I am back!

It has been awfully quiet here. Sorry guys, loads of things have happened. Let me give you a quick rundown.

·         I quite got quite ill.

·        I qualified for the CrossFit European Regionals (how on earth?) and opted out of the competition some two weeks before the actual event.

·         I went to the games anyway but as a judge. Probably the best choice I could have made.

Being ill was so frustrating. I don’t do “ill” very well. (Who does?). To make matters worse, I had to undergo a medical procedure (sorry guys, that’s all you’ll get) which added to the setbacks.  Things got quite bad and two weeks before the European games I finally decided not to participate. 

The thing is, when I signed up in March, I figured there was no way I’d end within the first 60 female athletes in Europe. After all I was ill and had only been doing CrossFit for about 9 months. The whole thing was supposed to have been something fun I did at the box with my fellow “crazies”.

Somehow I did qualify.

As D date approached I wondered what I would gain from participating, ill as I was. Day in day out and I pondered on whether it made sense to give my body a serious beating in those circumstances, how long it would it take to heal and whether I would have done some irreparable damage.  

As much as I love me a competition, participating at the games would have been for “the experience” at this stage. I have loads of competitive experience from my kayaking days. I wasn’t going to win this thing not even by a long shot and there was a good chance I’d have to spend months recovering from the weekend in Bolton, Manchester. The “experience” just wasn’t worth the damage, so I chose to live and fight another day.

Participating as a judge was very inspiring. I got to be right on top of the action and saw things I would otherwise not have seen had I been there as an athlete.

The good news is I am all better now and ready to rumble. 

Goal: to qualify and compete at the Regionals yet again, oh and yes, I want to do very well.

Will I succeed? I will keep you posted on what I am up to.

Lights and sleep

Did you know that light affects how well you sleep?

That's right, contrary to popular belief, us humans are part of nature and as such we react to it in ways similar to other animals.  Have you noticed how birds go to sleep as soon as it starts getting dark and then wake up at the break of dawn? Have you ever seen a bird in need of a power nap?

So back to lights and the quality of your sleep... did you know that the production of melatonin by the Pineal Gland is directly influenced by the amount of light we are exposed to? Yep! Our eyelids have receptor cells that " tell"  the body to start or shut down the production of melatonin depending on how much light you are exposed to.

The problem these days is that we are constantly exposed to light. Think of computers, mobile phones, the television, the ipad or any form of blue light. If years ago we went to sleep as it got darker, today we stay up watching the latest news, we text friends, watch one more episode of Grey's anatomy (or other TV show of your preference) or post one more Tweet; lights are constantly on.

If your melatonin production is dependent a.o on the amount of light we are exposed to, no wonder so many of us find ourselves lying in bed staring at the ceiling. Think about it, when would your body get the signal that it is about time to go to bed?

No melatonin = no sleep.

By all means, I am not suggesting you should go to bed with the birds. That's utopia and not very realistic in this day and age. However, if you find that you are having trouble sleeping, why not turn off your computer, tv or mobile phone a bit earlier? 

Call the Paleo Police!

I have several pet peeves; one of them is being told that what I am eating “isn’t Paleo”.  And to complete the whole charade, the wagging finger and the condescending smile that says: “caught you!”

Caught me? Caught me doing what? Eating a kitten? Was I naked? Did I have a bone punched through my nose and was I screaming oogha boogha?!

Hold on and rewind! Did I announce that I was going to reenact the past, by dressing in animal skins, living in a tree and clobbering animals for food, devoid of ANY form of modern comforts or technology? Did I state that I was hell bent on becoming that person who won’t accept dinner invitations for fear of being “poisoned” by “non paleo” foods?

I get upset when people get into a whole purist stance of what is and isn’t paleo. As if there is a Paleo bible somewhere that tells you what you may or may not eat.

Me being the type of person who has SERIOUS issues with authority, anything that suggests (never mind outright saying) that I am forbidden from doing or eating something, is going to be kicked right to the curb and never to be seen again. Just saying I cannot do something doesn’t work. I need to understand why. It is a matter of motivation through education. 

Paleo to me isn’t just about food, it is a lifestyle (and no, it does not include running around scantily clothed in leather underwear). With regards to my food I choose to pursue optimal health by choosing foods I know will not:

•  Give me pimples
• Make me feel hungover
• Ruin my digestive system and consequently how I absorb the foods I eat
• Get me downright depressed.

What does it mean? That after deciding to give this whole no grain, no dairy, no legumes and no sugars a shot AND after some serious tinkering and re-introducing certain foods, I now have a pretty good idea of what I can or cannot tolerate. I know what works for me and have become an expert on Carla.

This is what I know:

•  Too much sugar (be it 85% chocolate, fruit or sweet potatoes) will make me unpleasantly jittery. I won’t sleep and then I will crash and burn.
• Wheat is a serious no-no. Eating any of it will leave me curled up on the floor with a major stomach ache and a destroyed digestive system.
• I can handle Milk (as long as it´s raw) on occasion and in small quantities.
•  I seem to have no problems with a little white potatoes or rice every now and then. 

In practice it means:

•  I never eat wheat
•  I will eat chocolate (even if it isn’t always 85% cocoa) and dairy as occasional treats
• I won’t pass up the opportunity to eat some good Thai food, rice and all. 

I guess what I am trying to say is, doing something like a 30 day challenge is a good way to find out what works for you. See it as a way to re-set your system and set the basis to heal your body. Does it mean you need to be 100% clean (whatever that means…) ALL the time? As far as I am concerned: no.

Again, find out what works for you and consider the following:

•  Do you have signs or do you suspect any auto-immune disease or inflammation? Skip the dairy, the grains and the legumes. Yep. I am afraid that is what it is.
• What are your body composition goals? Want to lose weight? Then, even if you find you can tolerate potatoes and rice, these would not be the best choice for your current goal.

Otherwise, kick up your heels a bit. Enjoy once in a while and by all means do not become neurotic and anti-social.

I for one am on my way to South Africa pretty soon and you bet that I am going to go and enjoy the delicious food at The Fat Cactus.

6 weeks from 18 to 14% body fat percentage

As I mentioned in previous posts, for a long time I led a lifestyle that pretty much fried my adrenals and left me feeling like someone had punched the air out of me. Although I embraced the Paleo way of eating, which has allowed my body to heal itself in many levels, sleep and stress management still left a lot to be desired.

We all experience some form of stress in our lives, but things go belly up when it becomes too much. Your body not only perceives stress when you experience emotional stress (think of trouble at work or school), but also when you do too much exercise (chronic cardio for example, or too little rest between training sessions), do not get enough sleep, or eat foods the body cannot handle. So yes, experiencing too much stress may mean that although you are lean overall, your body still carries that extra body fat around your middle.  It may also mean that although you dial in on your food and exercise smartly, you will not lose body fat.

Before I get into the (somewhat gruesome) details of the consequences of the lack of sleep and stress management on my body, let me give you a little scientific-ish background information you will need to make sense of the rest of the story. Please note that this is a simplistic  explanation of an otherwise intricate process.

Our kidneys have little “hats” on top of them. They are called adrenals and it is their job to produce several hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol. Also known as the ‘’stress’’ hormone, cortisol is necessary and good in the right quantities, and bad for us in excess. If you are under constant stress your adrenals rev up the cortisol production and keep on going until they tire out and are no longer able to keep up with the demand. The cortisol output will slowly diminish and you will eventually experience the unpleasant consequences.

Now imagine a tree. That tree is Pregnenalone and it has two branches: cortisol and DHEA (a hormone that is converted into either male or female hormones). Both branches are “fed” by the tree trunk. So if your adrenal glands are constantly serving the demand for cortisol, eventually the pregnenalone ‘’tree’’ will be used mostly to cope with the stress (cortisol) and there won’t be enough pregnenalone left over to create DHEA.

What does this mean? It means that too much stress may result in a serious lowering of your sex hormones (estrogen, progesterone and testosterone) as well as growth hormone levels. This isn’t exactly what you want if your goal is to increase or maintain your lean body mass.  

So now that you´ve passed the crash course on hormones, back to my story:

My latest holidays did help and I leaned out a great deal. How do I know? It really is as simple as looking in the mirror. I usually check the “damage” in a room with neoprene lights. (WARNING!: If you do this first thing in the morning, you risk being grumpy the rest of your day.)

Me being me, I had to get myself tested to know exactly where I stood. Having this information helps me establish how to adapt my “diet” and most importantly: how I should or should not be training to get the hormonal response I need for the results I want.

Two weeks ago I decided to bite the bullet and get myself tested by one of my mentors:  Bas Willemse from The Overload Principle. You can always count on Bas to tell it like it is. This is fine by me as I am not into the fluffy stuff anyway.

I underwent a test that established my Hormonal Profile. This test is based on the premise that where your body stores fat says a great deal about how balanced/imbalanced your hormones are. Once you know what your “issue” is, you can (assisted by a practitioner) effectively make changes through a combination of exercise, supplements, diet and critical lifestyle changes that are relevant and applicable to you. This is the type of testing that I do with my own clients and with great results.

So, there I stood as Bas used a skin caliper to measure 12 different skin folds on my body. Top on, top off, pants on, pants off. (On a side note: so glad I did remember not to wear a G-string.  That’s just not cool.)

By the way, did you know that if a man has a higher percentage of body fat on his chest than on his triceps it generally means that there is some imbalance in his sex hormones (Growth Hormone, Testosterone and Estrogen? Something else I find interesting is that measurements on the umbilical (a.k.a. belly button) site say a lot about your stress levels. )

So anyway, my skin fold measurements, in addition to an extended questionnaire on matters such as how long I sleep, how I deal with stress, how my digestion works, etc., gave me a clear picture of what is currently going on in my body. 

Tadaaaaaa! Here are the results:

Current body composition: body fat had gone from 14.9 % to 18.2 % EEEEKKK. Although I weigh the same, my lean body mass declined by 2 kilos and made way for some “good old” fat. DOUBLE EEEEEKK!! I could have cried, but it really wasn’t something I didn’t already know (and stressing out about it would have made me fatter). So yeah: shut it, take a deep, relaxing breath, and do something about it.

Hormonal Profile:  estrogen profile

Broadly speaking, here are some of the “symptoms” of someone who has an estrogen profile:                         

• Mood swings (guilty as sin)
• Nervousness (I can go on like Speedy Gonzales)
• Irritability (yep)
• Fluid retention (on occasion and to my horror)
• Sleeping problems (bingo)
• Quick weight gain (I can’t say it was quick) 
• Accelerated aging (didn’t notice anything) 
• Reduced recovery after an intensive work-out or illness (yep)
•  Cellulite (didn’t quite get to it. Phew!)

To my doctor’s annoyance, I always need to understand why things happen in my body as I refuse to believe that it simply went mad one day and decided to do me in. So of course, I looked into it. Again in a nutshell, here are some of the possible causes of an estrogen imbalance:

• Exposure to xeno-estrogens (took care of that). 
• Alcohol use (I don’t drink) 
• The pill (stopped using it when I realized I became a crazy psycho every month) 
• Yo-yo dieting (was never really my thing) 
•  Excessive carb eating (been there)  
• Excessive sugar consumption (been there)      
• Stress (hmmm) Cardio training (Eeek! How often did I go for long runs? Can I hear spinning classes, aerobics, 2 or more hours of paddling per day?) 

Man, no wonder things got so messed up! 

Anyway, now I know and it is time I did something about it.

My goal: 

• Get my cortisol back to normal levels by living , exercising and eating smart. 
•  Regain lost muscle mass and decrease body fat from 18% to 14%.

My plan:

•  Sleep 8 to 9 hours per night. 
•  Do 2 relatively heavy 45 minute (max) weight-training sessions (100% effort) per week.  The workouts will include  will include things like Bench Press; Pull ups; Squats, Dead lifts and Shoulder presses.  Why? Because I want to recruit as much muscle as possible in one exercise and therefore create overload in a shorter period of time.  Getting thus the hormonal response I want. 
•  Do 2 CrossFit workouts per week  (Average of 15 minutes per workout). Why? Because I enjoy it and because I know estrogen reacts really well to lactic acid build up.  As I do have my cortisol levels to consider, longer work-outs than that just won’t do. 
•  Go for walks with my dogs, just because it relaxes me, helps me recover and keeps my babies fit too.

I am ready, willing and able.

The coming 6 weeks I will update my blog regularly so that you can follow me on my journey and I can be held accountable.  

I am at the start line…3,2,1  GO! 

Stop. Listen. Change

My work as a personal trainer entails establishing a client’s hormonal profile. In other words, I try to understand which hormonal disturbance is causing the person to gain or lose weight. Once I have a hormonal map of that person, I create a training program and suggest lifestyle changes. It is never a matter of one size fits all. Why? Because we are all different and what works for my best friend, may not work for me. After all, my hormones may be doing something completely different than hers which means that my body will respond differently to a certain stimuli.

I see different people in my line of work. The first group comes in for advice on how to balance their hormones, get healthy and consequently lose weight. That’s right: you need to get healthy to lose weight and not the other way around. These people want to do things on their own and use me as their sounding board when needed.

The second group wants one-on-one help inside the gym, in addition to their own implementation of the lifestyle changes I suggest. In most cases the second group always gets better results. This is because I am constantly reviewing their efforts. During training for example, I can quickly see whether someone has recovered from the previous workout or from life in general and whether or not they are in fact ready to have their homeostasis disturbed yet again. If the person isn’t recovered due to any of several possible causes like bad food, dehydration, lack of sleep, deadlines, etc., there won’t be any training. Instead, we will do some mobility and recovery work. Adding stress in the form of exercise to an already- stressed body is not going to help that person reach her goals any faster; in fact, it can contribute to some unsightly developments in the abdominal area.

Things go south when someone refuses to acknowledge his or her own responsibility regarding health and body composition, and much of this responsibility has to do with what we put into our bodies. You cannot out-train a bad diet. At the end of the day, I cannot MAKE someone follow the recommended lifestyle changes. This goes further than avoiding processed foods, preservatives (Read your labels people. Those crazy E numbers and words you do not understand have a negative impact on your body!), sugars, Trans fats, soy, dairy (depending on the person). It entails a clean diet that allows your body to heal itself, good training and good recovery. Disregard one of these and you will not get the results you desire.

Imagine that you are someone who is always tired, you have trouble with bowel movements and you keep on waking up in the middle of the night. This is not normal. You may be so used to it that you think it´s normal, but it´s not. Your body is ringing the bell and telling you something is up. More often than not, your hormones are all over the place or your food choices are irritating your bowels.

Do we listen to our bodies? Nope. Although we all know that if we do not fuel our car properly it won’t get us too far, most of us fail to make the connection between body and food, and body and rest. In fact, we choose to take a pill (why not just mask the symptoms, right?) and keep on running in the crazy rat race. Great. Now you’ve just added pills to the equation. Have you bothered reading the contra-indications? Why not try and establish WHY the body is giving you all these signs?

Then, there are others who will decide to starve themselves for a certain period while punishing themselves by doing aerobic exercises for at least 2 hours a day in the hope that if they “just lose that weight” all other problems will also magically disappear.

At the end of the day you may lose that weight (today I won’t get into what you may be in fact losing and whether you should be happy about it), but you are constantly hungry and tired. Chances are you are now skinny, bloated, tired and still not sleeping too well. You may also have developed an injury from all that repetitive movement. When you fail, you blame it on your own lack of perseverance or even strength of character. Oh brother…

Just how long do you think you can keep that going? Until your body’s survival instinct takes over and makes you eat everything in sight? Until there is a complete system failure, i.e. your body decides that enough is enough and steps on the breaks?

As a trainer and guide, there is only so much I can do when someone keeps on coming back with excuses like “I am too busy to concern myself with what I eat “, “I forgot to eat lunch or dinner and then ate a whole pack of cookies” or “I am too busy to sleep – sleep is for the weak”. I do not know what to say to that person. Nobody can care more about your health than you do. Nothing frustrates me more than to see people eating all sorts of junk, depriving themselves of sleep, doing crazy cardio in the hopes of losing weight and then complaining about how tired they are, how bad their skin looks or how much weight they are putting on. All these things will throw you out of (hormonal) balance.

If you get sleepy after eating or you get brain fog, it means you’ve just had something your body cannot handle well. If you wake up with a flat stomach and find yourself bloated at the end of the day, then stop to think about what you’ve been feeding yourself. If running half marathons on a daily basis isn’t helping you lean out and feel energetic and healthy, then you should at least question your methods. Or you could just keep on “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. This was Einstein’s definition of stupid.

All you need to do is Stop. Pay attention. Change. Get help if you do not know how to do it. Remember: You need to get healthy to lose weight.

How I leaned out on vacation

My husband and I went on a 3-week holiday to Houston, Texas and Costa Rica. We saw many things and had a great time with friends and family.

Although we did not deprive ourselves of the foods we love, we both leaned out. Note that I specifically chose “leaned out” instead of “lost weight”. In my book, and in our specific case, losing weight could mean a loss of muscle mass and an increase in body fat.

I see losing muscle mass as something like removing a Ferrari’s motor and replacing it with a Fiat 500’s. The car loses power. It may look impressive for a while but eventually you will see that it isn’t going anywhere fast.

Without getting into too much detail, simply see your muscle mass as your body’s fat burning motor: the bigger the engine, the bigger the capacity. So if you replace the motor with a smaller version (i.e. you lose your muscle mass), you won’t be burning as much as you used to.

So how on earth did we lean out during our holidays? Sounds like a feat? Well it wasn’t really. This is what I did:

We ate good foods

We had plenty of sleep

Good foods

Breakfast

While in the USA, most of our breakfasts were eaten at our family’s home. Remco and I found the nearest WholeFoods where we bought eggs, veggies and blueberries. This became our breakfast staple. In Costa Rica we relied mostly on restaurants.

Breakfast at a restaurant usually included avocados, bacon, eggs and a cup of tea. Once we went to a place called Texas Grill, and did I ever dive into those sausages? I did stay clear of the sauces (no idea what they were made of), beans, rice and other staple foods that do not fit into my diet. Result? I was fuller for longer, did not get bloated and had no sugar cravings.

Lunch and dinner

When in The Netherlands we eat mostly at home. I value knowing what is in my food, and I like my organic meats, fruits and veggies. When we do go out, we make a big deal of it and indulge. Yes, I will get an entrée, a main course and a dessert.

While on holidays, I did not indulge in a 3-course meal each time. When we did, the whole thing looked like this:

Entrée:

Salmon salad with olives, olive oil and some lemon juice (no croutons, cheese, or sauce, please) or perhaps some Carpaccio. I always make sure to include some protein and fat.

You may wonder why I do not dive into the bread basket. Well, for two reasons: first, wheat and I do not go together well. Ever since I stopped eating it, any tiny bit I consume causes me a major stomach ache. Second, I have since learned that wheat has anti-nutrients, that it irritates my gut, making it very difficult for my body to absorb vitamins and minerals. Bread doesn’t sound that appealing now, does it?

Main Course:

Always a big piece of protein, loads of vegetables and good fats.

Protein: anything that once had a face. You know: cows, ostriches (yeah, I am an African), fish, chicken, etc.

Veggies: pretty much anything that tickled my fancy.

The fats I ate depended on the meal I chose. Coconut milk if I selected a curry, olive oil, or even a good old avocado. While in Costa Rica I made it a habit of eating one avocado per meal (yes, I said one whole avocado per meal). Fats and protein keep me satiated for a long time. This means I can enjoy my holidays and do not have to worry about the next snack every 2 to 3 hours.

Dessert:

I like fresh mint tea, but unfortunately it isn’t’ available everywhere. I also love chocolate and would on occasion indulge on some truffles or 85% chocolate that I had bought at Whole Foods. Have I mentioned that I love that store? Seriously, I am like a kid in a candy store, eh, well… without the high and lows of a sugar crash.

Most meals were simply a one-course meal that left me satisfied. I drank water most of the time. Why? Because I never learned how to drink in my early years (going out, getting wasted and having to be up for a training session didn’t go hand in hand). I do believe that if you like wine, then by any means enjoy a good glass of red wine.

In Costa Rica, I did enjoy my share of fruit. I did not go overboard because I found that eating too much fruit left me cranky (holy sugar crash), hungry and that it awakened my sugar cravings. Since I wasn’t interested in waking the sugar dragon, spiking up my insulin levels and consequently gaining weight, I ate small amounts of these tropical treats.

Sleep

Life tends to be hectic. Or maybe I should just cut the bull and say that I have been guilty of not planning things well, of taking way too much work on, training too much and sleeping too little. “Run Forrest, run! “

All of these “lovely” ingredients contributed to my adrenal fatigue. Complete system failure. I had high cortisol levels and a tentative small muffin top to show for it.

Poor Cortisol, it gets a bad rep when in fact this hormone is also responsible, among others, for controlling inflammation. In my case, constant periods of stress (yes, exercise falls under that category too) led to a lowering of my testosterone and growth hormone levels (yes, women have them too!). This led to a break down of my muscle mass, slowed my metabolism and added the dreaded extra adipose tissue. EEEEKKK!

So I have changed my ways. I was already sleeping more, reduced the amount of exercise drastically, and started saying no.

During our holidays I slept until I woke up. No alarm clock. I spent a great deal of time in the sun and at the beach, I read several books and enjoyed the company of friends and family. Not having to be anywhere or do anything. . .bliss, just bliss.

I also decided to take time off of exercising. In fact, I took a 32-day sabbatical. No exercise whatsoever. That was new and scary! I was still somehow stuck to the idea that you have to exercise not to gain weight. Guess what? Not only did I not gain weight, I lost body fat!

I sleep much better and I feel rested for the first time in ages.

This was my formula: good foods and sleep. I avoided foods that spike up insulin levels (bread, pasta, potatoes, juices, loads of fruit, sugar, dairy) and opted for proteins, veggies and good fats. I slept a great deal and relaxed for the first time in ages. It really was that simple.

Does this mean we did not indulge? Yes, of course we did. We joined my family on their Christmas meal. Half of the family being Angolan, it mean that we were served Bacalhau com Natas, a very typical Portuguese dish with cod fish, heavy cream and fries, among other ingredients. I grew up with this recipe and the smell alone brings me good memories. So what the heck? I dove in, enjoyed and dealt with the bloated belly later.

My slow dance with Adrenal Fatigue

Last year my doctor told me that I had adrenal fatigue. Adrenal what now?! How did I ever get this far?

Turns out it is quite “easy” to fry your adrenals. This was my own very successful recipe:

1. Go on sleeping an average of 6-7 hours per night. Throw in a couple of shorter nights just for good measure and never get up feeling rested.
2. Live constantly under stress.
3. Get too much work on your plate and do not ever say no.
4. Beat up your body by competitive kayaking for years and by all means do not even attempt to fuel your body properly.
5. Once done with competitive sports continue to beat body down by training 6 days a week. Mix 100% effort in weight training sessions to a few CrossFit circuits and you’re all done!
6. Drink crazy amounts of green tea or coffee.
7. Eat bad foods for most of your life and make sure your gut gets so irritated that your body is no longer able to absorb nutrients properly. Or better yet, eat things you are allergic to. I mean, since you are at it, you might as well do a thorough job at busting your immune system, after all who needs it? (right?!)

But wait, I guess I should rewind a bit and tell you why I ended up at the doctor’s office in the first place. Here it goes short and not-so-sweet:

1. Lethargic.
2. Major decrease in sports performance.
3. Loss of muscle mass followed by a disturbing increase in body fat.
4. Poor sleep or lack thereof.
5. Awake during the night and sleepy during the day. I became a bat! Too bad the rest of the world didn’t work according to my body’s new schedule.

You think I would have stopped and analysed what I was doing as I went downhill wouldn’t you? Well, I didn’t. I kept on going, thinking I was “ hardcore” (yeah, whatever… in fact, yawn). After a while I started blaming my age, after all I was no longer in my twenties. (ugh). Only after my circadian rhythm flipped out completely and I realised that I was going to lose my mind from a lack of sleep did I drag my sorry butt to the doctor.

Blood tests and a 24-hour urine test confirmed that I had a Masters in Adrenal Fatigue. I had passed Cum Laude.

Horrified beyond belief, I listened as the doctor told me what I needed to do in order to revive my adrenals. Beat up, I left on a mission (how typical) to get myself all patched up.

Next time I will tell you what I did and whether it worked.