Mental Health And Your Relationship With Food

You can probably think of a time in your life when you had an incredible meal or dessert. Perhaps it was on your birthday, during a vacation or for a holiday. This meal was so delicious that you felt a physical sense of happiness and joy. To this day, you can't help but smile and feel your mouth water as you think back to that special occassion.  For me, that meal is carrot cake. I love carrot cake. And in a few days (May 31st), I will enjoy a big slice of this spicy and moist cake as it's my favorite way to celebrate my birthday.  Although I can enjoy carrot cake any day of the year, this is a special yearly tradition that started when my dear friend Laura made me a delicious carrot cake for my birthday back in 2009.  Food is a necessity for life. Although I can live without carrot cake, humans can't live without food.  For any individual who is living with disordered eating habits, you may find that certain foods do not bring you joy, but instead, bring you great feelings of anxiety and stress.  Extreme focus, fear or worry about food and calories can bring on great emotional distress. Attempting to follow a 'perfect' diet can cause someone to become rigid and inflexible about food. This may bring on guilt and shame when certain foods are consumed. Ultimately, disordered eating patterns can impact physical health and mental well-being.  Unless you have a food allergy or intolerance to a certain food, eating should always remain a source of pleasure, not panic. By improving your relationship with food, you may find yourself more at ease in social settings, during holidays and events, when traveling and while eating out.  Viewing foods as "good" or "bad" may seem harmless but this language has a direct impact on how you feel about yourself. In other words, you are assigning a moral value to food which means when you eat a "good" food (like a vegetable) you feel good about yourself but if you eat a "bad" food (like cake) you feel bad about yourself. Transferring labels onto food means you are putting labels on self-worth, which can create shame and guilt - further affecting how and what you eat. The reality is unless you have a medical reason to avoid creatin foods, enjoying french fries or a slice of carrot cake will not make you a bad - or unhealthy - person.  To help you feel more at peace with food, remain open-minded with your food related decisions. Relaxed and mindful eating doesn't mean you are letting yourself go but it's the opposite - you are listening to your body and eating without judgement, punishment or to compensate (earn and burn).  Food doesn't only exist for fuel and nourishment but it is also for pleasure and to satisfy your hunger. Give yourself freedom and flexibility with your food choices. While it's ok to have a preferred style of eating, allowing yourself variety during special occasions (birthday) and during unique circumstances (ex. travel) is part of being human.

Need to eat more but scared of weight gain?

An eating disorder distorts the way you think about food and your body, causing you to eat and exercise in a way that can be harmful to your mental and physical health.

A critical step in eating disorder recovery is working through counterproductive and destructive thoughts, emotions and behaviors - not just relating to food and the body but also with self-esteem, confidence, control and perfectionism.

To fuel, nourish and train in a way that will optimize performance and to become more comfortable and confident with your body image, it's necessary to break away from unhealthy food and exercise-related behaviors and to challenge and fight against disordered thoughts.

Keep in mind that the weight/body image that you think you need to perform well in sport will likely be different than the body composition/weight that allows you to train and race in a way that supports your physical and mental health.

An eating disorder is not about food.

Body weight is also not the issue.

The body composition insecurities and overwhelming food-related decisions are symptoms of a problem, but not the problem itself.

Therapy is critical. Don’t let yourself give up - even if it feels like you aren't making progress.

A huge part of the recovery process is accepting that your body and mind will change. Your body and mind may heal at different times. Learning to let go of control can also be hard.

Once you restore your physical and mental health and strengthen your relationship with food and the body, you will physically feel better, your decisions around food and exercise will begin to work for you (and not against you) and any body composition changes will never be as visible as you fear/believe.

Although the road will be bumpy at times, trust the process and journey ahead of you.

Your body is worth the time and effort. 💕

Happy 2021! My Heartfelt Message To Athletes.....

Dear athlete, 

On the first day of the New Yearm you are likely reflecting on the past twelve months. The New Year brings with it excitement for new beginnings and hope for a better future. As you look ahead to the upcoming year, you may be planning your New Year goals, resolutions or intentions as a way to officially begin anew. 

Although goal-setting is an important component in the journey of self-improvement, I ask that you carefully think through your New Year, New You thoughts, actions and behaviors. 

The New Year symbolizes a time when most people resolve to make changes in health. I'm assuming that one of your New Year goals involves your diet, training, body composition or health. Even if you have great intentions with your New Year goals, I am concerned. Because the month of January is so deeply rooted in making changes in body size, shape or weight - supported by the toxic diet culture - I am extremely worried about how your current thoughts about your body size or health will influence your new nutrition strategies and training regime. 

I see and hear about it year after year.........

A seemingly simple resolve to become a faster, stronger, healthier or better athlete takes a downward spiral due to extreme measures. Although being driven, disciplined and highly motivated are great qualities to help you achieve athletic excellence, these same qualities can put you at higher risk for mental and physical health issues, an exercise addiction or an eating disorder. Because of the normalization of disordered eating and obsessive exercising among the athletic population, it can be incredibly difficult for you to recognize the difference between your self-care and self-sabotaging behaviors. 

As a Board Certified Sport Dietitian, many athletes come to me for help with daily and sport nutrition. Not surprisingly, far too many athletes try to optimize performance at the cost of mental and physical health. Sometimes this is unintentional, but many times it is from an intentional desire to achieve the idealized body in the name of sport. 

Because of an ongoing obsession with weight and performance, alongside the cultural norms of disordered eating and exercise behaviors falsely labeled as a "lifestyle change," I had to do something.

I will no longer sit by as a concerned outsider, watching you damage your physical health, destroy your mental well-being and sabotage your athletic capabilities. 

This is why I create The Whole Athlete.

There's nothing wrong with being motivated and dedicated. But when your extreme drive and perfectionistic qualities show up in your eating habits and exercise regime, your intentions can do more harm than good. Add in the pressure of wanting to be lean due to sport expectations and a societal obsession with health, I hope you can now understand how your good intentions can lead to unhealthy outcomes.

Taking health risks for a perceived competitive edge will make you lose in the long run. No matter your athletic goals or fitness level, you should not have to prioritize your athletic development over your well-being.

If this speaks to you, I create a program to help you get more out of your training without compromising your mental and physical health. Through The Whole Athlete 6-lesson course, you will learn how diet culture, a societal obsession with health and the chase for an ideal race weight could be negatively impacting your training, mental well-being and physical health. Once you understand why you think how you think about food, health and your body, you can fix the distorted views that you've developed. You can try out an intro course for free. The 6-lesson course will officially open on January 3rd. 

I care about your health. I also want you to succeed in sport. To help you truly optimize your health and performance, I want to remind you that overall wellness involves taking care of your mind, not just your physical self. 

As you look ahead to the upcoming year, please think about how you want to live your life and not what you want to look like. Remember, your thoughts drive your actions. 

Don't forget to thank your body. Give it credit for all it has allowed you to do and be grateful for what it continues to let you do in life. 

-Marni

Change your thoughts to change behaviors

What behavior (or habit) has the strongest negative impact on reaching an athletic goal?

What behavior has lead you into a vicious cycle of self-sabotage?

What habits have you struggled with the most?

What behavior, if changed, would give you the most leverage toward improving the odds of achieving your athletic goals?

Changing a behavior to reach a goal sounds simple but it actually requires a process of changing the way that you think. The idea that if you change your thoughts, you can change your behaviors sounds straightforward but many athletes go straight to behavior change and neglect working on the thoughts that influence actions. 

This is why I created The Whole Athlete. 

As you enter the New Year, the motivation may be high to change behaviors in order to move closer to your athletic goals. While you may have good intentions behind your behavior changes, it's not uncommon for good intentions to lead to bad outcomes. 

I want to remind you that your thoughts are controlled by your beliefs, which are usually ingrained in your subconscious mind. Interestingly, many beliefs are inherited from the beliefs of others - before you are able to form your own beliefs. This is why behavior change can be so hard. 

Many thoughts and beliefs are so deep-rooted that it can be extremely difficult to reprogram your mind. For example, being repeatedly told that carbohydrates are bad for you or that carbs make you gain weight can make it incredibly hard for you to meet your daily carbohydrate needs as an athlete. You may feel extreme guilt, shame or anxiety when consuming bread, rice or raisins - all because of the deep-rooted belief that carbs are bad. Perhaps it's something as small as not eating before a workout or not running with a hydration belt because you feel you don't need to - that you are just fine without. Sometimes you have to change your opinion to experience better results. 

These are only two examples (of many) to show how powerful thoughts can be as it relates to behavior changes. 

Hopefully you can now see how just one small shift in a belief can have an enormous impact on your life. 

Due to the cultural norms of "clean eating" and over-exercising, this sends a message to athletes that it's ok to eat and exercise in a certain way in order to look, feel and perform at your best. Unhealthy behaviors like restrictive eating, excessive exercise and intentional underfueling have become so normalized that behaviors that would qualify as disordered are often considered perfectly appropriate - reinforced by a culture that is obsessively fixated on food, eating and weight. A few of this normalized behaviors include: 

• Denial of hunger and use of tricks to avoid eating (such as drinking large amounts of water, detox drinks or coffee). 
• Refusal to eat certain foods (ex. bread), progressing to restrictions against whole categories of foods (ex. carbohydrates). 
• Anxiety about gaining weight or being "fat."
• Development of food rituals (ex. I can only eat this if I have exercised x-amount of duration or intensity). 
• Rigid exercise routines to burn off calories or to compensate for eating. 
• Withdrawal from friends and activities in favor of new social groups that share similar food and exercise rituals and rules. 
• Regular use of compensatory behaviors such as fasting to burn off calories. 
• Extreme concern with body weight and shape. 

If you have been victim to these beliefs, it's because you have become conditioned to perceive them as normal by professional athletes, the media, fitness influencers and diets. Because extreme eating and exercising strategies are normalized and reinforce behaviors and thought processes that aren't healthy, they can have very serious consequences on your mental and physical health.

You can't change your behaviors without changing your thoughts. Once you accept that your inaccurate beliefs are driving your actions, you can start the work of unlearning and changing self-sabotaging behaviors with more productive behaviors to enhance your performance, optimize your health and protect your well-being. 

Are you ready to change your thoughts to change your behaviors? 

Check out the FREE introduction of the The Whole Athlete course. 
If you found the content helpful and you want to learn more, you can pre-enroll now or register for the 6-lesson course when it opens on January 3rd, 20201. 

Eat to Thrive: Improve your relationship with food

Sport and daily nutrition consulting is much more than learning what and when to eat. Much of my consulting services are dedicated to helping athletes overcome an unhealthy relationship with food and the body. By improving your relationship with your body, you can actually improve your relationship with food, which will ultimately enhance your athletic performance. When you can thank your body (instead of bashing it), respect your body (instead of starving or overexercising it) and appreciate your body (instead of wishing you looked differently), you can make better nutrition choices to optimize health and performance.

In a past article I wrote for March 2015 issue of Triathlete Magazine, I discussed the topic of achieving a performance breakthrough by changing current eating behaviors and body image thoughts. In the article, I'll help you recognize if your body image concerns are steering your relationship with food in an unhealthy direction - and how to address them.

If you are currently struggling with your relationship with food and the body, now is a great time to reach out to a Board Certified Sport Dietitian for help. Don't wait until a performance or health setback occurs. A qualified nutrition expert (RD) can take away the guessing so that you can learn how to nourish and fuel your body for optimal health and performance.

To read the article: Eat To Thrive

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.