Written by Alta Clark
Alta Clark is pursuer of many paths, her current one being the start of a degree as an R.N., where she hopes to take her knowledge and apply it to her world climbing, skiing, dancing, and traveling. She has traditionally filled the role of mentor and educator, and is inspired by working with young people and women. Her life goals include being able to incorporate medicine with exercise physiology and psychology to help people understand that there are infinite approaches to serving their bodies and spirit.
Check out other articles written by Alta here.
New Normal
Exercise and a nutritive diet have always been core components of my self care and have lived at the top of my priority list for a long time. In the past, the way that I’ve coped with stress is through extensive amounts of time at the gym or outside, but now as a dedicated student it’s rare that I have extra time to spend on myself in that way. As time goes on, I am coming to terms that existing in one extreme or another isn’t sustainable; so in small ways I’m seeking out methods to re-incorporate my needs into my daily routine.
Eye Opening Experiences
Lately, I’ve been trying to prioritize physical activity more and seek out 15-30 minute windows in my day for some exercise. Last week I had one of those windows in between classes, and so I decided to go to the gym. I wanted to just do some light cardio to get my blood moving and help relax my mind, so I had planned on doing 15-20 minutes on the stair stepper, and 10-15 minutes of jogging on the treadmill. But after about 8 minutes on the stair stepper, I could tell something wasn’t right. I felt feverish, light headed, dizzy, and my heart rate shot up. I transitioned to the treadmill at that point, thinking a slower jogging pace would feel better, but I was wrong. I jogged for about a minute, then feeling like I was about to faint, I slowed to a walk. My symptoms persisted, so I decided I needed to get out of there and get home as soon as possible.
The world spun when I stepped off the treadmill, and I had to practice laser focus to get myself to the locker room, change, and hop on my bike to head home. I biked home as fast as I was able, feeling like I was floating in a dream state. I suspected that I needed food, so I ran to the kitchen and grabbed what I could and put it into a bowl– yogurt, peanut butter, granola, and a banana– my go-to snack. Seconds after beginning to eat I started feeling better, some immediate feedback that my intuition was correct. I simply didn’t have enough calories and sugar in my system for even some light exercise. I had a busy day, and it didn’t really occur to me that I hadn’t eaten enough to be able to fuel a workout.
What was so profound about this experience was not that I knew what I needed to do to help my body, but that as soon as that feeling of disappearing into space hit me, it brought back a wave of memories.
Reflecting on My History
In my late teens and early twenties, I practiced very restrictive dieting. I would eat only fruits, vegetables, eggs, lean meats, oatmeal, and chocolate, and certainly keep my caloric intake well beneath 1500 kcal/day. If I tried to exercise early in the mornings, I would immediately become lightheaded and forced to sit down and abandon my ambition to complete a workout. After this went on for a few weeks or months, I saw a doctor and explained to him my symptoms. Not knowing too much about me, he thought that my blood pressure was simply too low, and suggested I start eating pretzels to get some more salt in my diet. At the time I wasn’t eating gluten, so pretzels were out of the question, but I settled for salting my food more (something I also had abstained from previously). We ran blood tests, and everything came back normal. I started eating more salt, but that feeling never really went away.
Around 3 years later I eased out of my restrictive eating habits, and started allowing myself to use intuitive eating. I allowed myself to eat foods that I enjoyed, not just ones that I viewed to be nutritious. The motivation for this transition came from the semester I spent abroad in Italy, where eating a croissant for breakfast, gelato for lunch, and pasta for dinner was incredibly normal. It reignited within me a joy and appreciation for beautifully crafted foods, and a realization of how soul-feeding it can be to eat foods that make you happy. Now I need to mention that this was not a smooth transition. While in Italy I struggled deeply with body dysmorphia, and the obvious solution to me at the time was to undergo a series of low carb diets to in some way “punish” myself for eating the foods that I loved. On the path to healing my disordered eating I participated in a variety of other fad diets, and experimented with my body way more than I should have.
New Gifts
Many years down the road, once I was able to finally resolve my restrictive eating habits, I gained five pounds. This was a very difficult transition, and is still something I deal with almost every day. But what I didn’t notice until that day at the gym, is that dizzy feeling was gone. It went away so quietly when I started to eat more, that I never even noticed. My body no longer looks how I want it to, but in exchange I was given a gift – energy. I got my period back, my breasts grew, I no longer can see the clean lines of my abdominal muscles, but not until I underwent this transformation did I realize how often I had previously felt so fatigued and light-headed, to the point where just getting through the day felt like a chore.
Living in my new body and having a positive attitude towards it takes an immense amount of discipline and love. Yes, it’s true that my body doesn’t look exactly how I want it to any more, but I have to continually remind myself that this is how I was designed to be, and there’s something powerful about that. Whenever I see myself in a mirror and feel those critical thoughts creeping up, I practice thinking about my existence in a broader scope. I have to intentionally choose not to focus on things I’d like to change in that small moment in time, and instead focus on devoting my energy to practices that will benefit me in the long term– like telling myself that I am beautiful. Rather than zero-ing in on aspects of my physical self that I’d like to improve, I have to remind myself of my strength and be grateful for the many things that my very capable body can do for me.
This new normal has its difficult moments, but at the end of the day I hold so much gratitude for the respect I am able to give my body now, and how much it is giving me as a result. I no longer have to ask myself, “Why am I tired all the time?” or “If I eat this food right now, what will I have to eliminate later to make up for it?” Those thought cycles were so enveloping that I didn’t realize there was an alternative until I was out of it. But now, instead of trapping myself in that mindspace, I find myself consciously– after almost every meal – feeling overwhelmed with joy by the fact that I can enjoy food again.
