Sometimes it feels like health trends move faster than a toddler you just took your eyes off. You catch wind of the current zeitgeist — what the heck even is mouth taping?!? — and you wonder when looking after yourself got even more complex.

When you're weighing up a new weight loss or wellness strategy, you need to think through the cons as well as the pros. Here's a quick 'n easy shortcut: If one of the cons of whatever you're considering turns out to be muscle loss, run away. Our bodies need muscle. Without it, disease risk and dysfunction go up, and health and performance go down.

There are many ways to adjust your diet or the way you eat. Ever tried mixing up your meal times with intermittent fasting? We're big fans of that method around here. Another increasingly popular approach is plant-based eating, which is good not only for your health but also for the planet.

Intermittent fasting — which alternates fasting periods with an eating window — is a wonderfully flexible principle that you can customize for your needs, wants, and lifestyle. But if you're interested in intermittent fasting, you've probably felt like there are so many options that it's hard to decide which schedule to choose.

Look around, and you'll notice immediately that people are different. Humans vary widely in their shapes and sizes, from the barely-five-foot-tall populations in Indonesia and Bolivia to the easily-six-foot-tall folks of places like the Netherlands and Montenegro. Watch the Olympics, and you'll see diverse body types excelling at different sports: tiny bodies flying through the air in gymnastics, long bodies slicing through the water in swimming, and thick bodies hurling heavy objects through the air.

Cholesterol is a substance that our body makes naturally. We need some of it for good health and function. But when it gets out of whack, it puts us at risk of health problems. Almost 2 in 5 adults in the United States have high cholesterol, and high cholesterol doesn't have any symptoms.

You made it through your fasting window — congratulations! Whether time flew or you had to grit your teeth through a few hunger pains, you crossed the finish line. … Now what? Is any food fair game, or do you need to ease your body back into eating?

We've all been there: that day when you put on your pants and … ouch. The waistband is scrunching your stomach. The elastic isn't elastic-ing quite enough. Or the belt holes seem to have suddenly shifted in the wrong direction. Whatever the reason, you might have had at least one encounter with clothing waistbands that made you think: could I change my belly shape and size?

Possibly the only thing worse than getting that urge — the one that has you clutching at your stomach and running for the bathroom at an inopportune time — is when that urge hasn't come knocking for days, and you feel like your gut is a tight, uncomfortable coil that won't unwind. Since modifications to what and when you eat can affect your bowel movements, it's natural to be nervous that a new eating routine could also mean a new bathroom routine.

If you're feeling anxious about staying on track with all that extra-delicious holiday food around, you're not alone. Navigating food challenges (oh haiiii, social eating and food guilt!) during the holiday season can be tough. The good news is you don't need to eat like the holidays don't exist.