Latest / Eat More Carbs | A Period Recovery Podcast / 83. How Low Energy Can Impact Your Health as an Athlete
Transcript
- 0:00If you have been listening to the Eat More Carbs podcast, you
- 0:02know that Riley and I are both in our running era.
- 0:04To make sure that we're properly fueled for training, we're using
- 0:07both carbohydrates and Tuba 4. Tuba 4 is an all natural pre
- 0:10workout designed to enhance athletic performance through the
- 0:13benefits of New Zealand blackcurrant berries.
- 0:15Studies have shown these berries to increase vasodilation and
- 0:19prime the body to kick start muscle recovery.
- 0:21These antioxidant rich berries have a sweet and tangy flavor
- 0:24and will level up your performance and recovery.
- 0:27Use code Riley. For 20% off 20 packs and
- 0:30multiserve packs online at 2 before dot.
- 0:32Com. This is the Eat more Carbs
- 0:34podcast. Hello and welcome to the Eat
- 0:41More Carbs podcast. My name is Jenna Fischer and I'm
- 0:43here with my Co host Riley Beatty.
- 0:44This episode is a two-part series in which Riley and I are
- 0:47sitting down with a dietitian and a physician from from
- 0:49Children's Hospital in Colorado. During these episodes we are
- 0:52going to be talking about relative energy deficiency in
- 0:54sport and we will include topics such as eating disordered and
- 0:57disordered eating. We just wanted to let you know
- 1:00before we get into some of these really heavy topics.
- 1:02If you're an athlete and you're listening to this podcast and
- 1:04you start to recognize some of these symptoms and these signs
- 1:07might be something that you are experiencing.
- 1:08As we encourage you to reach out to Riley and I or join our wait
- 1:11list for a one-on-one concierge sports nutrition program.
- 1:14We hope you enjoy this series. Before we get into it, Riley,
- 1:16what's your high and low both? My high and my low have to do
- 1:19with my current move, which by the time this podcast goes live,
- 1:23I really hope is old news and we have officially sold our house.
- 1:27But today I'm going to be starting off with my high.
- 1:30First, it has been pretty challenging having a baby and
- 1:33trying to move and sell a house and buy a new house, especially
- 1:37with the housing market right now.
- 1:39A huge shout out to my family and then also Rob's family for
- 1:44really helping support us during this really hard time.
- 1:47They've been so amazing. And I'm currently at my parents
- 1:50house as we're recording this and they have Charlie, they're
- 1:52going to the park with her. And I'm just so thankful that we
- 1:55have so much family support right now because this would not
- 1:58be possible, especially running a business with you right now
- 2:01and everything. So just a huge shout out to
- 2:03everybody who's being so supportive of the move right
- 2:06now. So that's my high.
- 2:07My low also has to do with a move.
- 2:09And I've been dying to tell you this, but I had to keep it a
- 2:11secret for the low this week. This is one that you all want to
- 2:15sit down for. We are currently relocating to
- 2:17Winston Salem, NC and our house is currently in Charleston, SC
- 2:22Rob's, my husband has to be in the office five days a week and
- 2:25we're obviously moving to Winston Salem.
- 2:27So we've been trying to spend as much time as we can there to get
- 2:30acclimated, to get Charlie used to it, to get, you know, set up
- 2:33with our community and our new life.
- 2:35We spent two weeks away from our house in Charleston and at the
- 2:39beginning of October we went back down to Charleston to move
- 2:43out all of our stuff to put it into storage.
- 2:45So we're just not tied back to that location.
- 2:47We've just driven 5 hours from Winston to the house.
- 2:50We haven't been in the house in two weeks.
- 2:52Our house smells completely terrible, Jenna, I'm not
- 2:54kidding. It smelt like there was a dead
- 2:56animal in the house. We walk in, we're just
- 2:58exhausted, toes screaming. We are like, what happened?
- 3:02Our house is still in the market.
- 3:04It smells like a dead animal. We've had like at least three or
- 3:06four showings this past week with the house in this
- 3:09condition. We're like no wonder people are
- 3:10spending literally 5 minutes in our house because the house
- 3:13smells so bad. We're like what the heck smells
- 3:17like this? Like we're like something like a
- 3:19possum called in something died. We're walking around the house.
- 3:23Robbie opens the fridge. It is completely filled with
- 3:26black mold. The fridge lost power because of
- 3:29the hurricane. Everything in our fridge has
- 3:31like black molded. The whole fridge is like a fuzzy
- 3:35black mold. We cleaned out the fridge pretty
- 3:38good, but the freezer everything melted and has just been sitting
- 3:42in the heat. The entire freezer is black.
- 3:46Mold. Oh my word.
- 3:49Was a very our house is elevated.
- 3:52We live in like an elevated home.
- 3:53So like we had to get the fridge out the house and we can't get
- 3:56it down the stairs because it's just Roddy and I.
- 3:58So then we have this like black mold fridge sitting on our porch
- 4:01for like 3 days before the movers could come and like help
- 4:03us get it down the stairs. I would have asked the movers to
- 4:05bring it down the stairs and then I would just lit it on
- 4:07fire. How do you come back from that?
- 4:09Did it clean out OK or was it like, I can't imagine.
- 4:11I can't imagine just the thought of having to clean out a fridge
- 4:15covered in mold. Like I would just imagine myself
- 4:18like in a face mask gagging, like being the most dramatic
- 4:21ever and then just being like, we just have to get rid of it.
- 4:23Well, that's what. Happened is throw it away.
- 4:25We need to we need to clean it out.
- 4:26So grabby like rest of soul starts cleaning out the fridge
- 4:30and he's like I can't do this we just have to get it out of here.
- 4:32So we were like we're getting rid of the fridge like we're
- 4:35getting rid of the fridge. We're moving.
- 4:36Sorry y'all, you're gonna have to buy a new fridge.
- 4:38We take the fridge, we put it on the curb because the trash
- 4:40people come by and like they'll pick it up or, you know,
- 4:42sometimes people come and take it.
- 4:44Some guy took it for scrap metal.
- 4:45I was like. That brave soul, more power to
- 4:48him. But my gosh, I would have been
- 4:50like, I'm leaving this. Yeah.
- 4:51I'm still haunted by the smell. Oh my gosh.
- 4:54What about you? What are your high and your low?
- 4:56I don't have any black mold in my house, so I feel like I'm
- 4:58doing pretty good. I actually was thinking about it
- 5:00before we jumped on the podcast. I feel like I have so many
- 5:03things that I could share for my high, but I'm going to choose
- 5:05the thing that was most recent because I got a letter in the
- 5:08mail today and I looked at the like return address and I was
- 5:12like, I don't know who these people are.
- 5:13I opened it up and it was a save the date from a previous client
- 5:17of mine who had decided to invite me to the wedding.
- 5:20And the reason why I didn't recognize the return address, it
- 5:22was because it was the parents of the fiance.
- 5:24So I didn't recognize the name. And it was just so touching and
- 5:29so heartwarming. And of course we don't expect to
- 5:31be invited to every single one of our clients weddings, but to
- 5:34establish a relationship like that.
- 5:37This client is one of the sweetest, kindest people I have
- 5:39ever come across in my career as a dietitian.
- 5:42It would just like really warmed my heart.
- 5:43I could cry just talking about it.
- 5:45This person and their fiance felt compelled to invite me and
- 5:48my husband to their wedding. Just like really hit me in the
- 5:50fields. So that's definitely my high.
- 5:52Maybe for like the entire year. It really made my day.
- 5:55I hung it up on my fridge. That's so.
- 5:59That's my high, which I wanted to share that first.
- 6:02My low is not nearly as a traumatic experience as yours,
- 6:05but I love to cook. I love to make a delicious meal.
- 6:08I love to make a balanced performance plate in a single
- 6:10pot. Those are my jam kind of
- 6:12recipes. I am not a good Baker and I will
- 6:15openly admit to that. And last night my husband had
- 6:19some work things to do. And so I was like, you know
- 6:20what? Like he's going to come home and
- 6:22I'm going to have baked something delicious to be like,
- 6:24look what I did while you were gone.
- 6:26That seems like such a wonderful way to spend my evening.
- 6:29And I really didn't read the recipe that closely.
- 6:31I'm just like going through the motions and I had accidentally
- 6:34added double the amount of butter.
- 6:38I don't know it's. So.
- 6:39Interesting. It needed 1/2 of a cup and I
- 6:42added a cup of butter. When I was thinking about it, I
- 6:45was like melting the butter because it was like a stick of
- 6:48melted butter and I guess their sticks were half stick, you know
- 6:50what I mean? Like sometimes they're half a
- 6:52cup. I.
- 6:53Agree with you because sometimes you're like, is this a half a
- 6:56stick or is this a whole stick? I got you.
- 6:58I'm supportive of this, I would have made it possibly the same
- 7:01OK. Thank you.
- 7:02Because I was like, this isn't right.
- 7:04Like this is not the right consistency.
- 7:07I put it in the oven and I'm watching it cook and I'm like,
- 7:10what did I do? Like the butter is seeping out
- 7:12everywhere. And I was like, this is wrong.
- 7:14And then I looked at the instructions again and I was
- 7:16like, oh, you have unintentionally really doubled
- 7:20some ingredients here. We can't be good at everything.
- 7:22And for me, baking is one thing that I am not good at it.
- 7:25That is so funny. Honestly though, we need a poll
- 7:28because I think that a lot of people would have also made that
- 7:30mistake or have made that mistake before we.
- 7:32Really do hope you take a lot away from this episode of the
- 7:35Eat More Carbs podcast. Please enjoy.
- 7:38Aubrey and Amanda, welcome to the podcast.
- 7:39Hi, thanks for having us. We're so excited to chat with
- 7:42you today. Before we get into some of the
- 7:44questions that we have, can you guys share just a little bit
- 7:46about your background and the work that y'all do at Sports
- 7:49Medicine Center and Children's Hospital in Colorado?
- 7:51Sure, I can start. So I'm Aubrey Armento.
- 7:55I am a pediatric sports medicine physician at Children Colorado
- 8:00and an assistant professor in the Department of Orthopedics at
- 8:04the University of Colorado and my background is first in
- 8:07Pediatrics and then did a fellowship in primary care
- 8:11sports medicine, all of my training in Colorado and then
- 8:15was lucky enough to come on as faculty at Children's after my
- 8:19fellowship. So I have been here for going on
- 8:23or going into my 9th year now and my special area of interest
- 8:28is in the athletes triad, relative energy deficiency in
- 8:31sport and eating. Disorder.
- 8:33I'm Amanda McCarthy. I am the program coordinator for
- 8:36sports nutrition at our Sports Medicine Center, and then I'm
- 8:39also the primary sports dietitian in our facility as
- 8:42well. I did my undergrad in dietetics
- 8:45and then master's in dietetics at Missouri State University and
- 8:48then the University of Kansas Medical Center respectively.
- 8:51And then kind of did a little loop around the country and
- 8:53ended up in Colorado. I've been here for 12 years now
- 8:56and my role at Children's, I do a lot of one-on-one counseling
- 9:00with young athletes that our physicians are seeing.
- 9:02So oftentimes they have some type of injury or an under.
- 9:05Fueling concern is the majority of my role.
- 9:07And then I also do a lot of outreach and education within my
- 9:10role. And then I'll also support
- 9:12physicians research projects that are around nutrition.
- 9:14As well, in today's episode, we're going to be talking a lot
- 9:17about Reds and how that evides you a lot of the athletes that
- 9:20we work with. Before we jump in to talking
- 9:22about some of the nutrition application for Reds, I would
- 9:25love for you both to help us define red.
- 9:28So what is relative of energy deficiency in sports?
- 9:31Sure. So RED is the OR encompasses the
- 9:35physiologic, psychologic and performance impairments that can
- 9:41occur in the setting of low energy availability or LE A.
- 9:45So LE A is inadequate energy available to support normal
- 9:50functioning in those various capacities so physiologically
- 9:53but also from a sport performance perspective.
- 9:56And so the model of Reds describes all of these different
- 9:59bodies, systems and different sports performance areas that
- 10:03can be negatively affected and an athlete who has low energy
- 10:07availability, typically more chronic or more severe low
- 10:11energy availability overtime. What athletes are most commonly
- 10:15seeing Reds in? Athletes that tend to have a
- 10:18larger focus on a lower weight ratio for their sport, lower
- 10:22weight to power ratio are often at higher risk.
- 10:25So a lot of your endurance athletes, so I think of runners,
- 10:27cyclists, triathletes, but then like wrestlers oftentimes
- 10:31because they're trying to make weight for their specific sport,
- 10:34aesthetic based sports. So gymnastics and dance are
- 10:37higher risk as well, any anti gravitational sport.
- 10:40So gymnastics would fit into that.
- 10:42But also like rock climbing, those athletes who are very
- 10:45aware of their weight in relation to their performance.
- 10:48And I would say generally the culture of the sport can tend to
- 10:51encourage lower body weight. Those are the highest risk
- 10:54athletes. Is this something that we're
- 10:56seeing in only female athletes or can it affect male athletes
- 10:59as well? We see it in all athletes.
- 11:01So female athletes may be more at risk for Reds and disordered
- 11:06eating. Although I think that there's
- 11:08probably a component of underreporting or under
- 11:12diagnosis or recognition in male athletes.
- 11:15So Amanda and I see lots of male athletes in addition to female
- 11:19athletes with. Reds.
- 11:20You mentioned some physiological implications.
- 11:23What would those be for someone diagnosed with Reds?
- 11:26So essentially the body works to concern energy in various ways
- 11:32in the setting of low energy availability.
- 11:35And some of those adaptations can include things like GI
- 11:39distress that comes from the gut slowing down South, we see a lot
- 11:44of athlete that complain of getting full very quickly,
- 11:47feeling bloated, Constipation. Other stomach complaints we'll
- 11:52see decreased heart rate and blood pressure, so low resting
- 11:56heart rate or orthostatic intolerance, micronutrient
- 12:00deficiencies, iron deficiency, vitamin D deficiency being the
- 12:03most common that we typically see.
- 12:06And then there are basically everybody system can be
- 12:10negatively affected in the setting of Reds.
- 12:13And then you also have these performance impairments, so
- 12:17decreased power strength, endurance, impaired recovery,
- 12:22sleep disturbances, psychological consequences as
- 12:27well. So it really covers the whole
- 12:29gamut of an athlete, health and well-being just generally, but
- 12:34also in their sport. So it sounds like it's a lot
- 12:36more intense than maybe just. Losing our period, correct.
- 12:39Yeah. So I didn't even mention, I
- 12:41didn't even mention that when we talked, talked about Reds to
- 12:43start. Another consequence of Reds is
- 12:47hormonal suppression. In particular, reproductive
- 12:51health can be affected. So in female athletes, we see
- 12:54the loss of a regular period. In male athletes, we'll see low
- 12:59testosterone and consequences of low testosterone including
- 13:03decreased sex drive, increased fatigue, changes in body hair
- 13:07patterns and things like that. So consequence of low estrogen
- 13:12primarily and the female and then low testosterone and male
- 13:16athletes and then bone health as well.
- 13:18So when we think about the triad more specifically, that's going
- 13:21to highlight the reproductive hormone consequences and the
- 13:24bone health consequences of low energy availability.
- 13:28You mentioned the triad or somebody listening who isn't
- 13:31familiar with that. Can you define what that is?
- 13:33Sure. So the triad focuses on the bone
- 13:38health and then in the female athlete, menstrual health and
- 13:41the male athlete more testosterone related changes
- 13:45secondary to state of low energy availability.
- 13:49And the triad was described back in the 80s for the first time
- 13:53and has been around for a long time.
- 13:55There's a lot of research on the triad more recently around the
- 14:00male athlete triad, but certainly kind of decades of
- 14:03research on the female athlete triad.
- 14:05I still like to consider the triad as its own kind of
- 14:08distinct clinical entity, but Red sort of goes beyond the bone
- 14:13health and the menstrual health or reproductive health
- 14:16components to include these other body systems that can be
- 14:19affected. But at the heart of both of them
- 14:22is low energy availability. I'm so glad that you brought
- 14:24that up because it can be really confusing for an athlete who is
- 14:28maybe struggling with low energy availability because there are
- 14:31these like terms and different things that are thrown around.
- 14:34So I'm really glad that you helped kind of differentiate
- 14:36between Reds in the triad. And I'd like to add, I think
- 14:39that as female athletes, I mean we're all female athletes here
- 14:42in the room. And so for female athletes
- 14:44specifically, when we look at adequate energy availability,
- 14:47it's different than that of male athletes, right?
- 14:49So research is showing that female athletes need 45 calories
- 14:53per kilo of lean mass at baseline without added exercise
- 14:57on top of that just for normal work and function, just for the
- 15:00HPA access to work normally. Whereas in males, research is
- 15:04suggesting maybe they're closer to like 30, 40, so they don't
- 15:08need quite as high of energy needs compared to what we do per
- 15:12kilogram of lean mass. And I think you know that that's
- 15:14really telling when you're actually looking at the picture
- 15:16and looking at how many female athletes end up in this
- 15:18situation of low energy availability.
- 15:20We just have higher demands per kilo of lean mass than male
- 15:24athletes. Do I think that's important,
- 15:27especially if you find people comparing themselves to other
- 15:32athletes or certainly a female athlete to a male athlete?
- 15:36And the fact that the threshold at which we start to see these
- 15:40negative consequences occur is different, honestly, for
- 15:44everyone, even in female athletes, we're seeing there is
- 15:46likely some variation in that threshold at which, you know, we
- 15:50start to see that hormonal disturbances and loss of a
- 15:52period. But generally, as far as what we
- 15:55know, male athletes can tolerate lower energy availability before
- 15:59they start to experience the negative consequences of it than
- 16:03female athletes. And I think that is helpful to
- 16:05explain to people, especially if they're sort of in that
- 16:08comparison trap of like, well, this person can do this and
- 16:11they're totally fine and they're not injured and they're not
- 16:14having these problems, but you know, I am.
- 16:17And so kind of explaining that individual variation and sex
- 16:21differences in energy availability I think is
- 16:24important for people to understand with Reds.
- 16:27It kind of sounds like that there are a lot of things that
- 16:30someone might be seeing as far as those have physiological
- 16:32effects. Is it that someone diagnosed has
- 16:34all of them, or could they only see some of them?
- 16:36Oh yeah. That's a great question.
- 16:38You do not have to have all of those in order to make the
- 16:40diagnosis. The diagnosis of Reds is in a
- 16:43lot of ways you want to exclude other things that could be
- 16:47leading to. So for example, if someone's
- 16:50lost their period, right, like we need to make sure that they
- 16:52don't have PCOS, for example, or something else that that would
- 16:55be an underlying disease that would be leading to those
- 16:58changes. So you want to make sure you're
- 17:01excluding other pathology and sort of coming to this more like
- 17:04functional, you know, amenorrhea in the case of that example.
- 17:09But we see athletes that may just have one or two components
- 17:13of that Reds model, but with all the other pieces from a history
- 17:17perspective, from Amanda's diet analysis and from their labs,
- 17:22for example, rights, like all of these different things sort of
- 17:25go together and making the diagnosis of Reds, there's not
- 17:29really one test or a certain number of symptoms you have to
- 17:33show in order to meet criteria for that diagnosis.
- 17:37I'm sure we'll touch on it a little bit later, but I think
- 17:39this already goes to show how important it is for an athlete
- 17:42to meet with a physician, a dietitian, like a whole team of
- 17:45people when approaching something like.
- 17:47A Reds diagnosis? Absolutely.
- 17:49I agree. You'll hear.
- 17:50Us say this probably like at least five times today.
- 17:52We always talk about how this podcast should be called it
- 17:54depends and instead of eat more carbs because it's such an
- 17:57individualized approach. Like all of this is when it
- 18:00comes to nutrition, when it comes to Reds And I think you
- 18:02just highlighted it there as well as it really depends and we
- 18:06have this diagnosis, but the symptoms aren't going to be the
- 18:08same in. Everybody.
- 18:09Yes, for sure. And I think what's also tricky
- 18:11is like sometimes athletes can start under fueling, like they
- 18:14start flirting with under fueling themselves to see what
- 18:17can happen with their performance or with their weight
- 18:19or whatever they're looking for. And I think what's really hard
- 18:22initially is that sometimes athletes do see performance
- 18:24enhancement from that initial restriction.
- 18:26I like to call it the honeymoon phase of restriction, right?
- 18:29So like they get a little addicted to it and they're like,
- 18:31oh, this is working. Like why don't I try a little
- 18:33bit more? And often when we're catching
- 18:35them with a Reds diagnosis, it's because they get drawn into that
- 18:38cycle of restriction and they want to do a little bit more
- 18:40because their performance improved slightly initially,
- 18:43which we have data that supports that, right?
- 18:45Like small amounts for short periods of time probably does
- 18:48improve performance. But how do you stop that from
- 18:50becoming a cycle of just chronic restriction and chronic
- 18:54underfueling, which then turns into relative energy deficiency?
- 18:57So I think it can be really tricky and really hard for
- 18:59athletes to kind of swallow that pill when they're like, I was
- 19:02performing so well six months ago and now I'm falling apart.
- 19:04Like what's going on? I think also a lot of that's
- 19:06dependent on the sport. A runner, for example, right,
- 19:09with a 5 LB weight loss, if that's what they're going for,
- 19:12like Amanda said, initially, they may see some faster running
- 19:17times and unfortunately that ends up acting as oftentimes
- 19:20positive reinforcement for those restrictive eating behaviors,
- 19:24but ultimately it's not sustainable.
- 19:26So I think a big take home point Amanda and I like to make when
- 19:29we're doing education to young athletes is that there are so
- 19:33many other things that you can do to optimize your performance
- 19:37that don't come with the risk of low energy availability and
- 19:41sustained low energy availability, right?
- 19:43Like to name just a few, sleep, eating more carbs.
- 19:46There are things that we can do that have really no downside.
- 19:50And so why sort of take the risk of flirting with that
- 19:54restriction for those potential transient performance gains when
- 19:58there are plenty of other things that we can do to optimize
- 20:01performance that don't come with that risk?
- 20:04I see that all the time where we have athletes that come to us
- 20:07and they're convinced that their performance is going like one
- 20:10way or the other because of their weight.
- 20:12And I think we're so quick as a society to say, like, it's
- 20:15because of my weight. I didn't perform well today.
- 20:17I ran a little bit slower because I need to lose weight.
- 20:20And you just mentioned there's all these other factors there as
- 20:22well. You know, I even had an athlete
- 20:24who was feeling probably properly, she was preparing for
- 20:26an like an Iron Man competition and she was really upset that
- 20:29she didn't PR. And then afterwards she actually
- 20:31found out she was pregnant and she had just competed.
- 20:34But it could have easily been like, Oh my gosh, like this is
- 20:37because of my weight and was like, there's all these other
- 20:39factors that go into performance.
- 20:41Totally. What might be some of the long
- 20:42term implications for an athlete's career if they get
- 20:45stuck into that low energy availability that chronic under
- 20:49fueling state? My initial thought, especially
- 20:51since we work with a young athlete population, is if an
- 20:54athlete's chronically under fueling during these critical
- 20:57bone building years, it's very possible that they could end up
- 21:00with low bone density long term. So we know that up until about
- 21:03the age of 18 is where we built the majority of our bone density
- 21:06for our life. Just scary and exciting all at
- 21:09the same time. Like it's fascinating and really
- 21:11terrifying because I don't know how you guys, how smart you guys
- 21:14were at 18, but I was not very wise at that age.
- 21:16But. If they're under fueling and
- 21:18that is negatively impacting their bone density, that could
- 21:20be a lifelong struggle that they're dealing with.
- 21:23And if they want to be an athlete and they want to be a
- 21:24lifelong athlete, you know, that's something they are going
- 21:27to have to manage for a really long time.
- 21:29I think one of the positives is that what we do know is if we
- 21:33reverse that energy availability and get them in adequate energy
- 21:36like their muscle glycogen storage is going to improve and
- 21:39their muscle protein synthesis is going to improve and bone
- 21:40density will improve to some degree depending on what age
- 21:44they are and where they're at in that cycle.
- 21:46So we can see those improvements coming back, but especially the
- 21:49bone health, it can be more of that long term impact.
- 21:52Yeah, I think I probably put the most emphasis on the long term
- 21:56implications of bone health in the population Amanda and I
- 21:59mostly work with, which is that adolescent population and and
- 22:03trying to really hammer home this idea that like now is your
- 22:07time to make your bones as strong and dense as possible.
- 22:12And I know it's hard as a 16 year old to really think about
- 22:15you as a 60 year old, right. But when we think about like
- 22:19osteoporosis risk, if you are here, when really you could be
- 22:24here with your bone density if you did more to optimize it
- 22:27right now, your chance of slipping into that osteoporosis
- 22:31range. When we think about, you know,
- 22:33making that diagnosis from a DEXA scan, you've much more at
- 22:36risk for that into your adulthood.
- 22:39And so I spend, I feel like a lot of time trying to provide
- 22:42education around that. But I also think like in the
- 22:45female athletes, specifically for someone who is not having a
- 22:48menstrual period with low estrogen, estrogen is a super
- 22:52important hormone for lots of other things just besides bone
- 22:56health. We put a lot of emphasis on bone
- 22:59health because that's a really important piece of it.
- 23:01But estrogen also supports a lot of other body functions and and
- 23:06being in a state of estrogen suppression for a prolonged
- 23:09period of time is so not good. And then the other thing Amanda
- 23:14and I see, I'm just thinking back to just a few patients we
- 23:17saw together a couple weeks ago is like, we do see some athletes
- 23:21who end up falling off of their growth curves in adolescents who
- 23:25don't attain, you know, probably what their peak height velocity
- 23:29would be and end up with either delayed puberty or changes to
- 23:34their growth that you can recover if you act quickly
- 23:38enough. But I mean, we saw an athlete
- 23:39that was a couple years years past puberty and had fallen off
- 23:43their growth curve, right? And we're like, well, we
- 23:45probably don't have a ton of a window of opportunity at this
- 23:49point to really make up that loss.
- 23:51And so I think especially in that adolescent population as
- 23:54they're going through puberty, emphasizing the importance of
- 23:58nutrition to support that in addition to all of the other,
- 24:02you know, exercise energy demands that they have as an
- 24:05athlete. That's actually something that I
- 24:07saw when I worked in college athletics during the 2020
- 24:09pandemic, because a lot athletes were removed from sport and for
- 24:13the first time they were actually having adequate
- 24:15energies. So we had a number of athletes,
- 24:18like go through delayed puberty and it was a very like,
- 24:20interesting, I guess like side effect of the pandemic.
- 24:22Yeah, that is interesting. It's like a forced break from
- 24:25port and almost like a forced enhanced nutrition, right?
- 24:29But it shouldn't be that way. Like ideally we need to prevent
- 24:33athletes from even getting to that base.
- 24:35But it's hard. We see that with athletes who
- 24:37have those longer injuries. So like if they rupture their
- 24:40ACI and they've been under fueled and now they're
- 24:43sedentary, and then there's the mental health component that
- 24:45comes with that and then they also start going through puberty
- 24:48and then there's all kinds of feels about that.
- 24:50And it's it's a lot for the athlete to deal with.
- 24:53You mentioned injuries. I'm so curious, do you get a lot
- 24:55of referrals like that are from injured athletes that are then
- 24:58coming over to you? Because potentially that was the
- 25:01first diagnosis was like a repetitive injury or something
- 25:04like that. And then we kind of had to take
- 25:05a step back and look and say what's the root cause?
- 25:07Like why are we having injuries like this?
- 25:09Is that something that you guys often?
- 25:11Yeah, I would say from my side of things, all of our physicians
- 25:15are very, very good about referring whenever there is a
- 25:18stress injury or menstrual irregularity going on.
- 25:22I feel like I get looped into a lot of Doctor Armando's cases
- 25:25because she gets a lot of those athletes.
- 25:27But all of our docs will refer for those and we're slowly
- 25:30spreading the news, I feel like to outside providers and we're
- 25:33getting more referrals from them as well.
- 25:34So especially kiddos that have been struggling with like
- 25:36recurrent injury, they oftentimes end up in my office.
- 25:40Yeah, it's. Say, I think bone stress
- 25:42injuries, super common diagnosis that leads some athletes to our
- 25:47care. And then as we've been growing
- 25:50our practice, we're getting more referrals for like disordered
- 25:53eating or eating disorder concerns in athletes as well.
- 25:57Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Eat More
- 25:59Carbs podcast with Doctor Aubrey Armento and Amanda McCarthy.
- 26:03If you have questions for Riley and I, you can find us on
- 26:05Instagram. You can find Riley at easy dot
- 26:07sports dot nutrition and you can find me at Jenna dot Fisher dot
- 26:10nutrition. Thank you again for listening.
- 26:12Please make sure you rate, subscribe and review.
- 26:14And as always, remember to eat more carbs.