Latest / Eat More Carbs | A Period Recovery Podcast / 158. Top 3 Mistakes Athletes Make in Period Recovery (And How to Fix Them)

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158. Top 3 Mistakes Athletes Make in Period Recovery (And How to Fix Them) · Eat More Carbs | A Period Recovery Podcast

0:00
Hey girlies, just a quick reminder before we dive into
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today's episode. The information shared on this
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podcast is intended to be general sports nutrition advice
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and education related to period recovery for female athletes.
0:10
This is not specific to anyone individual and it may or may not
0:13
apply to your situation. If you are looking for
0:15
personalized guidance, be sure to apply to our period recovery
0:18
nutrition coaching program. Our four month period recovery
0:20
program is designed to help you sustainably get your period back
0:23
and keep it. You can apply now to get started
0:25
in our program and we'll leave the link for the program below.
0:27
This is the Eat more Carbs podcast.
0:34
Hello and welcome back. This is the More Carbs podcast.
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We are a team of dietitians and we talk every Thursday about
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sports nutrition for the girlies.
0:42
My name is Jenna and I host this podcast.
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And my name is Riley. You're also see me on this
0:46
podcast. I am the owner and founder of
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Steady State Performance Nutrition.
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We specialize in helping female athletes recover from low energy
0:53
availability and together along with Lily Rhymer, we are team
0:55
steady state. Before we get into today's
0:57
episode, we are going to do our high and low, so sharing just a
1:00
a little bit about our week, the good and the parts we wish have
1:01
gone a little bit differently. As always, Riley, can you kick
1:04
us off? Jenna, it's been a week.
1:06
I feel like it's always a week these last couple of months.
1:08
So like I feel like it's just that's how it's been lately.
1:11
I don't know if you feel the same.
1:12
I definitely feel the same yes, but why has it been a week for
1:15
you? Or what are you referring to
1:17
specifically? Because I have a guess but would
1:19
love to hear what you have to say.
1:21
Yes, we need to switch it up one day and you need to go first
1:24
because I'm always like so curious like if we have the same
1:27
like high, low because we don't like tell each other our high
1:30
lows beforehand do. You want me to go first today
1:32
since I think I know yours. Oh yeah, I would love to hear
1:35
what. Yours is OK, perfect, because
1:37
I'm kind of excited to tell you my high, my low, I'll start with
1:40
today because it's not very fun and it's not very exciting.
1:42
It's just yard work and yard maintenance because my gosh,
1:46
it's just not fun. And then like everything breaks
1:48
all the time. It's so expensive to fix and
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it's not like fun purchases to make when someone's like, oh,
1:54
this is broken and you have to fix it.
1:55
And it's like it's a non negotiable fix for sure, but
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it's not a fun one at all. So that's my low.
2:00
It's just frustrating and I'm sure you guys feel that too.
2:03
But like this time of year, like grass is growing, all the things
2:06
are happening, all of the plants are blooming and all that.
2:08
It's just, oh, it's just annoying.
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It's like adulting. Like it's things that people
2:13
didn't tell you about, like adulting.
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I just remember, like when we first moved into this place, we
2:19
were like, oh, we should do some stuff with our backyard because
2:22
we had like a blank slate. And then we started getting
2:25
quotes for things and people are like, it's going to be $100,000.
2:29
And we're like, what can you do for five?
2:30
And they're like, we can put some irrigation and I'm like,
2:34
OK, thanks. So now we have some drainage in
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our backyard and still super boring.
2:39
But I just, I feel like that, like, I don't know, just
2:42
signifies or sums up adulthood. Yeah, 100% yes.
2:46
And it's like a very important part.
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And of course, like I knew it existed, but like it's constant.
2:51
It's never ending. Never ending.
2:53
I think this is actually so funny that you bring this up
2:55
because last year around this time I think we were both
2:59
complaining about yard work because I remember chatting with
3:02
you that I pulled weeds for 8 hours one Sunday.
3:05
Yes. And it's like it's hot, it's
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uncomfortable. Like you don't want to do it.
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And you're like, but I have to do this.
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You're like, I'm cleaning up outside.
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How much sense does this make? It makes zero sense.
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This is also going to like totally give away our age.
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I know some people think that we're like 2627 and now they're
3:21
like Nope, these old ladies in their yard work.
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So we gave ourselves away. Yes, we do that quite a bit,
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though my high, perhaps one of our most talked about subjects
3:31
is Fruit Riot. We both love Fruit Riot.
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They came out with new flavors. I thought you were going to say
3:39
they're back at Costco. Dang it.
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I have to know what the flavor is though.
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Came out with three new flavors. They're all in the same bag and
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it's like blue. I don't remember, to be
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thoroughly honest, but I found them already.
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I had to try them, so I bought them immediately.
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But what I didn't realize is that they're not.
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Sour what? What?
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They're sweet. It's like they put the candy
4:04
coating on there, but they didn't put the sour part of the
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candy coating on there. But it's grapes.
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It's still grapes, but they just have like candy coating flavor
4:12
on there. So it's like candy grapes.
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I didn't know if I liked them at first when I first tried them
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because I think I was so caught off guard because I was
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expecting something sour, but they taste pretty good.
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I still would like much rather have the sour ones like 100
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times over and over again, but like they're actually pretty
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good. I want to play around with
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making them. Could save us a lot of money if
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you figure it out. I know there just has to be a
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way to do it with like a frozen grape and then putting some
4:37
water and some lemon juice and some like sugar and some salt
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maybe like on the outside or something.
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I know some people do it like where they put them in jello but
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like I need the sour. Me too.
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Anyway, I just had to tell you. I also heard a rumor that they
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like did a collaboration with like airheads.
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Do you remember the candy airheads?
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Like the Super Sour? I'm obsessed.
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I need there to be a Fruit Riot airhead collab.
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Yes, that's my high and low. So we're going first because
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what's yours now? My low might not, might be that
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they're not at Costco to be completely honest because I was
5:08
so excited. I literally go to like the same
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place every single time I go to Costco.
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And I know it's like still winter, spring or whatever.
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So maybe we don't. We won't see them again until
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summer, but I'm still holding out hope.
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I'm crossing all my fingers that Costco brings them back for us.
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My high and my low, though, are kind of one story.
5:25
Yesterday I promised that I was going to talk about this on the
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podcast, but we have to address the Emma Bates you can
5:32
situation. I think this is my high and my
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low because as always, there's like highs and lows on like a
5:39
current event or a story. And a quick summary.
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If you are not familiar with what's going on.
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Emma Bates is a very successful American Marathon runner.
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She has placed in top three in like majors, she's Olympic
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qualified, and she is very well known in the running community.
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Recently she announced that she was pregnant maybe a couple
6:01
months ago. This week she posted on her
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Instagram that You Can, which is one of her sponsors.
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You Can is a sports nutrition supplement company.
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They make gels and different powders and sports nutrition
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products. She announced that they had
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dropped her as an athlete in response to her pregnancy.
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I don't know that these things don't sit well with me and I get
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a little spicy over them. I hosted in support of her and a
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lot of people in the community are coming out and supporting
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her. So a ton of sports dietitians
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are supporting her. So many other athletes are
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supporting her. There's so many runners that are
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moms out there that I know that this really resonates with and
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those people are supporting her. And even people who are not like
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woman or moms at all are coming out to support her.
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This has just been a little bit of a situation.
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I feel like it is kind of like picking up you can has responded
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like on their page, they have, you know, PR teams and things
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like that have responded and they have actually reached out
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to me as well. That's a little bit about kind
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of what's going on. I don't know.
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Did I miss anything? Did I leave anything out?
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I don't think so. I don't think that you left
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anything out of like what everyone is able to see from the
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public view perspective. I think you got everything there
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from that perspective. She also, not super related, put
7:21
a fantastic fantastic time down recently.
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She ran out 225, I think it's like a 505 maybe or something
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like that, like mile pace for 26.2 miles, which is ridiculous.
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But I think even like even if she wasn't a professional
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athlete running really fast, I do think that the narrative and
7:40
like the stigma that's going on with a story like applies to so
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many other individuals as well. And again, there's a lot of like
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you can side of the story. I'm a side of the story and like
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as always, I side with the woman and I believe what she has to
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say. If Emma comes out and says like
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this has been a misunderstanding, like I will
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retract my statement. I think you can as kind of
8:02
handle this pretty poorly. And I think it's very similar to
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what we had kind of going on with like the men's hockey team
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where there was this opportunity to make a statement or to help
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women's sports and we ignored the opportunity.
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I think you can could have come out and been much more
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supportive of Emma and her pregnancy.
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Like we haven't seen any like congratulations post or anything
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like that. Or they could have just handled
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the situation a little bit differently because they're
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really going on the defense and that shows that there's like
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maybe something shady going on. I completely agree with you.
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That's the impression that I got was like it was very defensive.
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And I think the thing that like really maybe like hit me hard is
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like how much of a deterrent is this for other female athletes
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to like not pursue also becoming a mob?
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You can be a mom and be a pro athlete.
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You can be be a mom and be a recreational athlete.
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Like those two things don't mean like you have to be like one or
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the other. I look at that and I'm like,
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well, do we have to make a choice?
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That's how I felt. Yes.
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And I think that there's so many eyes like on what's going on
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right now. And it is really scaring people
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into thinking that there's a timeline because especially as
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like females and women, like we think that there's a timeline
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because that's what's always talked about in society.
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And I think this is just reinforcing that.
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I feel so passionately about this subject.
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Like obviously as somebody who was pregnant and like now as a
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mom, and obviously I'm not on the same level as I'm that.
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And anyway, but I just think that there's like this narrative
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that like your athletic career is over once you become a mom,
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and that's just, it's not true. Right.
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I have so many thoughts in my head that I don't think I'm
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articulating it well. But like I agree with you that
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like they had such an opportunity or there was such an
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opportunity to talk about like this isn't the end of her career
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and this is just the start of another part or chapter of her
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life too. But that doesn't mean that like,
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they're mutually exclusive, I guess.
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Yeah. I also think one of the big
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issues for me is the fact that like this story is so believable
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because maybe it is a misunderstanding between Emma
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and her team and you can, but the fact that like so many women
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are like rushing to support her First off is amazing, right?
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Like we love the community, but The thing is, is like so many of
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us like know that this happens all of the time.
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And like that's why it's so like heartbreaking is because it's
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such a believable story. This is happening all the time.
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Like this happened to Allison Felix, like this is happening
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all the time. It happens to just so many women
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who are not in the public eye. Is it always athletic related?
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No, it could be work related. Like there's so many different
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things, so many other stories that are like this, that like
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are not broadcasted or not available and like as much of A
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public eye. Yes, it's just frustrating to
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see that. And now I'm just venting, but
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I'm like standing with Emma, like in complete support of her.
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And like, if more information comes out and I'm wrong, I'm
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always, always happy to like change my approach.
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I will apologize. It's very similar to science,
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right? Like with studies and research,
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like things are always changing. And like often times like we'll
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be recommending something and three years later, we'll be
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recommending something else because new information is
11:03
available. We will see how it includes.
11:06
Which is why you can't stay married to the idea that, you
11:09
know, there's only one way to do things or one way to look at
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things, which is kind of what we're talking about today a
11:13
little bit on the podcast because we are talking about
11:15
like some mistakes that people make or common mistakes that we
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see from athletes in the period recovery process.
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We are joined by Lily Reimer and Lily is the other dietitian here
11:24
at Steady State Performance Nutrition.
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And we're really thankful to have her as another voice on
11:28
this podcast to kind of help share the story about period
11:31
recovery. On today's episode, we're going
11:32
to be talking about some of the biggest mistakes that you might
11:35
be making that are actually preventing you from getting your
11:37
period back. So a lot of times on this
11:39
podcast, we're talking about ways that you can get your
11:41
period back. Today we're going to be focusing
11:43
a little bit more on some of the things that maybe you're missing
11:45
or maybe not doing that are preventing you from actually
11:48
being successful in your period recovery journey.
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Today I am joined by Riley and Lily and we're going to talk
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about our biggest mistakes that we see.
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We're so excited to chat more about this today.
11:58
Before we jump into our biggest tips, Lily, can you give us a
12:01
couple definitions so we can start off with Li, A low energy
12:05
availability. Would you define that?
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Yeah. So low energy availability or
12:09
Lea is based off of an equation that we like to say is our
12:13
general energy balance. So when we have the energy
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balance equation, we're talking about energy in versus energy
12:20
out. Energy in is going to be any
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food that we intake because it provides our body with energy.
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Then our energy out is going to be our intentional exercise, our
12:30
unintentional exercise, and then just also the energy that we use
12:34
throughout the day for our body to have its normal function.
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So low energy availability is when we have less energy in than
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we do energy out. So if we were to do it as an
12:45
equation where we did energy in minus energy out, the number
12:49
would be negative. So we have a negative energy
12:51
balance or low energy availability because there isn't
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energy available for our body to use to match the amount of
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energy we're burning. That results in hypothalmic
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amenorrhea and or relative energy deficiency in sport.
13:05
What are those? Yes.
13:06
So hypothalamic amenorrhea is the absence of a menstrual cycle
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for three or more months. This is due to low energy
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availability and it has a direct correlation to our hypothalamus,
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which is the producer and regulator of a lot of our
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hormones. So when we have L EA, we are
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likely to have hypothalamic amenorrhea or HA and that is
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where we come in with our period recovery piece that we see a lot
13:30
of our athletes for. We work specifically with
13:32
athletes who are attempting to recover their period due to low
13:35
energy availability. Another one of the terms that we
13:38
talk a lot about is Reds, or relative energy deficiency in
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sport. Lily, do you mind defining that?
13:42
Yeah. So Reds was formerly known as
13:45
the female athlete triad, and it has since been expanded on
13:48
because low energy availability can affect more than just
13:52
females. It can affect males too.
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Relative energy deficiency in sport has a lot of factors that
13:57
go into it and it's more than just low energy availability.
14:01
And we also see a lot of downsides to it.
14:04
That is more than just missing cycles.
14:07
We see effects in our bones, energy, performance, things like
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that. And it really is a syndrome that
14:14
really affects the body as a whole.
14:16
It isn't just HA, it isn't just L EA.
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You are seeing a lot of things that are going wrong when you
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have Reds. Just like you said, Reds can
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affect both female and male athletes, but energy
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availability can be something that's impacting you and we
14:31
still have a period. We talk so often about this that
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you can be an athlete who still is having a period, but you
14:37
still have low energy availability.
14:38
And that's because the side effects or the symptoms of low
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energy availability are going to differ from one athlete to the
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next, just like our fueling needs differ from one athlete to
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the next. Today we're going to be talking
14:48
about some of the biggest mistakes that we see from
14:50
athletes and from the athletes that we work with that prevent
14:53
them from getting their period back.
14:55
I feel like so often in Riley, maybe you can touch on this a
14:57
little bit more too. We're asked about like the
14:59
number one tip to get a period back or the top thing that we
15:03
would recommend or what's the most important thing?
15:04
Is it carbs or is it fat in order to to get a period back?
15:07
But there's so many things, right?
15:09
Yes, I'm actually really excited that we're all going to share
15:11
our top kind of recommendation or biggest thing that we see
15:14
athletes being held back from because like you said, Jenna, so
15:17
many people are like, what's the one thing I need to do to get my
15:20
period back? And it's not just one thing.
15:23
It's usually a combination of things that add up, small
15:26
sustainable changes that we can makeover time that lead to
15:28
someone getting a period back. Lily, what's something that you
15:31
see often with the athletes that you're working with that are
15:34
holding them back in the period recovery process?
15:36
One of the biggest things that I see is when we have an athlete
15:41
or just someone who is starting their journey of getting their
15:44
periods back, we usually see a lot of excitement when they
15:47
first start because they are ready to go.
15:49
They are ready to make changes and then they kind of learn what
15:53
those changes entail. And like you said, we usually
15:56
start small and sustainable. We don't want it to be
15:59
overwhelming where you feel like there's no way you could
16:02
possibly get to where you need to be.
16:04
So we see a lot of athletes start implementing small and
16:07
sustainable changes and making a lot of good progress from where
16:11
they started, but then we see a plateau.
16:13
We see a lot of girlies who make changes because they're so
16:18
excited to start this journey, which we're excited with them
16:20
and we can't wait for them to get their periods back.
16:23
Then they feel like because they've made a couple of
16:25
changes, they're good. They are going to get their
16:27
period back because they made a couple of ads to their breakfast
16:31
or they started really focusing on feeling around training.
16:34
And I think this really ties back to what we've been saying
16:38
about it's not just one tip. And that's really because what
16:42
you might be doing when you start day one is a lot different
16:45
than what someone else may be doing on day one.
16:47
It's not going to be the same changes for everyone.
16:50
This also ties back into the comparison piece because you
16:53
might be making changes and the people around you might be at a
16:57
similar place than you are. You might be on a team and you
17:00
might notice that everyone else has peanut butter in their
17:03
oatmeal. Everyone else is doing these
17:05
things and you feel like you should be at the same level or
17:08
be energy restored like they are.
17:10
But you're your own person. You have your own needs and you
17:13
have to keep pushing. Because when we just make a
17:16
couple of changes, if you're so far from where you need to be,
17:19
you can't stop just because you've made a couple of changes.
17:23
I think you bring up a really good point here because I do
17:27
find that similar to what you shared, Lily, people are really
17:31
excited in the beginning and they're ready to make changes
17:34
and that's awesome. But sometimes athletes don't
17:37
realize how far away they are from proper fueling.
17:41
An easy example of this is a client that I've been working
17:45
with for a couple of months, and she was eating about 70 to 80
17:49
grams of carbohydrates per day. As we know, that's not even
17:52
enough for our brain and our vital organs to function
17:55
properly. And getting her to double her
17:57
carbohydrates was a huge step for her and a huge change for
18:01
her. But now we're only at like 160
18:04
grams of carbohydrates per day, and that's not not enough for an
18:07
athlete. That's not enough for a
18:08
sedentary person. That, again, was a really big
18:11
change for her. But we still have to push
18:13
forward and we still have a long way to go, yes.
18:16
Very similarly to that, I see this a lot when we provide
18:19
ranges of goals. So we might be saying, your goal
18:22
right now is 2 to 3 servings of fat in this meal and then the
18:25
athlete calculates that out. They know how much total they're
18:28
supposed to be doing in a day. And then we revisit that goal
18:31
later and we might say, OK, we're going to bump that up or
18:33
we're going to move that goal post.
18:35
They're a little bit hesitant on that because they're like, wait,
18:38
I thought I met the goal. And yes, you may have met that
18:41
initial goal, but we still have to continue to make progress.
18:44
It's not that we can make these initial changes and then we can
18:47
just sit there for 4-6 months without making more changes.
18:51
Those small sustainable things that you can do to keep working
18:55
towards period recovery, we can't just expect that those
18:58
initial goals that we have are going to be the same goals that
19:00
you have the entire time you're working on period recovery.
19:03
I love that point, Jenna. And I think that an approach
19:06
that sometimes helps athletes a lot is trying not to look at as
19:09
a daily total type idea. It's so funny because usually
19:13
you strive for the most in a lot of things, you strive for the
19:16
highest value you can get. But a lot of times in fueling,
19:20
we strive for the lowest amount possible.
19:23
And so when we give ranges and things like that and you're
19:26
like, OK, two to three servings of fat at every meal, they're
19:29
like OK, two. And you get stuck there because
19:32
you think that's enough, but it might not be enough for you.
19:35
And that's where the individuality of it comes in.
19:38
You have to listen to what your body is expecting.
19:41
And when we make these smaller changes, yes, it might take a
19:44
little bit longer, but it's going to be easier to continue
19:47
to build on them because we are making small sustainable
19:51
changes. Just like you both mentioned, we
19:53
have to push and we have to continue to move forward.
19:57
And it's it's so similar to training.
19:58
You're always trying to get better, you're always trying to
20:01
lift more weight, you're trying to run faster.
20:03
And after a while you'll meet a plateau like you will have
20:05
accomplished that goal. And you have to continue to push
20:08
yourself to move forward. And the same thing is happening
20:11
with fueling and period recovery, where at the beginning
20:14
you have to meet your body where it's at.
20:16
And you have to make that small sustainable change.
20:17
And you have to push. But then eventually you're going
20:20
to have accomplished that goal. You're going to be meeting those
20:22
totals. So now you have to push again.
20:24
Exactly. Yes, it's very interesting when
20:26
we think about like the training adaptations that we make in US
20:29
wanting to make progress with that, but we want to do the bare
20:32
minimum. We want to stay at like the
20:34
lowest possible amount when it comes to our fueling in order
20:37
for us to get our period back. Like we should be applying the
20:39
same logic that we do to our training to our fueling.
20:42
One of the things that I see really plays off of what you
20:44
said, Lily, which is you've made changes, but you aren't
20:48
consistent with those changes. So if we've implemented a new
20:52
goal for you and you have hit it maybe a couple of times, but
20:56
then you aren't hitting it all the time.
20:58
A good one I like to think about with this is like pre training
21:00
fueling. If we're working on implementing
21:02
an adequate amount of fuel before you train and you do it
21:05
once or twice, that's great and that's progress.
21:07
We want to be close to 100% when we're thinking about the changes
21:11
that we make. And we shouldn't just be
21:13
stopping short with our changes or saying, oh, maybe I got it
21:15
50% of the time. Like we should be striving for
21:18
100%. Not that we're perfect and we're
21:20
going to hit it every single time, but we should be aiming
21:22
for 100% when it comes to the changes that we've made.
21:25
And staying consistent with those changes is an incredibly
21:28
important piece of period recovery, because doing
21:31
something once or twice isn't going to be enough to move you
21:34
towards your goal of period recovery.
21:36
I'm so, so glad that you brought this up because I got a question
21:39
the other day on a Feeling Q&A and somebody was saying or
21:42
asked, I eat 2500 to 3000 calories every single day.
21:46
Why don't I have my period? The first thing I'm thinking
21:49
about is 2500 and 3000 calories. Like I know it's only 500
21:53
calories difference, but that's a big difference.
21:55
And are you consistently at 3000 or are you consistently at 2500?
21:59
Because just because you eat 3000 calories one day of the
22:02
month, that doesn't mean that your calorie range is 25 to
22:05
3000. Right.
22:07
If most of the time you're at 25 and you only hit 3000 and that's
22:10
maybe what your body needs or closer to what your body needs,
22:13
that's not actually doing that much because you've done it one
22:16
time out of 30. And if we were to think about
22:18
that as a percentage, like nobody wants that as the
22:20
percentage, that's to think about the only doing something
22:22
one time when they had 30 opportunities to do something
22:25
when we should be trying to do it 30 out of 30 times.
22:27
I also think about that from like the standpoint of no, maybe
22:30
500 calories doesn't sound like that much, but where are we
22:32
missing out on those 500 calories?
22:34
Was it pre training? And so you did a fasted work out
22:36
that day. Was it that we reduced some type
22:39
of a macronutrient, Now we're deficient in that for those 30
22:42
days that we didn't actually have that implemented in our
22:45
fueling like that can be so impactful, even if it doesn't
22:48
feel like it went from a surface level.
22:50
That's part of the accountability and support that
22:52
we provide within the period recovery program is like we're
22:54
making sure those athletes are hitting those targets for every
22:58
single meal. Especially if you haven't had
22:59
your period or you've been fueling a certain way for an
23:01
extended period of time, you have to kind of rewire the brain
23:05
and you have to build new habits.
23:07
You have to make this new fueling pattern your default.
23:10
Because at the beginning, if you're not intentionally
23:13
thinking about it all the time, you're going to default back to
23:15
old habits. And I do think that's what
23:17
happens, especially in these situations where somebody's
23:19
like, oh, I'm going to push to 3000, but if I'm not
23:22
intentionally pushing every single day, I'm going to default
23:24
back to my old mode. I also think that it plays a
23:28
huge role into people who are making drastic changes.
23:32
Having accountability is super important and being able to
23:36
slowly the increase is also super important because when we
23:40
see people who usually eating 2000 calories a day and then
23:43
they see online they need to be eating 2800 for period recovery
23:47
and they immediately jump in and are trying to track 2800
23:51
calories. That's when we're more likely to
23:53
see this kind of method of dropping off and starting and
23:57
dropping off. It's like our New Year's
23:59
resolutions where everyone says that you drop off after the
24:02
third week in January. It's because you're making
24:05
changes that you you can't keep up with because they're so
24:08
drastic and they make you feel so uncomfortable because it's
24:11
something you've never done before.
24:13
You bring up such a good point there with if we were to make
24:15
just drastic changes and then you're aren't consistent with
24:18
those drastic changes or even like Riley mentioned, you only
24:21
do them one time out of the month.
24:23
And then we're looking back and we're like, well, I've been
24:24
working on period recovery for six months now, why isn't my
24:27
period back? And it's like, well, we only
24:28
made drastic changes a couple of times.
24:30
Those things aren't sustainable in your long term fueling plan,
24:33
which is why it is so important, like you said, Lily, for that
24:36
accountability and for those small sustainable changes
24:38
because it can be a really intimidating process to change
24:41
your feeling and make feeling a priority again.
24:43
Riley, what is one of the biggest mistakes that you see
24:45
from the athletes you work with that's holding them back in
24:47
period recovery? One of the biggest things that
24:49
I'm seeing athletes held back with is trying to gain the
24:54
perfect amount of weight. And this idea and this concept
24:57
that you can gain or you can do it perfectly.
25:01
I do think that so many athletes are terrified of weight gain and
25:07
it's not your fault if you are right.
25:08
Like we've been convinced from a society and we've been told by
25:12
society that weight gain is bad and that being in a smaller body
25:15
is good. And this is reinforced
25:17
consistently in sport. When athletes hear that they
25:20
might have to gain weight in order to get their period back
25:24
or to get healthy, they are terrified of that.
25:27
And they often think that they need to perfectly air quotes do
25:31
it. If they can perfectly hit 2500
25:34
calories or if they can perfectly hit 2800 calories,
25:36
then they'll gain the perfect amount of weight to get their
25:40
period back but have it not affect.
25:42
The way they look, weight restoration is a piece of period
25:45
recovery that we talk about a lot on this podcast and the
25:48
importance of weight restoration.
25:50
And we also talk about we don't know how much weight change that
25:53
your body might need in order to help you get your period back.
25:56
And so I think that really ties into what you said about like
25:58
attempting to gain the perfect amount or attempting to weight
26:01
restore to the perfect weight. And we don't know that.
26:03
We don't know what that is. We don't know the point where
26:06
which your body is going to feel safe again, to cycle again.
26:09
And that can be really challenging and that can be
26:11
really intimidating. How do you help athletes work
26:14
through that? I do think that this is a very
26:15
individualized process and we've talked about that multiple
26:18
times. And with this process, there is
26:21
a lot of like psychological and mental parts of the journey with
26:26
athletes, helping them understand that weight gain, to
26:30
help your body be optimized and to be healthy is not going to be
26:34
a bad. Thing.
26:35
So what you're saying is, is that they will be a better
26:37
athlete? Yes, I think it's really hard
26:40
for athletes to accept that initial thought of that weight
26:44
gain is part of their journey. But once our athletes come
26:48
around the idea and realize that it's for their overall health
26:52
and their Wellness, they also see so many more benefits to it.
26:56
They see their performance get better, which is something that
27:00
a lot of athletes don't think is going to happen.
27:02
I think of course we do have societal factors going into
27:06
wanting to be in the smallest body possible.
27:08
We also see the mindset of athletes having that gaining
27:12
weight to restore their period is also going to negatively
27:15
impact their performance. But we actually see the opposite
27:18
pretty much every single time. And that's just because our body
27:23
wants to perform at its highest level and our body is not going
27:27
to perform under fueled. So correcting a low energy
27:31
availability and fixing that energy equation is not only
27:35
going to help you get your period back, it's also going to
27:37
help your performance. And if weight restoration is a
27:40
part of that, I promise it's worth it.
27:42
And I would argue too, it's not even just about performance,
27:46
like there's, there's such an optimization of health that
27:49
happens when you feel your body properly and when you get a
27:52
menstrual cycle, There's been a lot of conversation recently and
27:56
I absolutely love it. But the menstrual cycle is like
27:59
your 5th vital sign. And I totally agree with that
28:02
because part of our program, part of what we do with athletes
28:05
is we're looking at blood work and we're looking at lab
28:07
results. It's crazy to see somebody's
28:08
labs over a period of time when they're in the period recovery
28:12
program and how much better they get with the increase in feeling
28:16
and possibly weight. The same things that are holding
28:19
you back from getting your period are the same things that
28:21
are holding you back from performing at your highest
28:24
level. Yes, it's hard to get to that
28:26
point of getting your period back, and yes, it can be hard
28:29
from a mental perspective, just like Riley mentioned, from if
28:32
you are experiencing weight restoration, but it's so worth
28:35
it. I think the other thing that we
28:36
see a lot of is like the social side of things where people
28:39
start to experience and enjoy and do more things because they
28:43
don't have that fear or that restriction around fueling.
28:46
Anymore, yes, you never realize how much under feeling is taking
28:49
from you until you stop. If you are struggling with low
28:52
energy availability and loss of a period, please reach out to
28:55
us. We'd love to hear from you in
28:56
the comments of this podcast. Or you can reach out to us
28:58
online. You can find Riley at Riley dot
29:00
Beatty dot nutrition. You can find Lily at Lily dot
29:03
Reimer dot nutrition, and you can find me at Jenna dot Fischer
29:06
dot nutrition. Thank you so much for listening
29:08
to this episode of the Eat More Carbs podcast.
29:10
Please make sure you rate, subscribe and review.
29:13
And as always, remember to eat more carbs.