Recently I have announced that I will write about the changes in my diet. However, before I get to them, this article needs an explanation, which is why I divided it into two parts.
I would also like to mention, that this article may contain information that differs from the first articles, opinions and thoughts I posted.
As you know, all of us develop. There are new studies, new evidence, new articles, new books, and new smart minds. For the past year, thanks to my experience and observation of my surroundings and my body, which I have taken into my own hands in March last year, thanks to my newly acquired knowledge, a few dietary courses, participation in nutrition conferences, I have a new and more holistic approach to life, food and sport. I don’t just look at the external beauty of my body, but I try to take care of it from the inside too.
I myself found out how easy it is to manipulate our health by making bad or good choices in our life. Sometimes we think that we’re stronger than we actually are. We expose our muscles, do a few pullups, and lift more weight than half of the gym. However, from the inside, our body stops cooperating with us and is slowly weakening us, and we can be completely unaware of it for a really long time, or we just ignore the small symptoms, because flatulence, headache and weakness are experienced by everyone.
Once I promised myself, that after going through anorexia I will never let myself get into that state again, where my health deteriorates so much that I can’t control it anymore.
...And then I agreed to a fitness bikini competition;).
Of course, I’m writing it half joking/half serious, because I still think that you can get ready for the competition in a more rational way, it just needs more predisposition from the body, more experience and clarified logistics. There are a few athletes that prove that. (And I’m only talking about those that do not help themselves to doping; I despise the rest). However, most of them struggle with health afterwards, or need to regenerate for an extended period of time before they show themselves again, or they leave it for good, which is more reasonable;).
I know, that I wasn’t supposed to write about competitions today, but this topic is necessary here, and I also want to warn you how important it is that you prepare yourself under the supervision of a person with experience, though even that won’t always save you from all the bad that can happen. A personal trainer is not a magician, and they can’t always react in time. Which is why you should take care of your health, do some tests. This is directed at all those people, especially girls, who look at profiles of skinny bikini girls and try to copy them. Maybe this article will make you think, think about whether it’s worth it.
I probably wouldn’t damage my body so much if I had the knowledge I do now. Two hardcore strict reduction diets related to the competitions, one after another, with just a two month break in between, were deadly for my intestinal flora.
I instantaneously became weaker, my body became more vulnerable to diseases, intolerances and stress. I’m not even going to mention my frame of mind, “moods”, because it probably wasn’t nice for anyone close to me, and maybe it was good that at the time I lived alone;). You’re saying, that you feel hungry when you don’t eat? Imagine a person on a long term strict reduction diet… a walking killing machine XD;). Luckily, I reacted quickly, I listened to my body and not the people around me who were delighted with my body. In the meantime, I retreated during, or actually at the end of another crazy pre-trial. At the time, I resigned from the Polish Championships and Silesia competitions, even though I reached the best shape in my life – low BF, a muscle outline – not as strong as during my debuts, legs much slimmer, and there were only 2 weeks left until the competition. There might have been some regret, but that decision most likely saved me from a lot of autoimmune diseases, which was also proven by the test results from that period of time. Unfortunately, a lot of competing friends weren’t as lucky, and now they are seriously ill… I mostly meet girls with Hashimoto, hypothyroidism, polycystic ovary syndrome, insulin-resistance, SIBO, but there are also a lot more (but shhhh…).
Of course, I didn’t come out unscathed: intolerance to gluten and lactose, leaky gut, lack of menstruation, dry skin, damaged hair, overall problems with bacterial flora and low T3. Even before the championships my stomach was bulging like a child from a third world country, which is why I sometimes skipped workout. I felt like a character from a video game, which instead of a health point bar, has an increasing annoyance bar. In addition to that I had zero energy, going to the gym like a machine – just to get it over with and eat fast… no, it’s not something that always made me happy. Before competitions, I trained hard and hardcore, my progress was fast, I set myself new challenges, and after achieving them it built up my confidence and mood – it was passion. I was fit, I had ABS, I was happy. I ate a lot and healthy, nutritious: I didn’t limit fats, protein, maybe sometimes I had too much gluten;), but I was healthy. I seriously missed this. And when I am unhappy and summarise everything in my head, I reach the conclusion that keeping myself at this stage is not worth it, and I just change it;).
Today, everything is almost okay already. Thanks to sealing my gut, acidification, vitamin supplementation, probiotics, as well as a good supply of food, I fixed myself. Yes, it’s mostly too barren food, not enough of it, impacted my health. There’s also a matter of intolerances left, but they have also lessened. Before, a portion of a protein supplement was enough to have a III world war in my stomach;). And there’s also (but here, it’s not just food that had an impact on this)… high cortisol, which increased because of a long term exploitation of my body with diets, which was finished off with my intensive life style, small amounts of sleep, a very stressful job, caffeine abuse and a more recent accident of a person very close to me…
This was around two-three months ago. Not to think about the accident I started working out more often, sometimes even two workout sessions, which were also longer at that. As we know from my earlier article, workouts are an additional stress for our body. At the same time, project kept stacking up at work, I encountered a difficult investor and there were two boutiques scheduled to be open soon. Plus my constant life at full speed, two blogs, stimulating myself with coffee, and I went on a reduction diet after maintaining myself for a long time. Slowly, day by day, I started noticing a few worrying changes in my body. Every time I did a strength work out or did a long cardio, the next day my weight, opposite to what everyone would expect, went up! The fuck. I knew my body well enough by then, and after seeing an increase in fat tissue, especially around my stomach where my skin is always thin, and a quick increase in weight, I knew something was wrong.
My suspicion went to cortisol, insulin resistance or thyroid. All those hours of diet therapy, sport and bits of clinic dietetics courses paid off. I went to a lab to get some tests done; apart from a lowered T3 (although it was still in a normal range), low 46 blood sugar 2 hours after eating (80 on an empty stomach), it turned out to be cortisol – it was way too high. It was a textbook case. I knew that it’s time to relax, change my diet and frequency of physical activity, otherwise it will not be good:/.
Generally speaking, cortisol is a catabolic hormone, as opposed to the other hormone made by adrenal – DHEA (anabolic). Our body’s anabolic and catabolic processes should be balanced, unfortunately stress causes disruption, causing an increase in cortisol and decrease in DHEA, which simply results in catabolism. Apart from the fact that we have troubles with building muscle tissue, increased cortisol causes deposition of fat. It happens due to using glucose as a fuel. Which means that the more glucose we have in our blood, the more insulin is produced, which causes blockage to release of fatty acids from cells. But that’s not all. High cortisol disrupts the work of hormones – mainly thyroid by lowered production of THS and conversion of T3, which just decreases the metabolism speed (in my tests, T3 was already lowered). The body starts storing more fat tissue and has problems with reduction. In addition to that, oestrogen rises, which is linked with gaining weight especially around hips and thighs, as well as disruption of menstrual cycle:/
I also started noticing ravenous hunger after a workout and after giving up coffee, a decrease in energy after a meal that included carbohydrates.
So far when stimulating myself with coffee, it wasn’t noticeable to me. And because my tests showed really low blood sugar, everything indicated reactive hypoglycaemia.
It’s also cortisol’s fault, which starts manipulating insulin. In such case it’s constantly high, which makes the sugar levels drop, and with it our strength and enthusiasm. Additionally, hunger and craving for sweets increases. It’s not fun, because unregulated sugar levels can lead to insulin resistance.
I will tell you now that since I changed my diet, my sugar levels are stable, I don’t experience lack of energy, cortisol is slowly decreasing, and with it my weight.
Now you know what I don’t eat oatmeal or carb based omelette or fruits in the morning? Because then our cortisol rises, which really unbalances our sugar levels; I’m not writing this in plural without a reason, as this affects most of us. But, we will continue with this in part 2 ;).
Since I decreased the amount of workouts, I started sleeping more, eating (that’s why I’m on the mass for two months), I changed my diet, macro proportions and carbohydrates supply timing, my reactive hypoglycaemia disappeared, weight stabilised, I don’t have mood swings, I have a lot of energy, even in the morning at a work out after drinking a decaf bulletproof with oil and a protein supplement :D, which used to be unimaginable for me! I won’t change my job, because I love it, I also won’t change my lifestyle, but I am trying to do everything a bit more calmly;). I still give my 110% at workouts, but I spend less time on it and I gave up cardio completely. Sometimes I do intervals, and soon I will start going to Pilates (still LOL ;)) XD.
So take care of your health, of your physical activity and healthy food, as well as regeneration, and look out for PART 2, I will go on about carbohydrates;P
Kisses!! <3
Karola Kocięda (on mass:))
