So how do you correct poor eating habits?

Unfortunately it’s not as easy as some so-called Health & Fitness Experts might have you believe. You can’t just “Do It” or ask yourself “How Bad Do You Want It?”. This sounds great on paper and might motivate you to start eating healthier, however if you don’t have a strategy in place, I can almost guarantee you that whichever diet plan you choose to follow will not be sustainable. And as I always say to my clients, if the diet plan you are following is not sustainable, then it will not be successful in the long term.

With that said, creating a balanced and structured Nutritional Plan is also not nearly as complicated as some Dieticians and Nutritionists might have you believe. For example, I personally have never been a firm believer in Elimination Diets. I feel it’s important to review and analyze an individual’s diet thoroughly before taking certain foods out completely and irrationally.

Getting To Know Your Body

How well do you know your own body? Do you know which types of foods make you bloated? Do you know which types of foods make you constipated? Do know which types of foods make your skin break out and/or develop irritable rashes?

Now I know that many of you reading this week’s blog do know your bodies quite well. But do you also know that our digestive systems change as we become older? And no, not always for the worse.

I’ve helped hundreds of people over the years with their Nutritional Plans and rarely if ever have I used the same strategy with the same two people in order to help them achieve results with both their health, digestive system, and their physiques.

Why?

Because everyone’s body is different. Everyone’s metabolism is different. And most importantly – Everyone’s lifestyle and genetics are different!

Dieting With Dairy

For the purpose of today’s blog, I’m going to use Dairy as an example of a popular food group in which I’ve had to restructure and occasionally even incorporate into some of my clients’ Nutritional Plans.

There are numerous people of whom I’ve worked with who at one point in their lives could drink a litre of milk and eat a block of cheese in one sitting and have no digestive issues whatsoever. Fast forward 20+ years later and if these same people even have a small bite of cheese or add a splash of milk into their morning coffees, they spend half their day sitting on the toilet and the other half doubled over in pain.

Why? What Changed?

Believe it or not, this is actually more common than you may think. What’s happened in these cases is that over the years these people have developed an allergy to dairy and are now either fully or just slightly lactose intolerant.

So What Do You Do?

Well the obvious thing would be to give up dairy all together. Unfortunately that’s not always as easy or practical for every single person. There are people out there that absolutely love their yogurt and cottage cheese and are unwillingly to give foods like these up for life. And I work with people like this all the time. So rather than “Eliminate” dairy completely from their diet, I will provide them with a few options.

My first option (which is also my preferred option) is to try and find an alternative choice for dairy for these clients. Using alternative products such as Almond or Oat Milk in replacement of regular Milk and Cream has proven to work wonders for many people of whom I’ve worked with over the years. Switching over to Vegan Cheese (which is primarily made of either soy and/or nuts) in replacement of regular cheese has also proven to work well for the majority of Dairy Addicts that I’ve worked with as well. And using a good lactose-free yogurt, for those people that are even slightly lactose intolerant has always been a game changer for my people who just can’t live without their dairy.

The second option that I provide to clients when it comes to consuming dairy is to have a digestive enzyme or probiotic on hand to consume either after or before they have something that contains dairy in it. Let’s face it. If someone really enjoys dairy, they are going to want to have it. And even if they choose to have it just once or twice a week in a cheat/refeed meal, having it with a probiotic or digestive enzyme can save them from hours spent in pain and on the toilet.

How Well Do You Know Your Nutrition?

Okay, so you might know your body pretty well. But what about Nutrition? And I’m not just referring to macronutrients. What do you know about micronutrients? How about essential fatty acids, vitamins and minerals?

When creating a Nutritional Plan it’s incredibly important to have at the very least, a basic understanding of dietary nutrition. You need to know which foods will help you and which foods will hinder your results.

If for example you know that sugar is your kryptonite and that you crave it during a particular part of your day, then you need to strategize and figure out what you can do in order to eliminate those cravings.

Incorporating more healthy fats into your diet and limiting simple carbohydrates, can significantly help keep blood sugar levels low and stable throughout the day and into the evening. In turn this will also help you control your sugar cravings.

This is just another example of working smarter rather than harder when it comes to putting a successful and sustainable diet plan together.

Sustainable = Successful

Besides being sustainable, a successful diet must be a diet in which you yourself enjoy. And a diet that you enjoy should be able to provide you with some flexibility so that you can still occasionally consume some sugary snacks and guilty pleasures every so often without having these foods have an impact on your results.

Finally, I think it’s important to note that if you want to be a successful dieter and continue to have a healthy relationship with food, then you need to be willing to adapt accordingly. You might not be able to eat the things you could eat when you were in your twenties. You might not have as fast as a metabolism at 55 then you had when you were 35. And you might need to take a probiotic or digestive enzyme after consuming certain foods. And all that is OKAY.

Learn to accept the fact that your body and your digestive system is changing with age and appreciate the fact that you have the ability to make the necessary changes that is required to keep that body and digestive systems strong, healthy and running at optimal levels as you continue to age.

Yours in Good Health,

Nick Cosgrove
Forever Fit Performance