Unravel Some Knots In Your Belly: Nourishment Tips

Man, is it confusing to figure out what is “good for you” diet wise. 

Most folks I know are simply overwhelmed by the sheer amount of information that is out there today.  Keto vs vegan, intermittent fasting vs 6 meals a day, brown rice vs white rice, gluten intolerance and sugar addiction, hypothyroidism, proteins vs carbs, and on and on and on! 

For many years, the diet info overload and NEVER BEING RIGHT made me head to the couch, order pizza, and binge on some flicks while I waved my middle finger at the experts (those of you that know me, know that is literal). 

Fortunately for my health, I started studying Ayurveda and I was able to learn a system that helped me put some structure into my eating habits (and, ahem, gain some discipline).  I’d like to share some of the things that really helped straighten me out.  

The first bit of understanding I had to get is pretty basic and present in both the modern diet world as well as the ancient one - the concepts of metabolism, nutrition, and digestion. They really are three completely different concepts that are interrelated. 

I’m not going to try to dazzle you with a lot of science - if you’re like me, that route just adds to the confusion. Instead, I’m going to explain it the way I see it (If you like science, now is a good time to stop reading). 

It’s kind of like baking a cake… 

When you bake a cake, there are lots of variables - just like in your diet.  There are a lot of factors that make or break the taste, texture, and desirability of the cake you wind up with.  Some of the factors are the oven and its use,  the ingredients used for the desired cake, or the recipe measurements and instructions.  If the ingredients are fresh and appropriate, and the instructions followed to the letter, and the oven temp and cook time managed properly… then you probably end up with a dang tasty cake exactly like you intended.  BUT… if any of these are mismanaged, you’ve probably got a cake that looks wonky, has a funky texture, or is fed to the dog on the sly.

How is this like anything in our body? 

Well, when you eat and drink something it has nutrients (ingredients), that are digested/broken down in a specific way (recipe), then turned into energy (metabolism) that is used to power your body and build tissue (cake)..  So, in my mind, I have made the following little parallels to how my body processes food as it compares to cake baking:  

Nutrition =  Ingredients

Digestion = Recipe (amounts and order)

Metabolism = Oven Management (time and temperature)

I use these to scale back the information overload and make better food choices (most of the time).  Here are some of the ideas I managed to get my mind around using them:

Nutrition = Ingredients

Nutrition to me is like gathering the ingredients for a cake or other recipe.  I want to use the freshest, least processed ingredients I can if I am making something from scratch because I want that wholesome, homemade taste.  Some recipes have tons of ingredients while others just a few but each can result in a satisfying cake. 

Processed vs Unprocessed Foods

To me, eating processed foods is like eating a piece of cake made with an artificial sweetener.  It works in a pinch, but it just leaves me unsatisfied. Processed foods do this to our body - they promise nutrition, but don’t deliver it. 

Keto vs Vegan

The diet you choose will determine the type of cake you end up with.…One will give you a heavy, rich dessert while the other will be light and fluffy.  There are all sorts of diets that range in between these two extremes that they each tend to create something slightly different. 

Brown rice vs White rice

This along with other arguments like it are very “gourmet” to me.  I do not think about my diet enough to worry about these things.  To me, it is like specifying Madagascar opposed to Tahitian vanilla.  Frankly, I eat the rice that I have in my pantry most of the time and if I have more than one… I choose the one I think goes the best with my meal (but I make sure I rinse it and soak it). 

Digestion = Recipe 

Digestion to me is very like the instructions in the recipe itself.  It means combining things correctly in the recipe by paying attention to things like “softened”  or “sifted”, adding things in the correct amounts, and using specific techniques like “mixing” as opposed to “folding in” when making batter.  Digestion can be thought of the same way.  You will get entirely different results if you combine foods correctly than if you just dump all your ingredients in one big bowl and mix them willy-nilly.

Carbs vs Protein

This one was one place I made significant changes that mimic making a cake.  It is common in a cake recipe to mix the “liquid” ingredients in one bowl, the “dry” ingredients in another and then combine them. I started treating carbs and proteins as two separate categories and eating them separately as much as possible.   To do this, I use greens and non-starchy veggies as my “fillers” with either of the two main players.  

Food Allergies, Sensitivities, and Intolerances

I misunderstood a recipe once and used 1 tablespoon of coffee grounds instead of 1 tablespoon of liquid coffee in an espresso brownie recipe.  Needless to say, the grounds did NOT break down correctly and the brownies were a gritty, unpleasant texture.  Similarly, food allergies, sensitivities, and intolerances mean that the body has some specific instructions about ingredients that need to be followed or things won’t turn out quite right. 

Metabolism = Oven

Metabolism to me equates to the baking time and the oven temperature in the cake baking process. The quality of the ingredients and the care taken to make the batter do not matter if the cake is burnt or runny in the center when you try to eat it.   A great metabolism is like a properly working oven set to the right temperature. It cooks the cake to the desired texture in a predicted time frame.  Metabolism has many factors and can be adjusted in several ways. 

Intermittent fasting vs small frequent meals

I am going to fall back on my Ayurveda teachings for this one.  Ayurveda says that meals should be spaced 3-5 hours apart and you should eat your last meal 4-5 hours before bedtime.  Snacking or frequent meals are frowned upon unless there are certain circumstances like diabetes that require more frequent meals.  This is advice to keep the “digestive fire” burning regularly.

Hypothyroidism

Your body is super smart (and I am not, so this is vastly oversimplified).   Basically, the thyroid is like the temperature gauge on the stove and stress causes it to decrease.  Here is why - when you are in long term stress mode, the cortisol produced by the adrenal glands diverts energy away from the thyroid. This can cause the thyroid gland to stop working, which is called hypothyroidism. You can’t constantly jack around with the temperature of your oven while baking and expect your cake to turn out ok, right?  Similarly, wild swings in stress hormones make for terrible digestion. While there has been a  lot of news about ingredients that impact the thyroid, I’ve found that the single most effective way to combat the slowdowns due to hormonal imbalance is to learn to relax and manage stress.  

Ladies and gents, I hope my own struggles with this topic and my way of making it make sense can help you the next time you read some article about food and its impact on your body.  

Nowadays, I just try to figure out the category it falls under - is it the ingredient itself, the way the ingredient is mixed in, or is the temperature of the oven that is actually being discussed - then figure out what I want to do with the info…take it to heart or chunk it.  I have found I mostly chunk it because I’ve got some pretty solid eating guidelines for my own blueprint in the age old wisdom of Ayurveda.

Until next time, my friends -

Sandy