Top 10 Wedding Don’ts
Radiance-busting ingredients to avoid before the big day.

By L.A. Jones

You will be eye-catching on your wedding day, so exercise your right to control the body they’re all looking at. Here are 10 day-before dietary no-nos:

1. Stimulants. Caffeine and similar uppers have a diuretic effect, which makes you pee more. The less used to them you are, the stronger this side effect. In excess, they also lead to dehydration (less glow!) so stick with milder varieties and yerba mate.
2. High-sodium products. Anywhere from five to 10 pounds of excess fluid can be retained in our cells, making us look and feel bloated. Salty foods are often to blame, so avoid processed soups, snacks and sodas.
3. Simple carbohydrates. Besides being a quick-energy trap that leaves you stalled soon after eating, sugar is another water-retainer.
4. Carbonated drinks, chewing gum, smoking and drinking through straws. All of these cause you to swallow more air, and that gaseous buildup contributes to bloating.
5. Fatty foods. Greasy foods are like bad drivers: They don’t just cause trouble for themselves; they hold everybody up. By keeping food in your GI tract longer, they trigger bloating and constipation, so steer clear.
6. Alcohol. Drinking dehydrates you and alcohol acts as a depressant in the brain, leaving you looking and feeling duller the morning after.
7. Fresh seafood. Sushi, fresh oysters and shellfish are more likely to cause food poisoning than their canned cousins. Why risk it?
8. Smelly foods. Pungent foods like cabbages, onions and garlic don’t just smell before you eat them.
9. Fruit sugars. Fructose and sorbitol, particularly high in bananas, apples, pears, peaches and prunes, can induce gas. Dieters beware: Sorbitol is in lots of artificially sweetened products.
10. Foods high in soluble fiber. This includes peas, soybeans and any other bean. Fermented by bacteria in our intestines, the by-products stink. You probably knew that one. If you’ve been on a diet leading up to the wedding, be especially careful. Drastic increases in dietary fiber cause more obvious gas, so for a blissful honeymoon, don’t go off the health wagon too quickly.