Own Nutrition Experience Recap

Why hello there! It's been awhile. I will likely have another post regarding the latest 2016 obsession (DIY!) that led to me making my own dining room table and took me away from crazy training through this June. First though, I want to talk about the interesting journey I have been on the last 12 weeks working with Katie Rhodes from Own Nutrition.

As I mentioned, as of June, I hadn't been doing any crazy training as I was giving myself a mental break after back to back years of Ironman Tremblant and the Tussey Mountainback 50 miler. My initial goal was to work on speed and then do a half marathon in the spring, with the long term goal a sub-4 marathon at Richmond in November. However, those speed/half marathon plans just didn't work out since I was just struggling with being super exhausted all the time. I started going to the Techshop a one or two nights a week, and I just couldn't get myself to set an alarm the next day, no matter how mentally motivated I was. I also couldn't get motivated to run more than 90 minutes on the weekend, and even that was rare.

All of this came to a head for me in April when my clothes weren't fitting well anymore and I saw some photos of myself at a friend's wedding that didn't make me happy. I had worked so hard to get weight off I was annoyed I had let some of it come back over the course of 50 miler training & the off season. More importantly, if my goal is to PR the Richmond Marathon, the easiest way to do it would be to get back to my PR race weight and maybe a few pounds less.

Fast forward to Memorial Day and I was sitting in the airport getting ready to go on a marvelous two week journey to Italy for Pasta, Pizza, and Gelato, LOTS of Gelato. I checked Facebook and noticed my friend Anne Marie had a post about her nutritionist offering 15% off to her friends, and raving about how much energy she has, how good she feels, how she is never hungry, and how delicious the food was. I set myself a reminder to look it up when I came home and then went off and let myself ENJOY Italy. (At least as much as I could while feeling just completely exhausted/taking more naps than probably my whole childhood combined. If there was ever any test that proved a 100% processed carb/sugar diet is not good for my energy levels, that was it.)

I spoke with Katie right when I got back and signed up to start the following week. It has been a really great experience. Each week, she gives you a detailed meal plan for each day and you have a weekly consult. The meal plan is great because even though I know generic targets, life has been too busy for me to sit there and plan how I am going to meet them. The recipes are delicious and usually pretty simple. I have shared a lot of them with my parents (especially to make for me at Sunday dinner) and they love them as well. In between the consults, she is always available for a question, a last minute adjustment, advice, etc. The level of availability has completely wowed me and I am still getting used to it. When recently my memory issues were getting out of control (there was a week at work I forgot to bring something each day) I was able to talk to her real time and we agreed to really simplify the plan for the following week so I had less to remember/think about. (It helped, although I am still forgetting things often enough my coworker's have put a sign up "days since Hilary's last incident" and no one expects me to get to double digits.)  

One of my favorite meals. Blackened chicken salmon w/ mango avocado salsa.

The progress weight-wise has been slower than I would like (but still there and given how chaotic my schedule has been is pretty realistic) and I am still feeling tired, which given the oppressive heat/increased workouts I think is inevitable. However, the tiredness is nothing compared to what I had been experiencing, and since June I have kicked off my marathon training and have only missed one or two workouts. I have also learned a lot about how my body reacts to food, usually negatively. After the last mishap (my stomach swelled 2.5 inches in a day after going off plan by eating pizza the night before and a burger that day after a miserable run - gluten is not my friend), it made me laugh when I told Katie I felt miserable/awful and she goes, "this is actually a good thing! It says your body has adjusted and knows what it needs." 

Other ways my life/eating has changed:

• I drink my coffee black now (Italy's expresso culture really helped the transition) and have cut out artificial sweeteners. When I mentioned to Katie I used Splenda, she told me all about why she doesn't like them (sweetly) and the new piece of info for me was that it tricks your body into producing insulin because it thinks it had real sugar. As my family has a large history with diabetes, that was enough for me to make the switch. I haven't missed it and find I actually am craving bad stuff less. 
• I have cut down on my pre-workout meal and now have another full breakfast when I get to work (granola bowl, eggs & avocado, breakfast burrito) to help recover from my morning workouts. Always makes my coworkers jealous.

• I snack. A LOT. My coworkers constantly comment on how much I snack. The snacks include almonds (lots of almonds), avocado, hard boiled eggs, kind/lara bars, homemade energy balls made with peanut butter/honey/lots of good stuff (MY FAVORITE - picture below), almond butter & fruit. They keep me feeling good throughout the day and I am not missing the chips I used to default to on a daily basis at all.

• I eat a LOT of salad (and actually really enjoy it - I turn some non-salad meals into salads anyways). I binge bought a ton of different fruity balsamic vinegars, and "non-starchy vegetables" are always allowed in any quantity. Katie does a good job of mixing up the proteins (e.g., chicken, turkey, salmon, shrimp) and the add-ins (black beans, avocado, quinoa, salsa, fruit) to keep them interesting. 

• I can now tell when I have eaten too much fat and too few carbs - I start to lose concentration/get REALLY tired. That's when I know to eat some more fruit. Unfortunately, I didn't have any when this occurred while taking an organic sheet metal class and working with dangerous equipment (oops!). (This was another good thing according to Katie - it was an early "test" day while we were dialing in my macronutrient needs. Test failed!)
• I find I am preferring what's on the meal plan to other things typically available at parties. After a couple of more binge-like experiences (I LOVE dessert), I realized how achy/uncomfortable my body gets when I eat too much of the processed stuff, which just makes them less appealing. 

All in all, it's been a much different experience than I anticipated. I think the changes I've made to my eating habits the last three months will stick (80% of the time), although I still have a lot to learn. I would highly recommend reaching out to her if you are an athlete looking to improve your diet to do any of feel better/lose weight/get a PR/understand what your body needs.  

Picture from June shortly after I first started working with her

Picture from last week. Progress!

I came in 2nd in my age group at a local trail 10k today! Never thought that would happen. Unfortunately, I will have to break my low gluten stance to have a beer in the pint glass.