Life is always busy and slowing down can be difficult assignment for most of us. Changing lifestyle and eating habits can be a challenging commitment for 30 days or longer if you are trying to repair your gut, improve mental clarity, break sugar addictions, lose weight or as myself- recover from adrenal exhaustion (HPA-Axis Dysregulation). I know from personal experie
I know how much better my body and mind will feel if I make a personal commitment to follow my low-carb eating program 80% of the time, be accountable to my Nutritional Therapy Practitioner coach and follow my healing plan consistently. The WHOLESTIC Method Transformation program is based on the knowledge I have gained over the 25 plus years as a trainer, triathlon/run coach, podcast host, CHEK Holistic Lifestyle Coach and Nutritional Therapy Practitioner… and my journey repairing and rebuilding my adrenals from my own personal challenge of living each day as a race.
I am talking about my personal health complications, a domino of internal systems breakdown, since the onset of my adrenal exhaustion in March 2013. Five years later and I am finally healing from the inside out to rebuild my adrenals and more…as adrenal exhaustion is really the communication system breakdown of your hypothalamus to your pituitary gland to your adrenal gland becoming dysfunctional- and this breakdown of the hormone communication system just doesn’t breakdown your adrenals from chronic cortisol output but also your:
- Liver function
- Digestive system
- Gut health
- Food allergies and sensitivities
- Skin rashes
- Brain fog, concentration and memory issues
- Insulin resistance
- Difficulty breaking down and using fat for fuel (including in fat burning aerobic/endurance exercise sessions).
The list continues but I finally figured out how to put the piece of the puzzle together with Nutritional Therapy Practitioner (NTP) training, hiring my own NTP that has knowledge on fat burning and the endurance athlete as well as working with the team at Dr. Wilson’s clinic. Today, I can finally announce and share that I have lost over 15 pounds the past few months only because we have discovered with Nutritional Therapy the ROOT cause of my health symptoms and working on improving my body’s innate intelligence by taking the supplements/nutrients that my body needs to rebuild and improve function. I am still healing and making baby steps in the right direction but I don’t know if my body is ready to race again… YET!
If you read my personal story I shared in LIFE IS NOT A RACE, then you may remember that I quickly went from being in the best shape of my life at Ironman Hawaii in October 2012, to being the heaviest I have ever been in a few months. I gained 30 pounds after that major red flag bike ride incident and the “party bus” experience. Sadly, the day I first weighed myself for my reality check of how much fat I actually gained over the months (which had nothing to do with my nutrition or exercise plan!), was at the home we rented with friends for Coeur D’Alene Ironman that June of 2013. Wow was that a shocker and a moment I will never forget.
Nutritional Therapy and The WHOLESTIC Method Transformation program is finally working for me after years of chasing symptoms as most people do still today. Even working with different naturopaths and functional medicine doctors, they all gave me lab tests then sent me home with a bag of supplements to help fix my health problems. I made some progress over the years but not enough. How do you know if those exact supplements are the ones your body is lacking and asking for?
Well that is where Nutritional Therapy Practitioners can make a difference as well as an impact for individuals as myself who are struggling to feel, look and perform their best in life and sports. We offer at my Fitness Forward Studio a four-part session start-up program to begin The WHOLESTIC Method Transformation program. Included in this individualized program:
- Nutritional Assessment Questionnaire to help look at your symptoms and what they connect to in your body
- Review of your food log with symptoms tracked after you eat and overnight
- A confidential “interview” of your background, main health concerns and goals.
- Functional evaluation where we manually test reflex points in the body to determine sensitive or inflamed areas.
- Muscle testing or Lingual-Neural Testing to determine which supplements the body is asking for and which supplements improve the body’s reflex points of concern.
- Creating The WHOLESTIC Method plan including nutrition, exercise, sleep, stress, movement, digestion, hydration, and happiness
From my experience and journey that I shared in LIFE IS NOT A RACE, most practitioners did look at the root cause as I thought. Instead they were just doing the detailed labs and giving me, supplements including hormone supplements to improve my main health concerns. Yes, this can sometimes make a difference, but I wasn’t make much process which lead me to learning more about Nutritional Therapy then signing up for the program to become a Nutritional Therapy Practitioner in 2017. I wanted to know how to help myself, including helping so many others that had similar stories and symptoms as myself.
My podcast, The WHOLE Athlete podcast, has brought me closer to other type-a competitive athletes and over-achievers as myself. I know other people struggle with being overly busy while running on low energy, poor sleeping patterns, and chronic stress. We don’t have to continue living this way and speeding up the aging process. Health is a choice. Don’t you want to slow down the gaining process and live life to the fullest? I want to make today the best day ever… and tomorrow is going to be an even better day!
I made the investment in my health by choosing to a different direction and making lifestyle adjustments if I wanted to feel better, lose weight, think more clearly and race again at a competitive level. Even if you change your eating habits to a lower carb-high fat food plan, or be in ketosis, you may not be solving all your health problems or symptoms. I know my liver is congested and not breaking down fats for fuel plus I my resting blood sugar is high as I am insulin resistance… and these “areas of opportunities” are not from my food plan but from my abuse of living life as a race for some many years that I not only broke down my adrenals (HPA Axis Dysregulation= hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis) but also caused a cascade of events internally.
Do you want to transform the WHOLE you and slow down the aging process this year?
Here are three simple action steps you can do today to get started:
- Order my new The WHOLESTIC Method Manual and Workbook available on Amazon
- Subscribe to my weekly Nutritional Therapy blog
- Download, subscribe and listen to my weekly podcast The WHOLE Athlete
The WHOLE Athlete: The aging competitive athlete over 40 years old trying to slow down the aging process- that refuses to use “getting older” as an excuse. We will try any type of “bio-hack” to improve our performance in life and sports in order to continue living life to the fullest as we know and strive to do daily! We strive to find the root cause to our symptoms and put the pieces of the puzzle together instead of use a band-aid to cover up the problem. We will spend money on methods to optimize our health and improve the WHOLE person without second guesses. Followers of The WHOLESTIC Method programs are trusting me to keep them up to date on methods to get leaner, faster and stronger as they age.
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Debbie Potts
Fitness Forward Studio
Host of ‘The WHOLE Athlete’ Podcast
FUEL. TRAIN. PERFORM.
The WHOLESTIC Method
Author of ‘LIFE IS NOT A RACE’ & ‘The WHOLESTIC Method’
NASM CPT, NTP, CHEK HLC, USAT Coach
www.fitnessforwardstudio.com