Food is medicine…or is it?
What popular diet are you into these days? Take your pick…
Keto
Paleo
Vegan
Carnivore
Vegetarian
The Whole30
Autoimmune Paleo
I’m sure that by eating according to one of these diets, you think you’re eating healthy…but are you really?
There once was a time when I thought I was eating “healthy” too, but despite my healthy eating efforts, I still struggled to lose weight, my energy tanked every afternoon, and I didn’t feel like myself in many other ways.
The same is true for so many clients I’ve worked with over the years. They wind up reaching out to me frustrated and defeated because no matter what diet they try, they just can’t seem to get the weight off, get their energy back, get their autoimmune issues under control, or get back to feeling like themselves again.
One of my favorite quotes by Ann Wigmore says…
“The food you eat can be either the safest and most powerful form of medicine or the slowest form of poison.”
The food you’re eating may not be as healthy for you as you think, for a variety of reasons. In fact, food could be at the core of your low energy, weight woes, restless nights, autoimmune issues, skin breakouts and feeling uncomfortable in your own skin.
Because the truth is, the food your feasting on could be:
- The wrong combination of proteins, carbs, and fats your body needs to function at its potential
- Contaminated with pesticides, metals or other toxins disrupting the delicate balance of your body
- Packed full of synthetic hormones that are tipping the hormonal scale and burdening your liver
- Infused with antibiotics or antibiotic resistant superbugs that are wreaking havoc on your digestive health and suppressing your immune system
- Or simply foods that you’re unknowingly sensitive to which can trigger anything from anxiety, to digestive upset, energy dips or even skin breakouts
As I often say…
“There is a difference between eating healthy and eating right for your body. Eating right for your body will include healthy foods, but not every healthy food is right for your body.”
In this week’s video and blog, I want to help you make sure your food is NOT slowly poisoning you, but that it’s the safest and most powerful form of medicine you’re getting as it should be!
Eating healthy might be a simple term, but with our complex food choices these days, the act of eating healthy is not as simple as it seems.
Thousands of food commercials and packages lining the grocery store shelves make claims about being healthy, but they can be extremely misleading.
For example, the word “natural” can be used on any food label as long as the product does not contain any artificial ingredients, added color, and if its minimally processed (processed meaning it doesn’t fundamentally alter the product) – which is fairly vague honestly. Natural labeling doesn’t address any pesticides, hormones or antibiotics that might have been involved in the farming of the food, or make it void of processing all together.
Another example is beef labeled simply as “grass-fed.” This indicates that the cow was fed grass for 80% of its life, and the other 20% of its food sources can be anything else. This also doesn’t rule out the use of antibiotics or hormones.
Do you see now how some of your supposedly healthy foods might be slowly poisoning you?
Don’t fret. I want to help you navigate foods so your body can get all the nutritional benefits without all of the poisonous side effects.
When it comes to food quality, here’s what you want to aim for…
- USDA certified organic produce, especially at home where you have more control
- 100% grass-fed beef and organic for extra bonus points!
- Local free-range eggs, chicken, turkey or other poultry
- Certified human and pasture raised pork free of nitrates and hormones
- And wild-caught fresh fish and other seafood
Making these food choices will drastically reduce your exposure to harmful pesticides, added hormones, antibiotics, heavy metals or other toxic substances found in conventionally farmed or produced foods.
If you’ve improved the quality of your food choices and you still aren’t seeing the results you’re looking for, then it’s time to dive deeper and investigate hidden food sensitivities and/or your ratios of proteins, carbs and fats contained in each meal.
To investigate these potential food issues:
- Start a food and body language log
- 30-120 minutes after eating check in to see how your body is responding
- Note any changes in your energy, mood, digestion, your overall sense of well-being and if you have cravings
Based on any negative changes you might experience, you can review your log and start to trace your symptoms back to certain meals you’ve had and notice trends in what foods or combination of foods might have caused them.
When you’re eating foods that are right for your body, you should have an abundance of energy, be able to go 3-5 hours or more between meals without getting hungry, and be anxiety, craving, bloat or any other symptom free!
And if you want to skip the food logging and just cut to the chase, you can do an easy at-home food sensitivity and metabolic typing test to reveal any hidden food sensitivities and dial in your food ratios ASAP.
Cleaning up my food sources, eliminating food sensitivities and eating the right food ratios for my body changed my perspective about what “eating healthy” really meant for my body, and it put me on the right path to feeling like myself again.
And I’ve seen these steps do the same thing for my clients over, and over, and over again. Within a matter of days or weeks, they experience limitless energy, restful nights, weight loss and so much more!
Let food be thy medicine, when you’re eating the right food 😉
