Weight loss without dieting

One of the most common New Year resolution is weight loss (or changing body composition). If you are feeling dissatisfied with your body, wanting to improve your health or feeling tempted to lose weight fast, you may be thinking that a diet, calorie restriction or extreme exercise is the solution.

A desire to lose weight coupled with body dissatisfaction can easily turn unhealthy and dangerous. It's easy to take a diet too far. It's not uncommon for people to make extreme changes - like not eating grains, dairy, sugars and processed foods - severely restricting calories and nutrients all in the name of weight loss. A "diet" may offer quick fixes and a black and white method of dictating what you can and can not eat, but the truth is that these methods are extreme and impossible to maintain in the long term. Plus, they teach you nothing about changing your lifestyle habits which is how long lasting weight loss is achieved.

You can take a pill, injection, supplement, purchase a meal replacement kit, fast for 8-12 hours or follow a fad diet but if your weight loss method isn't sustainable, the weight loss you achieved will not last. Furthermore, with many extreme weight loss methods, there may be long term risks associated. It's easy to think that weight loss will happen easily from eating less and exercising more but maintaining a healthy weight means making sustainable habit changes. 

Here are some practical tips to help you eat healthier without the constraints of dieting:

1. Embrace whole foods

• Fruits and Vegetables - make sure your plate shows color variety
• Whole Grains and potatoes - choose brown rice, quinoa, oats, and potatoes.
• Lean Proteins - incorporate beans, lentils, fish, chicken and tofu.

2. Eat slowly and mindfully

• Take your time to savor each bite.
• Look forward to something at every meal.
• Limit distractions while eating (ex. avoid eating in front of the TV, while reading, scrolling social media, in the car, etc.)
• Pay attention to your hunger and satisfaction cues.

3. Stay Hydrated

• Carry a water bottle with you as a reminder to drink. 
• Add a slice of citrus fruit, a splash of fruit juice, cucumber or mint to add flavor to plain water.

4. Adopt a positive relationship with food

• Avoiding Labeling Foods as "Good" or "Bad" as this can lead to guilt and unhealthy eating habits.
• Focusing on eating for fuel, nourishment and joy. Think about how foods make you feel and how they fuel your body.
• Induldge responsibly to prevent feelings of deprivation and the tendency to overeat.

5. Plan and Prepare Meals and Snacks

• Set aside time once or twice a week to prepare meals and snacks.
• Create a grocery list to help with meal planning (and to avoid impulse buys).
• Don't go more than a few hours without eating. 

Avoid These Common New Year Weight Loss Strategies

 

When it comes to eating, it's not uncommon to have developed a few unhealthy habits over the years. For example, relying too much on caffeine to survive work, using alcohol as a reward after a stressful day or frequent eating out because you forgot to meal prep.

When it comes to the New Year, it's not uncommon to want to make a dietary change, especially if there is a desire to change body composition or to lose weight.

However, it's not uncommon for athletes and fitness enthusiasts to make radical dietary changes. While short term weight loss may result, fad diets and extreme dietary methods are not linked to long term weight loss or health benefits. Rather, following a fad diet increases the risk of disordered eating which increases the risk of developing an eating disorder. And eating disorders are mental illnesses that have serious physical consequences.

If you seek a dietary change for health, performance and/or weight loss, it's important to take a mindful approach. Instead of making drastic changes, here are a few realistic healthy eating changes to foster long-term results.

Should a coach tell an athlete to lose weight?

Coaches are influential role models for athletes and can impact how athletes perceive and feel in and about their bodies.

Unfortunately, as was recently courageously shared by @skyemoench, it's not uncommon for coaches to focus on appearance over body functionality. Body weight is a sensitive and personal issue yet far too many coaches share a belief that a lower body weight will improve performance.

If you are a coach, you have a responsibility to take care of your athlete - physically, emotionally and mentally.

Every athlete has his/her own optimal body composition where the body functions the best and this body is achieved through consistent training, nutritious eating and proper fueling and hydration.

Acknowledge an athlete’s strengths beyond a look, for an athlete is a human - not an object. Making remarks about body composition and performance (even if well-intentioned) can trigger or exacerbate disordered eating thoughts and behaviors.

Having a diverse representation of athlete bodies is important in every sport.

In today’s fad-diet, body image obsessed society, it can be difficult for athletes to keep a healthy perspective on body image. As a coach, use your authority. Help your athlete understand the importance of maintaining a healthy relationship with food and the body. Protect the physical and psychological well-being of your athletes by not associating weight to performance.

For further reading: 

• Why I never tell my athletes to lose weight
• Something needs to change - weight loss in sport
• Ahh, I need to lose weight
  
• For the coaches, when an athletes wants to lose weight
• Trying to reach your race weight
• Race weight

Is your diet too strict?

When someone expresses dietary struggles to me, I often hear responses like "I need to be more disciplined" or "I feel so out of control, I need to get back on track." While it's advised to adapt a nutritious diet for health reasons, eating healthier should never become rigid and extreme. And unless you adapt your eating in a way that honors your hunger, makes you feel satiated and aligns with your personal health and activity goals, you may find yourself with a lot of food-related guilt, shame, deprivation, and a feeling of failure from an unstainable style of eating.

Signs that your eating style may be too strict include:

• watching the clock for permission to eat
• having an off-limit food list
• only eating conditionally (ex. reward food)
• developing a fear of "bad" foods
• avoiding social situations involving food
• feeling constant hunger
• difficulty focusing, headaches or lightheadedness
• avoiding foods that you enjoy
• eliminating food groups or certain foods from the diet
• feeling out of control when eating a certain food
• desire to eat perfectly

The need to be so in control around food (and body weight) often leads to most out of control behaviors. Trying to eat in a way to fix your body into a specific weight, size or look that society views as ideal can lead to feeling out of control around food. In order to feel good about your food choices, it's important to welcome all foods. And to do this, you must be able to tune into your hunger and satisfaction signals. It's nearly impossible to feel in control around food when you are starving. Keep yourself fed and nourished throughout the day by honoring your hunger.

Signs that you are letting yourself get too hungry include: 

• poor concentration, dizzy, lightheaded
• tired, sleepy, sluggish
• hangry, irritable, moody, cranky
• stomach making noises, feelig empty
• low blood sugar, feelig shaky, tingly lips, salivating 

Individuals who try to sustain a strict diet often have standards that are too high (and unrealistic). A perfect day of eating should involve foods that you enjoy, those foods should make you feel satiated and energized, and those foods should fulfill your nutrient and energy needs. You don't need to only eat for health, you also need to eat for enjoyment. Putting limits on what you can or should eat can lead to out of control behaviors, followed by a lot of guilt and shame.

As a final note, the foods that most people feel out of control with are the foods that most people try to avoid - often containing sugar, salt, carbs, and fat. As a result of feeling out of control with certain foods, it's normal to want to set an off-limit food list (to reduce the risk of binging). However, this only leads to overeating. This is a cycle that continues until those "bad" foods are taken off an imaginary forbidden food list. Yes, donuts, muffins, bagels, chips and ice cream can be on the same food list as salads and quinoa. Once you level the food playing field, you can decide what foods make you feel good, rather than feeling controlled by certain foods.

If you feel like you've been trying to follow a strict style of eating, which could be leading to feeling out of control with certain foods, remind yourself that a sustainable style of eating should never involve discipline, willpower and rules. Give yourself unconditional permission to eat all foods.

Also, for a delicious Chanterelle mushroom pasta, check out our latest newsletter HERE.

Diet Culture and the effect on athletes

Yesterday was a great day. Karel, me and our friends Carley and Alvi went for a 64 mile gravel ride in Walhalla. The ride included gravel, road, single track and a lot of climbing. The route took us a little over 5 hours and we covered around 7300 feet of elevation. Carley encouraged me to go for one of the QOM climbs - a 9-ish mile gravel climb that took me 48 minutes. It was super tough to stay on Karel's wheel but I was relieved when it was complete (and I secured the queen status - at least for now). As I was riding, I couldn't help but think about how my body was able to perform. I was so tired and sore from the previous week/weekend of training yet my body was continuing to impress me. This got me thinking about how athletes view and treat their bodies, especially as it relates to food. 

One of the most common New Year resolutions is losing weight or changing body composition. This is very likely due to diet culture. If you are tempted to lose weight fast, it's easy to get sucked into one of the many endless popular diet endorsements.

Diet culture focuses on size, shape and weight. It has an obsession with thinness. Even if it comes across as a 'lifestyle' or 'health-promoting' there is an expectation that if you change the way you look, you'll be more attractive, loved, accepted, happy, valued, healthy and successful.

Diet culture does not prioritize health and well-being. It focuses on thinness, leanness and muscles. Diet culture is everywhere and it requires a daily fight to ignore the constant messages that you are not worthy unless you look a certain way.

With so much pressure to change the way that you look through restrictive eating, you must remember that diet culture is not responsible for the side effects of dieting. These include feelings of guilt and failure, lowered self-esteem, destroying your relationship with food and your body and putting you at risk for disordered eating or an eating disorder. Diet culture glorifies extreme weight loss. It also shames people in larger or non "ideal" bodies.  According to the National Eating Disorders Association, 35% of dieting becomes obsessive and 20-25% of diets turn into eating disorders. 

But this blog post isn't to talk just about diet culture. There is a subculture within diet culture. One that normalizes and even encourages disordered eating habits and body preoccupation. 

Athletic diet culture. 

The general population isn't alone when it comes to buying into diet culture. It's not uncommon for athletes - training 10+ hours a week for an athletic competition - to have an off-limit food list, restrict food groups, avoid carbohydrates, skip snacks and fast - because there's the belief that....

• You'll be faster if you lose weight
• You'll become a better athlete if you lose weight
• You'll be healthier if you lose weight
• You don't look like an athlete, you should lose weight

It's almost impossible to exist happily in your own body when dealing with sport specific pressures around body weight. Many disordered behaviors like excessive training, fasted workouts, avoiding carbohydrates, not consuming sport nutrition, skipping snacks, restricting calories and a preoccupation with food are perceived as normal or even encouraged in the athletic population. Although disordered eating behaviors are unhealthy for the general population, they can be somewhat dangerous to the athlete population. 

For athletes - no matter your current size, age or fitness ability - your ability to stay consistent with training and absorb training training depends on the fuel and nutrients that you give it. Like a car, your body will not run without fuel. However, unlike a car, your body will begin to struggle when fuel supply begins to drop below half a tank. The nutrients in the food that you eat plays a vital role in your body's ability to withstand training stress and function in daily life. Poor nutrition can lead to fatigue, hormonal issues, compromised immunity and bone health, slowed metabolism, injury, poor performance, difficulty concentrating, low motivation, burnout and restless sleep. 

While certain diets may look appealing for health, weight loss or performance, consider what may happen to your body when it doesn't receive adequate vitamins and minerals due to calorie/food restriction: 

Gluten Free - low in fiber, iron, folate, vitamin D, B12, magnesium, calcium, zinc. 
Clean eating (no processed or fortified foods) - low in calcium, iron, folate, B12, potassium, calcium, sodium. 
Keto/low carb- low in fiber, carbohydrates, vitamin D, calcium, folate, magnesium, vitamin D.
Vegan - low in protein, iron, calcium, vitamin D, B12, Omega-3.
Low calorie - everything.

Whether you choose to change your diet for medical, health, ethical or performance reasons, it's important to consider what your style of eating does or doesn't provide in order to ensure you can stay healthy and perform well as an athlete. 

Don't downgrade your training by dieting in order to attempt to achieve a specific body composition. Upgrade your diet to support your training. Performance improvements come from taking care of your body, not from simply existing in a smaller body.

Breaking the holiday restrict-binge cycle

The holiday season is here and it's filled with family, friends and.....food. 

Without a doubt, food is a significant component of every holiday. For anyone who suffers from an eating disorder or an unhealthy relationship with food and the body, this can be a challenging time of the year. 

You may not realize it but the holidays bring several triggers that could lead to disordered eating and exercising behaviors. Often times, stress, overwhelm, people pleasing, travel, toxic relationships/family members, uncomfortable conversations and finances can bring on uncomfortable feelings. In order to lessen those emotions, it's easy to resort to food restriction (or dieting).

And with restriction often comes binge eating. Overeating from time to time does not mean that you have a binge eating disorder. Fundamentally, binge eating is different from overeating. 

Signs and symptoms of binge eating include: 

• Eating a large amount of food in a short period of time (ex. over 2 hours)
• Frequent episodes of eating more than what may be considered a normal amount of food. 
• Binging as a way of coping with unwanted feelings, stress and anxiety. 
• Eating beyond fullness. 
• Feeling that your eating behavior is out of control. 
• Eating large amounts of food without being physically hungry. 
• Feelings of guilt, sadness, distress, worthlessness after not being able to control eating.

In our society, a lot of shame comes from eating too much whereas restriction is viewed as being good - having willpower, discipline and control. Despite stigmas and societal beliefs, binging (or overeating) isn't from lack of willpower or discipline. Binge eating is a common result of restriction. In other words, the solution to avoid binge eating is to eat more. 

If you ever find yourself binge eating or over eating, there's a good chance that you are intentionally - or unintentionally - restricting your food intake. This can occur from not eating enough, skipping meals (ex. breakfast, lunch), going long hours without eating, restricting carbs, eliminating food groups or specific foods or overexercising. 

Your body is constantly trying to protect you. For example, to keep your body from overheating, your body will initiate sweating. When you have a fever, your body may use 'chills' to boost core temperature to kill off a virus. The body is no different when it comes to responding to restriction. If you don't eat enough early in the day (or you don't fuel well during a long workout), your body is going to beg for what it missed out on. Our biology is hardwired to protect us against starvation. And if your body has ever experienced starvation trauma, it's likely to overreact any time you undereat. 

Because most people don't worry about where their next meal is coming from (10% of US households are food insecure due to low income, poverty or unemployment), if you have ever been on a diet or intentionally restricted food, this can be viewed as self-imposed starvation. And your body doesn't care if you don't have the ability or access to food or you are trying to intentionally lose weight. If your body senses an extreme caloric deficit, it's going to react by trying to protect you. 

The restrict-binge cycle can not be broken with food rules or willpower. The only way to reduce the risk of binging is to stop the restriction. 

Saving calories - Starving your body of calories so that you can "make room" for a large holiday meal will lead to overeating. Instead of saving your calories, see your meal as just another meal. Go into the meal feeling slightly hungry by eating well-balanced meals and snacks throughout the day, starting with a healthy breakfast. By arriving to you meal slightly hungry, you will eat in a controlled manner, making a conscious decision about what and how much you want to eat. 

Get in tune with your hunger scale - Despite being born with an exceptional intutive sense of your bodies physiological needs, you may have lost the ability to detect and respond to signals of hunger and fullness. Not surprisingly, disordered eating behaviors and a restrict-binge cycle can negatively impact your ability to properly feel fullness and hunger. A hunger scale can help with eating-related decisions as you practice body awareness. 


Begin eating your meal around 3-4 on the hunger scale and to finish your meal at 5 or 6. Give yourself time to chew and digest your food as the hunger scale can quickly (or slowly) change throughout the eating experience. 

Stop depriving yourself - Where there is excess there is usually deprivation. Similar to a feast-or-famine cycle found in people living with food insecurity, if you forbid yourself from eating certain foods and then give yourself permission to eat when food is abundant, you may find yourself feeling out of control. This was well-documented in the well-known, unethical Minnesota Starvation Experiment. Restrictive eating only increases the desire for the forbidden foods. When these "off-limit" foods are finally available (and allowed), there's a good chance that you will overeat. 

Mindful Eating - You will enjoy food the most when you are slightly hungry. Food always tastes the best on the first bite. There's a point when food no longer tastes as good as it was. By staying in tune with your eating, you can determine when you are finished eating. Eating should be a positive, joyful, comforting and feel-good experience. Aim to feel better after you eat than before you started. 

References: 
https://www.rosewoodranch.com/binge-eating-signs-symptoms/
https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/ag-and-food-statistics-charting-the-essentials/food-security-and-nutrition-assistance/#:~:text=The%20prevalence%20of%20food%20insecurity,had%20very%20low%20food%20security.
https://www.eatingrecoverycenter.com/blog/i-cant-tell-when-im-full
https://academic.oup.com/jn/article/135/6/1347/4663828

For the Coaches - when an athlete wants to lose weight

 

With so many ways to enhance performance and to optimize health, two of the most popular sought-after strategies include diet and body composition changes. When done correctly, performance may improve. However, it’s not uncommon for athletes to engage in unhealthy weight control methods, resulting in great emotional and physical consequences. Whether for aesthetics, competitive leanness, body dissatisfaction or in pursuit of an ideal “race weight,” athletes often place unrealistic expectations on performance and their bodies. What may start as an innocent attempt to lean-up or to lose a few pounds, can easily spiral out of control, undermining health, training, recovery, performance and mental well-being.

If you are a coach, you have a responsibility to take care of your athlete - physically, emotionally and mentally. 

When your athlete feels pressure to achieve a leaner body composition, an increased fascination with nutrition, body fat, weight and calories can develop into an unhealthy group of eating behaviors called disordered eating. Typical disordered eating behaviors include obsessive counting calories, clean eating, carrying out food rituals, fasting, avoiding sport nutrition products, having an off-limit food list, or avoiding certain foods or food groups for non-medical reasons.

If you are concerned that your athlete may have an unhealthy relationship with food and the body, start the conversation with a non-judgmental tone in order to make your athlete feel safe and cared about. Making it clear that you care about your athlete’s health and well-being, you may say, “I’m worried about you because I’ve noticed that you are struggling to complete your workouts lately.” You may also say, “you’ve been experiencing a lot of injuries/sicknesses lately. It may be best to consult with a sport dietitian to make sure you can adapt to your upcoming training load.”

The most common precipitating factor in the development of an eating disorder is dieting. What starts as a well-intentioned diet plan, slowly transforms into skipping meals, undereating, removing specific foods or entire food groups from the diet and sacrificing calories before and after workouts. An eating disorder is a serious psychiatric condition that affects all types of individuals. Eating disorders are complex and multifactorial. Interestingly, athletes are at higher risk for an eating disorder compared to the rest of the population. A disciplined, goal-oriented athlete can be guilty of chasing perfectionism. Feeling great pressure to succeed, restricting food can become an easy way to exert control. Constantly pushing the body to the limits, athletes don’t realize how much energy is needed for training. Lastly, many athletes believe that leanness is an essential factor in improving performance. But as we can see in today's society, records are being broken by all different body types.

With several different genetic and socio-cultural triggers, risk factors for an eating disorder include dieting, need for control, weight stigma, body dissatisfaction, perfectionism, anxiety, biochemical imbalances, traumatic life events, behavior inflexibility, nutrition misinformation, low self-esteem, and being teased or bullied. With a strong stigma behind eating disorders, it’s important to show support to those who are struggling and to emphasize that help is available.

As a coach, routinely remind your athletes that optimizing performance should not require excessive training and restrictive eating. Resorting to destructive methods of manipulating body composition will only sabotage performance and health.

Pay attention to any warning signs that your athlete may be eating too little and training too hard. Fatigue, anemia, compromised bone health, hormonal imbalances, hair loss, notable weight loss, lack of energy, a decline in muscle mass and strength, mood changes, amenorrhea, restless sleep, and overuse injuries are common signs of an energy imbalance. Inadequate caloric intake relative to energy expenditure (RED-S) will result in extra stress on the body – increasing the risk for injury, sickness and burnout. 

Encourage athletes to maintain healthy training and eating behaviors that will favor long-term health and longevity in sport. It’s encouraged to partner with a Board Certified Sport Dietitian to provide effective, safe and personalized nutrition advice to athletes. If you are concerned about an athlete’s weight or health, a Board Certified Sport Dietitian can counsel athletes who are struggling with the physical and emotional consequences of dieting. 

As a coach, how much emphasis do you place on body image?

Do you often talk about weight loss, body fat or dietary trends to your athletes?

Body composition is a sensitive and personal issue yet far too many coaches share an overvalued belief with their athletes that a lower body weight will improve performance. Inadvertently, you may be placing your own values and attitudes regarding weight, dieting and body image on your athletes. As a coach, you should never assume that reducing body fat or weight will enhance the performance of your athlete. Every athlete has his/her own optimum performance weight where the body functions the best and this body type is achieved through consistent training, nutritious eating and proper fueling and hydration. Acknowledge an athlete’s strengths beyond the physical, for athletes are more than just a look. Making remarks about body composition and performance can trigger or exacerbate disordered eating thoughts and behaviors. Don’t be the coach who makes stereotypical assumptions about the ideal body type for athletic greatness.

As a coach, use your power and authority. In today’s fad-diet, body image obsessed society, it can be difficult for athletes to keep a healthy perspective on body image. Help your athlete understand the importance of maintaining a healthy body composition – even if that image doesn’t look like the idealized image seen on social media. Protect the physical and psychological well-being of your athletes by discouraging dieting and enforcing health and performance-promoting eating habits.

Extreme nutrition habits are extremely trendy while discussions of health are lacking. Be a role model and encourage your athletes to care for their mental and physical health. Eating is not cheating. Meeting daily nutritional needs and supporting training sessions with proper sport nutrition is a necessary component of athletic success, and it keeps sport fun, long-lasting and health-promoting.

Facing your food fears

 

Have you recently taken healthy eating to the extreme? Have you rid your diet of all processed or non organic food? Has your fear of sugar reached a new level of obsession? Do you put carrots, bananas and raisins in the same "off limit" food list as candy, ice cream and cookies? 

Food restriction is a common disordered eating symptom. This avoidance behavior involves setting rigid rules that tell you which foods are "allowed" in your diet and what foods are "off limit." 

While calorically-dense foods are the most commonly avoided, fear foods vary from person to person and they may even vary depending on the day. Fear foods are foods that you may feel anxious or uncomfortable eating - thus the reason why they are feared. The fear may come from thoughts of how this food may affect your weight or body composition, how this food may affect how you feel about your body or any past negative experiences from a food. With no underlying medical, ethical or religious reasons, the thought (or act) of eating this food can make you feel ashamed or guilty. 

The reason behind your thoughts and fears about a food can stem from friends or family but more common reasons include social media, news and the ever-so-damaging diet culture. In our weight-obsessed society, diets are filled with "good" and "bad" foods. In attempt to lose weight or change body composition, the "bad" foods are removed in an effort to succeed with the diet plan. These off limit foods are correlated with the idea of cheating on the diet - and things bring great anxiety, guilt and shame. The more diets or meal plans that you follow, the more rules you develop - which can lead to many different food fears. 

Consider your diet as a whole before obsessing over and restricting sugar, gluten, dairy, carbs, calories or any other food, food group, ingredient or food component. The more fear you have around food, the more anxiety and guilt you bring to eating. This can cause lack of pleasure in food (and eating), food rigidity (only eating "safe" foods), isolation (not eating out or eating with others) and avoiding food-related events and activities. Food fears also creates an increased obsession with food which can lead into an eating disorder. Food fears requires a lot of time and mental energy with so much thinking and planning regarding food - which means having less time and energy to living a quality-filled life. 

All foods can fit into a healthy and active lifestyle. A nutritious diet is built on long-term, sustainable behaviors that enhance your quality of life. Challenging your food fears takes time, effort and courage. Disordered eating habits keep your life small. If rules and restrictions are not challenged, it's difficult to make your life big and meaningful. 

Because of the great fear of binging on fear foods, it's best to work with a dietitian who specializes in disordered eating when facing food fears. The dietitian will help you work through your food fears by helping you build confidence and trust in your food related decisions as you create coping strategies to use during the feared food process. 

The more power you give to food, the more you obsess over it. Disordered eating removes important things from your life - from relationships to travel. In an effort to gain control over eating, it's likely that you may lose more than just weight - relationships, careers, family, friends, vacations, joy, travel, etc. It is possible to have a healthy relationship with food. You have within you the courage and strength to face your food fears as you work toward a life where food no longer has power of you.

Diet culture and body image

In the midst of a global health crisis, now is a perfect time to make health and nutrition a priority. But in our body-image obsessed culture - supported by a multibillion-dollar industry that profits from body dissatisfaction, the idealized body image, dieting and fear of fat, this can be incredibly difficult as there's nothing healthy about our diet culture. Sadly, weight loss and body image are still a priority for many in a global health crisis.

The diet culture is constantly reminding you that you are not good enough at your current weight and being a bit thinner or more toned will improve your health and happiness.

If self-isolation and stay-at-home orders are becoming a real challenge in managing your mental health as it relates to your body image, consider that no amount of dieting or extreme exercise will make this pandemic less scary or will improve your mental well-being. Restriction, purging, bingeing, obsession, rigidity or "clean eating" only provide a false sense of control and temporary numbing of emotions in the otherwise out-of-control world that we are currently living in.

If you’re struggling with food or body image at this time, I want you to know that you’re not alone. Because the diet culture is alive and well during this pandemic, here are some important reminders to help you get through this chapter in your life:

• It's ok to feel your emotions - As a culture, we are taught to avoid unpleasant emotions. This often leads to finding ways to temporarily escape from these uncomfortable feelings - often relying on alcohol, drugs, restricting food, binging on food, staying busy, or self-harming as coping mechanisms. With so much going on, you have every right to experience a range of emotions. There are many new obstacles and circumstances to navigate. If you are having a difficult time, what you are feeling is completely valid. An integral component of being able to cope with emotions is the practice of self-compassion. Stay kind, grateful and compassionate to your body.

• Life is not pass or fail - Perfectionism is never helpful. Perfect is the enemy of the good. Instead of aiming for perfect, focus on making something "good enough". Do the best you can with what you have. Not every meal is going to be perfectly balanced. Sometimes your snacks will be just ok. Your diet may ebb and flow based on your energy, mood and what you can find at the store (or in your kitchen). This ok. Stay flexible with your food choices knowing that the most important thing right now is keeping yourself nourished as best as you can.
• Set boundaries - The intense media coverage, overwhelming tips by fitness influencers and conflicting messages on social media can increase feelings of anxiety and depression. When you feel overwhelmed, down or anxious, it can be extremely difficult to take action and do things that positively help to improve your mood and thinking. Set boundaries for yourself so that you do, read and see things that help to lift your mood.
• Talk it out - You do not have to face your feelings alone. Talk to someone you trust about your concerns or reach out to a health professional. 

13 questions to ask yourself before starting a new diet

→You recently watched a documentary and you are convinced vegan is the right diet for you. 

→You've been following the recent health and fitness trends on social media and you are convinced that carbs are evil and keto is the way to go. 

→You are ready, more than ever before, to get your diet under control and to get yourself back into good health. Starting tomorrow, you will eliminate all dairy, gluten, sugar, sodium and processed food. 

If you are considering a change in your diet, you are not alone. Whether it's for weight loss, body composition changes, health, self-confidence or mental well-being, you may feel that a significant change in your diet is exactly what you need right now in your life.

Unfortunantly, a healthy and well-balanced diet is not something that can be rushed. For long term success, quick fix diets are not the answer. In such a food and body obsessed society, dietary extremism seems like the norm. Radical, overnight changes often stem from misleading pseudo-scientific claims and empty promises. At the cost of your health, well-being, time, energy and money, I encourage you to ask yourself the following questions before starting a new diet.

1. Is this diet practical for my current lifestyle, health needs and activity regime? 
2. Does this diet fit within my food, health and athletic ideologies?
3. Am I choosing this diet for health/medical/ethical reasons? 
4. Am I choosing this diet because it is popular/trendy and/or I need a quick fix? 
5. Do I need to seek nutritional assistance from a dietitian before making changes to my diet to ensure I do things correctly so that I don't negatively affect my health/performance?
6. Can I realistically maintain and committ to this style of eating for the next 6 months? 
7. What changes will I need to make to my lifestyle to make this a sustainable style of eating so that it doesn't negatively impact my health and/or performance? 
8. How will this diet impact my social life, family, relationships, work/career, physical abilities and/or mental well-being? 
9. Does this diet negatively impact the environment/planet?
10. Is there well-supported scientific research and long-term studies to prove that this diet is effective, safe and health promoting in the long-term?
11. How will the "off limit food list" impact my physical, mental and emotional well-being? 
12. What aspects of this diet will help me with my unhealthy lifestyle and eating habits (ex. emotional eating, overeating, poor sleep habits, don't like to cook, etc). 
13. Is there a chance that I will become fixated with this style of eating and risk an unhealthy, obsessive relationship with food? 

Bonus question: Without overhauling my diet, what's one thing that I could do to add nutritional value to my current diet?

Body image and athletics - something needs to change!

Unhealthy weight control/loss practices are a serious and ongoing problem in sport, especially in aesthetic and weight-bearing sports, like running and triathlon. Too often, athletes are pressured by media, coaches and competitors to change body composition in order to boost performance. There's the mentality that you have to be thin to wind.

But if losing weight was a guarantee to performance improvements, why don't more athletes excel at sport after they experience some type of weight loss?

Many athletes are told (or assume) that they would be more successful in a sport if they lost weight or changed body composition. Regardless of the performance outcome, athletes who are asked or told to lose weight.change body composition are more likely to engage in unhealthy behaviors such as fasted workouts, skipping meals, replacing higher calorie foods for calorie-free/diet foods, fasting/cleansing/detoxing, using weight loss supplements, diuretics or laxatives and/or overexercising. While a short period of performance enhancements may be seen, most athletes end up with broken bones/stress fractures, hormonal issues, amennorhea (females), fatigue and burnout. Far from the performance improvements that are told to happen from weight loss!

Although I am not a sport psychologist (like my amazing friend Dr. G), feeling the need to lose weight can be a form of emotional abuse. Whether you are told to lose weight from a coach, you are constantly comparing yourself to other people or your inner critic is telling you that you would be a better/faster/happier athlete if you lost weight, you may not be aware of the emotional trauma that you are enduring and how it affects your confidence and self-worth.

How can we change the mindset of so many athletes/coaches that weight loss = performance improvements? 

• It starts with the coach - who is directly involved with an athlete's physical and mental development. Many coaches and experts wrongly place their own attitudes, thoughts, strategies and personal experiences with weight, dieting and body image on their athletes. Athletes need a coach who is a good role model, promoting  positive self-image and healthy dietary and fueling strategies. Coaches need to recognize that an athlete is more than just a body and athletic success does not result from a number on the scle or body image. 
• Weight is a sensitive and personal issue for many athletes. You can't look at someone and tell if he/she has underlying issues with food and body image. Unfortunately, many coaches and experts do not realize how certain words can affect an athlete. For example, if a coach tells his athlete that its bad to eat carbs after 6pm and the athlete eats a slice bread at 6:05pm, the athlete may feel like a bad person. When a nutrition "expert" suggests to an athlete that weight loss will improve performance, that athlete will spend a considerable amount of energy trying to change body composition (often through quick fixes and extreme approach). If a coach makes a snarky comment about an athlete's size, the athlete may feel an overwhelming sense of distress - overlooking strengths and becoming obsessed with weaknesses. 
• Coaches need to see an athlete as more than an object - consider how an athlete's lifestyle choices, mental and physical health, emotions and individual development can contribute to performance. It's absolutely wrong and unjust to assume that if an athlete weighs less, he/she will become a better athlete.  We must stop assuming that when an athlete looks differently, he/she will perform differently. 
• You can't perform at your best if you are not in optimal health. Because most athletes do not seek out professional guidance from a sport dietitian, there is no one to closely monitor and watch over an athlete for extreme behaviors. A sport dietitian can also clear up misinformation and debate against unhealthy dietary practices that may sabotage performance and health.

As a coach, sport RD and athlete, I take performance and health very seriously. I never ever tell my athletes to lose weight - ever! 

We must stop viewing weight as a performance limiter or as the best next step toward athletic greatness. There are many ways to boost performance, like eating "enough", fueling properly, timing food with workouts, strength training, mental strength, quality sleep, good recovery practices and consistent training. While weight loss may lead to performance improvements, we can't assume that reducing body fat will benefit every athlete. There are no shortage of cases where athletes have experienced a temporary boost in performance in the initial phases of changing body composition but eventually suffer from eating-disorder/disordered eating symptoms, overtraining, hormonal issues, menstrual irregularities (female athletes), low bone density, a weakened immune system, chronic injuries and a performance decline (or a sporting career cut short) overtime.

Sports are designed to build self-esteem, boost confidence, promote physical strength, improve skills and teach life lessons. As an athlete, you should do what you like to do, which is participate in the sport you love. It's hard to love what you can do with your body when you are underfuled, undernourished and underappreciated.

If an athlete feels the need to lose weight (for whatever reason), he/she should be the one to voice the concern and the next step is to consult with a sport dietitian - an outside voice to provide non-judgemental, practical, realistic, effective and safe information.  With proper education, support and guidance, athletes are more likely to stay in good mental and physical health, experience athletic excellence and maintaint great enjoyment for sport for many years.

Athletes - love your amazing body and be sure to thank it. Rest it, respect it, nourish it and fuel it daily. 

Do you fall victim to fad diets?

How many times have you fallen victim to the dieting trap?

-Restrict food to try to lose weight or to gain control over food choices.
-Feel deprived.
-Crave foods you are restricting.
-Feel miserable, isolated or confused.
-Give into temptation and eat off-limit food.
-Mentally beat yourself up for eating something you shouldn't be eating and think "What the heck. I failed again so I may as well eat it all."
-Feel guilty, uncomfortable and anxious. Become overly critical of your body. Feel like a failure. Get angry. Blame yourself for not having willpower.
-Binge eat or give up on the diet and go back to your old ways of eating.
-Begin the cycle again.

If you are one of the 45 million Americans who go on a diet each year, please keep these important reminders in mind when you consider a new/popular diet as a new way of eating.

• Dieting affects your self-esteem. You don't fail at dieting, the diet fails you.
• Diets severly restrict your food choices, making you feel deprived. In return, the desire to eat "off limit" food increases.
• You blame willpower for not thriving on your new diet but body is likely not receiving the energy and nutrients it needs to function at its best. 
• Dieting makes food the enemy. As a result, dieting can lead to an unhealthy relationship with food and unhealthy behaviors such as fasting, binging, excessive exercising, food obsession, social isolation and skipping meals. 
• It's common that eating disorders start off as dieting. 
• It's difficult to love our body and diet at the same time. To respect and care for your body, you must nourish and fuel your body. 
• Food does not need to be labeled "good or bad." Labeling food as bad suggests that if you eat a certain food, you are a "bad" person. 
• Food doesn't fix feelings or emotions. When you feel anxious, bored, lonely, stressed or upset, find ways to comfort yourself without food. 
• Get in touch wih your body's signs of hunger, fullness and satisfaction. Learn to eat more mindfully. 
• Don't use exercise as a way to lose weight. Exercise because it feels good - mentally and physically - to be active. 
• Eat for health, not weight loss. A sustainable diet is balanced, non-restrictive and easy to maintain for a lifetime. 

Coach vs. the Dieting Athlete

In many sports, it is considered beneficial to achieve a leaner body composition for locomotive efficiency — in other words, the less you weigh, the easier it is to move your body. Within the sport of triathlon, triathletes are not immune to this mindset and will often manipulate the diet in order to achieve a lower body fat percentage. Although there are safe and healthy ways to change body composition, triathletes can be very rigid and inflexible with their thoughts and actions. When a driven, perfectionistic, competitive, achievement-oriented triathlete is constantly exposed to diet discussions, advertisements, articles, endorsements and images on social media, a general interest in weight loss may manifest into an unhealthy obsession.

With so many ways to enhance performance and to optimize health, two of the most popular sought-after strategies by athletes include diet and body composition changes. When done correctly, performance may improve. However, it’s not uncommon for athletes to engage in unhealthy weight control methods, resulting in great emotional and physical consequences. Whether for aesthetics, competitive leanness, body dissatisfaction or in pursuit of an ideal “race weight,” athletes often place unrealistic expectations on performance and their bodies. What may start as an innocent attempt to lean-up or to lose a few pounds, can easily spiral out of control, undermining health, training, recovery, performance and mental well-being.

Earlier this year, I was asked to contribute an article to the USAT Performance Coaching Newsletter - an educational newsletter provided to all USA Triathlon coaches. For the month of June, the USAT Performance Coaching Newsletter was dedicated to nutrition. As we all know, for optimal performance, nutrition is just as important as training. For triathlon coaches, it is important that you are familiar with nutrition guidelines and recommendations as well as understanding how to effectively speak to your athletes about nutrition and body image.

If you are a coach, you have a responsibility to take care of your athlete - physically, emotionally and mentally.

When your athlete feels pressure to achieve a leaner body composition, an increased fascination with nutrition, body fat, weight and calories can develop into an unhealthy group of eating behaviors called disordered eating. Typical disordered eating behaviors include obsessive counting calories, clean eating, carrying out food rituals, fasting, avoiding sport nutrition products, having an off-limit food list, or avoiding certain foods or food groups for non-medical reasons.

If you are concerned that your athlete may have an unhealthy relationship with food and the body, start the conversation with a non-judgmental tone in order to make your athlete feel safe and cared about. Making it clear that you care about your athlete’s health and well-being, you may say, “I’m worried about you because I’ve noticed that you are struggling to complete your workouts lately.” You may also say, “you’ve been experiencing a lot of injuries/sicknesses lately. It may be best to consult with a professional to make sure you can adapt to your upcoming training load.”

The most common precipitating factor in the development of an eating disorder is dieting. What starts as a well-intentioned diet plan, slowly transforms into skipping meals, undereating, removing specific foods or entire food groups from the diet and sacrificing calories before and after workouts. An eating disorder is a serious psychiatric condition that affects all types of individuals. Eating disorders are complex and multifactorial. Interestingly, athletes are at higher risk for an eating disorder compared to the rest of the population. A disciplined, goal-oriented athlete can be guilty of chasing perfectionism. Feeling great pressure to succeed, restricting food can become an easy way to exert control. Constantly pushing the body to the limits, athletes don’t realize how much food and fluids are needed for training. Lastly, many athletes believe that leanness is an essential factor in improving performance. With these realities in mind, it’s not difficult to understand why so many athletes suffer from eating disorders and disordered eating behaviors.

With several different genetic and socio-cultural triggers, risk factors for an eating disorder include dieting, need for control, weight stigma, body dissatisfaction, perfectionism, anxiety, biochemical imbalances, traumatic life events, behavior inflexibility, nutrition misinformation, low self-esteem, and being teased or bullied. With a strong stigma behind eating disorders, it’s important to show support to those who are struggling and to emphasize that help is available.

As a coach, routinely remind your athletes that optimizing performance should not require excessive training and restrictive eating. Resorting to destructive methods of manipulating body composition will only sabotage performance and health.

Pay attention to any warning signs that your athlete may be eating too little and training too hard. Fatigue, anemia, compromised bone health, hormonal imbalances, hair loss, notable weight loss, lack of energy, a decline in muscle mass and strength, mood changes, amenorrhea, restless sleep, and overuse injuries are common signs of an energy imbalance. Inadequate caloric intake relative to energy expenditure (RED-S) will result in extra stress on the body – increasing the risk for injury, sickness and burnout. 

Encourage athletes to maintain healthy training and eating behaviors that will favor long-term health and longevity in sport. It’s encouraged to partner with a Board Certified Sport Dietitian to provide effective, safe and personalized nutrition advice to athletes. If you are concerned about an athlete’s weight or health, a Board Certified Sport Dietitian can counsel athletes who are struggling with the physical and emotional consequences of dieting.

As a coach, how much emphasis do you place on body image? Do you often talk about weight loss, body fat or dietary trends to your athletes? Body composition is a sensitive and personal issue yet far too many coaches share an overvalued belief with their athletes that a lower body weight will improve performance. Inadvertently, you may be placing your own values and attitudes regarding weight, dieting and body image on your athletes. As a coach, you should never assume that reducing body fat or weight will enhance the performance of your athlete. Every athlete has his/her own optimum performance weight where the body functions the best and this body type is achieved through consistent training, nutritious eating and proper fueling and hydration. Acknowledge an athlete’s strengths beyond the physical, for athletes are more than just a look. Making remarks about body composition and performance can trigger or exacerbate disordered eating thoughts and behaviors. Don’t be the coach who makes stereotypical assumptions about the ideal body type for athletic greatness.

As a coach, use your power and authority. In today’s fad-diet, body image obsessed society, it can be difficult for athletes to keep a healthy perspective on body image. Help your athlete understand the importance of maintaining a healthy body composition – even if that image doesn’t look like the idealized image seen on social media. Protect the physical and psychological well-being of your athletes by discouraging dieting and enforcing health and performance-promoting eating habits.

Extreme nutrition habits are extremely trendy while discussions of health are lacking. Be a role model and encourage your athletes to care for their mental and physical health. Eating is not cheating. Meeting daily nutritional needs and supporting training sessions with proper sport nutrition is a necessary component of athletic success, and it keeps sport fun and health-promoting.

My article can be found in the 2019 June issue of the USAT Performance Coaching Newsletter.

Food elimination to improve gut health?

You are not alone. Everyone has that day when your stomach feels blah and you just want to feel better in your own skin. It's important to acknowledge that your body will change shape throughout the day. Sadly, there's no instant fix that will immediately change the way that your body looks or feels. In other words - don't restrict food and overexercise in order to try to escape this uncontrollable feeling.

When you eat, the shape of your digestive tract changes. Your stomach may protrude and as your body breaks down food, you will retain water, develop gas and produce stool. This can all contribute to feeling bloated, "big" or heavy. Your physical weight (not body fat) can also increase due to constipation, sodium, water, hormones, exercise and medications.

To optimize digestion, we want to be in a relaxed state - rest and digest. For athletes, this can be rather difficult as our body becomes rather stressed during (or in the hours after) a workout - fight or flight. Couple this with life stress and anxiety, normal digestive processes can easily get out of whack.

As a sport RD, I often find myself in a complicated situation when dealing with athletes who suffer from digestive issues. On one hand, no person should feel uncomfortable after eating, which may mean recognizing what foods are not well tolerated and should be minimized or avoided. However, on the other hand, one of the worst things I can do for the athlete is give a list of foods that he/she should avoid when in reality, the underlying cause is not food related. It can be a very challenging situation. Sadly, in today's society, when someone has digestive issues, gluten, dairy and fructose are quickly blamed and avoided.

Because everyone is different, if an athlete comes to me with digestive issues, the athlete needs to know it's going to take some time to improve gut health. Food restriction is not always the first resort. While temporarily eliminating/reducing some foods may be needed, the diet will likely evolve and change overtime. Ultimately, my goal is to optimize digestive health with the least amount of food restrictions. In other words, I want my athletes to be able to eat as many foods as possible for physical, emotional and mental well-being, while also taking care of the gut.

Because gut disorders are extremely common among individuals with a current or past history with an eating disorder/disordered eating, a trusting relationship with my nutrition athletes is extremely important. Regardless of past history, athletes need to know that I may not be able to solve all GI problems but with a good relationship with food and the body, there's a good chance that the athlete will feel better about the foods in his/her diet and improve gut health.

Because not all GI issues are food related, here are a few reasons why your digestive system may not be functioning properly:

• Stomach is full of food 
• Constipation 
• IBS, SIBO
• You recently ate fermentable, gas-producing foods such as onions, garlic, beans, dairy, apples, honey, sugar alcohols and cauliflower. 
• Dehydration 
• Stress and anxiety
• Inflammation 
• Delayed gastric emptying (gastroparesis)
• Endocrine responses to an extreme/chronic energy deficit
• Shifts in fluids and electrolytes
• Water weight
• Shrunken stomach from chronic low volume of food
• Change in gut bacteria/lack of healthy gut bacteria
• Underlying medical issue
• Food intolerance/allergy 

As mentioned above, digestive issues can make it very difficult for an athlete to (want to) change eating habits. If an athlete is already restricting food/carbs/calories in the diet or struggling with body image, more food elimination is not the answer. Yes, it's very difficult to try a new style of eating when you are struggling with gas, bloating, constipation or loose stools or you struggle with your body image, but to improve gut health, it can't just be about food elimination. At first, you may have some food intolerances but this doesn't mean that you will forever need to follow an off-limit food list. 

When you've been limiting the foods in your diet, eating a nutrient-poor diet and/or dealing with anxiety and stress (life and/or training), the body/stomach is going to be a bit out of whack. It's going to take time to "heal" the gut through a change in lifestyle choices.  The answer is not a strict off-limit food list. Of course, if there is an underlying health/medical issue, it makes sense to avoid certain foods but for the common digestive issues that most athletes suffer from - specifically bloating and gas - it's important to identify the root of the problem instead of assuming that a restrictive diet will "heal" your gut. 

Are your healthy food swaps unhealthy?

The other day I received an email from a former Trimarni athlete who asked my thoughts about a product called Tofu Shirataki Spaghetti. This athlete has been working on losing weight and regaining a healthy lifestyle and is looking for a gluten-free pasta alternative.

At first glance, this looks like a delicious protein-rich noodle option. But when reviewing the ingredients, you'll quickly realize that there's not much to this product. 

Water, soybeans, yam flour, calcium hydroxide, glucono delta lactone, calcium sulfate.  

While the intention was good, with only 10 calories per serving (and less than 1g protein), I told the athlete that I don't feel this is the best "pasta" alternative. First of all, I can't see how this product would be satisfying. Secondly, I don't see much nutritional value in this factory-made concoction. 

The athlete then mentioned if spiralized noodles would be a good option in place of pasta. While offering a good dose of vitamins and minerals, there's not much to spiralized noodles.....just like with cauliflower rice. While these options are fabulous ways to decrease calories, it's important that your meal is still providing your body with the macronutrients (carbs/protein/fat) it deserves. For example, swapping out bread for a rice cake, spray butter for regular butter, a protein bar instead of eggs, sugar free jello instead of yogurt, or cauliflower mashed potatoes instead of regular potatoes may look like you are saving a bunch of calories (which you are) but you are also forgoing a bunch of nutritional content. For athletes, it's very important that your meals don't fall short in any one macronutrient (ex. carbs, protein or fat), for that's how sickness, injury and fatigue risk increase.

Instead, my option for this athlete was a plant-based pasta (ex. Explore Cuisine) and to add in crumbled tofu and marinara sauce for a hearty, satisfying and nutritious meal.

Although many "healthy" food swaps are no more healthy than the real-food option (ex. organic cookies, gluten-free bread, coconut yogurt, dairy-free ice cream), unless you have a medical/health or ethical reason to rid a certain food from your diet, make sure your recent "healthy" food swap is serving you well. Certainly, no food swap should leave you you exhausted, unsatisfied, hungry, constipated and moody.

It's time to take stock to any recent dietary changes that you've made. Take a deep look into your recent diet and ask yourself "have I made an healthy food swap that could potentially sabotage my health???"

Assessing your current relationship with food

It's getting closer to that time of the year. New Year diet fads. 

The start of the year (after the holiday season) is typically the time when people begin to "finally" get serious about the diet, in hopes of improving health, changing body composition, losing weight or getting rid of unhealthy lifestyle habits. While there's nothing wrong with a New Year Resolution, there's the tendency to take the wrong approach to changing your eating habits. Your old diet gets demolished instead of making a small renovation.

You may be wondering why I am bringing up this topic right now in early November. Well, relationships with food are complex, especially for athletes. Whether the focus is on health, appearance or performance (or a combination of all three), focusing too much on your diet and/or body image can become harmful to your health. There's never a wrong time to talk about your current relationship with food and the body.

I love my diet. It's easy, sustainable and it works for me and my health, performance and lifestyle. I'm comfortable with my style of eating, I feel comfortable eating around others and I can take my typical style of eating anywhere in the world. While I have standards as to what I want to put in my body most of the time (which makes up my "typical" diet), I never find my diet complicated or unappetizing. 

While you may feel the same way, many athletes feel the exact opposite. 

Eating is stressful. There's great fear, guilt, worry, confusion and anxiousness when it comes to food. There's inconsistency and uncertainty.  Although some athletes and fitness enthusiasts have yet to master a style of eating that is sustainable, healthy and performance enhancing, there's a large group of active individuals (from all fitness levels) who have a very unhealthy relationship with food and the body. Food is the enemy.

With a complicated relationship with food, there's the tendency to become obsessed with one style of eating that brings great concerns, guilt or fears when it comes to food. There's often something "extreme" with how these individuals choose to eat, constantly thinking about food as good or bad, right or wrong.  Interestingly, many athletes see food as the problem that needs fixing when in reality, the relationship with food and the body are the problems.

Your diet should provide adequate nutrients and calories to support consistent training, optimal health and recovery and should also help to reduce your risk for disease and illness. To achieve this style of eating, you should not have to spend an excessive amount of your time or energy thinking, stressing and planning your diet. Going to great extremes to follow a rigid style of eating may increase the risk for physical and mental health issues, disordered eating or an eating disorder.

I find that the individuals who fall victim to New Year diet fads tend to have a very poor relationship with food and the body. These individuals gravitate toward diet fads in order to feel control and gain a sense of power through an ultra-focused, extremely rigid style of eating.  In a culture that brings a bombardment of messages about how your athletic body should look and the many different extreme styles of eating that are marketed toward athletes, it's important to remind yourself that you don't need to make an extreme change in your eating habits to fix or resolve yourself to be healthier, happier or better athlete. 

Your inability to stick to a New Years diet has nothing to do with your level of self control. Diets don't work. More so, any program or style of eating that is extreme or rigid, comes with risks to your physical and mental health.

Although dieting and diet fads will always be part of our culture, this is one trend that you shouldn't be part of. Before the holiday season, take some self-care time to assess your current relationship with food and your body. Realize the impact that your past, current and future eating patterns have on your mental, emotional and physical health. Chronic restricted eating, habitual dieting, eliminating food groups or certain foods, ignoring physical hunger, compulsive/binge eating and food obsessions demonstrate a complicated relationship with food. 

Let go of the need to be, look and to eat perfect. Stop comparing yourself to a past version of yourself or to someone else. Don't make eating difficult. To love and care for your body, you need to fuel, nourish, thank and honor it for a lifetime. Now is a great time to start.

Is it socially acceptable to diet if you are an athlete?

Since my first Ironman in 2006, I've developed a strong connection to my body. Rather than seeing it for what it looks like, I constantly thank my body for what it allows me to do. While it's not easy in a body-image obsessed society, Karel and I spend no time discussing body image in our house. We don't weigh ourselves so we couldn't tell you what our "race weight" was at any of our past races.  There's no dieting, restrictive eating, watching what we eat or cheat meals. I'd say that our house is a very good place if you'd like to eat where there are no food rules, off-limit foods or controversial food discussions. While our dedication to sport, love for an active lifestyle and enjoyment for wholesome eating greatly influences the way we look, we have never fallen victim to the idea of "competitive leanness"  - that the leaner we are, the more competitive (or faster) we will be in sport. We've never tried to change the way that we look through diet or exercise. 

In light of a recent video of a professional male triathlete discussing his recent dietary change and current struggle of body image relating to performance, I feel this provides a great platform to once again discuss the pressure that most athletes feel when it comes to body weight/body composition and the extreme shifts that occur with diet and exercise. Even without the performance component, many athletes put great emphasis on how they look - which can contribute to great psychological and physical stress, not to mention the risk for health issues and a performance decline. 

We live in an interesting time where it has become socially acceptable not to eat. In other words, it's not uncommon for an athlete to restrict food/sport nutrition and it's accepted, encouraged or advised. Some athletes are afraid to eat "bad" foods while others are afraid to eat "too much." There are tricks, rules and games that athletes play as it relates to food - all in an effort to keep, obtain or achieve a different look or weight. Athletes are fasting, eliminating food groups, strategically choosing the training sessions that deserve fuel and hydration and avoiding/reducing carb and calorie intake and it's often applauded as a way of taking control over health, being dedicated to sport or having a passion for healthy living. To me it looks like a miserable way to live but to others, it's become viewed as the right thing to do. I'm shocked to see how many endurance triathletes will train for hours at a time, only to eat a few hundred calories for fear of "eating too much." 

To the outsider, certain athletes may look fit, lean, strong, healthy and happy but it's very easy to hide behind a photo on Instagram or Facebook or boast amount recent performance and health improvements from a recent extreme dietary change. It isn't until an athlete admits that there is an issue or is forced to back away from the sport due to a health issue, the dieting athlete is often praised and admired for his/her dedication (watchers are tempted to copy similar diet changes), even though this athlete has created a socially acceptable type of disordered eating. With an overvalued belief that a lower body weight will improve performance, coupled with society emphasizing leanness, performance anxiety, athletic self-identity, low self-confidence and a negative self-evaluation of athletic development/performance, it's not surprising to hear that so many athletes suffer from eating disorders and mental health issues.

Our society has a very dysfunctional relationship with food and body weight/image but things only get worse when it affects athletes who place tremendous stress on the body. A super strict, rigid and controlled way of eating often comes at a huge emotional and physical cost and takes up a lot of mental space in daily activities and food-related decisions.

It's a common misconception that the dieting athlete is lean and ripped, skinny or emaciated. This is far from the truth. You can also be very lean or skinny and be very well nourished, fueled and healthy. This is why you can't "look" at an athlete and make assumptions about health, fitness, happiness or performance. Eating disorders and disordered eating isn't a look. There are many athletes out there who are restricting and obsessing over foodwhile spending an exhausting amount of time and energy on body image and getting praised for their "healthy" efforts or being envied for looking so fit. How many times have you looked at an athlete and assumed "wow - he/she must be so fast." 

Because athletes can easily hide under the umbrella of being very dedicated to healthy eating and extreme exercise because they are training for an athletic event, it's important to ask yourself if you are eating and fueling adequately for health and performance improvements or suffering from disordered eating (or an eating disorder).

There's a common saying "are you eating to be thin or eating to win?" Changing your diet and/or exercise regime in an attempt to achieve an "idealistic" body type fights against your current biology and places you at risk for physical and mental health, hormonal and performance issues. There's nothing wrong with changing the way you look for health or performance but the methods of your strategies should optimize health and performance.

Regardless of your fitness level, I'm here to tell you that it's ok to not have a body that fits into your sport specific body "ideal". Fuel for performance and eat to nourish your body. And above all, be proud of the way you look, especially when you can do awesome things with your body.