Nutrition
our building blocks
Our body is constantly repairing, remodeling and renewing itself every single day. Quality nutrition is our way to provide the right building blocks needed to consistently repair and remodel ourselves well. We literally feed our body the energy it will use for the day or store for later as well as the building blocks it will reinvest in building our self back up.
Nutritional science is complex… Like reallllllly complex.
Food is made up of a huge variety of nutrients, which individually, all have their own effects on the body, but at the same time can have different effects on the body when combined with others. These nutrients/nutrient combos then interact with our complex physical, mental and social environment creating different possible effects. As you can imagine, it can be extremely difficult to monitor specific nutritional effects accurately, especially individual nutrients effects on our self in the real world. This is why nutrition is such a complex subject and why qualified nutritional experts are the only people who can prescribe specific nutritional advice and plans.
This is why I only touch upon general needs but no more. Nutritional principles can take some time to learn, then some more time to practice with them, then some more time to experiment and personalise. It is well worth the time and effort though as we will always have a need for healthy nutrition as will our children and every other human on the planet.
Key needs to consider in relation to nutrition :
Energy as measured by calories.
Macro-nutrients in the form of proteins, fats, carbohydrates, water.
Micro-nutrients in the form of vitamins and minerals.
Gut bacteria in the form of pre-biotics, pro-biotics and fibre.
Immune system activity in the form of allergies and intolerances.
Mental health in the form of psychological eating.
Social health in the form of social/cultural eating.
A nutritional overview
Energy pays for everything we do as a living human being and we all have varying energy needs depending on the demands of living our everyday life. The energy we consume from food and the energy we expend from living our life, impacts our body’s remodeling process. Remember, we have a constant turnover of our body, which is constantly breaking down, rebuilding and re-modelling and this re-modelling requires energy.
We use energy for three key functions : internal bodily processes, external movement/activity and reproduction. That’s it. Obviously this is a very simplified model, but fundamentally we use energy to maintain our internal world, to move in our external world and to grow little humans. This is vitally important to remember, especially when considering diets which aim to reduce energy intake.
We can only get our energy from two sources, external sources (food matter) or internal sources (body matter). Our body is fantastically adapted to use both sources of energy and constantly utilises both.
Macro-nutrients are the main energy sources and building blocks of our bodily tissues. The protein, fat and carbohydrates we eat are broken down into their basic components, shipped around the body to where they are needed for energy or to be rebuilt as us. Similarly, because we are made of these, the body can break down its own structures to regain these component parts for use as energy.
Because “energy can neither be created or destroyed, only transferred from one state to another”, any food energy that we actually digest, we must either use it or store it, we cannot magic energy away.
If we don’t consume enough energy from external sources, we use internal sources to make up the difference. If we consume too much energy for our needs, then we store it as fat. If we balance our in and out, we maintain the same weight as we maintain the same weight of bodily stores but we may have changed it’s composition. The net turnover of our body matter is what governs whether we gain weight, lose weight or maintain the same weight. It is important to understand that this is not a closed system. Our brain is able to tinker with the system by influencing both the energy we consume and the energy demands of our body.
When we overeat or under eat by a little, our brain tends to increase or decrease our energy demands in order to balance the books. It does this by adjusting our 3 energy uses, our internal bodily processes (metabolism, body temperature, repair, maintenance, growth), our external movements (exercise, daily activities, fidgeting etc) and our motivation to reproduce (lower libido). This is important to understand when dieting, as reducing energy intake reduces our available energy to spend on maintaining our internal world. Reducing energy intake AND increasing external movement (exercise) severely reduces available energy to spend repairing and maintaining our own body.
Successful short-term diets reduce energy enough to overcome these compensatory changes by the body. The problem is, when we return to “normal” eating habits, we no longer consciously try to control energy intake and our brain can overcompensate by tinkering with the system towards a positive energy balance in order to store a little more fat than pre diet levels. This is adaptive for the body, because it believes we live in a world of potential famines, which is an environment of food shortages. Not so adaptive for a reality full of calories or for modern society’s glorified desire for a fitness model look and can easily lead to a cycle of yo-yo dieting.
Successful long-term diets are usually called “lifestyle changes” because it actually changes our “normal” way of eating so there are no big compensatory changes by our brain. Successful long-term weight loss occurs because a small-moderate negative energy balance can be maintained for long enough to produce a net fat loss result without causing the brain to overcompensate. This is achieved by considering the whole context of nutrition, including the actual human, not just the energy balance. Even though getting the energy balance right is the only way to lose weight, successful long-term fat loss is achieved by successfully looking after the human being eating the food. This is achieved by including all aspects of nutrition within a diet, which includes the rest of this page.
The energy demands of our body mostly come from internal bodily processes and external movement, both of which are supported by our micro-nutrient intake. The vitamins and minerals we consume are needed for the normal function of all our bodily needs as they help our body to do all the things it does behind the scenes that we take for granted. Although they do not contain energy themselves, they influence our energy balance equation because they influence our internal bodily processes and external movement. This is why real whole foods are much better for the body than processed foods because they contain more essential micro-nutrients, helping us to keep powering all of our various bodily processes and movements over the long term. Deficiencies in one or more of these vital nutrients can downregulate the processes they assist, potentially leading to sickness and ill health.
Our community of gut bacteria (part of our microbiome) also have a huge impact on many aspects of our overall well-being as they actually communicate and co-ordinate with our body to assist with our normal bodily functions. Our gut bacteria are fed by our diet, changing over time by adapting to the world we feed them. Having a wide diversity of gut bacteria increases the diversity of pathways in which they can assist our bodily functions including digestion, metabolism and enzyme/hormone production. Gut bacteria influence our energy balance equation because they consume some of the energy we eat as well as influence our bodily processes, therefore influencing our body’s energy demands.
Our digestive system is linked with our immune system because of our individual food allergies and intolerance’s. If our body identifies food matter as a problem, it can mount an unnecessary immune response and too much of an immune response leads to the symptoms of an allergic reaction. This is why it is important to remember that we all have both general and individual needs from our nutrition and that all advice should be screened to fit our own needs. “Healthy” foods are not always healthy if we are allergic or intolerant to them as they can have huge negative effects on our body both immediately and over time.
Speaking of “healthy” nutrition, health is not just physical…
Real world nutrition
Healthy nutrition is mental and social too. Nutrition plays a big part in our mental and social health because it can be a great stress management technique as well as relationship builder. Eating tasty foods especially when eating them with friends and family can have a huge stress reducing effect (calming our stress dial and lowering of stress hormones) whilst also building the bonds between each other (also stress reducing). This is why nutrition is a key stress management strategy as the food we eat can not only serve our physical needs, but our mental and social needs too. It is important to consider all of these variables and how they all contribute to our health and fitness. It is a never ending process managing our nutrition and takes time to find what works best for us, but it is worth it.
Adherence is everything when it comes to nutrition, just as consistency is everything for achieving considerable fitness changes. There is no “best diet” because everyone is different, with very different physical, mental and social needs, all of which are ever changing throughout life. Sometimes physical needs will take priority when sick or pushing for fitness results, whereas sometimes mental and/or social needs will take priority when life is extra challenging or social.
This is why I emphasize to clients that the best nutritional regime is one which not only ticks their physical needs for health and fitness but also their mental and social needs within the bigger picture of them enjoying their life. Finding a personal way of eating which suits you can take some time, but when successful, comes with enormous pay off.
Remember, as with all things lifestyle, the benefits of healthy eating are temporary and you only reap them whilst following the process.
For more information on nutrition I highly recommend following “Precision Nutrition”
Important
Nutrition is important, especially if you have intolerances and allergies, so it is important to take specific food advice from a nutritionist or trained health professional.
Similarly, because food can be a stress management strategy, it is important to understand its potential effects on our mental health. Food can help manage mental stress but can also be a cause of it. If food or nutrition is having a major negative impact on you or your life, it can help to talk to a trained professional to rebuild a positive relationship with food.