Did you ever have a girlfriend who stuck up for you all the time when you were younger?  She would gladly talk for you whether you asked her to or not:  Someone talk trash?  She was on them.  Someone lie on you?  She’d shut ‘em down.   Someone get in your face?  She’d come between you and them, be all over them and then shut ‘em down.  She was awesome—at first.   And then, as you got older, you found she was buttin’ in even when it wasn’t necessary.  Some of the things she would say would not always be right or even nice.  You started to feel like it was more of a hindrance than a help and at times, she was bordering on being offensive.

But now, you have a dilemma.  This is your bestie.  Your other half who you have been super tight with since Kindergarten.  You share everything.  Telling her that you want your independence is not only going to hurt her feelings, it may even turn her against you.  The girl who spent half of her own childhood defending you could now become your worst enemy if not handled well.  You need an exit plan and it better be well thought out.

And so it is with The Pill…

Nowadays, more thought is put into the foundation we choose to put on our face than the choice of whether to go on the pill or not.  Medicine has done an excellent job of making the decision seem as basic as ‘paper or plastic’ and that we should not be concerned about any health risks or side effects because they’ve been around for years.  When you go into their office for a consult or annual appointment and try to discuss it with them, they give you a list of options like you were picking out a different flavor of ice cream for the first time.  They barely go over the options, they smooth over all the side effects and they never tell you what can happen if you choose to stop one kind and head over to another.  Essentially, you are at the mercy of their bedside manner which is not always great for doctors.

If you understand the pill’s role in your body, you understand why it is so important for you to be on top of the choice you make.  The above story is a good representation what the pill does in your system.  It’s your advocate.  It snuffs out all the other “voices” (hormones) that your body has such as estrogen and progesterone and does not allow them a chance to speak.  The problem is, just like in the story, that’s not your voice.  So it doesn’t get it exactly right.  There are some things misinterpreted and as time goes on, less and less of what it “says” corresponds to what you need or want.  After a while, it’s doing its own thing and you’re just a bystander in your own story.

Once you know this, think about who you are and how your system is different from every other dieter on the planet.  You have chosen to be on the leaner side.  This means that the balance in your hormones is in a much more delicate state than someone who is of average body fat.  You walk the thin line between respecting your body and thumbing your nose at your body.  Depending on where you are in the diet, you could be doing either one.  Therefore, you cannot afford to have an advocate who is shouting the wrong message at the wrong time.  This is the difference between gaining a pound or two when your cycle comes around and ballooning up like a floatation device every time you think of eating a starch.  I don’t know about you, but I prefer the former for sure.

If you are using the pill as contraception, knock yourself out—that’s out, not up.  Just sayin.   I am not here to poo poo the pill entirely and I want to make sure I say this so no one misinterprets this post.  As contraception, that’s your personal preference.  But as a fix for your hormonal nightmare going on, it’s not a very wise choice.  It does not “fix” your hormones, it masks them.  It will not “regulate” you like they say it will, it just causes other issues to crop up while you search aimlessly for the formulation that won’t break you out, make you fat or give you migraines.  And any change in your pill formulation will halt your dieting for at least 3 months while you wait for your body to stabilize.

I know firsthand this lifestyle can be challenging.  It’s a lot of work to pack meals, plan your workouts around an already packed week and still live life so having another thing to keep track of is annoying.  But of all the things that can truly affect the beautiful vessel you are living in, it’s this.  Pay attention to your hormones, particularly your cycle.  They are the Town Criers that you need in your life to keep you on track and to keep you healthy for real.  Listen to them.  As always, let me know what you’re thinking below.  I truly love to hear.  Woop woop!:o)

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Every Friday I will be posting an audio message for your enjoyment. I am working on getting video going, too, so look forward to that coming soon.

Feel free to comment below and let me know if you have experienced anything close to what I am talking about in this week’s post.  There may be 2 more posts in this series so hang tight while we get to The Silencer…the Pill.  Cool?  Woop woop!

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Remember in the last post that I said there is a lot of info out there–some good, some bad?  We need to put this whole issue into perspective by at least reviewing the information that is out there and then discuss how it does or does not apply to us:

Your cycle is a barometer by telling you:

Whether your hormones are balanced or not.

Find yourself crying because they made your coffee wrong that morning?  You may be a bit unbalanced.  Also, ladies, if you find yourself with a 5 o’clock shadow and it’s only noon time, you may have a problem there.  Shaving your beard on the way to work in the car is not cute, no matter how discreet you are.  If your chest hurts for weeks at a time (and you are not menopausal), you have extreme exhaustion from 2 to 5 pm, up all night long staring at the ceiling, some days you are Hercules—other days you are Pee Wee Herman or lastly, you have night sweats.   Any of these scream hormonal imbalance.

Whether your metabolism is fully functioning.

Gaining weight just watching fast food commercials?  Time to see if the thyroid is up to snuff.  Ate a piece of bread and it was as if someone opened an umbrella in your tummy five minutes later?  Could be issues with your gut which in turn mess with your metabolism.  Have a gall bladder issue and you aren’t your typical candidate for it?  Sounds like a possible thyroid problem there.  All of these things say, off kilter.

Whether your moods are in alignment.

Punched your husband in the face because he ate the last of something and then said, “so what?” about it?  Your free testosterone might be a bit too free, eh?  Feel like you need to have a baby yesterday and you are happily single and under 35 years old?  Get a hold of yourself, girl!  What’s wrong with you?  Sorry…that was my own personal interjection.  What I meant to say was, “You may be a bit estrogen heavy there.”  Gave somebody the finger in traffic and then realized it was your boss?  That progesterone may be getting the best of you.

If your cycle was off before you began clean eating it may be because of:

• Menopause/perimenopause
• Stress/Exercise
• Significant change in weight—up or down
• Medications
• PCOS/estrogen dominance/hormonal imbalance
• Nutrition
• And at least 5 other things that aren’t worth mentioning in this post

Most doctors help their patients manage these issues by:

• Focus on nutrition
• Limit stress
• Vitamin supplementation
• Prescribe the pill

This gives you an idea of what every woman faces whether they have chosen to lean out or not.  All of these are real issues and well documented in the medical community.  The question then becomes, “How is this different for you?”

Hormonal Imbalance

This is a given for us the first time we diet down to anything.  It doesn’t matter if we went from 200 pounds down to 180 pounds; dieting throws your body into a tail spin.  Some of us make it through unscathed, the rest of us are still picking up the pieces years later.  It’s different for everyone.  How it shows up, though, after dieting is anxiety, bingeing, mood swings (very high highs or very low lows), metabolic disturbances and our cycles.

If your cycle was off after you began clean eating it may be because of:

• Too little fat in your diet
• Too much exercise for way too long
• Too low of cals for way too long
• Too much exercise with too few cals for way too long
• Anxiety/depression medication
• Adrenal fatigue
• Insulin resistance
• Metabolic syndrome

What your doctor will suggest you do to help:

Eat right and exercise.

I know.  Don’t hit them.  Seriously.  But they will tell you that you need to eat healthy foods and make sure you do some cardio.  This is after you bring them 6 months worth of food journals and a plate loaded iso-lateral chest press machine for their waiting room.  You’ll be amazed at how many of them think that you are not doing enough even though you did the whole appointment with them on your own personal treadmill that you carried into the office all by yourself. Crazy.

Limit the stress.

This is about as effective as using chapstick as a gluestick.  Do they know who you are?  You’re Mrs. Type A.  You’ve already worked out, did 8 hours worth of work and made all your meals for the week and it’s only 9 am.  Getting you to relax is as laborious as 10^th grade summer reading list.  Totally no fun and getting it done takes forever!

Supplementation.

Not a bad thing to add in here but most likely, you’re already taking what they will suggest.  But it’s a good start.

Take the Pill.

WHOA NELLY!  This is the next post!  Sit tight!

There’s more to come and on Friday, I will have an audio post for you to listen to.  If you have never heard my voice or my crazy antics, now you will have your chance.  Can’t wait!  Woop woop!

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I have truly mellowed out in my old age.  Back in the day, I assure you, I was a much feistier gal.  I would like to say that that was a good thing, but alas…it wasn’t.  I have many a dead body behind me of those who entered into an argument with me and I wouldn’t say they “lost” but they lost something (i.e. limb, voice, money, life—who knows.  It wasn’t pretty.).  And those losses didn’t come because I knew something and was smarter than them—because that’s definitely not the case.  They came because I was ferocious at defending my end of the argument at all cost.  Whatever I knew to be true was true as far as I was concerned…and then I got older.

Getting older meant that I had to concede that I may know the truth or I may be “right”, but there could be a whole segment of information that I have never been exposed to that could stomp on whatever I am presenting as fact at that moment.  This doesn’t mean that I didn’t know what I was talking about; it means that I had limited knowledge in the topic being discussed.  This happens to all of us in some way, shape or form.  Think about how dumb we used to think our parents were when really, we were the dummies.  Or, say you are a trainer and a client tells you something that sounds odd to you and in your mind you call “bullcrap” because you think she just doesn’t want to diet or workout hard.  Then like a year later you find out that not only was she telling the truth, but now you have what she was talking about and you’re upset because now no one believes you.  Things like this happen all the time and I expect some of this to crop up during this series.  I need to debunk a lot of junk (wow, can I use that somewhere else?) that is floating around out there in the land of Greek Mythology, aka girl talk, surrounding our cycles and I expect some raised eyebrows.  There’s a ton of misinformation and we need to slog through the details to get to the truth.  Here are a few to start with:

1. Getting to the truth.

There’s no such thing.  There isn’t a central location of hormonal information that you will find that all of the medical community is going to agree upon.  There are two types of medicine that I am familiar with and I refer to them all the time:  Western medicine and naturopaths.  Western medicine is your traditional doctor who tells you what the insurance companies let them tell you.  They are not bad people, just limited by the system.   I will qualify this later so don’t get your underwear in knots if you don’t agree.  Hang tight.  Naturopaths are not exactly MD’s but they have a much more open view of tackling medical issues which is what you need when it comes to hormones.  The problem is, when you need a drug—you ain’t getting’ one there.

These two professions tend to be at odds with each other.  This is tough on us, the little guy, because we look to them for the answers and then find ourselves having to make a choice between the two without any real information to back up our decisions.  YUCK.

2. My cycle has always been messed up.  It’s just the way it is.

Umm…no it’s not.  And don’t accept that either.  Here is where I qualify my above statement.  Unfortunately for doctors, they do not have the resources to make you well.   They only have the capability to make you better.  That is not the same as being well.  Doctors look at the symptoms you present and make them go away.  They do not necessarily cure you.  And when it comes to a syndrome or chronic condition, they can only ask for so many things to be done that insurance will cover because after a while, they start getting vetoed.  Again, not their fault—it’s the system’s.  Hormonal issues require patience, lots of lab work and a good eye for detail.

3. My doctor diagnosed me with “fill in the blank” so that’s what I have.

Maybe so.  I have no right to argue that in any way.  I am not a doctor and do not profess to be.  But I am an advocate and I challenge you to get a second opinion.  Especially if what they told you that you had was a syndrome.  Things like PCOS, fibromyalgia and so on that do not have definitive tests (although PCOS does but few get the ultrasound done) but more like a list of things that you seem to have in common with them.  Syndromes are a great way to say, “I-have-no-idea-what’s-wrong-with-you-but-I-know-you-need-a-diagnosis-or-you-won’t-be-happy-so-I’m-going-to-tell-you-this-so-you’ll-leave-my-office.”  They have no true way to “fix” them but they give you something tangible to hang on to because it makes you feel better.  Not become well.  Just feel better.  And even then, you may not feel better, you may just be symptom free.

Why do I bring this entire subject up?  Why do I care so much?  I know some of you are thinking, “I was just fine before you started kicking up all this dirt.  Now you have my head spinning.”  (Or maybe that’s just Kas thinking that  I bring it up because if you are not optimal at normal body fat levels, you are REALLY not optimal when you get lean.  And for some of you, it’s what’s keeping you from getting the body that you desire.  Your cycle screams “I am not well” and to lose weight, change body composition or be the best you can be:  you need to be well.

Much more to come.  This is a big topic when it comes to changing your body for the better.  If you have any horror stories, you know I love them.  Hit me up below.  Woop woop!

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Is it me or does my littlest one look like he just saw something gross right before the shot was snapped?  These CIA agents have zero loyalty to their mother.

My kids are awesome.  Yes, I am biased in saying that, but truly, they really are awesome kids.  However, they tend to throw their mother under the bus on more than one occasion.  They say they don’t mean to, but the two older ones are worse than the town crier.  The main thing they tattle on me to their father about is the high flying antics stuff that happens when I drive them to school.  Now I am one of the most aggressive and psychotic cautious drivers there are out there so I’m not sure why they find it necessary to tell their dad that we were driving on two wheels to school but they do at times and it is very inconvenient.  Clearly they got to school by the hair of their chinny chin chins because they weren’t in my car when I got back home nor under the tires and the school didn’t call to say they were psychologically damaged absent so obviously they were fine.  So there are days I just want to hush the two town criers in my back seat by forcing them to listen to their father go on and on about it bopping them upside their heads—but I can’t.  But there is a town crier that we are silencing that we should not be and it is usually warning us of impending peril.  This would be our cycle.

Cycles are very funny because we loathe having them but we hate missing one even more.  They possess an uncanny ability to show up the week you go on vacation no matter when you book it and they make every day activities uncomfortable and cumbersome.  They’re about as welcome as a tummy virus is after a Sunday dinner with the family.   But missing one, for some of us, is more traumatic than being robbed at gun point so let’s just be honest that it’s not like we’re rejoicing because we skipped a month.  And even if missing one doesn’t send you into cardiac arrest, it still makes you think in the back of your head, “What’s wrong here?”

If you hop on the web and start googling, you will find a ton of information regarding missed periods, or as the medical community refers to them:  irregular periods.  Some of it is inaccurate, not all because there is some good info out there on the more prominent websites, but almost all of it is inapplicable to the lean community.  We are a special breed that is incredibly underrepresented in medical studies and on the medical websites.  We are lumped in with the general public and when it comes to issues regarding our hormones or how our bodies react to dieting, we aren’t even close.  But contrary to popular belief of us clean eaters, we do not lose our periods because we are low body fat.  Very few of us ever get that low of body fat to say we lost our cycle for that reason.  I know I have mentioned this before, but we have a warped sense of what our true body fat is.  I have heard girls say they are 8/9% body fat at their leanest and that is a far from the truth.  They are most likely 11/12ish but highly unlikely they as low as 8 or 9%.  The thing that most of seem to miss is that the accuracy of the measurement tends to decrease as you move out to either extreme.  Super lean BF levels and super high BF levels are normally not accurate because they are out of the range of accuracy for that measuring tool.  This is another post for another time but just know that unless you have some ribs showing and your femur perfectly outlined, you are not 8% BF.

We lose our periods due to high levels of the stress hormone cortisol.  It is the grand interrupter.  Cutting your cals and beating your body into submission is a great way to raise your cortisol levels which in turn messes with your sex hormones.  (Of course, this beats the old fashioned way of fight or flight which just shows that we have become bored with more traditional ways of jacking ourselves up and moved on to more sophisticated methods.)  Once that balance is off kilter, so is your period and it can take an act of Nature to get it regular again.  But why the fuss and who really cares?  If I’m missing my period, why don’t I just take the pill and make it come back, right?  That’s up to you but your period is the best loud mouth you will ever have in your body.  It’s forever telling you how you are doing medically.  Silencing may not be the most prudent thing to do.

Hang on tight while we jump into what your period really tells you on a monthly basis and why the pill may not be the answer you expected it to be.  Can’t wait, ladies!  Woop woop!

Ahhh…there’s nothing like a fresh batch of peer pressure to make us do something completely uninformed and irrational.  Gotta love it.

Everybody loves a challenge—especially us.  We love them more than the average person does, to be honest with you.  We can seriously get a little sick with it by setting crazy goals like 5 marathons in 5 weeks and of course, at the time it sounds completely rational.  It even sounds doable.  However, about halfway through the goal we know we are in trouble but we keep on going for pride sake. How about we avoid this calamity by giving you some things to take into account as we head into another year of the obstacle course races?

Let me remind you of who you are.   If you are reading this blog, then you are someone who may or may not realize that you are an athlete but you definitely realize that your physique is part of your overall health and fitness goal.  So it’s not ‘by any means necessary’ to reach the finish line because none of us here would be willing to go up 10 pounds to make the goal happen.  Instead, we will rethink it when we realize that it could take weeks to get the 10 pounds off again and we’ll most likely move on to another goal.  It is what it is.  This gives you an idea of what this series is about because it is not about getting you ready for the Tough Mudder or any other killer race.  No, it is about getting you ready for them safely while taking into account that you will need to be smart about how you fuel for the training, actively recover from the training and psychologically deal with the training. This is not the same as just plain old running or bodybuilding type lifting and if you are not aware of that you may either blow your diet, go crazy or the worst of them all: get injured.

Over the next three days I want to tackle 4 things:

• Tough Guy syndrome
• Nutritional challenges (how to work the STarch thing)
• Active recovery
• Injuries and their ramifications

In less than a month I turn 42 years old.  WOW.  I don’t feel a day over 41 30 yo when I do things, but the next day I feel like I am 75.  I honestly remember the time when I could wake up, decide to run a 10K that day (even though I was not training for one and never ran more than the 10 feet it takes me to get into the shower) and then get up the next morning and do it all over again.  Crazy.  If I did that today someone would be peeling me off the asphalt—and that would be at registration!  Shame.  I need to warm up for my warm up and I know that’s from years of abuse brought on by Tough Guy syndrome.  This malady affects almost all trainers, some group fitness instructors, avid runners and nearly every single physique athlete out there.

Tough Guy syndrome (TGS) is a peculiar syndrome because it crosses the blood brain barrier and renders us dumb as dirt as to the workings of the body and metabolism even though we could school a client on it in a heartbeat.  Somehow, we’re impervious to this information.  We can dispense it, but we can’t use it and because of this, we tend to do some of the dumbest things known to mankind.  It’s unbelievable.

TGS’s power is exacted by finding the weak spot in our immune systems: our egos.  Once it finds that chink in the armor, it quickly spreads throughout the Central Nervous System causing awful symptoms like signing up for and completing the Tough Mudder without any training for it and then systematically bragging about it like you’re a hero or something.  Frightening.  Fevers and chills can result if it goes undetected as people are hot with jealously or cold with disdain around you because you decided to just “pop into” the race.  And because TGS is a syndrome, there is no “one-size-fits-all” cure and normally diagnosis comes only with the egregious symptoms coming to light such as injury or accidents.

But there is hope.  You can take preventative measures to keep from developing this syndrome by realizing a few things:

1)      If you are under 18% bodyfat, you are of the lean community.  You cannot, and should not, put your body to the ultimate test without properly preparing it and fueling it.  Do not eat the same diet you are used to now and then just “jump into” an obstacle course type race.

2)      If you are allergic to starchy carbohydrates because you think they make you gain weight and want to just eat starch the week of the event, you’re in for a big surprise.  We’ll talk about this tomorrow.  Just know that you need to eat them long before the week of the event if you want to use them to fuel your race.

3)      You do not recover the same when you are lean.  You have fewer reserves in the tank and you must keep that in mind.  If you deplete them now, they will not be available to you when go back to working on your physique or just even maintaining it.

4)      You run the risk of injury—major injury—when you are leaner.  This truth comes in handy when you feel the urge to bounce out of bed and conquer the world.  One day of heroism could cost you 10 weeks of working out.  There’s a sobering thought.

This will be a short series.  I am only going to yell at you a little bit (I’m really yelling at myself but I’m using you as the punching bag.  Sorry.) so meet me here for the next 2 days as we get ready for an obstacle race.  Cool?  Woop woop!

It is 2 days before our wedding date and guess what?  We didn’t make our goal.  Our seamstress didn’t have to let the gown out any more, but we don’t look like the cover model that we thought we would and we didn’t hit our goal weight either.

Dang it!

Yes, I know…sad.  But true, nonetheless.  And we didn’t make goal in a few ways, not just on the scale, because our virtual diet is going to have a real ending as opposed to those commercials that make you think everyone is successful.  Everyone that is…except you.

Our lives improve only when we take chances – and the first and most difficult risk we can take is to be honest with ourselves.  Walter Anderson

I want to stress this point until I sprain a finger typing on my laptop keyboard:  realistic goals = success.  Dreams are great motivators only to the degree that the 1 size-too-small pair of pants hanging in your closet is.  In theory they are great to keep us going, but in reality they cause tremendous disappointment because they are so out of proportion to what we can expect as the outcome that nothing could satisfy our hearts at the end.  I am all for motivating quotes and rah rah shishcoombah type encouragement but only to a certain extent.  Then after that, we need to be yanked out of the clouds and have someone slap some sense into our heads.  Here are some facts:

• You will not diet into a great shape the first or second time around.  Maybe the third, though.  Even then, you will still be able to pinch something, jiggle something or point to something that you do not like because it’s not your body that is lacking, it’s your sanity that is.
• You will not maintain it without some level of work.  If you want something extraordinary, you have to put the ‘extra’ in to get it.
• The scale weight does not necessarily reflect the way your body looks.  This goes both ways.  I have seen folks excited that they hit goal weight and they look like someone beat them down with a bag of flour and I have seen women fall short by 5 pounds but be absolute stunners in the process.  Get over the number.  If it means that much to you, tape it on the scale and it will always read that and you’ll be good to go.
• Just because you “stopped eating” the junk does not mean that you will automatically begin to lose.  Where’s your sacrifice?

Efficiency is doing things right; effectiveness is doing the right things.  Peter F. Drucker

We would be able to go back and see where the disconnect happened in our plan if we were 100% on it.  I’m not saying that we cheated or anything, no—we were “following” it the whole time.  But the plan we were on was a hybrid plan.  See, we all do it.  We get our plan from our coach or from whomever we charged with the responsibility of dieting us at the time and upon opening it, decided that they were no longer qualified to do the job.  What were they thinking to tell us what to eat and when?  And don’t they know that that would make us hungry or possibly even cranky so there is no way we’re going to stick with that?  And we don’t have to let them know that we know better than they do, we’ve been dieting ourselves for years.  They just learned about us yesterday.  So we’re going to eat whatever we want for meals 3 and 4, do as much cardio as necessary and lift the way that we want to lift and if it doesn’t work out….well that’s their fault.  They should know we didn’t really want a plan to get us to the goal, we wanted our own plan—the one that fictitiously works in our mind—validated.  Affirm us that we were on the right track and all we needed was for someone to tell us about some new egg whites and oatmeal that we have never heard about before so we could get on with the weight loss thing.  Sheesh.

• Either you’re in or you’re out.  Get off the fence and stop being a couch coach.
• Get over yourself.  Yes, you read a lot.  Yes, you know a thing or two about nutrition.  But objectivity is impossible when you diet yourself so you are not hiring someone who necessarily “knows” more than you or even “knows” you; you are hiring someone who is not you.
• Once you change a plan you negate the outcome.  Period.

Sometimes you’re the bug, sometimes you’re the windshield.—Mark Knopfler

We’ve done everything right, according to the book and we had a very realistic goal and we still didn’t make it.  What gives?

• If you’re healthy and nothing medically stands out, you have been dieting too long.  Time for a break.
• You may have something medically going on that you are not aware of.  Only healthy people lose weight easily. Keep that in mind.
• Things you may not be aware of:  birth control, thyroid meds, food intolerances, stress, liver issues, chemicals in your diet, heavy metals in your body and the list goes on.  Depends on how your diet goes to be able to figure it out.  There will be telling signs.

That was the longest diet I have been on in years.  What was that, 7 days total?  I think I cheated at least 4 times since we started.  Shame.  Next series is on obstacle races like the Tough Mudder and such.  Not sure when that starts but it’ll be within the next few days.  Hang tight and hit me up below with questions or via my email if you like:  Jodi@trans4mationstation.com.  Cool?  Woop woop!

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I wrote this back in the winter time and it was the last email I sent out from Jodiojo.  I never had the chance to follow up with the series and put on paper all that I see day to day with clean eaters.  I am sending them out in the beginning of next week.  If you are not signed up on the blog, yet, you still have time.  This is an eye opening series that I am sure at some time in your clean living history you will experience.  Sign up and find out what you don’t even know you don’t know.

One of the most frightening things that I could ever read is an email from someone who wants to works with us that starts out with, “I run/bike/do cardio/whatever 7 days a week for at least an hour, eat clean, lift 4 to 5 days a week and want to lose X amount of pounds for my sister’s wedding in 8 weeks.  Can you help me?”  Ummm…

Getting lean the first time around is not that hard.  For some people it is a chore but for many of us, it is the most magical time period ever because you are on top of the world and you are invincible.  You look great, you feel great, all is well in the land and you think this will never end.  In fact, you walk around speaking “truth” to everyone about ‘how they need to clean up their act’ and ‘they should get in shape’ and ‘how it’s not that hard’.  You have become a walking billboard for the American Heart Association and you shun those that take elevators and eat junk food.  At some point we all lose our minds and become, even if just a little bit, self righteous and pious in our fitness.  It happens to the best of us; don’t think about it too much about it.

But then trouble begins to brew in paradise.  We start to have little things here and there that undermine our progress or even worse, jeopardize our maintenance levels.   This sets off a conundrum known as, “Oh I’ll just…” which is one of the most damaging phenomenoms  known to woman-kind because it takes all logical, rational thought and turns it on its head.  Basically, you’re going down hard because you begin to lose control and you think “you will just do XYZ” to get it back but it doesn’t work.  Somehow, someway you pushed it and the result of that is either plateau or dangerous territory known as weight gain.  None of us really want to admit that we’ve gotten to that place so I am going to spell it out for you so you can connect the dots.  Here are 3 common scenarios for you in terms of pushing it:

1. You cannot stop cheating for the life of you. In the beginning it wasn’t so bad because it didn’t affect your weight or your leanness so who cared, right?  But now, you’re softer and up a few pounds and you cannot “fix it” no matter what you do.  Sugar or salt can send you into a fit of nibbles that is essentially uncontrollable and mentally debilitating and happens way more often than you would like to admit.
2. You are falling apart at the seams. Because of the endless cardio and workouts, there is not a part of you that doesn’t ache.  You have just about every “itis” you can think of:  bursitis, tendonitis, shin splints, rotator cuff and so on.  You feel like a walking zombie because you are in perpetual motion and after a while you don’t even notice the pain anymore.
3. You are an emotional wreck. Can I just admit to you that I am a crier?  It takes nothing to make me cry—in private.  In public, I can hold it together like duct tape on a kid’s toy but you…you can’t hold *anything* together.  You cry at Bud Light commercials (those dogs are cute, though) for Heaven’s sake!  Anxiety, irrational behavior, drama and crankiness define your life now.  Girl, you are not happy and we can’t leave you like that.  There’s not enough tissues in the world.

If you have any one of those scenarios, are very lean and are working out hard…you are who I am talking to right now.   Fighting for leanness is bad business…seriously…knock it off now.  Instead, let’s talk about our options and what that really looks in the world of clean living.   There are 3 different situations you may find yourself in or have found yourself in already and handling them in the best possible manner could save you hours of cardio and pounds of regret.  Each one of these situations represents an email in this series and will have real guidelines in them to help you navigate your journey from lean to not so lean to lean again.

Email #1               Being Realistic:  What true maintenance looks like.

Email #2               Being Diligent:  Getting back to lean after gaining a few pounds.

Email #3               Being Smart:  Knowing when to say ‘uncle’.

If I do nothing else I want to impress this upon you:  There are a lot of ‘gurus’ in this industry.  Many of them are very good at what they do but very few of them do this.  Make sure all the blogs that you are reading and all the articles you are absorbing are talking about lean folk trying to get lean again.  Most of them are always referring to the first time around and like I said before, that is easy.  What worked before will not necessarily work again—or at least not without a fight.  We are all about balance here at Jodiojo.  All of us in some way, shape or form have had this struggle so we are more than qualified to talk to you about it.  If you have any questions during this series, feel free to hit us up at Jodi@trans4mationstation.com.   Please note:  the emails are not the same as the blog.  Don’t forget to check us out at www.jodiojo.com/blog  Monday through Friday for articles on living clean beautifully.

I grew up in a middle class neighborhood that was a true suburb in that it had less hustle and bustle than that of a big city but still had enough activity to label it more than a small town. But it also had this strange “country” feel to it that “city folk” would make fun of whenever they would venture into our little city. Now when I say country, I don’t mean Garth Brooks and the Grand Ole Opry, I mean I lived on a street that had a community center for teens on one end of the street and a horse stable on the other. Ummm, yeah. Talk about a dichotomy there.

Another thing that we had in my neighborhood was a “beach”.

Let me tell you right now, it is not a “beach”.

It is a river’s version of a “cul de sac” and it sits all the way down a very long, winding road (ironically, the same road as the horse stable) in the ‘city-country’. The river ends in a lake and the city has cordoned off parts of it for people to swim there. I think in my twenty-some-odd years of living on that road, I might have dipped my feet in the beach water maybe once. I wouldn’t swim in that water if you put a winning lottery ticket on a buoy halfway out and told me I could have all of the money when I got to it. Knowing that water, I would have to spend my entire lottery spoils on good healthcare after that.

Why? Because there is no tide; there’s just a river that drains into the lake (and if you knew where that water was coming from, you’d think keeping the beach open would be criminal). There are no filters, drains, purifying systems, nothing. And over the years, we humans have done a number on that water. From pets swimming in the water, to baby diapers left in the sand, people using it as a port-a-potty, to normal toxic waste coming in from the river, Mother Nature has not been given much time to regenerate and restore this body of water. So year after year, the damage has been done and now you are left with a very unsafe body of water fighting to keep some sort of balance with nature. And right about now you are asking yourself, “Where is she going with this?” Glad you asked.

Do you know what that lake represents? Your liver. Yes, your liver. That poor organ that takes up so much precious real estate on the right side of your body that you abuse more than your favorite pajamas is just crying for some love. I wouldn’t trade livers with some of you (I am making this sound like an actual option) if you paid me a million dollars. Right now, your liver is screaming:

“Dear God in Heaven, can you cut me some slack down here? What do you think this is? A waste paper basket? Enough already with the artificial sweeteners, fake food, smog, alcohol, tainted meat, stress and etc. Can you give an organ a break for crying out loud? All day long you have me shuttling junk out of here and then you think I’m going to help you lose weight, too? MAKE UP YOUR MIND! I’m taking this to the union! Convert energy, store energy, digest food, clean your blood. Enough! I need some relief down here and don’t think because you throw me a juice drink here or there that you are helping me out with cleaning up this dump. You’re not.”

Ok, once you get your liver to pipe down and get some sense, you need to pay attention to what he’s screaming about.

I have spoken about the role of your liver on numerous occasions but now it gets its own article. One of the things about ‘dieting with a specific look in mind at the end’ is everything needs to be on point for this to happen. We take dieting for granted and we shouldn’t. It is not easy nor is it guaranteed so we should be looking for ways to take advantage of every gift we are given in this area. Your liver just happens to be the best gift ever in the fight for a hot body but we do not appreciate it. Instead, we forsake it. Think about what we ingest on a daily basis and it is not too hard to see how much we seem not to care about this organ.

A primary function of your liver is to metabolize fat. If you keep it busy doing everything else (your laundry, your taxes, you know, all the stuff you don’t want to do), it cannot help you to lose body fat (Notice I didn’t say weight. If you want to lose weight just lob off a leg, we want to lose body fat here).

The best way to help your liver out is through detoxification. I bet you think that I am going to tell you to buy a detox of some kind to clean out your liver and then love all over it by avoiding the toxins above plus a few more. Wrong. I am going to tell you to avoid the toxins above (and a few more) but do not buy any pills or potions to “detox” your liver. While keeping it as clean as possible will allow you to lose more weight than you would have been able to if it was all clogged up, I am all about espousing nature and letting her take her course. Instead of focusing on trying to do some “weekend detox” or “instant flush”, just stay true to your clean diet, limit the toxins to as little as possible and drink plenty of water. Your liver will do fine all on its own.

Cleaning your colon does not clean your blood or your liver. Drinking a juice blend of 4 fruits and 3 veggies doesn’t do it either. No, your liver cleans your liver and does it quite nicely. It’s the only organ that can regenerate itself! How’s that for efficiency? Knowing that this organ can regenerate its own tissue and filter blood at a rate of 1.5 quarts/min., it almost seems silly to think that an herb can accomplish half as much as this powerhouse can on its own.

If you stop whatever weapon of choice you are consuming right now, you will allow your liver a chance to clean itself. It’s just like a cat, only it doesn’t demand things of you and then ignore you in your own home like an unwelcomed guest. When left to its own devices, it will clean and purify itself on its own and really does not need much outside help from you. Drink plenty of water (close to a gallon), eat lots of fruits and veggies (you should already be doing this) and limit the fake stuff in your diet (**transparency alert** I love diet coke. I’m working hard to wean this habit so I feel for you) and you are well on your way to maximizing the fat loss through your liver.

Since I am so hell bent on a beautiful body and face, I think it is worth me defining what I mean by this.  Unfortunately, our culture/country is obsessed with our outward appearance in a very negative manner.  Being thin seems to be worshipped as well as being young.  Both of these traits garner much attention in the media so they create a sort of undercurrent of pressure for the average woman.  We tend to worry about how we look in a certain outfit, whether we can compete with those “20 somethings” or if we are still acceptable in some men’s eyes.  This is not what I mean by being beautiful. 

One of the most attractive things to me is a woman is “good” with who she is, how she looks and how she presents herself.  She may be 20 pounds more than the ideal but she dresses like a fashionista so you would never know.  She could be 60 years old, but her skin makes her look 52.  She might be 45 but her attitude is that of a 30 year old.  Beauty defined by the dictionary:  The quality that gives pleasure to the mind or senses and is associated with such properties as harmony of form or color, excellence of artistry, truthfulness, and originality.  Beauty defined by me:  taking excellent care of one’s health via food, exercise and supplementation; presenting the best package that you have been given sole rights to by nature.  You cannot get any better than this. 

I want to make it very clear that vanity is not where I am going with any of this.  You do not have to spend hours in front of the mirror or spends thousands on a wardrobe.  You could be a jock in heels with not a care in the world about how you dress but your skin is amazing and your teeth are healthy.  Or you could be a book worm that wears glasses and is addicted to sweat pants but your nails are healthy and your estrogen levels are where they should be.  All of this to me is beauty. 

Being thin does not mean you are beautiful—in fact, it’s quite the contrary.  Most thin people (as a result of perpetual dieting) are very unhealthy.  Being high maintenance with hair appointments and body treatments does not mean you are beautiful—usually it means you need to get over yourself. J  I could go on and on but I think you get my point.  Beauty means that your body is functioning at its fullest potential because you gave it everything you had in terms of outside resources and it is reaping the benefits from that pampering.

Next time you notice how soft your skin is, how regular your cycle is, how even your moods are, how strong your nails seem, how great your memory is at that time, how normal your blood pressure and cholesterol is, how strong your sex drive is and how agile you are at your age, and all of these things got that way because your diet is healthy and you exercise, I want you to think to yourself:  dang, I’m beautiful!