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Welcome back, Dance Moms. I'm so glad that you're here to listen to this very important conversation about nutrition, something that is actually misunderstood in the dance world. And we're going to talk about why that is misunderstood and what exactly about nutrition versus diets is misunderstood in the context of our dancers and their wellness.
So what we're talking about when we talk about nutrition is literally the components of the food that we're consuming It's pretty simple, right? So it shouldn't be hard to be discussing that at a higher level so that our dancers can understand how to nourish their bodies appropriately, especially during challenging training times, right?
Well, yes, and at the same time, all I see and hear most of the time, yes, of course, there is some really, really [00:01:00] helpful and good nutritionists that I also follow and that I learn a lot from, but at the same time, majority of dance nutrition is focused not on nutrition, but on diets.
Something about, the food groups and having dancers really focus on the food groups as opposed to nutrition and nutrition factors of each of those foods that they're consuming. And that is the disconnect. When we're talking about nutrition for dancers at a level that is actually going to be helpful and useful, not just for now, but for the future as a professional dancer, it's important to emphasize what are the building blocks that my body needs today for this type of training that I'm experiencing today in order for my body to regenerate at the rate that it needs to.
Because as we know, we're not static things. We are living beings, which [00:02:00] means that our cells regenerate all the time and certain organs regenerate at their own pace. Some regenerate within a couple of days. Others take a couple of months to be a completely new regenerated organ. And that's because there's a lot of cells that are involved in a particular organ versus another, and therefore, it takes longer time.
There's more complexity that's involved. The point is that every single cell in our body either dies or it regenerates or both kind of in the same time. Because what happens is that we have these daughter cells and the mother cells, right?
So the more mother cells that are unhealthy that we have in our body, the more daughter cells that become unhealthy. And then you end up breeding in a way these unhealthy daughter cells in the body that keep replicating. And if you did not feed the mother cell appropriately, then you get the daughter cells that are also starved.
And then you end up building in the body this [00:03:00] compounded effect of unhealthy cells that keep on regenerating and reproducing to a level of ultimately causing some kind of a chronic condition. I mean, this is an extremely simplified way of putting nutrition together, for you. But this is something that I think is important for us to understand as dance moms, because what we teach our dancers from early on and also what we encourage and provide for them in terms of nutrition and, options for food, and we're not talking about diets, we're talking about specifically foods and nutrition, it really makes a big difference.
And not just for today, but especially for a long term Thriving Dancers is here for long-term. We're here not to just solve a quick problem, put a Band-Aid on an issue, We're talking about having your dancers to be well, to develop these habits that are serving them, not just [00:04:00] now, but also in the future, so that they are stronger in the future, so that they even get less colds in the future, right?
Because if their physiology is healthy, if their immune system is strong because it's been built through healthy nutrition, then we can expect those kinds of outcomes, right? We can expect those kids to be well better prepared for anything that can come to their body, whether it's heavier workload in terms of their training or heavier workload, and then everybody in the studio being sick, and then your kid also succumbing to that, right?
And also having to sit out or stay out or whatever. So what really drives me nuts about the studios, the old school studios, is when, well, besides the fact that there's a lot of body shaming still, and these unrealistic standards for women, and for girls to be in this body, but [00:05:00] then perform the tasks that cannot be supported by that kind of a body.
And expecting that that body will continue working for a while, or even worse, having expectations that, "But of course it's not gonna sustain itself, so you only have a couple of years, so just, like, push yourself through pain, push yourself through injuries, push yourself through, anorexia, and then just do it, and then enjoy those three years of fame, and then be done with it.
Go teach," right? Why is that kind of mentality even there? Well, that's honestly because it's based on the wrong foundation, and this is something that I feel like we as dance moms have the opportunity, authority, and kind of a responsibility to change at this point. Because let's face it, each one of us wants our dancers not to just succeed for this Nutcracker season.
We want them to keep going and to be in the space of their dream careers, [00:06:00] being a dancer, being a professional dancer, for as long as possible. I'm not saying teaching is bad. I'm just saying that, of course, you can teach on the side, too, but then you could still go off and do, freelance dance, or you can be part of a company for a long time, like some of these, professional dancers that we know, without any of these horrible consequences.
Because those dancers took care of their bodies when they were young in the right way. I guarantee you that those answers were not being, focused just on the diet, that they actually focused on the nutritional aspects of that diet. So let's talk So the idea of the diets is really to take these major food groups and put them into these categories of good for you, not good for you.
That's really a lot of times how diets are presented. there's the dancer, there's the athlete's diet, or, you know, it's a high carb [00:07:00] diet, or it's a keto diet, or whatever diet, whatever diet. And there's the vegan diet, and there's the vegetarian diet or whatever else. There's thousands of different diets, right?
And honestly, I feel like however many there are human beings on this planet, that's how many diets there really are. Because let's face it, every single person kind of sort of has their own diet still. They eat a little bit of this, they eat more of that, they eat, less of this, they eat more of that, and that's their diet.
That's it. Even within a family, there are differences between each person and how and what they eat. I mean, basically a lot of the times, right? Unless you're a family that always eats exact same thing together all the time, which to be honest, I don't know any families like that, but you may be that, so this is not about judgments.
It's about the fact that every single person really does have their own kind of a, diet in a way, meaning how and what type of food they consume, That really is what the diet is. [00:08:00] What is important is not the diet. I could care less about the diet, but what I care about is the nutrition factors of each one of those foods that our dancers are eating.
So let me talk a little bit more about this. And the other aspect of it is I feel like there's a lot of talk for dancers of what they should eat, but not really enough emphasis of what they really need to avoid. And, I think that just kind of a lot of times it comes with the basic understanding that, well, of course, yeah, you're not gonna do that, you know, 'cause you're a dancer, so you don't do that.
But the reality is, it's not really true because a lot of dancers really don't know better. And so that's why Thriving Dancers is here to give you, the dance mom, this information so that you can take it to your dancer and explain why. And, especially if you have teenagers.
You have [00:09:00] teenagers at home, they're your teenagers, and then you have your teenagers at a birthday party, they're their own teenagers out there, and then they go out somewhere else, and then they're own teenagers elsewhere. However much you can instill your, your rules and your requirements, they're still gonna do their own thing, outside of the home, either because there's no other options that they see or because that's what everybody else is doing and one time, you know, eating five pieces of pizza and drinking soda is not gonna make a difference, in their mind, right?
But then that's where we come in in teaching the importance of why we are mindful about what we put in our body. And, a lot of times there's the talk about it's not because it's the pizza. The fact is what type of pizza, where are these ingredients sourced?
Is it even real flour? Are [00:10:00] there other additives in it? Is it even real cheese, or is it one of those orange things that cannot even be called cheese, right? Versus you have whole grain, organic, maybe even gluten-free, but not highly processed, but simply processed cauliflower, flour type of, pizza dough, and then you have pasture-raised, raw, organic cheese that's in there.
There's gonna be a completely different body response, and especially digestive system response to those kinds of pizzas, even though both of them are called pizzas, but there is a difference. So when I'm talking about foods and I'm talking about, diets, and we just say, "Well, you should not be eating pizza," well, who says, and what kind of pizza really are we talking about?
So in the same way that we can talk about [00:11:00] drinks, right? you should not drink any fruit juices because, you gain weight as a dancer, which is complete BS because, okay, yeah, if you're gonna go and buy one of those fruit juice, concentrate things like Welch's whatevers. I'm not bashing any specific companies.
I'm just giving an example so that you know what I'm talking about, or one of those Capri Sun things, where, there's practically no juice really, where it's a drink. I think it's like a fruit drink or something. I'm not actually even super familiar 'cause we haven't really ever had those, simply because there's no nutrition value in those drinks.
Compared to you make a fresh juice, orange, apple, carrot juice at home, and that is going to give you, your dancer so much nutritional value compared to that other kind of juice. So are you really going to tell your dancer, "No, you should not drink that juice"? No, it doesn't make any sense. [00:12:00] Or I remember, long ago, a friend from a high-end ballet academy, was told, a specific diet that they're not allowed to eat grapes or any kind of fruits, high in fructose.
The only fruits that they were, allowed to eat were bananas, and even that was only one banana a day, which is kind of ridiculous because, eating just one banana a day, for nutrition fact, of what you're trying to get out of a banana is kind of crazy. if you want actual nutritional value from bananas and you're not eating a lot of other things or don't have an option to eat a lot of other fruits, then eating a couple of bananas a day is perfectly fine But, you know, that mentality of, "Well, it's sugar, so sugar is bad.
You look at the nutrition value of raw, unpasteurized, unprocessed honey versus one of those, fake [00:13:00] honey, honeys that has been, basically all adulterated with, sugar syrup, completely big difference. Whereas, you know, the raw, organic, unfiltered honey, you actually can only eat so much of it until your body literally says, "Oh, I got it.
I got what I need. I don't need more," which is usually maybe like one teaspoon at most, and that's your sweetener. So you're going to tell me that that is not okay? It makes no sense. So when we're talking about nutrition, all of these factors really are so important to think about when we are throwing these words around like, "Oh, don't eat that," or, "You shouldn't eat that," or, "Oh, well, just go eat the granola."
Well, actually, granola is one of the worst things you can eat also as a dancer. It's been presented as a healthy snack, but the reality is it is full of not so healthy sugar, unless you make it yourself, at which point your GI system specifically, is working a little bit too hard to [00:14:00] process that granola in your body.
And then the kind of nutritional value you get out of it is very little compared to what you get out of some other kind of snacks Even that banana, eating two bananas instead of that, the processed granola is going to give you a lot more than the granola itself. So considering these components of nutrition is so important, and going for whole foods instead of constantly think about, the convenience of it, of course, and I totally get it.
I also wanna be able to go to the store, grab things off the shelf, and just say, "Here's your nutritional snack in between meal, so that it's not messy and it's highly nutritious. There really honestly are not a lot of things out there. There used to be some things.
They're basically these protein balls, and they had just few ingredients that were literally raw ingredients. They had dates and [00:15:00] peanut butter or, hazelnut butter or almond butter in them and, some nuts, some more nuts around them. So they were high on all of these basically major food groups, minus the carbs in the simple sense carbs.
So that was really helpful, but there's... And there's only so many of them you can eat as well because they were rather big. you can maybe have four of them at max, three, four, and you're full. You're good, and your energy is high, and you don't feel hungry, and you are getting that nutrition that is processing in your body at the appropriate pace compared to something like, oh, just get some crackers or the processed those fish cracker things, half of the ingredients of which, nobody can pronounce, okay?
Every time when we go and we try to get the nutrition out of the food, we have to see what really is on the label? Now, if it requires a label, [00:16:00] it really needs to have as little of the amount of the ingredients as possible. And I know we've heard this before so many times, but those ingredients also you have to be able to pronounce.
And then remember, the most of the ingredient is always gonna go first. So it's like it goes from the most to the least amount. that's your ingredients list, okay? So if sugar is your number two ingredient, you know there's quite a bit of it. And then look at the label and see, okay, how much added sugar is in that thing?
And the reality is sugar is in everything, mean it's literally added into everything or a variation of it. the companies have gotten so smart because they want to sound healthy because, consumers are getting smarter, and they don't want sugar in their ketchups and various products that really shouldn't have any sugar in it.
So what companies have done is they substituted the sugars with unpronounceable, fake sugars or components of sugars, that give [00:17:00] that sweetness, and then they say, "Oh, no, it's a natural product." Well, no, because at that point, it's already extra processed, okay? So the other thing is a lot of times many people take the information of, well, you know, fat is bad and therefore let's do fat-free, or sugar is bad, so let's do sugar-free.
Or I'm a vegan, so I'm going to do all of the meat substitutes or, you know, the substitutes of the vegan type of products. And anything that we go into for substitutes, that is something to be extremely aware of. And the reason I say this is because those are the things that play the most role on your GI system.
Every time when you go for those kinds of substitutes, whether it's sugar-free type of things that honestly do a [00:18:00] lot more harm in your body than, actual sugar. I mean, it's not my opinion. It's a fact that aspartame and other fake sugars actually cause cancer. Whereas you have to eat quite a bit of sugar for quite a bit of time in order for it to have that kind of a detrimental effect, or at least at that level so, you know, you kind of and see, okay, what is it exactly that you are, substituting it for. Same thing with a lot of vegan people become extremely unhealthy because they are eating a lot of processed foods.
Because in order to substitute the taste, you have to have a lot of fake ingredients, or at least those substitute ingredients that have, a lot of natural flavors so they can mimic what is it that you're trying to replace. Now, I'm not saying that if you're substituting a burger with a [00:19:00] bean burger and you don't expect it to taste like beef, then absolutely, totally more power to you.
And that's amazing. That is the healthy transition. But if we're talking about people who, run off and still buy the fake bacon and the fake burger, the Tofurky or whatever the heck it's called, that is where you fall into the trap of eating a lot of ultra-processed foods that I understand the whole aspect of being a vegan is also, animal welfare, et cetera.
But then you have to consider your health. And when you're substituting Well,especially if you're eating, let's say, pasture-raised, grass-fed and finished, beef, then switching that and eating fully processed, Like the fake burgers, you are doing to your body a lot worse than if you were just eating that burger, honestly, three times a day, [00:20:00] which, you wouldn't be able to because that meat is so nutrient-dense.
Yes, it is extremely nutrient-dense, that you won't be able-- Like your body will not want more. It will say, "I've had enough." the satiation feeling will be reached a lot higher, than this fake stuff that you'd be consuming that your body will be craving more of because it's not getting the nutrients it needs.
And at the same time, it's also getting all of these addictive types of, additives in it, like sugars, fake sugars, and other things that, you can't even stop eating it tastes so good." Yeah, but it's tricking, those chemicals are literally tricking the brain from, being full and, thinking that, oh, you're eating something real when you actually are not.
in fact, there have been studies done where, fake ramen and other kinds of foods, from the packages, compared to real homemade, spaghetti, macaroni type of things, [00:21:00] had a completely different processing time in the body. So eating all of those ultra-processed types of, noodles and, the nutrient stuff, eating that would, caused that ultra-processed food to sit in the stomach for hours on end.
And mind you, we're supposed to empty our stomachs within about 30 to 45 minutes of consuming a meal. And when that meal sits in the stomach, causing the bloating and the distension of the stomach and so many other issues compared to the real food that we would eat that goes through the stomach, into our small intestine, into the large intestine, and then out in a couple of hours.
I mean, that's the process. That's how it's supposed to go. But if it sits in one place because the body just doesn't know how to digest it 'cause it doesn't even have the enzymes to break down... The enzymes are these tiny little, proteins that literally come [00:22:00] in and start cutting these pieces of food into smaller building block type of pieces so that those building blocks can go into our bloodstream and provide the actual building blocks to the cells in our body And, you know, we have, for example, we have lactase to break down the specific, protein, the lactose protein inside milk, right?
And some people actually don't have enough of that. That's why they're lactose intolerant. But, when you drink the milk, that enzyme comes in, cuts this out, and then these tiny little pieces then go into our, bloodstream, and then here we go. We use that as the building block. But for these kinds of fake foods, there are not even enzymes that could do that.
So the body says, "Okay, well, let's try this. Okay, no, this enzyme doesn't work. Well, that one doesn't work." And so it just sits there, and then eventually it could just pass through the system without gaining any nutrition any [00:23:00] nutritious value from that process, which doesn't make sense. Why would we eat something that literally would not give us any fuel, any building blocks ?
It just... anything positive, except for putting extra stress on our body because the body goes, "What's this thing in our stomach and in our GI system? We gotta do something with it 'cause it's just sitting there, and we're hungry." And now, okay, the body just got some food that it was asking for, and it needs fuel.
It needs fuel for the muscles, for the brain, for the heart, for all the rest of the physiology in our body, but it's not getting it because the food that we're putting in our body is not giving it to us because it doesn't have those components. So anyway, I went a little bit too technical about this, but I really want you to understand this as a dance mom at that level because that is where we start making our decisions from, and that is where we can [00:24:00] teach our dancers to make those better choices.
So when they do go to a party, they will not reach for diet coke or regular soda. They're going to ask for water because they know what it does in their body. In the same way that they're not going to eat five pieces of pizza because there is enough of it and because they haven't had pizza for a while because you don't buy that kind of pizza.
They will know that, okay, one piece for me is enough, and I will need to take specific enzymes to help my body process whatever it is and just know that it's not going to serve my body the best. And if I know I do not want to eat that- Then I could be okay just saying no and eat before going to a party, and only participate in as much of that process as possible.
But I know it's so hard because, of course, food is such a social aspect of our [00:25:00] lives. I mean, everything is about food if you really think about it. All the parties, all the outings, celebrations. Everything really revolves around food. And it's not the kind of food that we actually want to call food, honestly.
And that has been something that really we have struggled with, with my dancer as well, especially being in a small town that has... It's not quite a food desert by definition, but it only has one health store, and access to truly healthy, affordable, nutritious food and produce is very limited. So we make it a point to actually drive three hours each way to get healthy food, to get, the produce that we can use and that we actually could, could cook and feel like, "Okay, after I eat that salad, I actually feel more energized as opposed to more drained," right?
[00:26:00] That's what food's supposed to do for us, and especially for our dancers. So when we're talking about nutrition for dancers, there are so many different components that are involved in choosing appropriate nutrition for your dancer, and it's not just one solution fits all. Because you're a dancer, therefore you do that and that only.
Absolutely not. I do not believe in box solutions for anything, honestly. I think that every solution has to be customized in a way that makes sense for your dancer. If your dancer, for example, has a specific condition that either makes them more tired or maybe they have some other thing going on that requires certain types of nutrients, that only means that you're not only giving them the supplements, but you're also giving them foods that are rich in those nutrients.
So for example, my dancer really needs extra [00:27:00] magnesium and sodium in her diet, therefore drinking celery juice, which is extremely high in sodium, but then also eating some dragon fruit, which is very high in magnesium, could really help balance those things out, that she doesn't always have to be popping those supplements.
We can use nutrition as those helpers, knowing that this is what her body needs. Now, there are other dancers who may not have those kinds of requirements, but they are working out really hard and they have very extensive, training times and their muscles get really tired. Well, they may actually need extra magnesium as well, especially at night to help them recover, especially because we know a lot of dancers do not have enough recovery time, which is another problem for another podcast episode that we are going to talk about.
when they do have those types of heavy activity days, having that extra magnesium, whether it's in a smoothie form [00:28:00] or literally just eating either fresh or frozen, dragon fruit could be really helpful for their overall wellbeing. Now, I understand that sometimes it's challenging to believe these kinds of things, and the reason for that is because
we're so programmed and so used to not really thinking about food in that kind of way, but then also because there rarely are these drastic outcomes that we can see right away. So eating a small bowl of magnesium may not necessarily have the same effect as popping that magnesium pill.
but then at the same time, we have to understand that food does its magic at very micro level. And what I mean by that is that when you eat, it takes time. Remember I said it takes about between 30 to maybe 45 minutes for the food to just exit our stomachs. And [00:29:00] then as it passes through all of these different, processes that happen in our intestinal system, all that food, all the, let's say, the dragon fruit that has been eaten, is taken apart into these components, and then those components still have to be utilized, right?
When we take magnesium supplements, it kinda skips some of that digestive process. It doesn't need to be created or attached to some other forms because also when you take supplements, a lot of times they should be in this bioavailable form. So once it passes the stomach and then in the small intestine, it starts to get absorbed, right?
different components and different vitamins and different, nutrients start to get absorbed in the small intestine. In fact, most of that absorption actually happens in the small intestine. And then, we get into the large intestine, and then there's other things that start to get reabsorbed and including water and other things.
And then we feed [00:30:00] our, intestinal flora, which we're gonna get to in a minute. So when we are, taking that supplement, it kinda bypasses a lot of the processes that need to be done in order for the whole food, to be processed. So we get that response faster, right?
Why this is important is we have to really wrap our heads around this notion of, "Well, I eat it, but I don't get the result." Well, we're eating it, but we are getting the results that are just at a different level. It's at a cellular level, and When you create a habit of that kind of eating, instead of reaching for, caffeine, for example, you reach for...
instead of reaching for Starbucks' sugary caffeine drink, to get water, electrolytes, natural forms of caffeine or even green tea instead, at home could [00:31:00] give a lot more healthy and better results at a cellular level compared to the other drink. Because that other drink is going to create a lot more problems in the body because it will have so many other components that your body does not need, cannot process, and actually would do harm compared to good.
Compared to just drinking a cup of green tea at home or whatever, organic, good, clean green tea, with maybe some raw honey will do a lot better for that energy boost if needed compared to this. Or then understanding, "Why do I need that energy boost? What is making me tired right now? Am I actually hungry?
Have I eaten a not very nutritious meal that's draining me instead of giving me energy? Or have I overworked? Or have I been breathing shallowly?" I mean, that's another thing that a lot of times we don't [00:32:00] realize how shallow our breathing is. And when we don't get enough air in our lungs, we don't get enough oxygen in our body and our brain, so we start feeling sluggish.
So there are all of these pieces to feeling tired, but we don't really think about it, and we never really think about using food as an appropriate source of fuel and, and energy. And we just go for these solutions that these marketing companies basically have created for us that it's like, "Oh, hungry?
Go grab a SNICKERS bar." And what is that gonna do to our blood sugar? What is that gonna do to our dancers', sustainability of training? Yeah, okay, they eat a Snickers bar in the beginning. Cool, they got their protein. Hmm. And then what? And then they crash about an hour into their training. And then what?
And that crash is actually way lower than they were when [00:33:00] they grabbed that Snickers bar thinking it's gonna give them a solution. So all of these things have to be considered when we're talking about nutrition, and I think there is so much that's just not being said enough. I don't know, maybe because these, nutritionists either...
I mean, I cannot imagine that they don't know. I know they know. But the problem is that, they don't want to educate the public at that level because ultimately they're gonna be out of their jobs, right? Because if every dance mom is informed and understands what true food and true nutrition does for their child's, overall wellbeing and also their dance performance, now and in the future, of course they're going to be making those choices.
Yes, because it doesn't make sense that that information is not widespread, that there's a lot more information on diets, but not really enough information on [00:34:00] nutrition. And by now, you know what I mean when I say nutrition versus diet. And this is where we want to be as dance moms who are informed, and also for our dancers so that they understand that it's not about what to be afraid of, but how to use food as their ally in actually making them stronger.
Because that's where, honestly, the issue with dance world and eating and all of this mindset madness comes about. It's this idea of these things are bad for you, and those things are bad for you, and only this is good because it gives you this type of result. Well, the truth is, for some people, no matter what they eat, they still gain weight or they still lose weight.
Individual metabolism is so important to consider. [00:35:00] For me, for example, I can only lose weight if I restrict my diet. I'm old enough to have figured that out, That I can reach a certain, a certain number, and then I will plateau. That's just how my body works.
That's the composition of my hormones, my endocrinology altogether, in addition to my activity level, my energy level, and multiple other factors that are involved in the way that I process food compared to other people who can eat certain things and it processes in their bodies in a different way.
In my body, milk processes in a very wrong way, let's just say this. It gets mistaken for a thyroid, hormone and therefore it causes me to literally have thyroid issues. For other people, it is no problem. And so there are so many different things that people have to [00:36:00] take in consideration when they're talking about diets versus nutrition, and that's why for us dance moms, it's so important to really understand that forget about the diets.
Diets don't matter because if we focus on the diets, we're only going to create this weird mindset about foods for our dancers, and that's not what we want. We want our dancers to have healthy relationship with food and don't see it as either a friend or as a foe. We have to see it as this external source of energy that our body requires in order for it to thrive.
It's really that simple, and if we could just teach our children from very early on this concept, that's where we can actually prevent the issue of various, eating disorders because, it's not something that people are born [00:37:00] with. there really haven't been a research study that had shown that people are born with anorexia or with bulimia.
you're never going to meet a baby who has that. now if they have symptoms of anorexia, as in they're not eating, it means that there's some other underlying conditions that are causing them to do that. Same thing with the bulimia where they eat and then they throw up all of it, only because they have some kind of a physiological or anatomical issue that's happening.
Now, when we get into the already cognizant type of years where kids are thinking and they're processing things and they start develop, beliefs and certain mindset, that's where this issue comes up. And then you top the environment and the environment of training and other pressures and then the need for control of certain things and many, many other things.
the field of eating disorders is vast and there's a lot of [00:38:00] research that's being done, on this. And we're not talking about that right now, but we're talking about, how do we prevent it or at least counteract the effects of the outside sources that are really pulling our kids in that direction.
And how can we cut that string off with us training and teaching and educating our children on a different mindset about food, especially when it comes to food in the context of their training. whether they're a dancer or athlete, a lot of athletes also have issues with eating and eating disorders too.
It's also an unspoken thing, and I think it's really about this concept of Using food as this either enemy or a friend or this external thing that somehow has a good or bad [00:39:00] connotation. But the truth is, everything is good or bad, it's the meaning that we put on
It, it applies to everything in life, right? Everything is good and bad. It all depends on how you look at it. Two people can look at the same situation completely differently. But When it comes to food, there is no such thing, and that's what we have to understand. Now, there is helpful and nutritious food, and then there is not.
Instead of saying, "This pizza, this food, that ultra-processed thing is bad or good," that doesn't give, especially kids who are a lot more literal, than us adults, it doesn't give them the proper meaning and connection with that particular food. Now, is that food going to give you energy?
is that food going to create problems inside your body, or is it going to feed and nurture your body? That's all you're after, really. It's not good or bad. Is this food [00:40:00] that you're eating going to nurture the bacteria that is very helpful and, essential for our overall wellbeing in our gut?
And if not, then you know what that could cause. It could cause the balance to be thrown off in creating more bad bacteria in our intestines that can overgrow and cause leaking of the bad bacteria's, basically, waste products into the bloodstream, causing a lot more problems. So why, why create that issue?
Why do we need to make that choice? Now, sometimes it just is. Everybody goes out for this big dinner, and you cannot control what is going to be on that plate, right? It's, I don't wanna name companies. but you know, any kind of a restaurant you can think of that is not one of those, like, vegan, organic, whatever type of restaurants, healthy type of food places.
Any [00:41:00] kind of restaurant that you go with for big celebrations, and you can't control what you eat there whatsoever But, you know, if you go there every week, multiple times a week, then, I mean, there's really no difference. Then you making those choices of feeding your body in a way that does not nourish it.
That's it. Is it good? Is it bad? Well, you decide, right? I mean, we know what is actually good or bad for our body, but the only way of good and bad in this situation is, is it giving me enough energy to go through my training times? Is it putting me in the space of actually giving me the opportunities to be at my best and then to get to next level so I could get those roles?
Is it really creating that kind of opportunity for me to progress in this dream of mine of becoming a professional dancer, and then also to sustain myself in it [00:42:00] through the hard days? Or am I setting myself up for just this, okay, living just this one day at a time, fine whatever no meals most of the day, and then some milk and bread in the evening
honestly, I have never met a person who has eaten unhealthy all of their lives, and they were still healthy and well in their mind and their body at an old age. It just does not happen, because it causes the body to wear down a lot faster than it needs to be. No matter how happy and otherwise, good choices kind of a person you are, as in, like, you don't drink a lot, you don't smoke and do all sorts of crazy things and stress out a lot.
because it's a two-way street in a way, kind of this bi-directional, situation where having an appropriate mindset is important for our wellness. But if you're feeding the body with the [00:43:00] foods that does not nourish it, that mindset is going to be affected by the body.
It's going to be affected by that bacteria in our gut. It's going to be affected by the inflammation, the extra inflammation in the body that is not controlled for our dancers who are putting a lot of stress on the body, physical and also mental. And if we're not providing them with nutritious, meals that are feeding their body appropriately, creating and giving them those- appropriate nutritional building blocks to rebuild their body at a consistent basis, then, I mean, what do we expect when our kids constantly get sick over and over and over again every time when they get stressed out?
why is it that, they're having so many injuries all the time? Or, why is it that they get tired, so tired all the time? why is their [00:44:00] skin constantly breaking out? I mean, there are so many things that are the outcomes of those choices, and we could see that. So, once we understand it, and once we help our dancers understand it, and we help them reframe the mindset about food and about nutrition, that comes from that food, that's when we can start make a true big difference.
So, this was a very long episode. It's kind of winded because I've seen so many, dancers, and dance parents just not understand the concept of nutrition and how essential it is for their wellness. even if they don't want to be professional dancers, but still understanding what the nutrition is for a child's body is just so important, and it breaks my heart every time I see a dancer leave a studio late at night, at 9:30 at night after training, after three hours of training, and go off into [00:45:00] McDonald's and grab their Diet Coke with their big burger and feel like, oh, yay, they're getting nourished.
And that just, it hurts me because I know what that, food, that processed food is doing to their intestines, to their body, because the research is, it doesn't lie, what processed foods does. And then the Diet Coke and all of that, diet aspect of it, and then also the fact that it's the super highly processed, glucose, syrup stuff that basically just goes through the body straight into the bloodstream, causing insane spikes in insulin and, blood glucose levels that just does not do well for a young body to build a healthy body for a healthy life.
it hurts me because I can see that path and a lot of parents think that it's not, "Oh, it's just the one thing. Oh, it's just this. You know, it's for now." But the reality is it's not now. Everything [00:46:00] that goes in now, it's also for the future. And once we understand that, then we can help our dancers really make better choices in the future as well.
and we can also let go of the notion of there's bad and there's good, and we can live and have this nutrition by design in a way, that is appropriate for our dancers. So that's what I wanted to talk to you guys about today.
Thanks for coming, and I will see you at the next episode. Bye for now.
