Cleaning Up a Diet Without Restrictions

I catch myself saying the words: “new year, new me” every single January for years, and I get a little annoyed halfway through the month. It’s not that I feel there is anything wrong with the saying—I just think I don’t give myself credit for how good I actually am with most aspects of my life, particularly my health. I run six days a week, lift weights, eat pretty healthy, drink lots of water, stay away from smoking and heavy alcohol, and I wear sunscreen everyday. Besides working on time management this year, which has been a true failure for me since I became self-employed (this will be a separate blog post very soon!), I’ve been wanting to focus on specific aspects of my diet that I have been ignoring for years. I say out loud it is mostly about my acne-prone skin issues, but there are so many other symptoms that I feel are linked to annoying food sensitivities that I have been refusing to address.

As For These “Symptoms”…

I don’t feel I have experienced many symptoms that affect my function on a daily basis, which is the reason why I’ve just ignored them for so long. The only thing that’s really bothered me during my adult life is my acne and melasma, which I feel and have been told is primarily hormone-related. I also regularly get bloating and less than regular digestive issues. Increasing fatigue over the last couple of years has more recently been my main concern, since that specifically has been affecting my strength, running, and daily concentration on my work. Just a few months ago I was diagnosed with borderline hypothyroidism, which is definitely related to these symptoms, but diet can play a large role in managing the condition and keeping my symptoms at bay. My goal is to try and delay the need for long term hormone replacement for this health problem.

Restrictive is NOT the Way to Go…

At least not for me. Last year I went ahead and took advantage of a big discount that was going on for Everlywell—the at-home lab test. I was interested in seeing what food sensitivities I actually have based off of their kit. I know I shouldn’t take this as 100% accurate, especially after doing my own research and reading reviews about the discrepancies between these" “at-home” tests and real allergy testing. I kept in mind that this option was not testing allergies at all—just sensitivities I may have when consuming certain foods. I honestly thought my results would come out to maybe a couple at the most and it was a list of 22 foods! Now, one of the reviews I received from a handful of Instagram followers is that the case for some of these is that the test picks up foods I regularly eat, rather than something in my blood telling me I’m actually sensitive. Therefore I took the results with a grain of salt.

This long list of foods includes almond, wheat, chicken, eggs, garlic, potato, and oats, among others. Surprisingly the only dairy foods that were on the list were mozzarella and yogurt. For a few years now I have tried to stay away from dairy products after the recommendation from a dermatologist, and it made a big difference in my skin and digestive issues. I totally thought this would be number 1 on the list of food sensitivities! Regardless, the list was overwhelming for me so I did not do what was suggested which is an elimination diet. With that many foods on the list, it felt restrictive to me, and when I’ve restricted food groups in the past, it only caused me to have intense cravings and then binge eat. I feel I never minded restricting dairy all this time because I really didn’t care for it to begin with. I don’t like cheese at all, can live without yogurt, have never really been an ice cream fan, and with any recipe that called for milk I was perfectly fine using the alternatives.

Ticking Off New Year’s Resolutions

Okay, so one priority for me as far as goals go for this year is to learn something new every day. So far, I’ve been successful, and one thing I’ve learned this year is about what in milk is really the culprit of digestive issues. It’s the protein! I thought it was the added hormones some farmers use on cows or the lactose, but it’s actually specifically the A1 protein. My parents are very obsessed with A2 milk, which is made from cows that only produce the A2 protein. Once I learned all about this I decided to give this brand a try. As many of you saw on my Instagram feed, I jumped on board and took a challenge this month to switch out my milk, and I’ve been so happy about the results. No bloating, no stomach aches, and NO ACNE! I highly recommend this switch if you are sensitive to regular milk! Oh yea—and right now you can enter to win free a2 Milk for a year and a Peloton Bike + 1 year membership. Click here!

What About the Rest of My Diet?

Well, this post is the start of my goal—attempting to dial in to my current way of eating and pinpoint what is playing a role in my fatigue. I know I can be better about limiting my frozen food lunches and packaged snacks I have been eating regularly for the sake of saving time, so this will be the first thing I tackle (as I write this, I am eating plant-based air-fried chicken tenders). I also need to get back to a regular eating schedule—this will help with energy levels. I tend to get bogged down by projects and forget to eat. This will require me to make time for meal planning and being more creative with quick snack options for my work day.

Tackling this goal in 3, 2, 1… I’ll keep you all posted! Make sure to follow along on Instagram for the latest updates.

Cheat Meals: They May Not Be So Bad After All

Consuming a diet that is 100% healthy food is not the easiest way to live. Although some people do just fine cutting out all of the “bad” foods from their diets, the majority have a hard time. Daily stress surges, cravings kick in, and the temptation of indulging in a whole pizza pie or bag of cookies becomes impossible to dodge. It is known that one of the best ways to even start a diet is not necessarily to go cold-turkey and cut everything out at once, but rather in a gradual manner over the course of weeks. It has been questioned whether including a cheat meal in a diet is harmful or not, but recent research has stated that it can be helpful in order to stick to your strict eating plan as long as you do it the right way.

Not a Cheat “Day”

It is important to note that cheat meals are only helpful to a diet if they are left as that— meals. Often times dieters use an entire day to indulge at every meal and this can wreak havoc on your weight loss goals. Although a cheat meal can rack up to a few thousand calories, it will not undo any of your dieting from earlier in the week. But an entire day of feasting will double or triple those few thousand calories. Having more than one cheat meal may make it hard to get back into your normal healthy eating habits.

Motivation

A cheat meal serves many purposes. Many times it is a source of motivation for someone on a strict diet. Eating plain chicken and vegetables day in and day out can get boring, but knowing that you have a night of burgers and fries or ice cream waiting for you at the end of the week can motivate you to keep strict. Cutting calories when trying to lose weight can lower overall energy levels, especially within the first few weeks of beginning a diet. One cheat meal will actually provide much needed energy to maintain a balance in the body.

Increased Metabolism

Consistently consuming a diet too low in calories will eventually slow down your metabolism, leading to slower weight loss. A cheat meal provides a boost in overall calorie consumption, which will cause a “shock” to the body’s digestion. This will increase your metabolism and help you burn more calories on a daily basis. It is hard to believe, but yes, a cheat meal will actually help you lose weight! There are diet plans that will fluctuate the number of calories you consume each day for this same reason.

The reason this works is because the seldom ‘jump’ in calorie consumption on one day will help regulate the hormones in charge of hunger and satiety. When on a weight loss diet we should be eating fewer calories than we burn, but over time our bodies end up adjusting to this new calorie amount. That is when we hit a plateau and stop losing weight. Adding in one day of a bit higher calories keeps the body in a burning state, helping with further weight loss. Leptin, the hormone in charge of controlling the sensation of feeling full dramatically decreases over time when on a low-calorie diet. Ghrelin, on the other hand, is the hormone that is responsible for telling you that you are hungry and will increase over time on a low-calorie diet. In order to keep burning calories, one should strive to keep the leptin hormone elevated and ghrelin on the lower end. A cheat meal assists with this regulation and aides in continued weight loss.

Keep the Balance

When choosing your cheat meal, it is best to not have the ‘all or nothing’ mentality. If you are going to splurge, make sure it is on something you actually care to eat. Do not waste calories on something that is not that satisfying to you. For example, when going to a restaurant and planning on having a big bowl of creamy pasta for dinner, stick to just that. Your date or party may order a few appetizers that are far from being on the list of your favorite foods, so do not even grab a bite! You will enjoy your pasta dish much more if you steer clear from giving into calories you did not care for in the first place.

The best way to indulge in what you truly enjoy as a cheat meal, but not go overboard, is to cook at home. If you want pizza, make a homemade one—crust and all. This will ensure you know exactly what ingredients are going into every bite. If what you crave are a burger and fries, make your own at home using cooking spray rather than oil, whole grain burgers buns, and baked fries. You will most likely save about half the calories than eating this same meal at a restaurant or fast food joint. It is best to learn the most you can about healthier substitutions. You will be surprised as to how much you can still satisfy your cravings and not feel guilty when opting for healthier alternatives to those ‘bad’ foods.

Sources

Rita Coelho do Valea, Rik Pieters, and Marcel Zeelenberg, The Benefits of Behaving Badly on Occasion: Successful Regulation by Planned Hedonic Deviations, Journal, May 4, 2020.

Balanced Hormones for Better Performance

The body undergoes several different changes during exercise. As much as non-runners may constantly tell their running friends how bad the sport is for the knees or heart, the fact is quite the opposite. Running produces an extraordinary amount of benefits to the body. From better heart health, to improved lung function and joint mobility, runners have an advantage towards a longer and more satisfying life. Many of the benefits and changes that occur during training are straight forward, while others are harder to understand. The effect on the endocrine system is one of the more confusing topics for runners. The endocrine system is responsible for the secretion and regulation of the body’s hormones, which play a significant role in performance improvement.

It is useful for athletes to understand the function of different hormones in order to train properly and safely for endurance events. In many cases, too much information on the benefits of certain hormones has caused some athletes to go to extremes trying to increase the amount in their bodies. From sleeping in high elevation to using performance-enhancing drugs—there are definitely many ways to ‘artificially’ raise hormone levels in the body, but with negative consequences, and possibly no beneficial outcomes. The key to getting the most benefit from the endocrine system for running performance is to keep hormonal balance. When it comes to training, the most important hormones to pay attention to are growth hormone, insulin-like growth factor, cortisol, and testosterone.

Growth Hormone

The pituitary gland in our brains naturally secretes growth hormone in bursts, usually following stress, exercise, or trauma. Although the levels of this hormone vary throughout the day, it is usually increased during the night. Since growth hormone is responsible for the development of bones and cartilage, it makes sense that more of it is produced during childhood and adolescent years as opposed to adult years. The role of growth hormone for runners, or any athlete for that matter, is to facilitate adaptation to exercise, which naturally occurs during rest and recovery periods. It stimulates protein production and helps the body utilize fat for energy, therefore helping runners last longer during endurance events. This is a commonly used performance-enhancing drug in the bodybuilding world as well, since it helps promote gains in size and strength.

Insulin-like Growth Factor

Insulin is produced by the pancreas and is responsible for storing glycogen and glucose in the body. During exercise insulin is suppressed to ensure that glycogen is used as fuel instead of for storage. Insulin-like growth factor has the same structure as insulin, except it is produced in the liver. This hormone works alongside growth hormone to help repair muscle damage caused by exercise. These factors make artificial supplementation attractive to athletes. Although this hormone is considered a banned substance, many are still using it despite the significantly negative side effects. Since insulin-like growth factor contributes to muscle growth and repair, it has been linked to cell growth as well, allowing tumors to survive and possibly grow, increasing the risk of death from cancer. Making sure to supply the body with adequate food, especially from animal proteins, is helpful in naturally maintaining a proper balance of this hormone.

Cortisol

You have probably heard of this hormone when reading or learning about stress and the “fight or flight” response. Cortisol is a hormone produced in the adrenal glands of the body. The natural response during any stressful situation is for these glands to secrete cortisol temporarily to keep our mental state more alert and our bodies ready for action. Hard training puts the body under a type of stress that creates a similar response. The problem with cortisol is the negative effects from its prolonged elevated levels, which is common during overtraining. Too much cortisol breaks down muscle tissue and stores more fat in cells. This eventually leads to a decrease in performance. One way to combat this imbalance is to include proper rest into training plans and avoid overtraining syndrome, which includes symptoms of exhaustion, poor performance, and irritability.

Testosterone

When it comes to running, testosterone is responsible for supporting the growth of muscles and aiding in recovery. Intense workouts, such as interval training or speed work can increase testosterone in the body leading to muscle mass gains and shorter recovery periods over time. Overtraining and prolonged running can decrease levels. Testosterone is another commonly used performance-enhancing drug by endurance athletes for the shorter recovery benefit and bodybuilders for the massive muscle gain benefit. Negative side effects of high testosterone levels are numerous and include behavioral changes, increased risk of heart attack, impotence, and acne. Balancing testosterone levels to benefit your running naturally is as easy as mixing up your running plan and adding in high intensity sessions.

These four hormones are just a few of the many that are involved in running performance. As with any stressful situation, including trauma, injury, and personal tribulations, running increases and/or decreases the levels of hormones in the body. This response is a natural one. Understanding the effects of hormonal imbalance is important in order to learn ways to manage. Artificially increasing hormone levels for the sake of performance improvement does give athletes an advantage, which is why these practices are banned from sports. It is always best to naturally balance out hormone levels, instead of exaggerating the levels of some, in order to avoid harmful side effects.

Sources

R. R. Kraemer, R. J. Durand, E. O. Acevedo, L. G. Johnson, G. R. Kraemer, E. P. Hebert, V. D. Castracane, Rigorous Running Increases Growth Hormone and Insulin-Like Growth Factor-I Without Altering Ghrelin, Journal, Dec 23, 2019.

K. Karkouliasa, I. Habeosa, N. Charokoposa, M. Tsiamitaa, A. Mazarakisb, A. Poulib, K. Spiropoulos, Hormonal responses to Marathon Running in Non-Elite Athletes, Journal, Dec 23, 2019.

C G Semple, J A Thomson, and G H Beastall, Endocrine Responses to Marathon Running, Journal, Dec 23, 2019.