Beware the trickle down health economy
But big food and big pharma are big money and big money can get in the way of good information and clear understanding. Without that, how can you expect people to make healthy decisions?
- Ericka Thomas
Transcript
There’s no such thing as “settled science” when it comes to human health. I’m not a doctor. I’m not a therapist of any kind. I’m a fitness professional and I take that seriously because what that means is that I am a curator of health and wellness information. I believe that all fit pros have an opportunity and a responsibility to have a meaningful impact on the lives of the people we work with by helping to translate health science into real world application. We can do this within our scope of practice simply by staying current on emerging health science. The important thing to note is that our current understanding of that science is often 10-20 sometimes 30 years behind the times.
Take for example our nutrition recommendations. They are only updated every 5 years. And the board of professionals that are responsible for those updates often have conflicts of interest and seem (IMHO) reluctant to take any kind of stand or leave room for individual variation in the real world. So as a fit pro working with very confused clients it’s important to understand the science in the background and to be able to translate it as well as to stay as current as possible. When I say current, I’m not talking about CEC’s I’m talking about actual real time scientific understanding.
I am so grateful for some of the outstanding podcasts out there that are bringing really important human health discoveries to light faster. Podcasts like HUberman Lab, The Drive w/Peter Atia and the Better podcast with Dr. Stephanie Estima are excellent examples of that. The internet gives us instant access to nearly everything and anything we might want to know about but that information can go on forever and not all of it is entirely accurate.
I know, I can hear you thinking how time consuming that is. And that’s true. That’s why we niche down. No one can know everything about everything. That’s why it’s important professionally to find an area that you are well versed in and stick with that. Scientists do that as well. And that is why we need to be careful. Because we are working with whole people. Not only one system, like the musculoskeletal system, or the cardiovascular system, or the central nervous system. A whole person where everything is connected.
And there’s only one question that matters to a whole person and that question is “What does that mean FOR ME?”
So here’s the thing that I want to make sure everyone hears today. They don’t understand everything about the human body completely yet. There’s too much. We are so complex. So every year scientists learn new things and some of those things illuminate stuff we already know and some of them confuse everyone. Some of them are horrible like when they discover the impact of widespread carcinogens in our everyday environment and when we find the things we thought were healthy turn out to be the opposite.
So we can give a little bit of grace here. Like Maya Angelou says you do the best you can with what you know, when you know better do better. But big food and big pharma are big money and big money can get in the way of good information and clear understanding. Without that, how can you expect people to make healthy decisions?
What we have currently in the US and maybe the world, is a kind of trickle down health economy. Where the best metaphor wins. The best storytelling marketer wins. And those are easy to believe and hard to replace when they’re wrong.
Think, the food pyramid. Or the heart/ fat theory. That dietary fat and cholesterol led to cardiovascular disease. How about the triune brain theory. You might know that one as the lizard brain story. The story that we have to overcome our primitive instincts with our rational modern brain feeds the ego for sure, too bad it’s incorrect. It was refuted in the early 90’s but I learned it as truth in trauma release training as late as 5 years ago. And don’t get me started about known junk science, like the Women's Health Initiative.
Look, again this information was cutting edge at one time because that was how scientists understood it, how the experiments were designed or the technology we had at the time to look at these things was limited.
And this is my point today. We need to be more careful about digging in our heels over accepted health recommendations AND on the flip side we need to be open and curious about new understanding of how this incredible body we live keeps us alive. Current isn’t actually always current. It takes too long for health science to make its way into actionable behaviors and that’s where a fitness professional can assist.
Personally I always want to see proof. I don’t ever want to be the first to drink the kool-aid. And my go to filter when I hear about some incredible new protocol that’s supposed to boost metabolism or make me live forever are the 5 W questions. You can use them too.
Here they are.
Who did this study, who were the subjects and who is this for? Studies done on 25 year old male athletes are less applicable to post menopausal women.
Why would I need this? Why would anyone need this? Individual circumstances matter.
What exactly did they do in the study and what does that look like in the wild? Is it even doable?
When was this study done? (how long did it run?)
Where does this fit into a healthy lifestyle? Where does this fit into MY lifestyle?
But all of these can be distilled down to one question and that is what does this mean for me?
We all have to weigh the cost/risk/benefits of our choices, especially health choices . People do it all the time.
Alcohol consumption and smoking are 2 big ones.
There’s still a myth that red wine can be good for you. Um no. That’s some deliberately misinterpreted science.
There’s plenty of people out who know how unhealthy smoking is and they choose to continue to smoke despite there being many ways to help break that addiction. Even pharmaceutical ways.
So next time you hear about the latest greatest thing to come out of a lab, stop and think. What part of the human health picture were they looking at? Is that part of your picture? What is the source and do you trust their interpretation? To be biased is to be human and scientists are humans first.
Even when we think we have the whole picture it’s never the whole picture. There’s always another question and it’s important that we keep asking them. And as fitness professionals present the information as a work in progress, cultivate different perspectives. After all, isn't that what we all are? A bunch of works in progress?
And speaking of a work in progress…Let’s practice what we preach.
Metamorphosis is open! This is a menopause makeover workshop designed to share the latest health nuggets in science and myth busting about menopause symptoms and what you can do to naturally mitigate them. We’re talking about all things pelvic floor, why kegels don’t work and what to do instead, hormone balance, how insulin affects inflammation and sleep,stress, anxiety and depression and so much more. This is a 3 hour hybrid event on November 4th 2023 from 9 AM EST - noon. I’ll be teaching this live in studio so if you’re local, you’re welcome to come in person. But if you’re not you can still join us live online. Best part about this is that it will be recorded for everyone. So if you want to go back and review or you can’t make it live, you’ll have access to the replay.
Metamorphosis is open for enrollment now and you can go to the show notes and click the menopause makeover button to register. It’s only 65$. That’s at savagegracecoaching.com/theworkin or the website.
Thanks for listening! I’ll see you next time on The Work IN.
Hey there!
I’m your host Ericka Thomas. I'm a resilience coach and fit-preneur offering an authentic, actionable realistic approach to personal and professional balance for coaches in any format.
Savage Grace Coaching is all about bringing resilience and burnout recovery. Especially for overwhelmed entrepreneurs, creators and coaches in the fitness industry.
Schedule a free consultation call to see if my brand of actionable accountability is right for you and your business.