Many athletes may fuel their bodies with refined carbohydrates, consuming too many empty calories which lack essential nutrients. They consume some protein but the optimal amount they require is unclear and although they will cut back on saturated fat they may be missing the intake of essential fats.

The first areas which need to be addressed are to ensure that blood sugar levels are stable and every meal consists of healthy fat, fibre and lean protein.

Blood sugar fluctuates every three hours, for athletes it is important to never go hungry and thirsty, ensure that you have planned snacks and spread your meals throughout the day. Try having a smaller breakfast and have the remainder mid morning, do the same for lunch and dinner, you will consume the same calories but less energy deficit and enhanced performance. Large meals will cause more insulin to be released and could lead to a sharper fall in blood sugar and leave you tired with low energy.

It is also of vital importance that you listen to your body. Through keeping a food log every 7-10 days note why, when and what you are eating. Do this five times and you will become an instinctual eater rather than just eating for eating’s sake.

Exercise has two effects on nutrient requirements: it increases the rate of energy usage and increases sweating, if there is not enough energy consumption it will have a negative impact on the body and on performance. That is where restricting calories come into play when trying to loose body fat. Although you may be loosing weight on the scales, you will also be loosing lean muscle mass because the body is compensating and needs to get energy supplies from somewhere.

Weight loss of one to two pounds per week is safe and realistic and won’t have a negative impact on you training.

Eating real food may take time and preparation but will deliver results!

If you are not getting results from training program, a diet overhaul may just be the ticket to help you achieve the results you are working so hard for. Get in touch to find out if we could help.

Kate Cook helps people deal with their diet, digestion and stress.
Contact 0845 0502442 or kate@thenutritioncoach.co.uk http://thenutritioncoach.co.uk/contact-the-nutrition-coach.php”>

We all vary in the foods we like, how much we need to eat, and when we like to eat. It is also normal for us to experiment with different eating habits, for example trying a vegetarian diet or maybe cutting out wheat for a period to see the effect on our health and how it makes us feel. However, when food is used to help us cope with painful situations or feelings, then eating patterns can become damaging. For example, food may be used to help someone cope during a time of feeling depressed, lonely, ashamed or as a way to control their environment and manage external pressures and expectations. Whilst we can all relate to the idea of comfort eating and restrictive eating, for people with an eating disorder, thoughts of food, eating, weight and shape encompass every aspect of their life.

Having an eating disorder is a lonely existence and is associated with many health problems. There is no single cause as to why eating disorders develop, but they are associated with a combination of many factors, events, feelings and pressures which lead to the individual feeling unable to cope. Controlling food intake therefore becomes a coping strategy, but as the disorder develops it takes control of the individual’s life. The media often glamorises eating disorders with dramatic weight loss, size zero and speculation of ‘near anorexic’ celebrities making the front pages of glossy magazines. The reality, however, is that anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and other eating disorders are complex mental illnesses caused by psychological distress. A person does not choose to develop an eating disorder, just like someone does not choose depression.

1.6 million people in the UK are estimated to have an eating disorder, and anorexia has the highest mortality rate for any psychiatric condition. People with eating disorders, but who do not have enough of the features common in anorexia or bulimia, are termed as having an Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (EDNOS), and EDNOS make up the largest group of eating disorder sufferers. Other eating disorders include binge eating disorder and compulsive overeating. You cannot tell if someone has an eating disorder by their shape and size alone, as many are of normal weight – the real pain of an eating disorder is on the inside.

Research shows that eating disorders are becoming more and more common. It is therefore particularly important that people are aware of the facts about eating disorders and what help is available to them and their loved ones. At The Nutrition Coach we work with those suffering with eating disorders to improve their relationship with food and to help them to find their way out of the cycles of disordered eating. Taking the first steps to get help can be extremely difficult, but seeking help is the first step to recovery. Food plays an important part in all our lives and we are here to help people develop a balanced, happy relationship with food, so that they can live life to the full.

BEAT (http://www.b-eat.co.uk/Home) is the UK leading charity on eating disorders and initiator or eating disorder awareness week.

Kate Cook helps people deal with their diet, digestion and stress.
Contact 0845 0502442 or kate@thenutritioncoach.co.uk

Dim Sum: Literally meaning ‘to touch your heart’ dim sum, the ’small eats’ are originally a Cantonese custom and are inextricably linked to the Chinese tradition of “yum cha” or drinking tea (and that’s not PG tips I’m talking but plenty of healthy antioxidant rich green tea). Teahouses sprung up to accommodate weary travellers journeying along the famous Silk Road. Rural farmers, exhausted after long hours working in the fields, would also head to the local teahouse for an afternoon of tea and relaxing conversation. And if you go for the steamed and not the deep fried version you can enjoy some tantalizing healthy ’small eats’ and you should know by now that I always encourage eating ’small’ and if you do it while sipping a cup of green tea to relax instead of coffee you might dream of being in China instead of stuck in front of your computer.

Ginger and Garlic: These two ingredients are integral to Asian cooking. The unique tang of fresh ginger is used in everything from stews to stir-fried dishes, while the pungent flavour of garlic is featured in meals throughout China. If you are not using these two ingredients in your kitchen yet, it is time to start experimenting and some more flavour to your foods and dish up a nice ginger chicken or Chinese stir fry. Adding these to your diet will also mean you are adding some health promoting properties, as both of these two foods are thought to have medicinal properties and garlic provides you with anti-viral and anti-bacterial properties.

Tea: Brits are tea drinkers but unfortunately that’s mostly stimulating black tea and not relaxing herbal tea. I think it’s time to swap the black tea for some of the health promoting tea and tea drinking customs derived from the Chinese culture e.g. consuming tea as a sign of respect, to apologise or to connect large families on wedding days (I wonder how this would go down with the in-laws).

Kate Cook helps people deal with their diet, digestion and stress
Contact us
kate@thenutritioncoach.co.uk

by London Nutritionist Sylvia Hensher

There is a connection between our adrenal glands, thyroid glands and weight gain. When these two glands are not kept in a healthy state, the result can often be weight gain. The good news is that on the other hand, if these two glands are supported through proper nutrition and a healthy lifestyle, it can lead to a natural weight loss.

What our adrenal glands do

The adrenal and thyroid glands are very closely connected in how they enable the body to function properly. The adrenals are small triangular shaped glands that sit on top of both kidneys. They are responsible for releasing the hormones adrenaline and cortisol which among other functions, help control body fluid balance, blood pressure, blood sugar and are designed to help the body deal with physical and psychological stress. In addition, the adrenal glands produce small amounts of oestrogen when women enter into menopause and the ovaries reduce their oestrogen output. This is why it’s so important to maintain adrenal function in the menopause years.

Adrenal Fatigue

Adrenal Fatigue is a collection of signs and symptoms, known as a “syndrome” that results when the adrenal glands function below the necessary level.  This happens most often when you are exposed to constant , uninterrupted stress so that your body (and adrenal glands) cannot fully recover, or during or after acute or chronic infections. Consequently, the adrenal glands become fatigued and are unable to continue responding adequately to further stress.

You may look and act relatively normal with adrenal fatigue and may not even have any obvious signs of physical illness, yet you live with a general sense of feeling unwell, tiredness or “grey” feelings. People suffering from Adrenal Fatigue often have to use coffee, tea and other stimulants to get going in the morning and to prop themselves up during the day.

Some Manifestations Of Adrenal Fatigue:

• Confusion, poor concentration, and memory recall
• Chronic fatigue
• Cravings for salt or sweet foods
• Decreased immune response – recurrent coughs, colds, flu
• Difficulty during menopause (the adrenals take over the role of the ovaries after menopause)
• Fatigue in spite of sufficient sleep
• Increased fears, anxiety, and depression
• Insomnia
• Thyroid problems
• Weight gain

How cortisol levels affect the thyroid gland- and your weight:

1. Cortisol is required to facilitate the release of Thyroid-stimulating hormone (also known as TSH ) from the pituitary gland, which in turn stimulates the production and release of T4 (the inactive thyroid hormone) and T3 (the active thyroid hormone)by the thyroid gland.

2. Cortisol is required to convert the inactive T4 hormone to the active T3 form.

3. Cortisol allows each T3 cell receptor to more readily accept T3.

Thus, low adrenal functioning can lead to decreased cortisol output. This in turn can actually lead to decreased thyroid functioning, or cause someone’s existing thyroid problem to be much worse than it would be otherwise. As discussed in the other issues of this series on the thyroid, because thyroid functioning is intimately entwined with weight management, stress can really impact on the adrenals and therefore on your thyroid functioning.

So, if you have been exposed to chronic, unrelenting stress, think you might have thyroid problems and are struggling to shift those pounds, please call us on 0845 0502 442 for a  FREE 15 minute chat to see how nutrition can help you recover your vitality and health.

Wishing you the best of health

London Nutritionist Sylvia Hensher

Serotonin is produced from the amino acid tryptophan and therefore eating foods rich in tryptophan is an important first step in raising serotonin levels.  Excellent sources of tryptophan include oats, tofu, eggs, fish, beans, turkey and chicken. 

Noradrenalin is produced from the amino acids phenylalanine and tyrosine, and therefore eating foods rich in these amino acids are ideal for helping to raise noradrenalin levels.  Excellent food sources include almonds, butter beans, sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, oats, fish, eggs, meat, soya and poultry.

Therefore to help keep the January blues away, try to increase your protein intake with these amino acid rich foods, so that you can bounce out of January and into February!

Julia

Rehydrate

Alcohol is a diuretic – a chemical that kicks your urinary system into overdrive, and unless you managed to alternate your alcoholic beverages with water in between (which never works does it?), your post-drinking symptoms are most likely due to dehydration. Rehydrating is key when it comes to recovering from a hangover and cannot be stressed enough. But I’m not talking coffee, Red Bull or hair-of-the-dog here. Caffeine is an acknowledged stimulant, and while you might hope caffeine can perform its miracles of giving some much needed focus and alertness, it’s another diuretic. Red Bull isn’t much better (and requires another column), and choosing the hair-of-the-dog option would only be advisable if you want to pass out to forget what you’ve done the night before. Coffee will not help your stomach either, so the best option is water at room temperature. You may add some fresh lemon or fresh orange juice to give you additional Vitamin C for energy, and for soothing your upset tummy.

Top Up

When you drink excessively, you lose a lot of key minerals and vitamins including potassium, magnesium and B-Vitamins, all of which need to be topped up. Bananas are a great hangover food; they are like nature’s own little hangover cures. Not only are they full of fructose (natural fruit sugar) to help with energy, they contain a nice amount of potassium. Bananas are also natural antacids – which will help your nausea and stomach pain – and they also contain magnesium, which helps to relax pounding blood vessels in your head. Have a banana on toasted wholegrain bread (for the carbohydrates and B-Vitamins) with organic peanut or almond butter (great sources of magnesium and protein), and you get a good dose of all those key minerals and vitamins you lost the night before. Drinking vegetable bouillon soup or coconut water are two other good sources of vitamins and minerals, and easy for a fragile stomach to digest.

Eat

Do eat. Yes, it might be the last thing you want to do, but you will undoubtedly feel a lot better the minute you get your blood sugar levels up after having had some food. There is no one-and-only hangover food cure, but I’ve heard from many of my friends that you can’t beat a good fry-up. It gives you the greasy fat to coat your stomach, and the bread and eggs will give you the carbohydrates and protein for energy and blood sugar support. All I can say there is no perfect food cure for a hangover, so if you’ve found one that works for you, stick to it. My advise, though, would be to opt for a well-balanced meal, including all groups of macronutrients: complex carbohydrate, lean protein and healthy unsaturated fats. A toasted wholegrain bagel with cream cheese and salmon is another good option, and so is porridge with natural yoghurt and strawberries, giving you enough fibre for blood sugar balance, selenium to boost liver function, and Vitamin C for energy and soothing your tummy.

Sleep

But for the best cure of all (and if you have the luxury of not having to get up), go back to bed after your breakfast and sleep it off.

Wishing you a wonderful and nutritious Christmas!

Lisa

Studies have shown that 50% of the average annual weight gain is most likely to be gained in the six weeks between mid-November and Christmas. So we’re about one week in to the fixe week eat-athon which usually finishes with the consumption of a whopping 6,000 calories on Christmas Day (that’s three times the daily guideline amount of 2,000 calories for females). And unfortunately, that weight gain will (for most of you) still be there when Christmas comes around next year.

Over the next couple of weeks I will be taking a closer look at the nutritional value of some of the foods we tend to stuff our faces with during this six week eat-athon. The first on the list is the seasonal must-have, mince pies.

Did you know the female record holder ate 46 mince pies in 10min? With an average 250 calories per mince pie, this equals 11,500 calories, the recommended calorie intake of 5.75 days! Now I’m sure you don’t eat that many mince pies, but let’s have a closer look at this serious calorie punch.

So we’ve established an average mince pie contains 250 calories, 1/8th of your daily guideline amount of 2,000 calories. Put this into the mince pie calculator, and it tells you if you go swimming for an hour you burn off 1.4 mince pies. (But who has the time to do more exercise with all those festive dinners, ice skating events and shopping evenings. And be honest, do you really fancy showing off your body in an all-too-revealing swimming costume at this time of the year?) The mince pie might be small in size but high in sugar, containing up to 25gram per pie – that’s a total of five teaspoons of sugar in one mince-pie!

Considering your body can only ever deal with one teaspoon of sugar circulating in your system, you know what this will do to your blood sugar, insulin, and energy levels. The fat content isn’t much better – some of the mince pies out there contain a whopping 8g of total fat, and that’s not the healthy kind of polyunsaturated fat. So if you happen to eat 2.5 mince pies (which can happen too quickly, I know) you can easily reach your recommended daily allowance of 20g of saturated fat. The puff pastry offers little to no fibre, and can cause you to feel bloated and sluggish should you tend to be wheat or gluten intolerant. Protein levels are low so you won’t be satisfied for a long time, and you’ll want more mince pies in no time.

Now add a teaspoon of single or double cream (or brandy butter) and you can easily hit the 500 calorie mark. If you can’t resist a humble mince pie, keep these figures in mind, start reading labels, and try one of the gluten-free and lower calorie/fat versions out there.

After all, you don’t want to be first to cross the finish line of the five week eat-athon!

Lisa

P.S. Check out my weekly column to find out more how to survive the festive season and still fit into your LBD on Christmas day.

With the reduced daylight hours and the sun setting by mid-
afternoon, November can be a mellow month.

It’s tempting to want to warm ourselves up and boost our spirits by reaching for traditional comfort foods.  Unfortunately these tend to be stodgy, high-fat foods that do little for boosting our mood and actually make us feel worse in the long run.  If this sounds familiar and you suffer from the winter blues or Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), it’s all the more important to eat well to ensure that you’re getting enough mood-boosting nutrients.  Try following our top mood food tips to keep you feel merry in the run-up to Christmas:

1. Aim to include oily fish, such as salmon, sardines and mackerel into your diet two to three times per week, and have a handful of seeds or nuts (walnuts and hemp seeds are ideal) per day.  These foods are rich in omega 3 fats which help build receptor sites for ‘the happy hormone’, serotonin.
2. Include foods that are rich in the amino acid tryptophan in the diet, such as fish, chicken, turkey, oats, eggs, cheese and beans.  This is because tryptophan is needed to produce serotonin.
3. Eat complex carbohydrates such as oats, brown rice, rye bread, pulses and vegetables.  These help to stabilise blood sugar level fluctuations which can cause mood swings and depression.  They are also rich in brain boosting nutrients such as B vitamins, zinc and magnesium.
4. Always start the day with a good breakfast.  Ideal options include eggs on rye toast, sugar-free muesli with seeds and berries, porridge or sourdough toast with nut butter.
5. Eat three meals a day and a mid-morning and mid-afternoon snack.  Eating little and often helps prevent large dips in blood sugar levels and can leave you feeling low.  Ideal snacks included a Satsuma with a palm of walnuts, a handful of cranberries and almonds and vegetable crudités with bean dip.
6. Aim to eat some protein with every meal, such as eggs, fish, chicken, pulses, nuts, seeds and red meat but in moderation.  Protein is vital for good brain health and for maintaining blood sugar levels.
7. Avoid artificial stimulants including sugar, refined carbohydrates and caffeine as these play havoc with blood sugar levels and lead to low mood.  This includes white bread, pasta, cakes, many breakfast cereals, chocolate, coffee, alcohol and fizzy drinks.  Diets based on refined foods can reduce your levels of nutrients such as zinc, magnesium and the B vitamins which are vital for good brain health.
8. Avoid food additives, such as artificial sweeteners, preservatives, flavourings and eat organic food where possible.  Artificial additives and heavy metals can act as brain toxins and affect brain health.
9. Food intolerances can play a part in depression and therefore it may be worth seeking advice from a nutritional therapist to identify the culprit foods.
10. Get outside in the natural daylight as much as possible, aiming to spend at least 30 minutes outside daily.  It may is also worth investing in some ‘full spectrum’ lighting.  These light bulbs have the same quality of light as the sun and have been shown to be helpful in overcoming SAD.

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Not so strange to us as Nutritional therapists – in our more involved work (obviously at the top level we are involved in changing people’s diets) but on a deeper level we are trying to get to the bottom of why someone might be feeling a lack of energy.    A more accurate term to describe what a nutritional therapist does is, that we are involved in the area of functional medicine.  We certainly do not pretend to do the very important job a doctor does, but the doctor can only diagnose a condition when someone has already dipped in to “disease state” ie pathology.  The Nutritional therapist is trying to stop someone going in to disease so it is all about prevention rather than fire-fighting once that condition has got hold.

A point in case is when someone one does feel tired.  We do a test called an adrenal stress index (we are measuring cortisol (fight and flight hormone) and we are measuring DHEA (another hormone involved in recovery).  The doctor will does not recognise a lack of cortisol, or non optimal cortisol  – he recognises a serious and rare condition until called Addison’s disease.  But low cortisol should not be confused with this condition at all.  The Adrenal stress index is only measuring the function of the adrenal glands (where stress hormones come from).  If these hormones are low – you can feel any number of symptoms from lack of energy, depression, anxiety, foggy headed-ness  – it can manifest in the type of tiredness that even an apparently good night’s sleep does not refresh.

A Nutrition Therapist seek to redress this less than optimal cortisol by paying attention to the diet (or course), lifestyle (or stress hormones were designed to deal with sabre tooth tigers not email traffic and mobile phones!  90% of the adrenal gland is designed to handling chronic stress and only 10% acute stress and we don’t have adrenal glands the size of footballs to cope with the kinds of stresses we have on an on going basis.  In the old days, people would have had some really horrible things happen to them – think about living in Norman days (they were really tough those Normans and would chop of heads willy-nilly!) but if you were an ordinary person, the daily fear would not be there on a constant basis.  I am not saying it would be a walk in the park – life was nasty, brutal and short but the adrenals were designed for this kind of life.   A sudden sharp life threatening shock is the kind of stress the adrenals were evolved to deal with.

Taking care of your adrenals, I believe is the single most important thing you can do for your health!  Come and see us and consider getting your adrenal glands tested (we use a saliva test) and see where you are at our London Clinic or in Scotland!

Rooibos, or red bush, tea is an excellent caffeine-free alternative to regular black tea.  As well as tasting like regular tea, it has the added benefits of not leaving you feeling exhausted and recent research has confirmed that it also boosts antioxidant levels. The research from the Antioxidant Research Laboratory in Rome found ingestion of fermented and unfermented rooibos tea increased total antioxidant capacity levels in tea drinkers.  This means rooibos tea can also help strengthen the immune system.

If you feel stressed, exhausted or prone to mood swings then ditching quick stimulants is a key first step to getting your health back on an even keel.  If that sounds familiar then please do contact us to discuss your situation, or to make an appointment at one of our London nutrition clinics.

Julia