I love being healthy, eating healthy and how I feel as a healthy woman. I have been living this lifestyle most of my life and at 51 have a healthy handle of what being healthy means. I teach health and fitness as my occupation and since it is my passion really do not consider it work. There is something to be said about the existence of living a healthy lifestyle. My clients know that I don't teach perfection, but progress and it is not a lifestyle of complete restriction, but a healthy balance of
eating right 80 to 90 percent of the time and regular exercise.
I do not believe in taking things to extremes and making health feel like a burden for me or anyone else. My mental game is what I want to address here and keeping health in perspective. I am all about eating organic, non-GMO, and
cooking at home to be in control of what I am eating
80 to 90 percent of the time. I am human and
will indulge in occasional adult beverages and will not turn down a slice of my Mom's lemon meringue pie. I enjoy partaking in my treats now and then and do so guilt free. I also do not spend endless hours in the gym to maintain my physique and believe an effective workout can be completed in 60 minutes or less. I also feel my workouts are a healthy outlet and not a punishment for eating crappy. I make sure to get in 5 workouts per week with two recovery days. I would call my healthy lifestyle realistic, maintainable, and mentally positive.
I do the best I can to
eat healthy and realize that I will not be GMO free. None of us will be able to accomplish this task unless we are growing our own foods, and even then, what is in the soil? Is it truly GMO free? Did a bird carry over tainted corn or other seeds into my garden? What about pesticides flying over into my garden? I would not be able to eat at all if I began over obsessing about my healthy foods and started eliminating
essential nutrients because my focus was on purity and quality of food instead of what my body needs to function daily. What if I began eliminating my Mom's pie and stopped going out with my husband and friends because I was afraid of the food? This would not be healthy thinking or healthy living.
In addition to being a
fitness trainer and coach, I am a freelance writer and
Sports Nutrition Expert for the
about.com network. I recently researched and wrote an article on Orthorexia, an undiagnosed eating disorder that takes healthy eating to an unhealthy extreme. I was surprised to see such negative comments and backlash exposing orthorexic behaviors. It appears that the "meat" of the article was missed and a nerve was touched for those who are "clean" eaters. I fall into the eating clean category and as I shared earlier, there is a difference between eating healthy and "obsessive" eating healthy.
The article was an exposure of the mental thinking surrounding eating clean or "pure" not that eating healthy is a bad thing ... that would be ludicrous. Would you say that binging and purging, over-eating, anorexia, and exercise addiction are unhealthy and mentally and emotionally related? I welcome knowledge as power on all subjects related to health and we should not be birds with our heads stuck in the sand avoiding up and coming issues surrounding the health and
fitness industry. When food phobia becomes so severe that it affects quality of life in an unhealthy way, I would agree it warrants time and attention. Orthorexia is a mental health issue not a clean eating issue, although sparked by "pure" foods. It is an issue that requires us to look past the food and into the mind of a struggling person.
The article posted on the
about.com network is a very informative read on the
subject of Orthorexia. I hope that is can also be re-read with a more open mind.
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Stay Healthy!
Darla
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