Noelle is a Nutritional Therapy Practitioner (NTP™) and a National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA®) Certified Personal Trainer. She’s the host top-ranked health podcast, Well-Fed Women, and the founder of coconutsandkettlebells.com. She’s also the author of the best-selling cookbook, Coconuts and Kettlebells, and the creator an innovative personalized home workout program, Strong From Home.
Noelle has been working in health and wellness industry for almost 20 years. She’s a Marine Corps wife, mom to two young kids, and currently resides with her family in Northern Virginia.
Also, I have a free protein hacks guide and sample meal plan here: coconutsandkettlebells.com/proteinprep
Join me and Noelle as we discuss the to pic of healing your relationship with food and fitness and How long does it REALLY takes.
In this episode:
- Hitting rock bottom with dieting and trying to change your body
- What we’ve learned over the last 20 years about fitness culture
- Why more isn’t better when it comes to exercising for healthy hormones
- What is HPA axis dysfunction and how do we fix it?
- Questions to ask if you can’t break your routine with exercise
- Sifting through the lie “If I stop now, I’m going to lose all my fitness”
- Why true mental healing from disordered eating takes years, not months
- Letting go of a fit identity and learning to be okay with getting it wrong sometimes
Transcript:
Noelle 00:00
The goal is resilience. The goal is to create a body, support your physiology in a way that actually makes you more resilient. So that when these stressors come, it doesn’t screw your entire physiology up. I’m not saying that high intensity interval training and lifting heavy and lifting hard isn’t right for you. But it may not be right right now. So just use discernment, right?
Noelle 00:21
Just use discernment. Some days for me, or walk days, and I’m like my physiology, cannot handle that right now, right? So it’s just like a walk out in the sunshine with my dog kind of day. And that has kept me resilient. That is the essence of resilient is like sleep, eating enough, of course. Eating minimum of 2000 calories a day. Eating a nice big breakfast, but also really being able to respond to my body’s needs in the moment. And being able to tell when my physiology has had enough.
Lindsey Lusson 00:48
I love that. I think that having that balance is so important for building the resiliency that you talked about.
Lindsey Lusson 00:53
Welcome to the Period Recovery and Fertility Podcast. Here, we discuss the challenging, rewarding and life changing process of recovering your period and finding freedom with food and exercise. Whether you’re hoping to regain your cycle to get your health back on track or you’re ready to become a mama, this podcast is for you. While the recovery process isn’t always rainbows and butterflies, it’s my hope to bring you both information and inspiration during your own recovery journey. I’m your host, registered dietitian and fellow HA woman, Lindsey Lusson.
Lindsey Lusson 01:25
Noelle is a Nutritional Therapy Practitioner (NTP™) and a National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA®) Certified Personal Trainer. She’s the host top-ranked health podcast, Well-Fed Women, and the founder of coconutsandkettlebells.com. She’s also the author of the best-selling cookbook, Coconuts and Kettlebells, and the creator an innovative personalized home workout program, Strong From Home. Noelle has been working in health and wellness industry for almost 20 years. She’s a Marine Corps wife, mom to two young kids, and currently resides with her family in Northern Virginia.
Lindsey Lusson 01:57
All right, y’all, I have such a fun special guest on our podcast today. I’m so excited to welcome Noelle, the one of the co host of the Well Fed Women Podcast. Welcome Noelle.
Noelle 02:08
Hi. How are you? I’m so excited to be here, and I’m glad we finally got to connect. We did… I’m the worst.
Lindsey Lusson 02:16
No, you were very busy, and I’m guessing kiddos were mostly home for you with you this summer.
Noelle 02:21
Yeah, yeah. And my husband picks up work in the summer and fall, and so then it just is like, I have no…. like when you record a podcast, you want to be present and thoughtful, but you also need quiet. And it was hard enough to record my own podcast, so I was like, I promise. Let’s just get the kids in school and we can get this done. So once we got my kids are back in school this week, which has been great, and I know yours are too. So now we’re here. We made it.
Lindsey Lusson 02:47
Were here. We did it. I know whenever somebody wants to record a podcast on a day that it’s like a holiday and I don’t have childcare, I’m like, trust me, you don’t. It’s not. Like we’re not so many interruptions, so much editing. Yeah, yeah. Well, awesome. Well, for those unfamiliar, I feel like a lot of people are going to be big fans and excited about this episode. But for those who are unfamiliar, tell us a little bit more about you and I think most relevant to probably what people can relate to on this podcast is just the long history of struggling with disordered eating and with dieting.
Lindsey Lusson 03:17
I know that that’s something that you share very openly about your story. I think that that’s what drew me, like, personally to your podcast and your work. So I’m curious. Tell us a little bit more about that period and how you feel like that’s really shaped how you approach nutrition today.
Noelle 03:32
Yeah, well, in typical millennial fashion, I grew up in a diet centric household where we were always thinking about calories and restriction. And even in high school, I was doing these protein shakes and protein bars. I can see them, but I can’t really remember even the name, but I remember I would take in these shakes. Wasn’t even protein shakes. They were diet shakes into school at senior year. And let me tell you, I didn’t have any weight to lose. I was just a normal teenager. So it was definitely part of the conversation and nobody thought it was crazy.
Noelle 04:06
That that’s what I was thinking about. And when I got into high school, what kind of started out as an innocent, oh, I want to get back in shape, and I want to be healthy… What does that mean? Oh, that means restricting, and that means eating bars instead of meals, really turned into a full blown disordered relationship with my body and food. Because, as you know, it just it’s never enough. And I always felt like, Okay, I’m gonna reach a goal, and then I’d reach the goal and I’d be like, I’m not happy. And you keep telling yourself over and over again, like, oh, well, if I just get to this place, I’m going to be happy, and things are going to be great. I’m going to feel good about myself.
Noelle 04:44
And that never happened. In fact, I only felt worse to the point where I just hated my body. I could not stand the way I looked. I would look at it and see all the flaws. And so naturally, of course, that heavily influenced my relationship with food. I was always restricting. And in college, I was doing… I would say, I love exercise, and I love fitness. I do now, but back then, it was more a coping mechanism. A way to manage my anxiety and the way that I felt about my body and the fear of eating too much. So I figured out ways to work out more and more and more, and that was with triathlons and marathons and all the things.
Noelle 05:34
I got this sort of I always would get this attention and praise from people, because I was like the fit girl, and I was the girl that was doing all the extreme stuff. Now, a part of me absolutely really did love triathlons. Actually met my husband through the world of triathlon. Because after college, I actually went to work at a triathlon store. So, like, it still really has my heart. Like I love… I haven’t done a triathlon in over a decade. No interest in ever doing one again. But it really did have my heart at the time. And I just wanted to be better and be faster.
Noelle 06:07
But all of that was not driven out of, I’m excited to get stronger and do more and see what my body can do. It was all driven out of, I cannot stand my body. I want to, like, fix it, and this is the way to do it. This is the way to manage my anxiety. Like I never really worked on the root thing. And after I got out of college, I sustained a horrible injury, as one does. When you have these coping mechanisms and you take them to an extreme, you get extreme results.
Noelle 06:37
And I had all sorts of injuries. I had a torn labrum from I was a cheerleader. And I had major hip issues, tons of back pain. I met my husband, and after we had gotten married, I was still kind of like in it a little bit. I definitely worked a little bit. Like being married, and changed my perspective about a lot of things, because I have a wonderful, supportive husband. But I kept taking myself to these extremes in the gym, to the point where I was like, laid up in pain for like, months at a time. Like, not able to move or lift or work out.
Noelle 07:15
And it was really in those moments that I had to stop and say, like, what are you doing this for. Like, what is the purpose here? Because you’re unhappy, you hate yourself, and you hate, feeling this way. So what’s the drive? Like, what’s the purpose? And I actually had to, really, I did all these things, like emotional eating workbooks. Read all like, okay, maybe I need to be eating more fat. So I remember I would read all these diet books and thinking, where’s the answer? And I remember thinking, like, I’m just going to be stuck like this forever. Like this is going to be my life.
Noelle 07:49
So really, having that moment of like, Who are you doing this for? Kind of set me on a new… It was the wake up call that I needed. And I found the CrossFit gym, and I found the Paleo movement. I was a very strict vegetarian at the time. It kind of jolted me out of like, Oh, I thought I was doing, like, all the right things, but maybe I don’t know everything. And so while paleo had its issues, it really got me into this mindset of like, Oh, you don’t have to, like, always be restricting. You can, like, focus on nutrients and calories.
Noelle 08:22
And so that kind of started me on a new path. I am happy to say last many years, I do not think about calories or food. I think about, like, how I feel. And gosh, what a blessing that has been in the last decade. I cannot imagine going through my pregnancies and having that same attitude. Trying to get back into shape and like that being my focus. Like, It robs you of your joy. And so, like, I have my joy, my balance and my stability back, and I’m out of pain. I’ve never been stronger. And personally, like, I’ve never actually been this level of fit at 38 in my life. So amazing. Yeah, yeah.
Lindsey Lusson 09:00
I think that there’s so many women that actually live their life. I always describe it as a mental prison of the, oh, how many calories is in that? Or I’m going out to eat tonight, so I better save up. Or I was really bad over the weekend. So time to get back into intermittent fasting, or whatever diet I’m doing at that point in time. I think there are so many, I mean, like, I know, like, my mom’s friends that are, like, still on that same bandwagon. And to circle back to the idea of, like, you being a high school girl bringing, like, a slim, fast shake or something to school is your lunch. I wonder how much of this is still going on in, like, under the guise of a different fad. You know what I mean?
Lindsey Lusson 09:39
Like, oh, well, now everybody is doing the carnivore diet or whatever. But such a liberating journey to be able to come out of it, and to be able to view food as fuel. And to really be at a place… I think that that’s everyone’s dream, is to be at a place where you can actually trust your body to be your guide about what you want to eat. And, yeah, you can use nutrition information to guide that. But ultimately you get to tune in with yourself. And I think that’s something that is 100% lost when you’re dieting and restricting and struggling with disordered eating.
Noelle 10:15
You know, what’s interesting I was just thinking about is, in my teenage years, I defined fitness so differently than I do now, right? It was like, How much could you do? Like, what were your numbers? How fast could you run a mile? How heavy were you dead lifting? Like, all that kind of stuff. And now that’s irrelevant to me. Fitness, to me is so much more all encompassing, and even health is so much more holistic and all encompassing. How I define it has changed so much over the years that now. That healing that I did has gave me a totally new perspective.
Noelle 10:52
I don’t have to be hyper controlling. My body actually, once it’s safe and once it knows that it’s… I’m in a good space here. Your body naturally, just exists without you having to control things. And I never have had to control things. I’ve which would have blown my mind 10 years ago. But I don’t think about that. And I think about, what am I doing right now that is going to make me stronger and not in pain. What does help me do the things I want to do? Like, if I want to go for a hike with my kids or whatever, what are those things that I need to do to get me there? And that’s a beautiful thing, because that’s gotten me to the place where I am today.
Lindsey Lusson 11:34
Do you feel fitness culture has shifted some towards this idea of like, you don’t always have to be training harder and longer to see results? Or do you feel like some of that same mindset that you and I kind of shared in our 20s is still there? Like always be going hard, no days off, push yourself harder, run faster, get stronger, get leaner, get leaner, get leaner, get leaner. Do you feel like that still exists? Or do you feel like there’s been a good shift in kind of just fitness culture in general?
Noelle 12:02
I think it’s mostly driven by trends. So if you think about what was happening in the early 2000s it was very much that mentality of like get lean and strong as the new skinny and all that kind of stuff. And CrossFit started. And while CrossFit has some good things, it largely was very… Especially in the beginning, early CrossFit, was super toxic, right? And it was really all about, like, pushing yourself to your limits. And I was in it. I was like, in one of the very early CrossFit gyms. We were intermittent fasting, and we were doing the hard workouts that sometimes went 45 minutes long, and you were supposed to be good at everything. There was no periodization or rest days or anything, right?
Noelle 12:49
So it was very intense, and I think that that culture drove a lot of that conversation now because of social media. Which I hate to say that I do feel like people have learned. There’s so many good trainers out there, and a lot of them have learned, like, I want to help people. I don’t want to push them to their limits and make them feel terrible about themselves. So a lot of good trainers, I think, have come a long way, and I’ve thought, yeah. Like, I’m so surprised even the mind pump media guys…
Noelle 13:17
I interviewed one of them recently, not recently, like, maybe a year or two ago. But I remember leading up to that interview, I was like, Look, this is what we do here. And I don’t want to talk about, I don’t want, I don’t want women focused on weight loss. I want them focused on getting stronger. And they were like, no, no, no. That’s what we do. Like, that’s who we are to our core. And I was like, oh, so like, I do think even men and women trainers alike have and the fitness culture as the one that I’m in and the one that I’m watching at least. I have to recognize that my Instagram’s different than other people’s Instagrams.
Noelle 13:48
So the one that I’m seeing, there’s a big shift, and that has happened. What’s happening with Gen X and the 20 somethings? I’m not so sure. I do get fed some things. It’s unfortunate. I do get fed some things. If I switch over to a different Instagram account, my Well Fed Women account, and I start scrolling, and I’m like, What am I seeing here? And it’s becoming a little bit more trendy to do the thing of like I wanted to look like I worked out, and so this is what I did. And then you kind of like, look at their profile, look at what they’re doing, and they’re like, in body building, and they’re heavily restricting, and they’re not eating.
Noelle 14:23
And so it is still very much a part of our culture. It’s always going to be. And so you have to be able to look at that when that content is served to you. Instead of being like, Oh, I wish I was like that, you have to be able to look past it and say, what’s really going on here? What’s going on behind the curtain? Do I want that life? Absolutely not. Like that’s not what I’m interested in. So we can look at things and say, That’s cool, not for me, right? And move on with our lives.
Lindsey Lusson 14:52
100%. I agree that there’s been a shift. But I also think, I curate my feed, so the things that I see, I’m like, Yes, like this. So I do probably miss a lot. I do also think that we’ve learned a lot along the way. But I think ultimately, yeah, when you’re being fed something that like, I was in a fitness class a couple of mornings ago, and somebody was like, Well, why didn’t you do the class before this class? And I was like, because I only need to work out once a day. Like, why are you doing two classes? Like, I felt like, I was like, Why do I have to explain this to anyone?
Lindsey Lusson 15:25
But I was like, I came home to my husband and I was like, I was like, I can’t believe I had to explain that, and he would just kind of like, laughed. And was like, I mean, I already know how that story ends. Like, I know how that would go for me. Like I’ve done that, like I did that for a decade, and we’ve moved on. I’m sure it’s still there. But I do like to think that especially educated women have have learned a little bit there.
Noelle 15:49
I love that. What you just said, you said, like, I already know how that story ends. I don’t need to relive that chapter.
Lindsey Lusson 15:58
Well, when we think about exercise and women’s hormones, I think a lot of the women listening to this podcast, can probably really resonate with the like, I’m always doing too much. I know I’m probably doing too much, but like, I love it, you know. I’m doing air quotes if you aren’t watching the video portion of this. But like, not really able to pull back, maybe not having the right information, maybe not motivated enough.
Lindsey Lusson 16:20
Tell us a little bit more about how high intensity exercise impacts women’s hormones. What are the top things that women need to know about how they approach exercise, to optimize their hormones and to be in better balance with their hormones?
Noelle 16:34
I think what’s important to note is there’s nothing inherently bad about moving your body in an intense way, or to even be lifting heavy, or to do some sprints, or whatever. I think the problem that has happened in the last few years, let’s say decades. Because, like, every time I think of like, how long I’ve been doing this, I’m like, wait, it’s been, like, 20
Lindsey Lusson 16:54
It’s been 10 years. Yes.
Noelle 16:55
I have been working out for 20 years. I think that what has happened is that there is such, still a strong culture of more is better. And as women, especially in the last five years, women living in the modern world, are dealing with so much stress. We have so much expectation. We have so much going on, we have so much demand. We’re supposed to be mothers and children and cooking home cooked meals, but also being fit and also rocking it in her job or her career. Or you gotta do a side hustle. You have to be involved with any non profit, and also like, post on social media regularly and get your family…
Noelle 17:40
Like there’s just so much. Not to mention just like the regular stress that people deal with, like work stress, family stress, like death in the family, all this kind of stuff. I feel like the modern woman is constantly living in a state of almost burned out. Like I’m almost burnt out. I’m one thing away from going overboard. My adrenals diving into dysfunction, right? And one thing that we have to learn and know, especially as we get older, is that everything around us is pretty much a stressor.
Noelle 18:15
Workouts are stress, not getting enough sleep is stress, the toxins that we we’re breathing in from the air can be stressed. So when we decide, oh, I’m going to do some high intensity interval training… Or say, one of the things I say a lot is, if you are forcing yourself to get up in the morning and work out, like it would be better for your body just to get adequate sleep. You don’t need to force yourself to do these exercise. And that’s truly because as you get older, your body becomes more sensitive to these stressors and can really throw you off balance.
Noelle 18:50
So it does, quite literally, increase your cortisol levels, and they stay elevated. Especially if you don’t eat right afterwards. And so if we’re not doing the things that our body… Like I still do maybe one interval session a week, and that’s because I know that that’s what my body can handle. If I were to try to do two or three, I would probably get myself into a bit of dysfunction or imbalance. High cortisol production, or what we’d call like chronic cortisol is it impacts every other hormone in your body. So when cortisol is elevated, you will see a disruption, a big disruption, in sex hormone production.
Noelle 18:50
So we have to one always make sure that we’re in a fed state. So one of the big problems with high intensity interval training is that women are often doing them in a fasted state. They’re not eating beforehand, and then they’re not eating enough to support your workouts. So this is a very, very common thread. So under eating combined with high intensity training is a disaster for women’s hormones. Because not eating breakfast actually is, we’ve seen this in the evidence, is linked to higher cortisol throughout the day. We know that high intensity interval training increases cortisol beyond if you were just to lift weights or go for a walk or whatever.
Noelle 20:13
Your body… The stress response is so important to your function overall, that it will down regulate other processes. So that’s why we see progesterone and estrogen be down regulated in those high cortisol state. We see a lot of disruption to digestion overall. So you know that can really cause especially issues with bloating, and we see a lot of dysfunction and thyroid as well. So, like, especially if you’re under eating, like, if you’re not eating enough, your body immediately starts to down regulate thyroid function and and that can… I know a lot of women that deal with that, especially as they age.
Noelle 20:52
So one of the things that I always tell women is that you have to be in a fed state. Fed, calorically, fed, nutritionally if you want to bring in any sort of like intense exercise in which you’re pushing yourself pretty hard, or lifting heavy weights. Like you have to be so dialed in with your sleep, with your eating and all that kind of stuff. So there are seasons for it, and there’s seasons of healing and rest. And so make sure that you’re in the season for it, and that everything is dialed in.
Lindsey Lusson 21:24
100%. And I think unfortunately, a lot of the people that are engaging in a lot of high intensity exercise, are doing it at 5am, are coming from years of chronic under eating. But it’s interesting, you talked about in your just kind of whole journey with exercise and food, the thing that kind of the straw that broke the camel’s back with multiple injuries. You were getting injured all the time. And for me, I had minor injuries, but mine was basically like infertility.
Lindsey Lusson 21:50
But just how everyone’s bodies respond differently to stress. And I think everybody has a breaking point. But it is interesting that people can kind of get by for a finite amount of time. Maybe without fully recognizing all of the thyroid, the digestive stuff. I mean, I do hear a lot of digestive stuff, and then I think people go on, they do, like, food sensitivity tests, and they do all these, like crazy things with their diet, trying to fix their gut health. And a lot of times it works for a short amount of time, and then things get even worse. But, like, it’s just interesting how people’s bodies respond to just being, like, running on those stress hormones differently.
Noelle 22:27
Yeah. No, it is. It’s so unique. I’m this person, I want the general one, one size fits all Answer. And even in my DMs this morning, I had somebody saying, well, what’s the body fat percentage that you need to be tohave a cycle? And I was like, there’s no such thing. Like research has looked at it, and there’s no you have to be between this and this if you want to get a cycle. Like, women who have body fat percentage here, women who have body percentage here, have a cycle, and they also don’t. So there is no like, this is the thing. And here is the solid… I mean, we have solid research and evidence that we can build conclusions from, but unfortunately, it’s all over the place, and we can’t have that.
Noelle 23:10
Like, okay, that’s your answer, yeah, yeah. Like, everyone must be this percent body fat, yeah.
Lindsey Lusson 23:15
Because we know that there is elite athletes who are very lean, who cycle and have babies. The other thing I was going to add to mix that up even more, like, Okay, you’re X percent body fat, and you get your period. Like, is it a healthy period, or are you, like, not ovulating? It comes every 60 days, right? Like, getting a period, it’s great that you’re getting one, but it isn’t necessarily like, the best sign of how healthy your body is, especially if it’s like, a wonky period.
Lindsey Lusson 23:43
Well, what are some common signs that women are kind of stuck in this? I mean, like, cortisol. I’m just giggling because, I think something that’s been coming up in my social media feed, usually people kind of just like stitching it and making making fun of it, but it’s been coming up a lot in my feed is cortisol coaches. Like, Oh, well, you need to hire a cortisol coach to get your cortisol in check.
Noelle 24:02
Cortisol coach, call a coach.
Lindsey Lusson 24:04
Yes, apparently it’s a thing. But Noelle, like anybody, can create this, like social media profile, pay a photographer and get some really cool looking branding photos down, and then just put, like, a made up title. Some people are charismatic and they can pull that off. So it is… I mean, I giggle, but I can understand why some people could think that that’s the thing.
Lindsey Lusson 24:26
But talk to us a little bit more about cortisol. And I think, sometimes I’m glad we’re talking about it, but I also think sometimes people are like, Oh my gosh, well, I can’t do this because that’s going to spike my cortisol, or I can’t do that because that raises cortisol. And can you just talk to us a little bit about this hormone? What it is, what it does, is it bad that it spikes all the time, or is it more like the chronic elevation we’re concerned about? And a little bit more.
Noelle 24:52
Yeah, so cortisol is the hormone secreted by your adrenal glands. They’re two little things lower back. And small as they are, they do a lot of work. Gosh, like they do a lot of work. So in the morning, your cortisol. Cortisol has a number of different functions. It is what secreted to like, of course, we all think of it of our stress hormone, because it’s secreted during times of stress. Why is it secreted during times of stress? It raises our blood pressure, it raises our heart rate. And the reason that physiological shift happens is that our body needs to be able… If we’re in danger, our body needs to be able to move quickly.
Noelle 25:27
We need to have oxygen faster, we need to have blood flow going faster, pumping faster. So it does all of these things in a very beautiful way to help us manage and adapt to stress. It also is part of our circadian rhythm, and I think this is where a lot of people actually are truly struggling when it comes to cortisol. So cortisol peaks in the morning, it’s what wakes you up, and then it’s supposed to slowly decline in the afternoon and at night. Then melatonin is what comes up in the evening, and that’s how you fall asleep, and you have restful sleep and all of those things. We live inherently in a world in which, like I was mentioning before, I feel like we are exposed to an enormous amount of stress. More stress than one person should really ever have to deal with.
Noelle 26:14
So what is that doing to our physiology? It’s changing it pretty significantly. And yes, I believe that chronic cortisol production, or not properly managing cortisol, can lead to a lot of dysfunction. Hormonally, it can lead to adrenal dysfunction. I know a lot of people probably have heard the term adrenal fatigue. We used to believe that, or we used to think that adrenals got tired because they were so they were just done. They were done producing all this cortisol, and then so they needed a nap, and it just stopped working. Your body doesn’t just stop working.
Noelle 26:44
What happens really is a dysfunction. So more like a breakdown in the communication system. So your brain, your hypothalamus, talks to your pituitary. Your pituitary is sort of like the thing that talks to the rest of your endocrine system, and it’s always getting feedback from your brain, right? So it’s called HPA axis, hypothalamic pituitary adrenal access. Big word, big, big words. But it is simplified in a nice way. It’s just like you get the feedback, you communicate it, and then you tell the organs what to do.
Noelle 27:16
And so basically what can happen with this adrenal dysfunction is there is an, ultimately, a breakdown in this communication system. One, experts say that it’s probably some sort of cortisol resistance, where your cells actually stop responding to cortisol because they’re done. Like, it’s almost like insulin…
Lindsey Lusson 27:36
Like an insulin resistance, yeah.
Noelle 27:38
Or it’s just that there’s a breakdown in the feedback loop overall. So your brain stops being able to communicate properly to the adrenals through that system. This breakdown in communication, and also this disruption in circadian rhythm function, is really what causes a lot of negative symptoms. So if you’ve ever been felt wired and tired at night, that is really a disruption in circadian rhythm function. Fun, fact, a lot of women, including myself, usually start to kind of become symptomatic. They start to be wired and tired. Maybe their sleep’s a little bit off. Maybe they’re dealing with fatigue. They’re starting to crave caffeine and sugar. Then they start to take, they cope with caffeine, which I did for so long.
Noelle 28:25
Caffeine actually frees up stored cortisol and adrenaline. So your adrenals actually produce adrenaline as well. Free up stored cortisol and adrenaline at rest. So if you are… I’m one of the people in the camp that says, Look, if you are dealing with any sort of stress or adrenal dysfunction, you’ve got to get off caffeine, because the caffeine is literally just putting fuel on the fire. What I’ve described to you is mostly, is the majority of people overly stressed, dealing with too much, not able to sufficiently manage it.
Noelle 28:57
On top of that, we know that under eating and not supporting your body with sufficient calories is a stressor. We know high intensity interval training and working out is a stressor. We know not sleeping enough is a stressor. And you know most, most people are dealing with that. And so we can see that there’s such a huge disruption in overall physiology just from like living normally. Like the way that, the way that the health and wellness industry tells you is the ideal way to be. To wake up early, to push hard, to like, eat less, to like, take your pre workout supplement that has, God knows…
Noelle 29:32
So it’s like, we can see how women, maybe 35 plus, are not really feeling their best. Why so many women are struggling with adrenal dysfunction and a breakdown in adrenal hormones, which then can lead to, of course, hormone disruption and thyroid issues and all that kind of stuff. Because thyroid and adrenal issues are very, very closely linked. And so that is why I feel so strongly about creating a strong foundation. Especially when it comes to your adrenals and cortisol.
Noelle 30:02
Is cortisol bad? Absolutely not like we need it. What our body can do when we are in… The goal is resilience. The goal is to create a body, support your physiology in a way that actually makes you more resilient. So that when these stressors come, it doesn’t screw your entire physiology up. You can actually go through that stressor and come back to baseline, right? You can come back to baseline and you can get on with your day. So what does that look like? That looks like sleeping in. I’m so passionate about sleep, and I destroyed myself trying to wake up so early and get my workouts in. And now it’s like, I just have to figure it out, but I’m not waking up early to work out.
Noelle 30:46
So like getting sufficient sleep, getting your eight hours, not forcing yourself to wake up early, eating a decent breakfast with lots of protein and good nutrients. Because I didn’t even talk about blood sugar, but we could talk about blood sugar if you want to, in regards to cortisol. Eating a really solid breakfast with lots of protein, so you’re balancing your blood sugar, you’re supporting your physiology. Breakfast immediately brings down cortisol levels in the morning.
Noelle 31:09
You’re doing restorative movement. I’m not saying that high intensity interval training and lifting heavy and lifting hard iisn’t right or right for you, but it may not be right right now. So just use discernment, right? Just use discernment. Some days for me are walk days. And I’m like my body, my physiology, cannot handle that right now, right? So it’s just like a walk out in the sunshine with my dog kind of day. And that has kept me resilient. That is the essence of resilient. Is like sleep, eating enough, of course, eating minimum of 2000 calories a day eating a nice big breakfast.
Noelle 31:42
But also really being able to respond to my body’s needs in the moment. And being able to tell when my physiology has had enough, and saying today or this week is is I need to sleep more. I need to work out less. This is a time that I’m not working. I’m just going to be doing some walking, and I got to support myself and really be on top of it a little bit more. So you’re always going to have seasons.
Noelle 32:05
You’re always going to have seasons where you’re overloaded and you have to be able to recognize this is the time where I’m doing all the things and doing less, and I’m saying no, and I’m establishing boundaries. And I’m not stressing myself out even more when I don’t have to.
Lindsey Lusson 32:22
I love that, and I think that that’s been something that’s been so key for myself, and being able to get back into a decent amount of fitness. Like, I feel like I was telling my husband the other day, I was like, I feel like I’m working out the max amount that I kind of can without getting a little bit too obsessed with it, right? Being able to be like, Oh, I know I was gonna do that spin class today, but like, I’m tired. Or like that just literally doesn’t sound good to me. It does sound good is going for a walk around our neighborhood and getting some sunlight and things like that.
Lindsey Lusson 32:55
I think that having that balance is so important for building the resiliency that you talked about. What I think is gonna come up for a lot of people. So I’ll just go ahead and frame this. What about our super routine oriented person? Noelle, I have to do my 5am peloton every single day. If I don’t do it, it throws my whole day off. Like, I’m gonna have my cortisol, It’s gonna spike. If I don’t get that workout on, if I get that workout on, then I can’t eat as much, or I can’t do this, right? Like, what about the people who are like my routine has to be this way, or I’m so stressed out. What do those people do?
Noelle 33:26
I don’t want to be mean. Sorry. I can empathize. I can empathize with that, but that at its core is a coping mechanism. You are still in a state of hyper control. Your lack of routine should not stress you out. And if it is, then you need to take a step back and say, Why do I feel like I have to control everything so tightly in my day? That is the opposite of resilience.N ot being able to handle shiftin one thing is a lack of resilience. And so if you’re saying it’s throwing my whole day off. Well, what pops in my head is, well, then you’re throwing your physiology off as a result.
Noelle 34:05
Like, if you’re choosing to throw your physiology off, you’re still going to be stuck in a hole, and you’re always going to be climbing out of that adrenal dysfunction hole. You’re going to be that person that’s on the verge constantly. One decision away from a symptom that you don’t want adrenal burnout, or like, tank fatigue, autoimmune condition. What’s the, what’s the thing that’s going to trigger it?
Noelle 34:31
And so we have to be able to take a step back and say, Okay, why do I feel like I have to control everything so closely? And Can I maybe experiment a little bit? Maybe not changing my 5am workout routine, but changing something else. Because if you don’t start, you will be forced to, right, you will be forced to.
Lindsey Lusson 34:52
100%. And I think that ultimately, you have to really think about like, I like control, but like are you in control, or is it your routine that’s actually controlling you? And like, if there’s not flexibility, then you’re kind of bound by all of these, these rules or metrics, or whatever you’re trying to hit. That’s not really a life that you want to live.
Noelle 35:09
Yeah. I totally empathize. I really do empathize with that. Because that was really me. And I think that what I had, like I said, I was forced. I was forced out of that routine, and that being taken out of that was a wake up call for me. And even having my children and not being able to work out for years at a time because of my pain was another data point for me. It was another, oh, like, I haven’t worked out in a year, but my body actually hasn’t changed. Because I’m doing the things that I need to do to take care of me.
Noelle 35:49
I was in PT for like a year. Doing PT work, but I was not doing actual exercise. And so realizing that, wow, my body just like, took care of me, and it did not… There was no this drastic, huge change. Yes, I lost my certain aspects of my fitness, but being able to gain that back and gain that strength back has been mind boggling for me. Where I’m at now, because I’m like, oh. Because we’re fed this narrative too over time that, like, you have to keep it now or you’re going to lose it forever. Yes, and that is inherently false.
Noelle 36:27
It is never too late, and you can always make positive shifts. And after you’ve had kids and you’re in your 40s, you can still get stronger. And you can still make incredible positive shifts that lead you to feeling better than you ever have. So don’t fear letting things go for a little bit in order to process properly through the healing that you need to live your best life down the line.
Lindsey Lusson 36:53
Amen. And that is it. That is the narrative that we’re fed, is that, well, if you stop training the way that you are now, you’re going to lose all your fitness and you’re never going to be able to get it back. And you’re going to be miserable, and you’re you’re going to be in pain, and you’re going to have disease set in, and you’re going to hate the way your body looks, right? It’s like, no, like, fitness will always be there, and how much better is it going to feel when you come back to it, when you’re properly fed, when your body is working the way that it’s supposed to.
Lindsey Lusson 37:20
And your approach to fitness is very different than being all about, how can I be the leanest possible or how can I do as much exercise as possible.
Lindsey Lusson 37:30
Well, let’s talk a little bit more about food and nutrition. We talked about how going through lots of restriction has really shaped the way that you approach food. And before we push record today, we were talking about how there’s a necessary healing process in healing from disordered eating and chronic dieting that takes a lot longer than people talk about. What did that journey kind of look like for you? What would you typically tell someone when they’re like, Okay, like, I’m ready to heal my relationship with food? Like, how long is this going to take?
Lindsey Lusson 38:03
And I mean, circling back life like a blanket statement, it’s going to be different for everyone. But I do think, like, yeah, even putting like, a ballpark number on it. Because I think in a lot of the women that I’ve interacted with is they’re like, oh, I can just give me, two months and I can fix all of this.
Noelle 38:19
I think it’s interesting. I’ve been doing my podcast for about 10 years now. And when I started it, I thought I had gone through the healing. Really I had gone through the majority of it. I was writing blog posts that were heard talking about, like, why I don’t want six pack abs. And I was talking a lot about body image and where your worth lies, and the realities of weights for women. Like you can be healthy at a variety of weights. You don’t have to be this, like one thing. And so we were educating, we were talking about all of that.
Noelle 38:50
But like, looking back on that now, I was, for sure, still going through my own healing process. And really it took at least a decade. Because there’s so many different pieces to the puzzle. Like it was my wake up call. You’re constantly getting feedback from doing things differently. So in the beginning, you’re kind of holding on to some of those things. You havethis little thing of all around you that are your comforts and your control. You’ll maybe let one of those things go. And then maybe you grab it again. You let go of it again, and then you grab it again, then you let go, and you’re like, okay, I’m good.
Noelle 39:32
And then maybe you accidentally let go of it. Maybe you’re forced somebody pried it out of your hands you accidentally had to drop it for a few weeks. And you’re like, Oh, I’m I’m okay, like, I survived, yeah, nothing happened here that. I was always told that would happen. And you kind of can, like, move on through that. You’re like, Wow, I feel this is great, like, I have freedom in this. I’m not obsessing, and I’m not tracking, and I’m, I’m feeling good. But maybe you’re still struggling a little bit with exercise. And that was kind of my story, right?
Noelle 39:59
It was still like, I felt like I had to be in the gym and doing the extreme stuff and pushing myself to my limits. And, like, working on four days a week. And, like, if I only worked out twice, it was like, Well, I’m not gonna be making progress. What a waste of time. Like, just, no, just do nothing. And it was like, when I went on vacation, it’s like, we gotta still work out. I look back on that now, and I’m like, what were you doing? Just go on vacation, yeah? Once you don’t work out for like, a year and I’m like, I was fine.
Noelle 40:31
You’re gonna be fine not working out for a week. It’s gonna be fine. You can get your fitness back. But, um, looking back and really seeing still, like I had to work through a lot. I still had to learn a lot especially in this new…Your body, not only are you changing and you’re kind of going through this mental and emotional shift, but your body is also physically changing. You’re physically as you age you you’re learning More, but your body also responds differently to things.
Noelle 41:02
So even as I approach 40, I’m thinking so differently about my body and what it needs. And it’s responding differently to things. It’s responding differently to Exercise and Movement. And I’m even learning things through that process of like, what did I think I had to do before to be fit, versus what do I think now? So now I do feel like I’m kind of on the other side of it. I always encourage women to…I think the word triggered is a little overused. I will say that there are always going to be things that push you to maybe move back to those, those things that helped you feel like you were in control.
Noelle 41:45
We live in still a pretty messed up world when it comes to women’s bodies and expectations and how you feel about yourself. Health and wellness, culture and your relationship with food, and just the food industry as a whole. There’s a lot of mess there. You will always be exposed to Instagram posts or movies or what commercials. And so we have to figure out, how can we see those things? Maybe acknowledge that like, wow, that’d be nice. It might be taboo to say this. But if you were kind of scrolling and you saw, like, somebody that had a what, a quote, unquote, great body that lives and body lean, yeah, and you thought, wow, that would be nice. Like, don’t beat yourself up over that.
Noelle 42:32
Like, Oh, wow. That’d be really nice to look like that, or feel like that, or whatever. You can say, like, Oh, wow. That’d be nice to look like that. But, like, you said, like, I know how this story ends and right? I know how this goes. Yeah, well, it might be great for her. Do I want to spend my time spreading with that and, like, chasing that? No.
Noelle 42:53
So when we give ourselves the power to make those choices, instead of being like, that’s what I have to do, like, this is, this is the best way to exist. You can instead say, like, cool, I just don’t, I’m good, yeah. Having the power to to recognize that that’s a choice and I’m not choosing that one for myself, is really, really empowering, And it can help you, throughout your life, make the best decisions that are right for you and your body and where you want to be.
Noelle 43:24
What do you want your future to be? Because you could always go back to that. You know you could. We all know what to do. We all know how to restrict and to over exercise. That’s not hard. Do you want to? Do you want that life, or do you want a different one?
Lindsey Lusson 43:43
So, yeah, no, that that’s great. I also love just like, bringing it to light that like you’re gonna see stuff that’s gonna make you think, like, oh gosh. Like should I be cutting back on my carbs? Or taking that extra spend class this week? That makes you just a human existing in the messed up culture that we live in. But to be able to see stuff and to and to make that choice, like, not for me I think that that’s a true sign of healing as well.
Noelle 44:12
Yeah, and that’s true of food too. Because I know a lot of women have… One of the big questions back in the day was like, Well, how do you heal your relationship with food, even though you have sensitivities to food? And like, maybe you, maybe there are foods you have to restrict. So like, how do you heal your relationship with food? And a lot of times it’s just, again, it’s a choice. Like, you get to make that choice. Nothing has control over you, even if I know gluten, makes me not feel great. You can still eat it. It’s not a decision that…
Noelle 44:43
There are a lot of, I don’t want to like stereotype, but I will say the generation before us, boomers and such, that’s always like, well, I can’t have that. You know? It’s always this, like, I can’t, yeah, I’m not allowed. It’s not allowed. I think that conversation, luckily, has sort of changed for our generation. But we have to be careful of not letting that conversation infiltrate ours. So it is, well, I can have that, but I’m choosing not to, because I don’t want to feel like crap the next day. And that’s kind of where I get to exist too right now, which is so empowering.
Noelle 45:14
Of like, well, I could get up and work out, but what’s actually right for me? Like, I could eat gluten, but I don’t want to. Everything is a choice, and I get to make that choice. And so what do I want tomorrow, the next day of my future to look like? And I’ve got so much feedback already from so 20 years of this. So like, what can I learn from the feedback that I’ve gotten from making these decisions before to make better decisions moving forward?
Lindsey Lusson 45:15
Yeah and some of that just kind of comes with, like, lived experience too. I mean, a lot of healing, a lot of healing, right? Yeah, that we were talking about this too, before we push recorded, there’s a lot of women in their 30s, 40s, 50s and beyond that are still stuck in the mindset that we talked about. The counting, every calorie, stressing about what they ate over the weekend is impacting, what’s the new diet they have to go on this week? And so, like, it definitely takes work to get to healing.
Lindsey Lusson 46:10
But I also just like this whole idea of, like, it’s kind of an ongoing process, right? Like, it’s easier over time, you’re probably going to be less like, triggered by things like the severity of it definitely goes down. You’re able to respond better, but it is still like a constant process, because you’re constantly being fed new information. There’s new things that might be coming up for you, but so many new trends. Let’s see so many trends.
Noelle 46:38
Wait. What are we doing now?
Lindsey Lusson 46:40
Are you just like, sitting back and waiting for, like, the 90s? You know how, like, every like, 90s is coming back, like 90s, teens and crop tops and, like, low rise and like shoes, right? I’m just like, waiting for the day where, where they’re like, all right, fat free, everything fat is so bad. Like, I’m just like, it’s it’s gonna swing back, it’s coming back.
Noelle 47:00
Oh no, I hope not, but I would not be surprised. It all, it all comes back around again. So no, I fully on to something. You should write a book. I bet it would do well.
Lindsey Lusson 47:09
Well, one last question to kind of round out today. So many of the women listening to this are recognizing, oh my gosh. Like everything that they’re saying makes so much sense. I am Noelle in her 20s, like I am stuck in this cycle where I think that I need to be doing more, more, more, more, and I know I need to make this change, probably a drastic change. But I’m scared, because this is all I know. This is all I’ve ever done in my friend group. I’m the strongest girl in the gym. I am the fittest one. Everybody’s telling me how they want abs like me. This is who I am.
Lindsey Lusson 47:46
So if I stop training this way, if I stop eating incredibly low carb and high protein and paleo and all this stuff, if I stop doing that, then who am I? How would you encourage somebody who’s struggling with like, this whole identity being wrapped up as the fit girl and recognizing, oh my gosh. Like, I probably can’t do this for forever. Like, what do I do?
Noelle 48:06
I would ask you, like, what do you have to gain to change what you’re doing? And that should be your focus. We have to be really why centric in the beginning, when things are a little uneasy and our identity is wrapped up in something, and we don’t know, like, how we’re going to feel. We don’t know what our identity is going to be moving forward. I’ve lived a lot of life, and I’ve had a lot of identities, and I can tell you, being the fit girl was probably the least fulfilling identity.
Noelle 48:36
Because if you have friends in your life who are only your friend because you’re the fit girl. Like, are those really friends you want in your life anyway? If you have guys that are like, Oh, we love you. We love your abs, or maybe there’s guys in your life that, and this is, of course, for like, college age girls that are like, they they really worship a specific body type, and you kind of like getting their attention. Like, are they worth being in your life anyway? Are these the kind of men that you want to spend the rest of your life with Anyway? Probably not, right?
Noelle 49:05
So I think that you have so much to gain from shifting your identity, maybe to something new. And it’s not to say that you can’t still be the strong girl. Like you, that we have such a narrow view, I think. Especially when we’re stuck in these mentalities of like, what it means to be fit and strong, and so you can actually still be really fit and strong. And I bet you, you’ll actually feel a whole lot better when you move into a more healing, on a healing path where you’re actually supporting your body instead of being the fit girl. Let’s be like the resilient girl.
Noelle 49:38
It’s let’s build resilience. Let’s build holistic health, mental, emotional and physical. I bet you’ll get stronger. I bet you’ll do a lot more in the future. But what you have to gain right now or not, maybe not right now, but in in the near future, has to remain on the top of your mind. And you have to really be open to maybe being a little bit wrong about the way that you’ve perceived things for so long. That’s the beauty of experience. It really is. Like every time we do something, we’re getting feedback. We’re getting feedback, either from our bodies or the worlds around us. And learning from those little nuggets of feedback are what make us a much more well rounded and healthful, resilient person.
Noelle 50:23
So even though I’ve been through…That fit identity had to literally be ripped out of my fingers. It was torn away from me, with me groveling. I’m grabbing on so hard, right? Um, but I’m so happy that it was. I’m so happy that it was, and I’m so happy that it was really early on in my 20s, 2122 23 versus somewhere in my 30s or now, because it would have been such a detriment to my mental, emotional, physical health, especially as I was being a mom and having kids and all that kind of stuff. So the work now is so worth it.
Lindsey Lusson 51:01
Yeah, definitely. And, I mean, I always tell that to people too, is, like, I get the question a lot, like, oh, well, is it, is it harder to recover, from Ha and missing periods if you wait or, like kind of along that line? And I’m like, well, physically, your body’s pretty resilient. Like, it’s not impossible, but what’s going to be harder in your 30s versus your 20s, or even your early 30s versus your late 30s, is how set you are in your habits and how deeper ingrained some of these disordered thought patterns are, and like the mental piece of overcoming of that is a lot harder. Ultimately, like, the longer you live with those habits, the harder they are to give it up.
Noelle 51:45
Interesting. I never really thought about that, but, yeah, that’s so, so true. I feel like I am pretty adaptable right now, and that might be because of that. Like I think again, you become such a more well rounded person when you’re able to live one life and then also live another life and realize, like, your life didn’t fall apart. Things actually got better, and you learn what works and what doesn’t. And so now, even at 38 I’m shifting. I’m shifting, my food and what I’m doing and my workouts, and I’m getting stronger, and I’m able to do that now and be in such a good place because I did that work 1015, years ago.
Lindsey Lusson 52:18
Yeah, and I think also, one thing that you just said, that I think is important to understand, is it’s okay to be wrong, right? Like, it’s okay to pause and be like, maybe I’ve got this wrong, and maybe you didn’t get everything wrong right. But maybe your approach is wrong. And the beauty of recognizing that maybe you were wrong in some instances is that you get to learn. You get to be better.
Noelle 52:41
Yeah, I love that. I was wrong so, so many times.
Lindsey Lusson 52:44
Same. We’ll probably continue to be wrong about something. Yes, yeah, you’re informed, but more informed and more open to, like, more open, more flexible to taking information, looking at it objectively. And getting to make that decision that you know, is this for me? Is this not for me. So awesome.
Lindsey Lusson 53:01
You have been so helpful today. Thank you for coming on, sharing your wisdom. , going down memory lane with us on things that you’ve learned over the past decade plus, and yeah. Just explaining some really complicated topics to us. And I know that listeners are going to get so much out of this episode.
Noelle 53:17
Thank you, Lindsey. I appreciate you having me on, and it was a joy.
Lindsey Lusson 53:21
And if people want to hear more from you, tell us a little bit more about your podcast and what all you’re up to in the online space.
Noelle 53:27
Well Fed Women is the podcast. Coconuts and kettlebells is my website and my Instagram handle that’s basically where you can find me.
Lindsey Lusson 53:36
All right, perfect. So if you guys aren’t following along already, you’re gonna love the content that Noelle puts out. It’s all for active women. It’s all from a lens of , how can we like get stronger and without having this obsession around the way that our bodies look like. How can we focus more on performance and health versus esthetics? And I love that about you.
Noelle 53:57
Thank you!
Connect with Lindsey Lusson:
Instagram: @food.freedom.fertility
Website: www.foodfreedomandfertility.com/
Twitter: @LindseyLusson
Tiktok: @food.freedom.fertility
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