Women's hormones, gut + metabolism

Pro-Digestion Foods vs. Anti-Digestion Foods

Are you shook?

Yup, the same foods that are pro-metabolic are also pro-digestion.

You see. Digestion requires lots and lots of nutrients and energy to do its job and keep that digestive fire burning.

If you metabolism is sluggish due to nutrient deficiencies then your digestion will be too whether it be bloating, constipation, diarrhea, gas, etc… it is always a metabolic issue.

The problem is when you have digestive issues the first thing you want to do is restrict food in hopes of feeling better which in the end is just contributing to more nutrient deficiencies.

By supporting your metabolism you are in turn supporting your digestion.

Bone broth, collagen + gelatin: supply the body essential amino acids that are therapeutic to the digestive tract and they bring down inflammation in a muscle meat heavy diet.

Fruit + orange juice: Easy to digest carbohydrates full of minerals like potassium and magnesium. Potassium helps send signals from the brain to the digestive system to churn and digest food.

Beets: stimulate bile flow to break down fat

Cooked mushrooms: help the intestines break down food, disinfect, suppress bacterial growth and absorb toxins plus they are aromatase inhibitors and help balance hormones

Raw Carrots: are anti-microbial and anti-fungal and help to clean the intestines of bacteria, fungus and endotoxins

Coconut oil: contains lauric acid which is antiviral, antibacterial, anti-fungal and easily digested

Dairy: “Besides being an ecologically favorable source of calcium, protein, sugar, and fat, the composition of milk causes it to be digested efficiently, supporting the growth of bacteria that are safe for the intestine and liver, and reducing the absorption of endotoxin.” – Dr. Ray Peat.

All the foods in the anti-digestion column are gut irritating, hard to digest, inflammatory and contain anti-nutrients that make them even harder to break down and assimilate nutrients from.

They are stressful to the digestive tract and it’s all about bringing down stress in the body.

Stress = less blood flow to the digestive tract.

At the end of the day support your metabolism so you in turn support your digestive system.

What’s Your Health Status?

Are you freezing cold all the time?

Is your sex drive non-existent?

Sleep? What the heck is that?

Is your period dreadful? or has it gone missing?

Is your digestion out of wack?

Are you having a hard time conceiving?

Are you bloated all the time?

Can you just not lose that extra weight?

Do you find it harder and harder to recover?

Are you anxious and stressed?

Is your skin a mess?

Are you sick all the time?

Do you have a poor appetite? or are you hungry all the time?

Can you not leave the house without needing to pee constantly?

Can you make it through the day without feeling exhausted?

🙋🏻‍♀️ How many of those did you say yes to?

Girlfriend, none of these symptoms are normal and it all relates to a poor functioning metabolism. What if I told you we can heal your metabolism and get rid of these symptoms with proper nourishment and nutrition?

You see…Metabolism has nothing to do with whether or not you are skinny or fat. Metabolism is the sum of all chemical reactions in the body. To simply put, it’s how well we use energy (carbs, protein, fat, minerals) for fuel throughout the day. It all comes down to how well our cells can take in these nutrients. Your metabolism is everything from digestion to immunity to detoxification to hormones to repair. If you have a poor functioning metabolism YOU WILL FEEL LIKE SHIT. Good health is linked to high metabolic function.

If we are not nourishing our cells appropriately with proper nutrition and minerals, our thyroid will suffer, our metabolic rate will be low and our body will try to compensate for our lack of nutrients by using the adrenals to pump out the stress hormones to keep us alive.

In my Group Coaching Program Wild + Well-Fed, I teach you how to optimize your metabolism and start using food for fuel appropriately. I also give you a crash course on the thyroid, adrenals, digestion, and liver- yes, it’s all connected!

Are you ready to balance your hormones (for real this time) and feel happy, healthy + horney?

Are All Those Vegetables Causing More Harm Than Good?

You begin eating healthier so you start incorporating tons of raw salads + vegetables into your diet, loading up on them at meals and making it a point to always get them in.
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You probably think eating these things comes with no consequences. Well, every single food you put in your mouth has a consequence, yes, even vegetables. In particular, cruciferous vegetables! Things like collard greens, broccoli, kale, cauliflower, arugula, brussel sprouts, + cabbage.
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Hear me out. I’ve talked about how important the health of our thyroid is on numerous occasions since it runs the show when it comes to our metabolism. These cruciferous veggies have a direct impact on your thyroid! You’re thinking, nah girl, I got my thyroid levels checked I’m all good but you’re cold, losing hair or thinning hair, your libido sucks, you have digestive and hormone issues, and you’re tired AF.
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Just like other plants, they place a high priority on survival- this means they are going to try to protect themselves from predators and being eaten by you with phyochemicals.
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Cruciferous vegetables in particular contain goitrogens that are extremely anti-thyroid when eaten daily, in large amounts and especially raw! These vegetables directly interfere with thyroid production + compete with iodine – one of the most important minerals when it comes to thyroid health.
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Don’t be fooled, these veggies are not doing your hormones any favors. Some practitioners believe eating large amounts of cruciferous veggies helps the liver detox excess hormones, in particular estrogen BUT if you are not metabolically stable these veggies are not going to contribute to helping rid the body of excess estrogen but actually contribute the root of the problem- slow metabolic function. If your thyroid is fucked your hormones will be too!
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Another thing to consider is that they are so hard to digest and put a lot of stress on the digestive system. Why do you think you are so bloated and gassy after eating them? If you can’t digest them, you are not getting any nutrient value from them.

Remember your vegetables are only as nutritious as the soils they are grown in + unfortunately our soils are depleted as fuck. You simply CAN NOT get all your nutrients from vegetable sources, especially hard to digest veggies. You get a whole lot more bang for your buck if you stick to quality animal sources + easy to digest carbs. Eat these in moderation, as sides, not whole meals + always make sure they are cooked + cooked well!

Why Skipping Meals is Wrecking Your Hormones

You wake up, get in a workout, drink your coffee, forget to eat breakfast or just aren’t hungry.

You rush off to work maybe have a small snack or protein bar to hold you over. You maybe drink another cup of coffee and get so busy you forget to eat lunch. By the time dinner rolls around you are starving and craving all the things which leads into a spiral of overeating and poor food choices but you’re proud of yourself for making it the whole day without eating because now you can eat whatever you want with no consequences and because… calories.

I’ve been there. I used to think I should get some badge of honor if I skipped meals or had no appetite. Girl, was I wrong. If only I knew I was just making my health issues worse with this blood sugar rollercoaster.

You see, when it comes to balancing hormones it’s ALL about balancing your blood sugar.

Let’s talk about the hormone insulin real quick. First of all, insulin is not bad, it in fact helps glucose (sugar) get into our cells to use for energy which is necessary and important.

Where it goes wrong: your body starts over producing insulin when you are under chronic stress. Eventually your cells stop responding to these high stress demands and become resistant to insulin overtime. Your body produces higher amounts of cortisol (the stress hormone) which makes your cells resistant to insulin. When this happens too much sugar builds up in the blood instead of being used by our cells. Insulin resistance simply means your cells are having a hard time absorbing glucose.

What is stressful? Skipping meals, restricting calories, poor diet, poor gut health, overexercising, under-eating, eating too much, and not eating balanced meals.

Chronically elevated insulin levels lead to increased testosterone, increased adrenaline and cortisol, depleted progesterone, high estrogen. Progesterone actually helps to balance blood sugar where estrogen over-stimulates the pancreas which increases insulin resistance. Basically we are talking a hormonal disaster.

The first thing women think when they get diagnosed with PCOS, are having a hard time conceiving, can’t lose weight (since insulin resistance makes it near impossible to lose weight even when you are doing all the right things) or other hormonal issues is to start fasting and cutting carbs.

Sure, go ahead and cut those carbs and fasting to try and help with said insulin resistance but that is not getting to the root cause of WHY your cells are having a tough time taking in insulin in the first place and why your body is having a hard time using carbs for energy.

Some tips to balance blood sugar and stabilize insulin:

⫸ Eat every 3-4 hours and make sure your meals consist of a carb, protein and fat (amount of each can vary depending on the person)

⫸ NEVER have coffee black or on an empty stomach

⫸ Get your minerals in check so you can utilize carbohydrates appropriately

⫸ Work on eliminating/managing stress

And a little reminder for all you low carbers- just eating that slab of protein without a carb actually creates the same blood sugar response as just eating a carb bomb!

How Do I Overcome a Weight Loss Plateau?

First let’s set this straight. YOU DON’T NEED TO WORK OUT HARDER AND RESTRICT MORE to get over a weight loss slump.

So you head into this weight loss journey and I am guessing you probably eliminated food groups, started counting macros, restricting foods (possibly sugar and carbs), working out more consistently, possible harder than you ever have. Whatever it may be you probably made some pretty drastic changes in your life to lose the weight in the first place.

So now it is time to re-evaluate. As we know you will always see changes in your body when you implement a new diet or plan BUT eventually your body does hit plateau. One thing to consider is, maybe this is your set weight, your happy weight, the weight you are meant to be at. And if this just doesn’t seem like the case then here are a few of my suggestions.

1. Address the stress in your life. Have you been under more stress than usual? IS YOUR NEW DIET OR WEIGHT LOSS REGIME STRESSFUL? We can only run on adrenaline for so long my friend, running on adrenaline initially can make us feel really good and cause us to actually lose weight, until our body hits burnout and it will… Guess what your body needs when it’s stressed out? More calories, not less.

2. If you did eliminate carbs and sugars from your diet it might be time to start adding those back in. Eliminating carbs and sugars is not only stressful it will affect your metabolism and most importantly your main metabolic gland the thyroid. We need glucose in order to convert the inactive thyroid hormone T4 to the active form T3. Focus on simple sugars that are easy to digest like fruit.

3. Are you killing yourself at the gym? Depending on the workouts you are doing this can be a big stress and cause more harm than good. Take it down a notch and make sure you are recovering. Also, focus on strength training over cardio since putting on muscle will increase your resting metabolic rate (the amount of calories you need just to live and breath). Find out your energy expenditure you might be pleasantly surprised you need to be consuming a lot more calories than you think!

Address your protein, carb and fat intake. Make sure you are getting enough carbs and protein and consistently eating every 3-4 hours to balance your blood sugar and keep your bodies stress response down. Also, don’t overdo it on the fats! If you are consuming nuts and seeds and adding loads of healthy fats to your meals that may need to be addressed.

5. Sleep! I can’t stress this enough! If you are not getting deep restorative sleep every night you simply can not expect to lose those extra pounds.

Did you see a trend there? Stress in all forms is probably the reason you have hit a weight loss plateau. What’s the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. I know what your thinking- you are scared you will put on weight if you change things up. Girl, i’ve been there and that is a valid fear but I assure you the fear of gaining weight won’t fix anything but may actually contribute to the plateau.

If you are still having a difficult time losing weight it might be time to get some labs to address hormonal imbalances, gut probs and mineral imbalances. I offer DUTCH hormone testing, GI Maps, and of course the Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis.