The Right way to guide Fitness & Nutrition

Have you come across a friend whom you haven’t met in a while, you exchange warm greetings and that’s when she notices that something is has changed about your appearance and it strikes to her so much, to ask:

“Hey you have lost so much weight! So happy to see you like this! I myself have been trying to lose weight over a period of time but I couldn’t make progress! How did you lose your weight? Can you tell me the secret?”

Every single person who achieved a decent weight loss would definitely come across this situation because be it friend, relative or any other person who just knows you a bit, loss of weight never goes unnoticed!

Now, it’s natural for someone who has lost weight to be proud of their efforts. You deserve to flaunt it. So we tend to get carried away, and broadcast your personal routine to everyone who asks you!

But all you gotta do is:

Refer to the nutritionist / personal coach / dietitian who made you lose weight… Yes! That’s the right way to actually help others instead of forwarding your food schedule or asking your friend to follow the exercises your trainer made you to do. I totally get the great thought behind that, but unfortunately it’s not the right way to help. When someone asks you that question, at the moment they blindly trust your words, not just because of it’s you, but it is because they are mesmerized with your transformation. So they blindly follow you. Let’s look at all the problems associated with starting a fitness journey straight out of another person’s book

1. Every human body is not the same:

Every human body is different.

Your friend may look the way you used to look before your transformation. She may be the same height, weight and her features may resemble the way you used to be. So you may think what worked for you, will work for her.

Of course, most foods in your plan would have been healthy and eating healthy foods is anyway a great step in your life. But it’s a half measure so along with the foods, you must also consider suggesting the nutritionist who you hired when you achieved it because your friend may look very normal to you, but she might have never told you about her health histories like history of kidney stone, familial history of diabetic, cardiovascular disorders.

She might not even be aware of her own health status unless she finds herself thyroid positive after her dietitian suggestion. So a diet differs from the health history of a person starting from depression, anxiety, peptic ulcer, asthma, thyroid, PCOD …the diet plan changes for everyone.

A simple example is: a person who is taking thyroid medicines can’t include cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, kale in their diet on a daily basis or in huge quantities because it may affect the thyroid medicine which the patient regularly follows.

But, cruciferous vegetables are a part of a healthy and balanced diet. So here, the nutritionist should decide how much quantity it must be given to that particular client for a particular day / week. So when your diet plan has these vegetables and you forward the same plan to your friend who has thyroid, you are not helping her and may even have some bad results. Let’s respect the uniqueness of each body and keep this rule in mind.

2. Same diet plan will not work for everyone:

Here we are going to discuss about the calorie deficit:

A calorie deficit is the number of calories you need to eat in a day to lose weight compared to the calories to maintain your weight

In other words, “caloric deficit is any shortage in the amount of calories consumed relative to the amount of calories required for maintenance of current body weight”

So if your nutritionist provides you a schedule for 300 calorie less per day for your calorie deficit diet and if that’s exactly the right amount for maintenance, she will experience no weight loss with the plan, and might even lose faith in losing weight through diet plans.

3. Same exercise programs don’t work for different people:

You might have lost weight with random video references without having any injury. But you are risking your muscles and bones during the entire program, which might not affect you immediately. You will get to know and monitor your own postural defects only when you hire a personal trainer.

I don’t mean to say everyone has postural defects but some of the postural defects might not be identified by people on their own but only with the qualified person.

So even if you had great results from your exercise program, you end up risking whomever you recommend it to even more because that person may not grasp the right way to do the exercise from these videos. An exercise done the wrong way will not just come in the way of progress but can also lead to injuries.

Instead if you suggest them a personal trainer, he/she knows how to identify and potentially improve postural deviations that may help individuals prevent injury, improve balance, and increase strength

Let’s dive in some more into the relevant and important topics.

Posture: Proper posture helps us stand, walk, sit, and lie in positions that do not strain supporting muscles and ligaments and allows muscles to function

Deviations from a neutral spine are caused by many factors, including repetitive movements, awkward positions (such as a habitual slouched posture), side dominance, fatigue, or a lack of joint stability or mobility —all of which are correctable factors.

Non-correctable factors include congenital conditions, some pathologies, structural deviations, or traumas (e.g., surgery, injury, or amputation). Any deviation can lead to pain, compensations, and/or dysfunctional movement patterns

Below are some examples of typical postural deviations:

• Kyphosis
• Swayback, also called lordosis
• Flatback
• Forward head posture

These are some basic postural defects, there are many other defects which can be corrected with the help of a trainer

As being a trainer, I strongly make my clients to focus on the postural corrections followed by their weight loss program

Once this is done, the fitness program will be designed according to the goal, ability, intensity and availability of the client and trust me, that’s the best way to become healthy and fit instead of random video references. The online videos are targeted at a general audience, but only a trainer can make it personalized and help you reach your goal faster.

4. Say goodbye to buzzwords

Saying keto, paleo is cool. Intermittent fasting sounds so precious. Beyond that, people experiment with all kinds of crazy, unhealthy diets to lose weight:

eating cotton balls soaked in orange juice, intentionally ingesting tapeworms, and surviving on only grapefruit, to name a few.

Let’s actually visit what a keto diet means. Unlike other fad diets, “the high-fat, low-carb keto diet involves putting the body into a natural metabolic state called ketosis, in which the body burns fat for fuel instead of glucose.” Although this metabolic state is a generally safe way to help you lose weight, it can be very difficult to maintain and also has numerous associated risks like heart diseases, nutritional deficiency, constipation, mood swings, liver & kidney problems.

The popular low-carb diets (such as Atkins or Paleo) modify a true keto diet. But they come with the same risks if you overdo it on fats and proteins and lay off the carbs.

Eating a restrictive diet, no matter what the plan, is difficult to sustain. Once you resume a normal diet, the weight will likely return

So it is always best to go with a customized diet plan scheduled by a qualified person to have a sustainable diet instead of directly jumping into diets like keto or paleo.

5. Never ask your gym/personal trainer about diet plan, before asking their credentials:

In India, a personal trainer is typically a self-employed individual who has undergone a fitness training program and earned a certificate. They aren’t required to have a license to operate. A nutritionist or registered dietitian (RD) has a degree in health and nutrition and is accredited by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

RDs and nutritionists have spent years studying the human body, learning about proper nutrition, anatomy, and more to provide medically-sound diet advice. Personal trainers, no matter how skilled or well-intentioned, do not have this level of medical knowledge

Personal trainers can suggest a dietitians or nutritionists, but they can’t schedule a plan for you because your diet impacts everything. From your energy level to the appearance of your skin, eating right is about so much more than merely counting calories.

10 years back when I entered the gym, even I made the same mistake by asking a fitness trainer a diet plan for myself, he handed over a paper from a bundle of printed schedule. After looking at the plan it made me realize that it will never be sustainable and from then onwards I started to explore how I can understand the basics of nutrition and here I am, qualified enough to train a client in a healthy way, and still pursuing more certifications to upgrade my own health and fitness and for the betterment of my clients.

So to drive the point home, instead of asking a diet plan from your fitness trainer, you can ask his credentials because there might be a possibility of your coach being a qualified person in nutrition as well, which can be a great win-win. But if they’re not, it can cancel any wins from the exercise you may get.

In conclusion, these 5 thoughts are very important and crucial for starting the right fitness journey, be it yours, or for your cared ones, or even for your clients. Let’s eliminate the risk of just forwarding things, and leave it to the experts, and grow fit the right way. Your loved ones will love you even more because you truly lead them to their goals.

– Coach Dr. Sruthi Ramesh