As you might be aware I’m a qualified trainer, with a special
interest in “relapse avoidance” via productive training rather than
calorie burning, and flexible dieting rather than restrictive fad diets or extreme calorie restriction.
Eating disorder recovery is no trivial matter and for the most part
it is best managed by qualified specialists in psychology. What I
am
qualified to do and what I have become very good indeed at doing is to
provide a training program and nutritional guidelines that will allow
people in recovery to pursue their goals without an increased risk of relapse, and
even to further their recovery as they see improvements in performance
and body condition as a direct result of leaving restrictive and
disordered measures in the past.
Of course this is also more than suitable for anyone else who wants
to get into fit, strong and leaner shape without restrictive and
destructive approaches, as well.
How and why did I end up doing this though?
To try to make a long story short; because people asked me to.
I’d been a trainer for a couple of years, had been quite successful
with a small number of clients both locally and online, and I had
started joining some industry networking groups to learn how to market
better so that I could become more successful in business and help more
people.
Well. Everything I kept getting told was hard for me to accept. I
need to get all of my clients to eliminate all grains from their diets,
all processed foods for that matter. Not too much fruit either, because
of the sugar. No legumes either for some reason no one had an
explanation for, and soy products too because GMOs are bad.
People had different labels for what everyone should be doing….
“elimination diet”, “paleo”, “clean eating”. Much the same rules and
restrictions but just different labels depending on who you were getting
lectured by, as far as I could tell.
Now right there, I had a problem because I’ve just described my own
diet as the “half arsed vegetarian” that I am, and I was in stronger and
more athletic shape than a lot of the people lecturing me about clean
eating. Not to mention I’d had some clients getting very, very good
results indeed without cutting out any of those food choices, either.
Apparently, I couldn’t possibly though. Because working to calorie
and macronutrient (aka IIFYM) targets “just doesn’t work”, because the
real issue is the hormonal chaos caused by the inherent badness of these
particular foods and ingredients. Yep, including fruit and legumes.
So, this doesn’t add up because you’re telling me that something I’ve
done personally and helped several others do to “can’t be done” the way
I’ve done it. But maybe I am misunderstanding. Perhaps what you mean to
say is that there are certain medical reasons why someone might need to
cut out these foods, and unless they do so the regular stuff that works
for most people won’t work for them? In which case, surely they should
be diagnosed by their GP and seek specialised nutritional advise from a
real dietitian, rather than by a trainer?
Nope. I was told these restrictions were required for
all people, and that I should keep GPs and dietitians out of the process as they don’t know about this stuff.
Well. That’s a pretty big red flag right there.
Obviously I couldn’t accept any of this. I was open to the idea that
it might be something I should learn about for the benefit of “some
people, in certain circumstances, as per doctors orders”, but I’m going
to need to be convinced with some strong evidence. Just a blanket
diagnosis for everyone who walks in the door just wanting to trim up a
little in time for their summer holiday? Nah uh. Especially since it
couldn’t possibly be true.
People all over the world have been “not obese” through out history
while eating varying diets including some or all of these food choices.
People have lost weight and gotten into great shape while still
including some or all of these food choices. I’ve done it myself. You
can’t possibly expect me to accept that no one, anywhere, at any time,
has ever been “not unhealthy and obese” other than on this particular
restrictive diet that you’re trying to push on me. The idea is
ridiculous.
And of all things, the idea that
fruit isn’t really a “healthy
enough” choice of a snack that people can enjoy regularly? I remember
saying “it actually sounds like you’re just trying to give everyone an
eating disorder, making them afraid that any or all of these quite
nutritious every day foods will mean they can’t be healthy and won’t see
results from training.”
Then the pressure and the guilt started.
This is the direction the industry is moving in, so you
can either get on board or be left behind. If you cared about your
clients you’d set a better example by cutting out bread and cereals.
Even though you really enjoy them and are getting great results while
eating them.
I got really angry at this point, but at the same time what I started
to realise was that most of the people arguing with me were victims
who’d been sucked into this idea that if they wanted to be a trainer,
they needed to be this shining light of dietary virtue, never eating
anything “unclean” or indulgent, and so on, with every individual meal
or snack choice chosen solely on micronutritional value plus some kind
of “moral value” rather than on taste, enjoyment or convenience. So much
of their self worth was tied up in their dietary choices, because not
living up to those impossible standards would make them a fraud who had
no right to be coaching anyone else towards a healthier lifestyle.
There were a couple of guys at the very top, mostly in the UK, who
had made a hell of a lot of money from putting these ideas into people’s
heads, and the people bought into it almost religiously. So for me to
refuse to buy into it was offensive to them, and for them to try to use
guilt and shame tactics to pressure me to get on board after failing to
provide a logical reason to do so that held up to scrutiny was offensive
to me.
I got to the point where I thought “well, if it’s a choice between
being a part of this or failing in business… I guess I’ll go back to
putting people on their arse for a living”. AKA security work.
At some point though… I must have ranted a bit about this all on my
personal blog in frustration and anger at what was going on. People
started to write to me saying, “that’s actually how my eating disorder
started. Being given a restrictive diet, being afraid to eat everyday
foods and being made to feel guity and ashamed if I ever ate something
that wasn’t clean”, and so forth. Some of the stories I heard, and the
depths of what eating disorder can do to a person, and the lengths they
will go to to avoid eating or digesting something that’s “bad” were…
well, you probably can’t even imagine.
And the senseless part is that all of these restrictive measures were
the only thing stopping these people from actually seeing results from
training. For that matter, a lot of the time I only really heard about
the bad stuff 3 months after I’d given someone a program, in the context
of “here’s what I didn’t tell you before we started. I’m not doing any
of that anymore. I feel great and I love the results I’m seeing”.
When you find that you’ve been able to help someone like that, you
want to help more people. Simply by giving people a training program
that is actually effective, and emphasising that results will come from
putting in enough nutritional resources to get stronger and healthier,
and not by withholding those resources and restricting energy intake.
You cannot starve or force your body into a healthier, stronger, more
athletic state. That can only happen by utilising
more energy and resources to adapt favourably to training.
When you’ve helped people like that and have heard their stories, you
get angry with the people who are responsible for putting those ideas
into their heads in the first place. And every time a new one appoints
their self the new “health and nutrition guru” pushing more of the same
nonsense to more people, you get pissed off all over again.
Now 5 or so years later and I am happy to report that the fitness
industry is changing, and more and more people and organsiations are
promoting positive, moderate and flexible approaches. Unfortunately
though, we now have more mainstream and celebrity promoters of
pseudoscientific, disordered nutritional nonsense on the public at
large.
Fortunatley though, as these charlatans continue to align themselves
with anti-vaccine activists, anti fluoride activists and any number of
other variety of scare monger, conspiracy theorist and tin foil hat
wearing nut jobs… they erode any facade of credibility they might have
had.
The tide is turning and ethical, evidence based practitioners will win out in the end. But the battle is far from over.
