Why am I eating the Metabolic way?

 

I keep banging on about metabolic eating but it really is just so the way to eat.   

After years of yo-yo dieting and dropping bodyweight quickly and then creating binging habits and anxiety over food and eating the wrong foods, I remembered my studies in Nutrition (four certificates), and amended some of my eating to how I believe food works for our body at a cellular level, not against our bodies.

I managed to keep food as something I enjoy and didn't restrict myself too much.  It made more sense to eat for fuel than to restrict, but I suppose the damage had been done. It used to frustrate me as a PT when clients would want to focus on "just dropping 5kgs but I don't want to change my lifestyle".  

When I found Kitty Bloomfield, Craig McDonald and Kate Deering, who have adapted Ray Peats research into metabolism and eating to fuel the body it was like "yes, this is what my beliefs were, before the fitness industry told us all not to eat full fat nor carbs"!  The conditioning had been done... when you feel fat, you would restrict food and train more, right? 

WRONG - exercise cause stress on the body. You need only a little. Excessive exercise and restrictive eating further damages you at a cellular level and your metabolism slows down which causes many other health issues (hormonal issues, weight gain, sleeping issues, digestion and on and on).

Back to metabolic eating. When I first started eating this way it was just before covid started and I noticed an immediate difference. I had only reduced all PUFAs, introduced carrot salad daily and ate more sugar (including ice cream and fudge daily). Good lord - it was like the angels came out of the clouds and started singing.  I dropped cms. my Skin improved and it was just a liberating moment.

I felt free, I felt in control, I wasn't hungry, I didn't want chocolate and I slept really well and woke up feeling like I had slept well, instead of being tired.

So, back to now. With all the excuses aside I pretty much have stuck to the metabolic eating way for over 18 months now and it really has freed my negative thoughts about food and training to burn calories. I have implemented many new changes. 

The last few months have been up and down with hormonal issues and covid lockdowns, just a few things to disrupt and haven't been doing the metabolic eating properly, purely to being lazy, disorganised and just not feeling like looking after me.  All good. It happens to all of us. Work, kids, winter. So instead of doing it 60/40, time to get it back up to 80/20.

Some food prep last night saw me excited to start today knowing I had lots of good nutrients to get me through the day and not reaching for the mint slices at 3pm.

My lunch today is something I love. A fav, sometimes I have with fruit and sourdough also.

Doesn't look much right but check out the nutrients:

Potatoes – cooked in my new air fryer with coconut oil and salt – carbs and fibre, vitamin c, vitamin B6, potassium and manganese.  Potato is so starchy as it is glucose, so I have it with protein and fat to help balance the blood sugar.  Stable energy whilst keeping stress hormones low.

Juice – Nudie orange with no pulp (pulp can irritate me) – natural fruit juice can help with vitamin c and sugar (yes, sugar, it is good for you in the right source) – sugar helps with tissue growth and repair, maintaining homeostasis (including your body temperature), fueling your daily activities, converting T4 to the active form T3 (thyroid hormone) and also helps the liver detoxify the body. Plus it tastes amazing and calms the adrenals!

Grass-fed Beef burger – so good – less processed crap and just good quality beef which contains iron, zinc, vitamins A and E, B12, B6, Selenium, Zinc. Who needs to take a multivitamin? Mixed with some light swiss cheese – calcium, protein, saturated fat!

Fats are GOOD for you fat isn’t bad. I am avoiding and limiting PUFAs from my diet (post to come on that). Saturated fat is good for your body – they remain solid at room temperature and turn into liquid above room temp (saturated just means carbon bonds being saturated with hydrogen).  This means they wont be destroyed by light, oxygen or heat, they won’t produce free radicals when cooking that cause damage to your body and cells. I used coconut oil in my cooking.  Other good fats are butter (without any vegetable oils etc), ghee, dairy products from pasture with fat, chocolate fat (mmm cocoa anyone).

I used to eat what I thought was healthy (nuts, seeds, brown rice, broccoli, kale, sweet potato, lean meats and vegetables oils). Limited dairy because of fat and I thought I was intolerant – turns out take out vegetable oils, broccoli and other processed foods like nuts and nut butters, I can tolerate dairy perfect.  The toxin in the broccoli and other cruciferous vegetables can cause inflammation.

Lots of salt and Heinz Tomato Sauce – delicious, if I had mustard I would put on there also and have some sourdough like an open burger.  So so good.  Salt is good, salt helps replenish minerals lots in the body. Just the plain white salt. The pink and orange colour represents the high levels of toxic inorganic iron and Celtic salt: the grey colour is due to residual mud and impurities. You just want the sodium chloride (you can get an abundance of the other minerals from your food) so just go for plain white sea salt or pickling salt that is free of anti-caking agents and added iodine

Salt can also:

Support proper thyroid function and metabolism

Enhance insulin sensitivity

Help improve sleep

Increase energy

Important for hydration & hydrochloric acid production

Help your body absorb nutrients

Decrease inflammation

Reduce stress

 Salt excerpts from Kitty Blomfield FB Page - as I have used her pages so much! 

Other people to follow:

Jessica Ash Wellness    all things hormones and especially PCOS

Kate Deering               Author of how to Heal your Metabolism - a MUST READ!

Ray Peat                      the researcher!