australian Psychological Society has a Find a Psychologist service: you can search by location, areas of expertise (such as anxiety, ADHD, trauma) and the type of therapy you’re interested in
- start early with kids. Helping children with ADHD learn emotional language, boundary-setting and resilience can prevent rejection sensitivity from becoming overwhelming. For parents, resources such as Raising Children Network and books like The Whole-Brain Child by Daniel Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson offer practical ways to teach these skills at home
- communicate gently. If you work or live with someone who has ADHD, try to give feedback clearly and kindly. Avoid sarcasm or vague phrasing. A little extra clarity can go a long way.
Rejection sensitivity dysphoria isn’t about being fragile or “weak”. It’s about how the ADHD brain processes emotional and social cues. With insight, tools and support, these experiences can become manageable.
Victoria Barclay-Timmis, Adjunct Lecturer in Psychology, University of Southern Queensland
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
Hydroxyapatite Toothpaste – 6 Month Update
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
A dental hygienist tried hydroxyapatite toothpaste for 6 months, and this is what she found:
The results are in
In few words: she took before-and-after photos, or rather, regular photos through the 6-month process.
What she was mostly looking for: tooth translucency, enamel imperfections, and stains.
What she found: a slight improvement within two months, though over the course of the six months, the photos were somewhat inconsistent—however, this may have more to do with the machinations of her camera, the ambient lighting, etc, than it has to do with the toothpaste. In an ideal world, she’d be able to do a density test with a laser on one side and a sensor on the other, but it seems her budget didn’t stretch to that. In terms of subjective improvement, she found that her teeth felt better, even if the visual change was not consistently apparent.
This is consistent with the idea that hydroxyapatite toothpaste can mineralize teeth throughout the tooth, not just from the outside in, due to the porous nature of the enamel. So, a lot of the change may have been on the inside.
Ultimately, she neither recommends nor discommends the toothpaste, and acknowledges that more time, up to a year, may be needed for more noticeable results.
For more on all of this plus visual demonstrations, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like:
Tooth Remineralization: How To Heal Your Teeth Naturally
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
