Undoing years of obsessive behavior doesn’t come easy. For years, I counted macros diligently, trained through pain, holidays, and intensely enough to gain a significant amount of strength and muscle.
I admired others who took the same path, and I erroneously thought this was the best way to live.
As I approached my late 40s, the epiphany started to take shape. New clients would sometimes tell me, "I want to look like you," and I would cringe a little at both the pointless comparison and the knowledge of knowing what I did to get to the point in my life where I had an admirable build that many wanted to emulate.
I am no "Greek god," but I am in the top 99% of my age bracket. I am not foolish enough to pretend I am not, but that came with a cost.
The cost is not worth paying for many people. Sure, many professionals choose to take on an extreme lifestyle, but most of us will never handle serving multiple masters.
I thought I could until I couldn't. By being the extreme example, I thought I was serving my clients correctly by being the example of what hard work, discipline, and willpower can do.
In all honesty, it isn't the way to "walk the walk," because that walk is not what most people want to do.
But it came with that cost I mentioned earlier.
I smashed face-first into a wall, and it hurt.
I grew so damn tired of body image issues, obsessing about the perfect training program, worrying that I either wasn't eating enough or eating too little.
What did I do?
I stopped tracking food.
I used my apps as a crutch, not a tool. I find incredible value in tracking macros and calories, but most of us need to learn, use, repeat, sustain, and then ease off the training wheels. Use the apps while learning bio-feedback, and apply it piece by piece.
In my coaching, I do that for many clients. We gradually chip away from tracking individual macros like protein/carbs/fats and shift to tracking protein and calories. Once they develop a mastery of that, we go to protein only.
That reverse engineering your diet is very effective with proper coaching, patience, and mindset work.
What I did was different from what I coach, as it works for me, and I enjoy it.
Intermittent fasting. I don't look at it as anything magical but as a tool. The tool allows me to not think about food, it mentally forces me to eat quality meals, and I feel better about my food choices, activity level, and health outcomes.
I eat three meals per day, and I follow these rules:
60g of protein per meal
Fruit
Starchy carbs as needed per activity level and hunger
Some veg - I don't tolerate many vegetables, so I have a select few I can eat.
Add fats as needed.
I bought a water bottle from Hidrate Spark, which helps me ensure I am hydrated enough, as that has always been a perpetual issue.
Am I eating the scientific requirement of 2.2g/kg of protein daily to prevent sarcopenia and ensure lean tissue building?
I don't give a fuck anymore. I am no longer shoveling down 230g of protein (or more) daily. I am eating about 175-195g daily, which is enough. If you want to rabbit hole this and look at Menmo's blog about protein studies, he concludes that 1.8g/kg of protein per lean mass is enough.
Do the math.
My BodPod measurement had me at 10% bodyfat at 228 pounds. Yea, I was shocked I was 10%, too.
228 x 10% = 22.8
228 - 22.8 = 205.2 of lean mass
205.2 / 2.205 = 93kg
93 x 1.8 = 167.4 grams of protein
So, I am fine. You can disagree with Menmo's meta-analysis, and that is ok. Some do, and some don't. It works for me, so I am cool with it.
I upgraded to three weekly training sessions focusing on movement.
Upgraded is an interesting word to use when I am in the gym less, but I see it as an upgrade because I allow myself more time outside the gym.
I am 48 years old and realize a few undeniable facts about myself.
I will not gain much muscle at this stage of my life unless I take steroids (I am on TRT, that's plenty), eat a lot of food, and train like a savage with weights. Neither of these appeals to me.
I will not lose muscle mass when training three times a week because I put the work in for 25+ years to get to this point.
I don't want to live in a goddamn gym anymore.
I stopped focusing on the traditional upper/lower or push/pull/legs split. My training days are whole body with an emphasis on single limb work, movement-based exercises like quadruped work, and extra conditioning to keep myself in decent shape.
There is zero doubt that I want to look good, but I do not want that goal to be my reason for training. I want more, or less, depending on your point of view.
I started a new sport.
Brazilian Jiu-jitsu entered my life right as I was amidst the changes above, and I took on this new challenge. It brought me back to my roots of sport and gave me a community to embrace and a coach to hold me accountable.
Sport doesn't care how good you look, how strong you are, how lean you are, or how many selfies you post in a mirror in that perfect gym lighting.
Sport cares only about whether you improve your game or not.
The beauty of being a good athlete is that you need all the factors to make you one - sleep, recovery, practice, diet, training, mindset, and coachability.
All of them are important, and great athletes know this.
I am a 48-year-old white belt and am not the athlete I used to be. I am slower and less quick, but my strength is an asset. I am learning new skills and knowing what I can do on the mat. It was a gift to myself, and I am treasuring it. I am learning more about myself than I ever expected.
I am learning how to relax under pressure, overcome fear, work through discomfort, face my crippling claustrophobia, and I am enjoying it.
Every day I plan to attend a class, I feel anxiety brewing. I can feel the battle within where one side says, "you suck, stay home, you aren't any good," and the other says, "fucking go."
I go, and I learn. I feel improvements, and others also see them.
It's much more rewarding to be able to control yourself in a fight against a superior skilled opponent than you can imagine. If you are familiar with it, you understand. At this stage of my BJJ journey, the goal is survival, progress, and listening. I can't expect to be able to string together multiple moves. When I first started, I tried to do what my instinct taught me. Win and win fast. It doesn't work when the rules state, "no punching, kicking, or hitting people with bricks."
I will not do that on the BJJ mat, but unlearning extreme tension and chaos takes some time, and it's starting to work slowly.
Trust myself.
This is a big one, and I say it to my clients often.
The other day a nutrition client needed a phone call. We discussed his anxiety around food when he's unable to track it properly due to dining out and holiday obligations. It was a productive call where he learned to enjoy food a little more without feeling like he needed to track everything.
Isn't that the goal of nutrition coaching? To help your client achieve sustainability without relying on a food scale and app?
Trusting your knowledge is a fantastic feeling once you learn how to trust it and not revert to the comfortable feel of the crutch.
Trusting yourself goes as far as trusting the coach to have your best interests in mind while asking questions to clarify, asking for help, and doing your best. This also means hiring a coach who will work with what your goals are rather than against them.
A couple of years ago, I hired a nutrition coach to help me get back on track. We did very well together, but after several months I was getting macro burnout and expressed it.
Their response was, "well if you want to do this on your own, we won't stop you, but that precision won't be there with taking off or adding a few grams of fat or carbs weekly."
I didn't know what to write back. I was shocked a coach would tell me the exact opposite of what I was saying. I was expressing my burnout with macro tracking and wanting a more intuitive eating style. If this coach could not work with someone who wants that, let them know instead of adding that guilt-ridden statement.
I moved on from them that day.
Each of you has your preferred way of being coached. Some like the intense structure, while some thrive with a more intuitive style. Some want five days a week in the gym, some want 3, and some even less because they are active outside or in their sport.
You are a unique individual who deserves to know what you want and advocate for it. Your coach leads you into what is best for you, not what is best for the coach.
If you feel your lifestyle is becoming an obsession rather than something you enjoy, you owe it to yourself to find out how to simplify, change, and modify it to fall back in love with the process and not dread the grind.
It took me a long time to unshackle myself from the obligations of it, the fear of "being smaller," and the stagnation I felt. I never felt freer in my life than I do today regarding my fitness goals and how I approach them.
This isn't to say I don't struggle some days. I will open my tracking app every so often, start to puzzle piece food, and then close it. I will look at my training program and say, "I can add this, that...." and then stop knowing I have enough and I am fine. I feel more in control of my food when I follow the outline above than when I track macros and plan meals to fit every gram. When you measure protein down to the gram, and 215g of chicken is enough while 235g is too much, you will know exactly what I am talking about.
The ball is back in my court, and trusting myself is a process.
Undoing obsession isn't easy, and contrary to the memes and popular fitpro opinion, it isn't mentally healthy to have obsession take over your existence.
There is a better way.