Loving your whole body well with Allie Cass
LINKS in this episode
Savage Grace Coaching
Instagram: www.instagram.com/alliecasshealth
Website: www.alliecasshealth.com
“loving yourself is not always about doing what makes you feel good in the moment. Sometimes it is putting your shoes on going out and doing a workout or sometimes it is making the decision that you don't want to make because you know what's going to help you in the long run. ”
Allie Cass
Transcript
Ericka Thomas 0:01
Welcome back to the word can everyone My guest today is Alison Kass. Ali is a former bodybuilding pro turn functional health and fitness coach who helps stressed out women optimize their metabolism up level their mindset and shift from surviving to thriving. She specializes in holistic health with an emphasis in gut health hormones, metabolic health and fat loss and she's got quite the certification collection that includes certified personal trainer, nutrition coach Integrative Nutrition, and health coach, along with functional nutrition and metabolic specialist. So let's dive into our conversation. Get into that work in with our guests today. Allie Cass welcome, Ali. Hi, Ericka,
Allie Cass 0:51
thank you so much for having me.
Ericka Thomas 0:53
Thank you for being here. So let's start off with a little background. Tell us a little bit more about yourself and maybe touch on some of the things that got you into the world of health and fitness both personally and professionally.
Allie Cass 1:11
Oh, my gosh, absolutely. I'll try to keep it at the shorter version on and on. Many minutes, so I have been in health and fitness professionally for almost eight years now. But I grew up as an athlete so physical fitness competition. Sport was always a really big value to me. I went on after graduating high school to play division three basketball, I only played for a couple of months, I realized it was no longer something I wanted to pursue and decided to make a shift. In the process of making that shift. I realized what an unhealthy lifestyle I had outside of the realm of my little athletic bubble. No one ever taught me how to nurture my body whether that was through proper nutrition, through stress management through proper sleep, addressing with and dealing with emotions or other adversities. So as an athlete, you know, I was just always taught to power through, you know, grit, mental discipline. And so I started to, you know, over time see the downside of that as well. And while it is a very important thing, which we can absolutely talk about, you know, later on, I do think that at a certain point that that mentality no longer serves us anymore and so I kind of found myself in a very unhealthy place both physically and mentally. While I was in college, I had your typical college diet. I was drinking way too much alcohol. I was just not prioritizing my well being because I didn't know what that either looked like and I had no one in my life yet friends or family to really model that for me. Fast forward, I'm graduating college. A few months later, my mom was diagnosed with a very rare form of brain cancer, and essentially was given about 12 months to live. I moved across the country became one of her primary caregivers along with my father, and I was with her for the last nine months of her life. That's all but she made it through. And it was in that process that I kind of both realize within myself where I was at in my journey and how unhappy I was with the way that I felt not just the way that I looked, but truly the way that I felt I was 21 years old at the time and I was like I'm I'm way too young to feel this way. I still think that anyone who feels that way is still too young. But I realized that something had to change and in that process of watching her go through her illness and experiencing the very conventional side of Western medicine. I I just started doing so much of my own research. I wanted to ask why and nobody could give me the answers. None of our doctors, you know, no one and so I just really started down this rabbit hole on my own of asking like what makes someone who seems otherwise healthy, get a diagnosis like that. I started looking at nutrition, holistic health, environmental toxins, even going as far as how our beliefs, our past traumas, how emotions that we don't acknowledge and don't let go of how that manifests in the body as disease. And I just became so passionate about it. And through everything that I started to learn, I realized how much like none of this was being talked about, at least in the world that I was in at the time, and how little was addressed in any of those areas amongst any of her practitioners or doctors while she was going through her cancer treatment and so it really just became a passion project of mine, both as a way to help cope with the grief that I had from losing her. And as a realization like, I am not healthy myself. I'm not happy with the way that I feel. I'm not happy with the way that I look. And I just knew that I needed to change so after she passed I decided to hire my first health and fitness coach. I really just wanted some guidance, some structure and in the process, my coach talked me into competing in a bodybuilding show which was never on my radar. I thought it was a terrible idea. And I was terrified of it. But at that point in life I felt like I was really lost and I just really wanted a goal that I could like hone in on and just really go for and so I was like okay, fine, I'll do it. I ended up doing it. I competed. For almost two years. I got my pro card, and I really loved it and it really served me at that point in life. But on the flip side of that, I got to also experience you know, going from being in a very unhealthy state to being in an obsessive, obsessively healthy state essentially, I definitely started picking up some disordered eating patterns, not true clinical eating disorders, body dysmorphia, just other negative use of food fitness myself. And so I decided to kind of break away from that and give myself a break and start, you know, pursuing what I loved and that was educating people helping other women and helping spread this information and just continuing to essentially be a student of this industry for the rest of my life. And so I got my first certification, which was as a nutrition coach moved on to personal training, moved on to health coaching, then into functional nutrition and human metabolism, currently finishing a new nutritional therapy Practitioner program and then going into even as far as the mind body practitioner so I'm so passionate about health and wellness as a whole. And I just think that, you know what, I hope that people learn, you know, moving forward and I think it's caught a lot of traction, especially now with social media and other practitioners and people like yourself talking about all of these things, but health is so holistic, it's not just it's not just working out. It's not just eating well, it's not just doing this or that and it's certainly not you know, what can I take in a poll for him to get me the quickest results so I can go back to doing everything that was creating this dysfunction in the first place.
Ericka Thomas 6:48
Right. Oh my gosh, you brought up so many great things that we can talk on that story. I mean, just from this high contour when you look at that story. What stands out to me is, you know, you were an athlete, and we think of athletes at as peak health examples, right. And yet, there was there were still pieces missing. And then when you got into actual competition in body buildings, which you know, you are completely on top of everything you're eating everything, how you're moving, every everything that you put into your body, and yet still now that process is actually pushing you to unhealthy behaviors. And I think that this is an important point to bring out for not only general population, but especially fitness professionals. We are notorious for lack of self care. And I'm not sure why that is. It might be that same kind of same kind of idea I'm sure you've heard like where the mechanic at the mechanics house, all the cars are up unblocks you know, but they work on fixing everybody else's cars, but none of theirs work. So I mean it could be something like that. But so, in that in your pursuit of all of this education, especially after your time with your mom, which I can, I can hear in your story that was just it's just heartbreaking. To try to turn to the medical profession to ask, you know why? I mean, I'm sure as a doctor, you're thinking well, what can I do to for myself now, you know, to make sure this doesn't happen for me, you know? That is one of the things that comes up for people in family lines, right like, you can see your future almost with your parents and and so how frustrating for you, you know when when the medical field which is supposed to be quote unquote, you know, healthcare isn't providing those answers. So what are some of the things that you have come across in your, in your pursuit of this education and that have helped for you to kind of swing the pendulum pendulum back and find your way to a healthier balance?
Allie Cass 9:47
That is a great question. I think probably one of the biggest things that's been helpful for me to kind of come back to you know what I like to think is a state of balance. I don't know that balance ever truly isn't achieved. I think it's a constant work in progress. But understanding how the body works on a deep physiological level and holistically, right, like, when you take a class, whether it's high school, college, whatever and you're you know, you're in anatomy or you're in something like that it's super easy to learn about the body in its you know, little siloed systems, which is very much how our medical system operates, right you go to a cardiologist if you have a problem with your heart or a neurologist with the you know, something with your brain. And so really, being able to kind of throw that perception out and understand that everything is truly integrated, and then at a deeper level, how it's actually integrating and knowing that when I have dysfunction in one area of the body, how is that manifesting somewhere else? Or how is that impacting somewhere else? That was super helpful for me to understand a little bit deeper, why certain things happen and what the actual root cause was. So really learning about getting to the root cause of what is going on on a dysfunctional level. And then also understanding too that more is not always better, and that our stress affects us so much of that something I see in the fitness industry or particularly with women. When I coach them, they come to me they think that they just need to exercise more, they need to eat less and some people do need that but a lot of them are so undernourished, their bodies are so mal adapted to what they've been doing and they're essentially killing their bodies in the process. And so you know, understanding that whether it's a physiological stress like that, not nourishing our bodies properly, exerting too much force upon ourselves or whether it's psychological stress, or even emotional stress. Those all impact us and they prevent us from being you know, where we really want to be. And so I went through a time it was years after my mom passed, and it was after I stopped competing, and I was coaching women. And I was doing all the right things, you know, with my exercise, my supplements, my nutrition, and I just still did not feel great and I couldn't figure out why and the reality was I just wasn't happy with but you know, there were some other things in my life that I hadn't addressed that I hadn't worked through a lot of grief from losing my mom through, like through things that happened prior to that, that I thought that I had addressed and worked through and I hadn't and I was still carrying the grief but I was still carrying the burden of those emotions. And it wasn't until I decided that I needed to actually face that and you know, be willing to let those things go that I was like, Oh my God, I feel like I lost 20 pounds of energetic weight. You know, you can do those you can do the right things on the physical level. But if we're not addressing you know, what's going on inside, be it your thoughts, your emotions, you know, at a spiritual level as well. You're not going to, you know, have the best results or get to that optimal state of well being.
Ericka Thomas 12:47
Yeah, that's probably going to sound a little bit woowoo to some people but it's absolutely correct. And I think especially for women and men too, but especially for women because our emotional state, so tied to the nervous system, and even though today I feel like there's kind of a new emphasis, at least in some, some areas of medicine, or at least an understanding of how everything is connected. We're still not to the point where people are practicing precision medicine, per se, where they're treating the whole person. You're still sent to the endocrinologist for hormones, you're still sent to the GI doc for gut health and cardio, vascular, you know, like it's all separate, even though even though exactly what you're saying you've got all of these layers and every person, their their, their source, the source of whatever it is for them could be at a different layer, right? It's not the same for everybody. So it's very difficult for like that allopathic medicine to see. I think it's really important and I think this is the number one reason why it's so important that people who are in the fitness industry in various ways, health coaches, and nutrition coaches and personal trainers need to be more aware of these things. And so that they can bring that to their clients. My question for you is, what is what are some of the biggest issues that you are seeing for your your clients, when they're struggling with specific goals like fat loss or weight loss or some of the typical health goals that women come to come to us for?
Allie Cass 15:08
Yeah, some of the so you know, touching kind of back like one of the biggest things that I see is women. Having that that mindset in that paradigm that we should not be eating a lot of food. I'm not saying that everybody needs to eat a ton of food. But you know that that mindset that I'm a woman, I should just eat a salad or eat a little dainty portion of something. I've seen women who have metabolic adaptation. So essentially what's happening is they've been in such a chronic energy deficiency for so long, that their hormones are down regulating their metabolisms down regulating because it's adapting to what they're giving it and that's a beautiful survival mechanism of the body but it doesn't serve you very well when you're looking to lose fat or increase your energy or just feel better overall. So that paradigm like I have a client right now and you know, we're just actively working on coaching her that mindset and she's terrified she trusts me, which is wonderful, but she's terrified because she's like, I this is what I've been taught my whole life and I'm like, I understand, but like, you know, it hasn't gotten you where you want to be. So let's let's just try something different. And so, you know, that mindset only serves you for so long and so for people to understand that, especially with nutrition, yes, you need to be in a calorie deficit to lose that. But there's seasons of that there should be periods of that you're not meant to live in that state forever. And when you do, that's when we start getting those mal adaptations. Another one that I see quite often and I think this was something that was an experience for me touching on the nervous system is that if you are constantly living in a sympathetic state, and your nervous system is constantly activated like that, it's going to be so much harder to lose weight, lose that address, things like hormone dysfunction, gut dysfunction, things like that. Because obviously when you are going through those periods of activating your sympathetic nervous system, that's going to be your body's priority. It doesn't care about creating reproductive hormones, if it if it thinks that there's an external threat that needs it, it needs to help you survive. Why is it going to prioritize reproduction? Or why is it going to prioritize digestion? It's not. And so, you know, I see so many, so many women and I've been one of those women who is just chronically stressed out, be it from, you know, external things. Oftentimes, I think it's, you know, internal stressors are these demands that we place upon ourselves because we're taught that we need to show up a certain way or we need to provide for people in a certain capacity, and it becomes a lot for us to carry. And so helping people and that's where I like to say like sometimes the less is more approach. So when we're, I'm working with someone, whether it's fitness, nutrition, just kind of overall lifestyle modifications, if what we're doing is only creating more stress, then it's probably not advantageous for us to do all of it at that time. So you know, learning when to pull back when to just get rid of things. So we're not just constantly adding to someone's plate. Those are some of the biggest things that I see.
Ericka Thomas 17:58
Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up about the nervous system. Because it's such a complex thing. It's like you live in a certain level of stress. And so you think that that's normal. So I'm sure a lot of these women would probably say, Oh, I don't, I'm not stressed. Like this is just my life. You know,
Allie Cass 18:25
that person, right?
Ericka Thomas 18:27
I was that person too. And, and, and that's just the external stress, right? Because that's what we typically think of as chronic stress. But you're you're absolutely right, especially when most most human beings I would hazard a guess to say all human beings have have had some sort of trauma at some point, whether they acknowledge it as trauma or not. And that and carrying that inside themselves, it can turn into like an internal source of that of that stress response. So on the outside, you might, you might actually not have a lot of stress. That you know, some objective objective stress, but it's the perception, because if on the inside you're you're not feeling safe, or not feeling good, not feeling good in your own skin. That is that's worse because you have to live in your own skin. So So yeah, that can that's really interesting what you said about how difficult it is to meet those goals to reach those goals that you have that because you can do everything right and it won't it won't change. So what would be a proper nutrition and exercise strategy for something like that for someone who is in that state? who really needs like to back off on the cortisol, you know, how do we do that
Allie Cass 20:05
for the hug, but I'm so glad you asked that question. Well, for from an exercise perspective, for someone who is like chronically high cortisol living in that state of just being stressed out, I mean, I would say, Don't go, you know, don't go do high intensity interval training. Like maybe once a week, twice, tops and I probably depending on the stress levels of the person wouldn't even give them that at all. You know, I would not give them something that's super high volume or high intensity. You know, focusing if you're going to do resistance training, focusing on stuff that is not getting your heart rate up quite as much. And walking walking is so a I mean, obviously, it contributes to your overall daily energy expenditure anyway, but it's so restorative in nature. There's so many studies that have shown walking as you know, good for helping to balance blood sugar, stress relief, you get to go outdoors, you know, if you live in a climate where that's conducive right now, in the wintertime, you get vitamin D, you're in nature. There's just so many benefits of walking from both a mental and a physiological perspective. And I think that's something that we don't do enough of. So when it comes to the exercise, exercise side of things, that's kind of where I've started to focus on if I have a client who's super stressed out. I don't, I have a lot of clients that will come to me and they are like, Well, I love orange theory, or I love F 45. And I'm like, that's great, but it's probably not serving you at this point. It's not to say you can't ever go back to those classes, but those classes tend to be you know, a lot higher intensity. I know I've gone to classes like that before and it's super fun. And sometimes I feel terrible three hours later because I'm like, I don't think I was you know, meant to have my my adrenals like activated for 45 minutes while I was like going through the super high intensity workout.
Ericka Thomas 21:51
Yeah, and it's not just the workout. It's the atmosphere in the in that type of a class, the loud music that the lights I mean, there's more to it than just, you know, this high energy, high intensity class, right. And I think that that is something that people don't understand. Like, people don't understand how that affects them on the inside. And that environment that you're in. So part of that is like part of the things that people love about those classes is the connection with other people, right that tribe mentality because it's so fun to be with other people and who wants to be alone when you're doing things like that. But it but you're exactly right. Like those things you may need to back off of those. So do you have do you have people test for cortisol levels or how do you assess like someone who is in that high stress? Space?
Allie Cass 22:51
Yeah, I do have clients test for it. We do the four point salivary cortisol test. Not all clients have the ability to test with for financial reasons. So if I can get the data then I'm all for it or if they're doing zero labs and we can measure it through that. But other than that, I typically just I can oftentimes tell by the energy that they have when I'm having a conversation with them, you know, personality as well, and just you know what they report so I do biofeedback assessments every every week. With clients so we assess, you know, what their perceived stress is like, you know what, everything else is going on. And so I'm able to typically tell and, again, I It's not like I have a radar where I can say someone's cortisol is high. I've had plenty of clients who are at the point where their cortisol is actually low and you know, we need to address that as well. But that also kind of goes into not continuing to push down that stress pathway quite as hard as we are. And so just kind of gauging clients symptoms, their personality, you know, what they perceive to be stressful for themselves. And realizing like what you said that so many of us have become adapted to the stress in our everyday lives that we just accept it as the normal we accept it as this is my life. I'm not that stressed out. And so understanding that sometimes people are going to underreport, what's actually stressful to them because they are used to it they, they have just accepted that as this is what it is. And so I always tell clients, like, you know, where you're at is your baseline, whether that's good, bad, indifferent, and oftentimes we make progress with whatever we're working on. You may have a day where, you know, things aren't as good and you're like, Wow, I feel terrible today. Well, the what you're feeling right now is your old baseline oftentimes, and so it's actually good to see that because now we know how far that we've come. But when you're living in a certain state, whether it is being chronically stressed out or otherwise, you start to adapt to that and you start to get used to it. And so, you know, understanding to that. That's something to take into consideration when you're in onboarding someone when going through an intake form. When assessing what a client perceives is their own stress in their own life. But also looking at symptoms as well like do they have down regulated hormones? Do they have thyroid issues? Do they have blood sugar imbalance? Is their insulin resistance present? A lot of that comes from other factors as well but stress oftentimes plays into those issues at a very high degree.
Ericka Thomas 25:16
Yes, so let's, let's talk a little bit about that. That overlap. Because I'm, I'm curious, maybe you can shed some light for us on how that emotional state that stress state, maybe our beliefs and our thoughts about pretty much everything affect that biology that physiology in the body. And then maybe talk about, you know, what are some things that you can do about that, you know, like if you're, if you're experiencing these physiologic symptoms and having all of these emotional and belief and thought patterns that are pushing those where, where do you where do you start to pull back I mean, that doesn't seem like something that you can address with the food on your plate, or, you know, the workout and that's, that seems a little bit more complicated than that, but really has a strong effect on the body.
Allie Cass 26:33
Yeah, so going, you know, to the to address the first question of how thoughts beliefs, traumas because that's you know, those things manifest as thoughts and beliefs and emotions, and how that plays out as a metaphysical level. So I look at it two ways, you have an actual physiological effect, and this might sound woowoo to some people, there's science behind it, I'll explain it at a high level and then, you know, throw some resources out there. People who do the research I can explain it in a much deeper level. But you know, when we have a thought and we experienced an emotion we have, you know, we released neuropeptides and other chemicals in the body. So there is a physiological response to an emotion that's why, you know, you'll get mad and you feel your face flush or you get nervous and you you know, some people get nervous or anxious and they literally have diarrhea. Well, that is a physical manifestation of something that you're feeling and so there's that downstream effect. And so, when we, you know, live in a state of either being chronically stressed out, or you know, we were constantly thinking negative thoughts. We're, we have this anxiety, whether it's, you know, from the external world, or what we've created inside of us, and oftentimes a combination of both. We are creating physical manifestations of that, and I say, in the form of disease from the perspective of its dis ease, so we're throwing our body off balance and when we are living in that sympathetic state, we're chronically stressed out, regardless of what it's from. We are causing our adrenals to constantly produce adrenaline or epinephrine, cortisol, other hormones to address those things. And what happens when we're producing those hormones all the time is that digestive function starts to decrease. Again, hormones start to downregulate because that's not the priority. But I always tell clients, your body, your body's number one priority is survival. And so when you are giving it reasons to be in a state of survival, on a chronic basis, it's not going to prioritize the other functions that are going to make you feel your best or that are going to help you get to those body goals of, of losing fat building muscle. And so, you know, when we're in that place for a long time, those are some of the manifestations that start to happen. And so it doesn't matter if that stress is coming from the external world. Or if it is coming from the fact that you went through a traumatic event. And you know, now you're kind of living on edge, so to speak, in certain situations, like I've had that in relationships in the past where I was in a traumatic relationship in high school and I had to work do a lot of work within myself with my therapist, to change the physiological response I would get when I, you know, would be confronted from my partner or when someone would raise their voice, even if it wasn't at me like I just see what a look at this reaction that would create a stress response in my body and so I had to learn to get through that and so I think for anyone who is potentially living in that state, I would say the first thing that you can do is just create self awareness around it. You cannot change what you're not aware of. And so, you know, learning to sit with yourself. It is uncomfortable to sit with that discomfort but when you do, and you can just sit with it for a little while and just start to look at what you're experiencing from an objective point of view and not tie in emotion to it or not assign that to your identity. You start to kind of just get clues about what you're experiencing.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Allie Cass 0:00
And those clues are the first steps of what we need to change the how or the methodology might be different for different people. And I think that people respond to different modalities. And I think that there is room for so many different modalities, whether it's breathwork, yoga, therapy, you know, just addressing our physical health at a deeper level. So we're also putting our body in a state where we feel our best and you know, it's easier to make mental shifts when you also physically feel good.
Ericka Thomas 30:33
Right yeah,
Allie Cass 30:35
that's my long answer.
Ericka Thomas 30:37
No, I think you did a great job of explaining that connection. And I hope people hear it because it's, it's really common. And I I've had plenty of clients and students that have really been so frustrated at not being able to reach those, those body goals. But basically refuse to look at anything outside of, you know, calories in calories out and how many hit classes can you squeeze in a week? And you know, how many steps are you getting on your Fitbit and all of those things? And I'm so glad that we have people in the industry that are bringing that to the forefront bringing that emotional, energetic and nervous system side up to the forefront because it really does make such a difference and I I tell my classes these days all the time like that most effective five minutes of your workout should be like the last five minutes where you just lay there or like calm down before you go off into your day. Like you need to let it come down off the off the ledge, you know. So yeah, so you did a great job talking about just that general stress hormones. Can we talk a little bit about gut health and metabolism in in there too? Like I know for myself, like that is where I always would feel my stress, right? It's always been in the gut. That's for me where it first hits and it's always very painful. So So I I'm sure I'm not alone. Right? That's like not not uncommon. But we hear a lot about like the gut microbiome and how do we support that and how is that gut brain axis affecting our mental health? So what you know what that says to me is like it's been it's pretty important what you put on your plate. So what kinds of dietary approaches are recommended? I would say we I would love to just talk about like how these some of these different dietary approaches affect that gut microbiome, and what kind of their teaching these days about that?
Allie Cass 33:29
Yeah, that's a great question. I want to preface this with saying, you know, because talking about people who get very emotionally attached to one way of eating or one diet style or nutrition strategy, I could give you a use case for or against basically, any dietary theory out there. So just understanding that those diets or nutrition strategies or ways of eating were proposed, originally because they were you know, advantageous for one certain type of person, the population or one kind of disorder or condition. And then it like it catches on like a trend right and so, like we can all benefit from eating more whole foods, reducing our processed food intake, I mean, that's going to be so foundational, regardless of what your eating strategy as your nutritional strategy is. And that's a really big one that plays into gut health, because highly processed foods are known to kind of feed our pathogenic gut bacteria and that can create a proliferation of that bacteria to where we have dysbiosis and we now have an imbalance in the gut. Now, as far as the best strategy for gut health, it kind of depends if someone already has some level of gut dysfunction present that might look different for different people. Now we know approaches like low FODMAP can be very beneficial for someone with small intestinal bacterial overgrowth. We know that if somebody already has some level of gut dysfunction present, they may have food sensitivities, be it to gluten dairy, soy, eggs, you know nightshade things like that. And that's different for different people. I I'm personally gluten and dairy free because I feel best that way. But I have clients who tolerate dairy great don't do well with gluten or you know, they don't. I have a client who is sensitive to like seven different things, then, you know, it kind of depends, but you know, at a foundational level, making sure that we're getting Whole Foods that we're getting sufficient protein you know, if you're someone who doesn't eat meat, then making sure that you're getting that protein those amino acids elsewhere or potentially supplementing. If you are someone who eats meat, making sure that you're choosing super high quality meats, preferably things that aren't pumped with antibiotics, or other things. You know, making sure that the carbohydrates that we eat are also, you know, kind of I say higher quality, but they're not processed. They're not super refined. And that's not to say we can't have those things right. But if that's going to be the majority of our majority of our diet, that's probably going to manifest in some sort of gut dysfunction because we are going to be feeding that pathogenic bacteria. Yeah, so it really just depends on the person but at a foundational level, and I when I do because I'll do full gut protocols with people we go through the four or five art process and we go through removal phase replace repair, Rhian oxalate, we go deep on it and the nutrition strategy changes. I try to keep it as non restrictive as possible, but sometimes we have to get super restrictive for a very brief time. But the foundation of all of that is how can we eat higher quality micronutrient dense foods
Ericka Thomas 36:34
Yeah, yeah, I I love what you said about how each and every one of these dietary approaches were developed for a really specific kind of population. Fun fact, I don't know how many people out there know this, but the keto diet was developed for epilepsy was developed to treat epilepsy. And so there you go, if you didn't know that, keto diet is actually for your brain.
Allie Cass 37:08
And if you ever do the keto diet, you can get some of those benefits that are fast. So there is that that benefit to it. But there's so many people out there that are like such diehard keto followers. And if that's like a short term strategy you want to try then by all means, if that's what you want to do, go for it. But I've also seen clients as well, long term and that reduced carbohydrate intake over a long period of time actually is counterproductive to hormone function in women, particularly the population work with
Ericka Thomas 37:38
Yeah, and I want to ask you something about that too, because speaking of women in general, and you didn't you didn't mention this earlier to talking about like a seasonal approach. And not just seasonally, like through the year. But for women. I mean, we need different kinds of nutritional support. When we are adolescent when we're in childbearing years during perimenopause and menopause like that. Difference in hormones, changes everything in the system. So you can't think at 55 that you can do the diet that you did when you were 20 and have it do the same thing for you. It just doesn't work that way for most people, and so how do you approach how do you approach that with clients like who show up with this? Well, this is how I had success before now nothing is working because you know, maybe that was 25 years ago or whatever. What are some of the things that for different ages? That we can we can kind of keep in mind for some of those body goals that people might have?
Allie Cass 39:04
That's a great question. So when I'm doing it I don't look quite as much at the age of someone when I'm determining nutrition strategy as much as what is presenting currently in their body. From a symptoms perspective. But that is a great point because I can tell you I used to do really well on low lower carb approaches when I was a competitor. And now if I go below like 140 or 150 grams of carbs a day I want to like eat someone and go, um, you know, understanding what's going on at a logical level can help with that. So we do know as you know, as we age as we're in, going into menopause, postmenopausal years, we do see a higher correlation with insulin resistance, higher cortisol in general. And so understanding that you know, pushing high amounts of carbohydrates might not be beneficial. But that being said, that doesn't mean that people should just be or women should be, you know, super low carb. A lot of people though that come to me have so many big rocks like at a foundational level with nutrition that we oftentimes don't even necessarily get will address those things. But we don't make that the primary focus of their strategy because there's so many other things like that are not happening that I'm like, Okay, we have to optimize a b and c first before we can graduate to D, E and F. And so you know, making sure that we're getting sufficient micronutrients. Also, we know as we age, we break down proteins less effectively, we typically have reduced rates of stomach acid. So you know, making sure that we're continuing to maintain a high protein intake while also optimizing digestion so we can actually absorb what we're in taking through nutrition. And then, you know, also matching the exercise and the lifestyle with that, right. So like, for women, especially as we age as we get closer to menopause, or we're postmenopausal, we see decreased bone density, you know, muscle loss, muscle atrophy, and so making sure that we're doing sufficient resistance training to maintain those structures in the body as well, making sure that we're sleeping, you know, typically as we get older, we start to see people get less and less sleep, and oftentimes we feel okay with reduced or reduced amount of sleep, but I have a lot of clients who their sleep is not optimal at all. And so making sure that we can optimize that, from a foundational level to while we're working on stress management while we're working on making sure that we're getting sufficient micronutrients and macronutrients. Again, eating enough food is something that I work with almost all of my clients on rarely do I have a client that comes to me I do have them I have a couple right now, but I have so many more clients who are under eating when we look at their food log, as opposed to just like eating so much food every day that I'm like, Okay, we need to cut it back.
Ericka Thomas 41:59
Yeah, yeah, that's, that's coming at it like the trihard instead of try easy thing right now to try hard. So that means less is more, less, less less. There's there's a lot of push in the world towards the term is Health at Every Size. And I like to get your viewpoint on that. Taking this health first approach. What Tell me a little bit about that about your perspective there as far as Health at Every Size?
Allie Cass 42:39
Yeah, that's a great question. And it's it's a touchy subject, but I feel like it's become something that's very polarizing now, especially with social media, like everything is polarizing. With the internet, but I am a big proponent of body positivity. of, you know, loving yourself for who you are, not necessarily because of what your body like, looks like or doesn't look like but for what it does for you every single day. I had a revelation. I say revelation, it's really not when you think about it, but probably a year ago I was I think I had had a glass of wine and I was sitting on my couch and I was like, thinking about wine and alcohol and just kind of the effect on the body and how my body breaks it down. And I was just I was like, Oh my gosh, I literally have trillions of cells who their whole job my entire life is to correct every misdoing that I do to my body. They work 24/7 They never sought they do not get an off day. They don't get to take a break. And all they want to do is bring me back into balance. Anytime that I do something to throw myself off whether it's you know, go out and have a few too many drinks or put something you know, in my body food wise that doesn't agree with me, or, you know, having those negative thoughts, beliefs living in that perpetual state of stress. All it wants to do is fix it for me and I just like I wanted to cry because I was like that is so beautiful. And if you know I don't think that anyone loves us more than our own body does. And so I am a big proponent of loving yourself and your body but with that I think it's 100% possible and feasible to still want to change it's okay to still you know want to cultivate a certain aesthetic if that's your thing. It's okay to want to lose 20 pounds. If that's what you you know, if that's actually going to make you feel better if that's going to make you healthier. That's going to improve your quality of life in some way. Now, that is a whole discussion in itself because when I have clients come in, we talked about why they have the goals that they do and oftentimes it's this perception of you know, we're gonna get this external validation from these efforts. But oftentimes, we do need to make those necessary changes to feel our best to show up in a more powerful way in our own life. But I think there's this dichotomy of like, you know, body positivity, love yourself, you're fine the way that you are, and there's nothing inherently wrong with us the way that we are. But the reality is, is there are certain habits, lifestyle factors, things whether it is being severely obese or I mean, I've seen plenty of people who are underweight or normal weight who are also very unhealthy. So you know, it doesn't always mean your size doesn't always mean that you're healthy or not healthy. Sumo wrestlers are a great example of individuals that we would classify as very overweight and they are actually very metabolically healthy because of the way they eat with the train. And so that's just an example of how those two don't always correlate. So I am a big proponent of body positivity, but I also really think that it maybe I should say that I'm against body shaming. I just don't understand why we even need to do that. And so like, that's just actually there's just something that I think we need to get rid of. And the fact that you know, I just feel like people have that much time to make comments on other people's bodies, like go get a hobby or go do something else with your life because you have too much time at that point as far as I'm concerned. But I also think that in the realm of self love and that kind of breath that loving yourself is not always about doing what makes you feel good in the moment. Sometimes it is putting your shoes on going out and doing a workout or sometimes it is making the decision that you don't want to make because you know what's going to help you in the long run. And so, understanding that discipline can be a form of self love as well, as long as the intention behind it is healthy and is to, you know, get you closer to where you want to be. And so I think that, you know, one of the things that has come with the body positivity movement is complacency, and maybe not just from a body positivity perspective, but I think that a lot of times people take those messages and they just choose to accept what they're experiencing. Like, they tell themselves this narrative of, Oh, I'm fine. The way that I am, everything's great. Or, you know, I don't need to change per se. And in reality, if you don't feel your best or you're not, you know, cultivating the things in life that you want to cultivate, then you need to do something to change it. And that doesn't always mean losing weight or changing the size or the shape of your body. But it could be choosing habits that are healthier that are going to help you feel better and show up in a better way. That's kind of my my 50 cents. What definitely
Ericka Thomas 47:37
no that is fantastic. I love that and it kind of leads me into my final question for you, Ally, that I asked all my guests that come to the work in what is your work in personally, something that you do just for yourself, that brings you balance and joy and has nothing to do with any of that external stuff.
Allie Cass 48:04
I have two things can I say? Yeah, sure. So I have recently started adult gymnastics. It has been amazing. I did a brief stint with gymnastics as a very little kid and then I moved to a very small town that didn't have gymnastics. And so I was a competitive cheerleader just for a few years when I was in middle school, and then one season in high school. And so I love doing backflips. I love all of those things. And so I decided about two months ago that I was going to enroll at this like local gymnastics gym. It's an awesome place and said that is something that just brings me so much joy. It's so much fun. I love moving my body in that way and it just makes me feel so good. Now that is you know, getting away from kind of the exercise side of things. I love spending time in nature. So when I was when I was 2022 I lived in a national park for a year and a half with a former partner of mine and it was one of the best experiences I could have ever asked for. And it was in that process. I always knew I liked nature, but really immersing myself in that environment and having like a disconnect from the outside world was just so life changing. And so, you know, anytime I can go on a hike or go to the beach, which I live very close to the beach, I don't live very close to very many hikes. That's my only complaint about where I live. But I just love nature. I think there's something so wonderful about disconnecting from this like crazy, digital world that we live in. And just something so humbling about being amongst the elements and in realizing that like there's this big world that's so much bigger than you know this little bubble that we live in every single day.
Ericka Thomas 49:45
Oh my gosh, yeah, totally. And adults gymnastic sounds so on
Allie Cass 49:54
I highly recommend Oh my god.
Ericka Thomas 49:58
I'm gonna look that up and see if I've got anything like that around here. That sounds fun even just to go one time that would be fun. Yeah. Awesome. So Elie, if people want to get to know you a little better if they want to work with you or find you where can we send them?
Allie Cass 50:17
So I am most active on Instagram. My handle is at alleycats health or you can visit my website www dot Alec has health.com You can read a little bit about me my program my experience, book a free consultation call and I'm you know I just love connecting with individuals. It's been so great to talk to you today. So anyone who wants to connect
Ericka Thomas 50:39
all of those things will be in the show notes. So be sure to head over to savagegracecoaching.com/ the work in and you will have all of those things at your fingertips, as well as the transcript from our interview. Thank you again, Ali. So much for joining us today.
Allie Cass 50:58
Thank you so much, Erica.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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 consulttation call to see if my brand of actionable accountability is right for you and your business.