Dooley Noted: 9/11/2015
As a doctor of chiropractic, I have been trained to give nutritional advice to patients.
Having recovered from my own eating disorder in my early 20s, I had a decent background in how Food affects health and fitness.
I had patients sending me food logs and helping them with their goals.
But in the past year, I wasn’t consistently doing it for myself.
I was putting work before all things – even myself. And diets were something that disinterested me. After all, I felt pretty fantastic.
Over the last two decades, I’d tried every nutrition plan with a bit of science plus fad behind it. Warrior Diet, Cyclic Ketogenic Diet, Paleo, Gluten-Free, Vegan, Atkins, you name it. I tried each like a true scientist, with an n=1 of yours truly.
In 2012, a researcher friend of mine suggested intermittent fasting.
I did it for years, and not only because of the research. It was an excuse to not waste my time eating breakfast. And one day a week, I didn’t have to eat at all.
I didn’t like the way breakfast felt, ever since childhood. And I had found a diet that encouraged skipping it. It was backed up by peer-reviewed literature, so it was right for some people.
Fast long enough, and part of you believes you don’t need food at all.
Fasting makes some people, like me, feel just fine. I could work more and not even think about stopping for food.
It’s funny how we are attracted to things that fit easily into our mindset.
When some people skip breakfast, it’s easier to start skipping other meals, too. This is especially true for people with a history of eating disorder.
I started getting the signal I wasn’t eating much when one of the Catalyst trainer’s started putting food on my desk.
A few years into meal skipping, I had actually gained weight. I kept my calories too low throughout the rest of my day, and my body would hold on to dear life to anything I gave it.
And what I noticed is that my training volume started to decrease slowly, and my strength gains were stagnated.
My sleep was solid, but something was missing in my recovery.
And I looked lumpy in places I never had before.
Something was amiss.
I got on quality Chinese herbs, to help with my holistic presentation.
It helped.
I started seeing a therapist to help with stress management.
It helped, too.
A colleague looked at my nutrition and suggested breakfast and digestive enzymes.
I still disliked breakfast, but my workout output increased. And the enzymes took away my morning nausea.
So, that helped, too.
But I knew that enough was enough.
I had met the people who could help me most in 2010. I wasn’t ready then to make the jump. The focus on food scared me then.
I was well-past my eating disorder but nervous that so much attention on food might cause me to relapse.
But I realize now it didn’t have to be that way.
I needed someone with structure and focus, with s strong background in healthy, sustainable nutrition and athletic performance.
My friend and colleague suggested I contact the experts from 2010, the team at Diet Doc. I connected quickly with Kori Propst, part of the formidable team of Diet Doc.
They work with general population folks like myself, as well as athletes of all avenues.
They aren’t a fad system. Their team consists of PhDs in nutrition and competitive athletes.
Kori herself is a champion natural figure competitor, and her background is in psychology.
At first, I tried to talk myself out of contacting her because of the price.
Money is always the easy excuse.
But I did the math.
If I stopped having Starbucks in the morning, I could pay for Kori’s help with Starbucks money.
It ended up being the exact same price – to give up my morning expensive coffee in order to finally get to the root of my nutritional issues.
Easy trade.
Her intake alone got me thinking about how I prioritize so much over my nutrition.
I used to do the same thing with my training. Then, I started scheduling training as if it were an appointment with a patient. That worked wonders for my consistency with training.
But Kori asked why I didn’t do that with my nutrition. It opened the can of worms I had closed since 1999, and I couldn’t hide behind work anymore.
When insourcing doesn’t get it done, you outsource to someone who resonates.
All Kori cost me was a cup of overpriced coffee and a commitment to myself to prioritize nutrition.
And she’s about to catalyze me into changing the way I look at my personalized nutrition.
And for the record, i booked her help for a year. No fads. No 8-week plans. I paid a year’s tuition.
So stay tuned.
If you in-sourced but it didn’t get the job done, it’s time to outsource for a while and get some personalized attention from an expert.
As always, it’s your call.
– Dr. Kathy Dooley
P.S. If you are interested in learning more about what Kori and her company have to offer, please visit their website:
www.thedietdoc.com