It’s resolutions time….

With Christmas over and New Year on the horizon, it’s that time when people start to make resolutions. Maybe you find yourself annually writing the following:

  • lose weight
  • get fit
  • give up alcohol
  • join a gym

And so on…

How do those lists pan out, usually? I know for me they fail every single time! And not because I can’t lose weight, or I can’t get fit, or I can’t give up alcohol, or I can’t join a gym; rather it’s always because I set the bar too high. A goal to lose weight and to get fit is so intangible that it’s set up for failure. There is no measure for what losing weight or getting fit will look like. Further to that, we have all been bombarded with the message for so many years that to lose weight or to get fit somehow involves restricting ourselves, punishing ourselves, relying on “will power”.

So how about we look at it from a different view-point? How about taking a look at where you are now, taking stock, then finding all the positives about where you are RIGHT NOW. Look at all the ways your body already serves you well. The reasons your friends and family love you. The things you excel at.

Then, how about being kind to yourself? So, rather than restricting your food and ultimately ending up bingeing (did you know that 97% of people who diet ultimately put the weight back on after 2 years – surely with a success rate of only 3% it’s worth looking at alternatives…), why not start to move more, start to listen to what your body really wants from you.

Listening to your body is huge. It knows. It is really clever. It knows when you need veggies and when you need protein, it knows when you need sleep and when you need to move. But we’ve got so used to ignoring the messages that we flit between pushing too hard on the food or movement side (just me who has tried to “punish” themselves for eating something yummy by doing an extra however many minutes of an exercise I hate?) to then “failing” and giving up on it.

Now, it doesn’t come quickly to start listening to your body, but I will bet you any amount that if you really tune in to it, it doesn’t want another diet starting on January 1st. It doesn’t want any more punishment.

Let’s resolve to make 2019 the year we are kind to our bodies.

For support, hints and tips, sign up to my mailing list or head over to my Embracing Fitness community Facebook group.

Tuning into hunger

This is a biggie for those of us who eat for reasons other than fuel. Let’s say you’re prone to reaching for the doughnuts after a stressful day at work, or your go-to treat after doing something you weren’t looking forward to is a bag of crisps, you’ll know all too well what I mean about eating when you’re not hungry.

If you sign up to a diet plan, they tell you prescriptively what to eat when, and for those who use food just as fuel this can be really handy. Likewise, many PTs ask their clients to record what they’re eating, which can be a great way to stop and think about what you’re going to eat before it goes into your mouth. However, both of these ways ultimately cause a feeling of deprivation in those of us who use food as an emotional crutch as well as fuel.

If I’m not describing you, you probably already intuitively tune into your hunger and you’re good to go. However… if you’ve read the above and thought “how the hell does she know that I do that?” then read on…

Intuitive eating is (for emotional eaters and yo-yo dieters) an amazing thing. It takes time. You have to overcome a lot of gremlins in your head, and you often find yourself faced with societal beliefs that mean others still believe you should diet. Intuitive eating is just that – you eat what your body wants when it wants it. You take away the norms around food, so if you want apple crumble for dinner (like really genuinely craving it, not just fancy it cos it’s sweet and yummy) then have it. You don’t have to have some savoury thing beforehand to justify it.

Yeah, it goes against all that “you can only have pudding if you clear your plate”. It goes against lunch at lunchtime, breakfast and breakfast time and so on. If you want bubble and squeak for breakfast, because your body is telling you that’s what you need, then that’s what you have.

Now, this is by no means a quick fix. You don’t get free of the gremlins overnight. It is also absolutely not a weight loss tool. Yes, some people do lose weight because they work through some of their non-hungry gremlins and end up eating less because their body needs less. Others gain some weight because their body has been stuck in the yo-yo diet rut for so long that it needs to find its natural weight. But the beauty of it is that weight isn’t the measure. How YOU feel is the measure. What YOU need is the measure.

This is a very brief overview of a much more in depth topic, but if I’ve piqued your interest I would strongly suggest you look up Beyond Chocolate. It’s a great way to start your own journey to intuitive eating.

For support, hints and tips, sign up to my mailing list or head over to my Embracing Fitness community Facebook group.

Will I lose weight?

Anyone who knows me, or who has read much of my blog, will know I am not a supporter of diets (because they are short term, involve depriving yourself and ultimately fail, in case you wanted to know!). To this end it surprises me when nearly every client who signs up with me tells me exactly how much weight they “need” to lose.

I have to admit this chase for some perfect number on the scales baffles me somewhat, but that’s not the point right now. The point is will you lose weight if you exercise more?

Well, maybe. Yep the answer is that wishy washy, I’m afraid.

If you exercise your body will likely use food more effectively, which can lead to weight loss. Exercising uses extra calories, which can lead to weight loss. Moving more can bring about better food choices, which can lead to weight loss.

But does exercise = weight loss? No, ‘fraid not.

And does this matter? No, it absolutely doesn’t.

Exercise does has so many benefits above and beyond the number on the scale:

  • Increased energy
  • Improved mood
  • Better sleep
  • Better muscle tone
  • Change of body shape
  • Improved concentration
  • Lower stress
  • Reduced anxiety and depression
  • Increased confidence
  • Improved body image

And the list goes on. Diet alone won’t give you all that. Exercise alone won’t give you guaranteed weight loss.

Personally I have only once in my life lost weight only by exercising more. And that was when I was working as a ski rep so I was skiing 4-6 hours a day 4-5 times a week. I ate whatever I wanted. I drank a lot of beer. I lost weight. I have no idea how much, because I didn’t see a set of scales in over 6 months, all I know is I needed new clothes!!

Conversely, I have put on weight while training 12+ hours a week for a long distance triathlon. Why? Because I would rather eat when my body needs fuel and I would rather be strong than skinny.

So what’s my point? Well, if your ONLY reason for exercising more is to lose weight, I’m afraid I have to be the bearer of bad tidings. However, if you want your chance at the things listed in the bullet points above, get moving. Get jumping around. Dance to your favourite song. Go for a long walk. Play on the swings. Anything that gets you moving and feeling good. Go for it!

Join my Embracing Fitness community on Facebook for more hints and tips.

ExerSIZE

“Oh I’ll start exercising when I’ve lost weight”, “well you don’t see anyone my size in the gym”, “lycra is only for the skinny girls”… and so many other thoughts can help to keep larger ladies away from moving more. I understand – I have been the fat lass at the back on bike rides enough times to know it can feel pretty alienating.

However, what if these thoughts are just the demon voice telling you what you want to hear? What if you could start moving more TODAY whatever size you are?

At the weekend I went to watch a good friend play rugby. The girls on both teams were a range of shapes and sizes, from the tall skinny ones who charge forward when they get the ball to the shorter stockier ones who are there to prevent the tall skinny ones from scoring. Everyone has their place. Everyone is as necessary to the team as everyone else. BECAUSE of their size, not despite it.

Then on Monday I was chatting to my PT about power lifting – she is getting me lifting crazy heavy weights that I would never have dreamt possible – and she told me about a competition she was in where she couldn’t lift as heavy as she used to because she had lost weight. She needed those extra few pounds to be at her strongest.

Granted there are many sports where having very low body fat is the key to being at the top of your game, and granted the pros will generally be slim, but in amateur sport? No such bias is necessary. Find the activity that suits you, work out if you’d like to try a team sport or if you’d rather go solo and head out for a walk or dance around your kitchen to your favourite songs, and go for it. Go for it today. No more internal excuses relating to your size.

Remember: yes, your size can be your strength. No, you don’t need to lose weight to be able to move more. Yes, there is always something that is right for you. No, you don’t need to hang out in a gym and be intimidated by the “beautiful people” (many of whom, incidentally are just as self conscious as everyone else – the ones who don’t look beautiful when they’re exercising are the ones who are doing it right!).

For more of this sort of thing, join my Embracing Fitness Community on Facebook.

Leaving the diet culture behind

I have been chatting to a lot of people recently about exactly what they’d like from me when they sign up to get more active. Weight loss comes up time and time again. Initially that really saddened me, because I always want to help people feel comfortable in their own skin and strive to be the best version of them. I felt that this desire to lose weight showed that my clients were unhappy as they are now and were looking for yet another diet.

Then I had a really honest conversation with a friend, who I believe is typical of so many people. She wants to lose weight to be healthier. She worries about specific health issues that are related to her weight being higher than ideal. What she doesn’t want is yet another diet, yet more guilt, yet more chasing her tail. However, and this was the “aha” moment for me, she doesn’t want to “love the skin she’s in”, she doesn’t want to do the body confidence/boudoir photos thing, because actually she still won’t be healthy.

Interesting, I thought. I had been seeing the term weight loss as synonymous with dieting, when actually it needn’t be. Perhaps rather than looking at the diet options that are out there we can dig deeper into our relationship with food. I know I am absolutely an emotional eater. I know I don’t have it nailed on. I do, however, know that I am comfortable in my own skin and am fit and healthy.

Because of this, I feel I am better equipped than some in the fitness industry to help people who over eat, or eat food that doesn’t support their health – I get it. I totally understand the link between boredom and reaching for chocolate; having a crazy busy day and wanting a “reward”.  I am not a nutritionist or a dietician, and as such I would never dream of offering advice beyond my remit, but I have tried most of the diets, I have walked the walk. I have learnt what little swaps really do make a difference, so you aren’t depriving yourself or counting every last calorie. I have worked out how to have a more normal relationship with food, and how to couple that with being more active. It’s pretty cool!

Food: good vs bad

The topic of what food is “good” and what is “bad” seems to come up with alarming regularity. I all too often see people who have had it ingrained into them by the diet culture, previous PTs, the media, etc that some foods are “good” and others are “bad”. I hate this. I genuinely hate this.

Yes, there are foods that support our health more than others. Yes, there are foods that fuel us better for work, exercise, life. Yes, there are foods that, if eaten 100% of the time would do us more harm than good. But can we say any one of these is “good” or “bad”? If you stuck to the different food stories in the media over the months and years, you’d never eat anything. Everything seems to have been demonised at some point. I remember red peppers being a bad thing some years ago; bananas have their phases; red meat, white meat, fish, chocolate, red wine, white wine. Aarrrgh!

I am not for a second saying we should ignore the five (or more) a day idea; I’m not suggesting we all live off pizza and chocolate. No. Not for a second. To suggest that would be to go against what supports our health, and fuels our body to do what we require of it.

What I am getting at is that we can change our language around food. Rather than good vs bad, healthy vs unhealthy, why not look at it as food. I know my clients are intelligent. I know they know what foods will support their health. I know they get tempted by “yummies” – don’t we all? The huge thing here is to remove the “bad” label from the latter. So long as it’s forbidden, we will crave it. We will want to rebel against ourselves and have another slice of cake while nobody’s looking. And hey, if nobody saw it we don’t need to acknowledge it happened, right?

I am often asked by clients to review their food diary. More than happy to. Will I then produce a calorie-counted meal plan? No. I’ll look at what times of day they are eating and aren’t eating. Skipping breakfast can lead to grabbing extra food later, because of an energy slump; a mid afternoon slice of cake can show lunch wasn’t balanced enough. Also, I like to look at WHY someone is eating. Is it habit? Is it comfort? Is it stress? Is it actual hunger?

Once we get to the bottom of why someone is eating what they’re eating when they’re eating it we stand a much better chance of making little changes that will bring big results. No diets, no meal plans, just little changes.

And with those little changes comes the acceptance that food doesn’t fall in to “good” and “bad” lists. It is all just food. Some will make you feel better, some will make you feel worse. Take away the emotion and the guilt from it, and you’ll be much more likely to reach for the things that make you feel better, safe in the knowledge the “yummies” are still there, still available for you, never off limits.

Sound good? I’m always happy to have a Skype chat to see if I can help you get more active and get a more happy relationship with food.

A few lunch suggestions

With many clients, we talk about how food can work with us rather than against us. I love really simple yet effective lunch ideas, so here are a few of them:

 

Easy Humous

Ingredients: 1 can chick peas, 1 tub cream cheese, 1 teaspoon tahini

Method: blend together

Serve as: dip for carrot sticks, sandwich filling, wrap filling

 

Easy fish pate

Ingredients: 2 smoked mackerel fillets (or hot smoked salmon), 1 tub cream cheese, 1 dessert spoon drained capers

Method: blend together

Serve as: spread on Melba toasts or oat cakes, dip for sliced cucumber, wrap filling, sandwich filling

 

Quick salmon pasta

Ingredients: pasta, courgette, smoked salmon, crème fraiche

Method: while the pasta is boiling, fry the sliced courgette until it is lightly browned on both sides. Drain the pasta. Mix the pasta, chopped smoked salmon and crème fraiche into the courgettes and quickly warm through

Serve as: main dish

 

Chorizo spinach mix

Ingredients: chorizo, cherry tomatoes, pine nuts, spinach, mozzarella

Method: fry the sliced chorizo, when it’s cooked add the halved cherry tomatoes and pine nuts, after a minute, stir through the spinach until it wilts, make dents in the mix and divide the mozzarella into them. Serve when the mozzarella has gone gooey

Serve as: main dish

 

Chilli, garlic and prawn linguine

Ingredients: 1 bird eye chilli, 1 clove garlic, raw prawns, 1 dessert spoon olive oil, linguine

Method: while the linguine is cooking, lightly fry the chopped chilli, and add the finely chopped garlic. Before either browns, add the prawns and mix the cooked pasta through

Serve as: main dish

 

Simple salmon

Ingredients: salmon fillet, bag of stir fry veg, lime juice, soy sauce

Method: put the salmon fillet in tin foil with some lime juice and soy sauce, make the foil into a parcel around the salmon and cook in the oven for about 15 mins. In the man time, heat some oil in a pan and stir fry the veg. As it’s nearly done (takes about 5 mins in total to stir fry, usually) add some lemon juice and soy sauce. Serve the veg with the salmon fillet on top

Serve as: main dish

 

Avocado and salmon open sandwich

Ingredients: hot smoked salmon, avocado, sour dough bread, rocket

Method: toast the bread, mash the avocado and spread it onto the toast, sprinkle hot smoked salmon and rocket on top. If you’re feeling really indulgent, add a poached egg.

Serve as: main dish

 

Pesto

Ingredients: basil, pine nuts, roasted garlic, olive oil, cheese (ideally parmesan)

Method: blend all the ingredients together to taste

Serve as: a pasta sauce, a topping on salmon fillet, an alternative to butter in a mozzarella and tomato sandwich, a drizzle on a salad.

 

If you’d like help with your food ideas, please do contact me.

 

 

Success stories

Being terribly British, I’m not one to sing my own praises. However, as my clients’ biggest supporter I am desperate to sing their praises and share their successes. While I may have shoved these clients in the right direction, only they have ultimately made the changes in their life. That’s pretty cool, right? I am privileged enough to be involved in big changes. Wow.

I am genuinely honoured when people choose to start their fitness journey with me. I’m touched beyond belief when someone who has always considered the exercise world to be out of their reach trusts me enough to make the little changes I suggest. I could do a happy dance every single time someone does something they had always believed was beyond their reach, something “other people” do.

Give us some examples then, Emily…

Client A – she sidled up to me at a networking event about 6 months ago and quietly said “I think I need your help”. We started working together a few weeks later, when the time was right for her. At that point she was battling various health issues and had to allow 45 minutes to walk to work partly to give her time to catch her breath, partly because her knees were so sore. After only a couple of months of us doing a 30 minute session a week and her then doing shorter sets while dinner was cooking (with an emphasis on building leg strength so her knees were supported), and with some small switches in her food, she had a medical follow up which showed she had lost 7% body fat. Wow.

Fast forward another 3 months and we ran together for the first time. I think she had expected we’d do maybe 1km, or that after a couple of minutes she’d be crawling on the floor gasping for breath. Nope. 3.5km in half an hour. Amazing. Absolutely amazing. Oh, and that walk to work – now takes 7 (SEVEN) minutes.

Client B – she has always felt exercise was for those fit people. She never felt it could possibly be enjoyable. It was some sort of torture people did, and the effort of even getting to a gym or other fitness gathering point was tiring enough to mean the class she might have set out to take part in would be off the cards by the time she arrived. In an early Skype conversation she mentioned her husband has a stationary bike “he goes on there for an hour at a time, you’ll never get me on there”. I suggested it might be a good warm up. For 3 minutes, before doing some other exercises at home. Maybe while listening to a podcast.

A couple of months later, and after a pause when life, family, cake, got in the way, we got back to speaking regularly and establishing where we were with the stationary bike. 2 mins was enough, with a short at home session after it. We’re building back up. What she didn’t notice was that the other day when we spoke on Skype she answered downstairs and so had to walk up 2 flights of stairs to get to her office, where we always speak. No being out of puff; she kept chatting to me the whole way up the stairs.

Client C – she has wanted to make some changes, to get more active, to work with her body again. We started out with some at home exercises, including doing some sessions together over Skype, so she stayed accountable. Then, a couple of months ago, she decided it was time to face her fear (phobia, fear belittles it) of swimming. Working with a life coach friend, Debi, she addressed the phobia, and then she gave me the great honour of being the person she wanted in the water with her when she first took a dip.

 

I am passionate about helping people get started. I can’t put into words how amazing it feels to hear and see these wonderful women discover that actually they CAN.

It may be odd to say, but I don’t want to work with people who are already going to the gym. For me, there’s no fun in that. There are lots of people who do that. But being trusted with someone’s first foray into getting more active? For me, that’s just awesome.

Willpower

Of late I have found myself having quite a lot of conversations in which the topic of willpower has come up. It’s got me thinking about the wider implications of the word.

There is a widely held belief (or certainly it’s portrayed in the language we use) that things fall into “good” and “bad” or “naughty”. Take food, for example: I regularly have people confessing to all the “bad” or “naughty” food they have eaten recently, as though in telling me they’ll somehow absolve themselves. Or maybe I’m expected to berate them and be pious about the fact I never eat anything “naughty”. This conversation inevitably leads to the confessor reaching their own conclusion that they have no willpower and therefore they’re a failure.

Here’s the thing. I don’t ever eat anything “naughty”. I enjoy salads, I enjoy pizzas, I enjoy wine, I enjoy chocolate. I don’t like coffee or tea. I don’t like pineapple. The difference is in my labelling of these things. Over the years I have learnt that my internal language is the only thing that helps or hinders me. If I tell myself I have no willpower because I eat chocolate, I will eat more chocolate, feel guilty, feel a failure, eat more chocolate. And repeat. If I tell myself I can have some chocolate, I will eat the amount I want AND THEN STOP. Because I have permission to eat all of it.

The same goes with exercise. I don’t have any willpower for exercising. I go for a run because I enjoy running. But (unless I’m training for a specific event, and need to cover a specific distance) I am allowed to turn around at the top of the road. If when I get to the top of the road I want to carry on, then that’s what I’ll do.

Am I rambling? The point I’m making is that the word willpower needs to go in the should box. It’s an external pressure “oh well I should do some exercise, because, you know, society thinks I should” vs “I want to do some exercise because I want to be more active”. External pressures inevitably lead to guilt because we can’t ever meet the expectations of this external someone who is applying the pressure. And so we believe we have no willpower. And so we feel guilty. And so we have some more chocolate and do no exercise. Cos, well, we have no willpower, right?

My biggest piece of advice for having willpower is to stop requiring willpower. Reword your inner monologue. Get rid of ALL SHOULDS. Replace the ones you like with WILL, and get rid of the ones you don’t want in your life.

I should go for a run = I won’t go and then I’ll feel guilty and tell myself I have no willpower.

I will go for a run = I will run because I have chosen to, and I didn’t need willpower.

Everytime you catch a should creeping in, ask yourself if the sentence is right with will in place of should. If it isn’t, don’t do it. There’s no guilt, it just wasn’t right for you right now.

Permission granted to say no when things aren’t for you and to feel zero guilt for it.

 

A sugary treat?

One of the things that led me to become a personal trainer was the wish to help people feel better about themselves, primarily through exercise, but also through food. Now let me set this straight from the start: I am no nutritionist, but I do have basic nutrition qualifications, so when I analyse clients’ food diaries I am looking for little tweaks they can make so their food works with them, not against them; things like spotting where there’s a blood sugar slump during the day and advising on healthier snacks that could be eaten to ward that off, or advising on healthy yummy breakfasts that will see my clients getting through the morning at work without needing to reach for the biscuits.

For more detailed food work I look to two friends, one I see as my female hormone and energy level guru, the other I view as my sports nutrition guide. They are actually both qualified the same and can advise on each other’s areas, that’s just how I fit them into my little world.

Anyway, last week Health Coach friend, Kathy Payne, who runs Kathy Payne – Hormone Health and Fertility, ran a facebook challenge called Curb Your Cravings. Every day she set us a challenge, some easier, some harder. The one that really got my ears pricked up was her sugar day. We were challenged to add up our sugar intake (either all sugar or just refined sugars, it was for each of us to choose, I went for all sugar, including those from fruit, veg, etc) as we went through the day until we reached the daily recommended amount for an adult woman, which is 30g. 30g of sugar. That’s about 5 teaspoons. That’s nothing!

OK. Breakfast – soya yogurt, muesli, ground linseed, mixed berries. Yep, I’m feeling pretty smug. Oh. The muesli is 9g sugar/100g. OK, have a look at the other box of muesli in the kitchen. Oh. 14g sugar/100g. Breakfast in total was 10g (I went for the lower sugar muesli and had nowhere near 100g of it).

Lunch – right, let’s do this. Made a veggie/chickpea/spinach thing 3.3g sugar/100g. Smugness back. 1 apple. 12g!! What????? OK, mental note to self, stick to berries when wanting fruit. Total 15.3g

Mid afternoon – OK, I’ll have some mixed nuts, they’ll be fine, right? 4g sugar/100g. Wow. But you know, nuts are good fats and all, so I’ll still have them, just add them to my sugar tally. Total 4g (ish, didn’t weigh the nuts)

Dinner – cod on a tomato and butter bean sauce, with tenderstem broccoli. About 10g

So on a day WHEN I WAS FOCUSING ON MY SUGAR INTAKE I got to 39.3g. Nearly 10g over the recommended daily intake. Granted I was counting fruit and veg sugar, not just the refined stuff, and had I only counted the refined stuff I’d have been at about 9g over the day, but what an eye opener.

Interestingly nutritionist friend, Claire Doherty, who runs Namaste Nutrition, is running a sugar challenge on facebook in September. I may report back. If I survive a low to no sugar September!