“For far too long, women have been pressured to cut calories, exercise solely for weight loss, and prioritize being smaller at any cost. This harmful narrative has led to widespread energy deficits among women… It’s time to shift the goal from smaller to stronger.”

Mindbodygreen, a comprehensive health and wellness platform, posted this message on LinkedIn earlier this month with an infographic that read: “After a lifetime of being told to eat less, stick to cardio, and ultimately shrink themselves, women are filling up their plates, picking up weights, and stepping into their power.”

Praise God.

Shifting Consciousness

A shift is happening in our collective consciousness. As much as we are inundated with scary statistics and stories about chronic disease and mental health—facts and issues that, yes, absolutely warrant attention—good things are happening too.

Among those is the recognition of biochemical individuality and the growing movement toward a focus on all facets that affect human health.

Biochemical individuality is an aspect of science that acknowledges diversity and accounts for how genetics, lifestyle and environment contribute to an individual’s nutritional needs (Neustadt & Pieczenik, 2007). It underpins bio-individuality, which is a core concept in functional medicine and functional nutrition.

“There is no one perfect way of eating that works for everybody,” explain Karr et al. (2023) in Our Journey With Food.

“Each person has particular needs for their health according to age, constitution, gender, size, lifestyle and ancestry. When discussing bio-individuality, we are talking about all the ancestral, environmental, and cultural influences surrounding a person,” they say (Karr et al., 2023, p. 424).

What We Know

Cultural influences are at the heart of the message from mindbodygreen.

We know that low energy availability (LEA) is an issue for women. A 2022 narrative review reported that 81% of female collegiate athletes and performing artists across disciplines including equestrian, volleyball, softball, beach volleyball, ballet and soccer were classified as having LEA as one case in point (Jagim et al., 2022).

We know that that osteoporosis and the prevalence of low bone mass (the precursor to osteoporosis) is far greater among women than men. Data from the 2017-2018 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey show that osteoporosis at the hip, spine or both affects 19.6% of women compared to 4.4% of men. Likewise, low bone mass affects 51.5% of women compared to 33.5% with trends in prevalence indicating a growing differential between genders (Sarafrazi et al., 2021).

We also know that physical activity, particularly when coupled with resistance training, helps improve bone mineral density (BMD) and therefore protects against osteoporosis and bone mineral loss. A 2017 randomized controlled trial including 101 women ages 60 to 70, showed that high-intensity resistance and impact training improved BMD outcomes compared to home-based, low-intensity exercise (Watson et al., 2018). Studies with similar findings abound.

We know the science and we see the trends. Yet, when we circle back to culture, bio-individuality and the narrative stated by mindbodygreen, we need to acknowledge that simply knowing the science is not enough to yield necessary radical change.

Calories and Fashion Trends: An Odd Pairing

How Calorie Counting Evolved

This past spring, Smithsonian Magazine published the story of Lulu Hunt Peters in a fascinating article that traced the evolution of the calorie and how calorie counting came into vogue. In the article, Peters, a rare female doctor for her time having earned a medical degree from the University of California in 1909, is credited with the “novel insight” of looking at calories in the context of weight loss as opposed to healthy weight gain (Stacey, 2024).

Prior, calories were applied to the emerging field of nutrition science in the context of protecting against malnutrition, improving dietary health, and giving people the chance to choose food based on “physiological fuel values” (Stacey, 2024, para. 8).

More striking is that calories, in their infancy, had no relation to food or nutrition at all. The metric was first identified by a French chemist and physicist, Nicolas Clément, who used it to measure heat that could be converted to energy (Stacey, 2024).

“Clément was not concerned with food or body weight, but with how to measure the steam energy needed to operate engines,” says the article’s author, Micelle Stacey (2024, para. 6).

Ironically, when calories did enter the conversation in relation to nutrition science and dietary health, it was based on premise that the body is like a machine and also burns fuel to make energy (Stacey, 2024).

Fashion and Female Physique

Just as we see calories and weight loss falling in line as early as 1909-1910, the concept of small body size as a cultural ideal goes back to the 1920s.

“A tsunami of social transformations had been building from the turn of the century, including a shifting cultural preference from the curvy Gibson Girl of the 1890s to a whittled-down, boyish silhouette that would become the 1920s flapper,” explains Stacy (2024, para. 13).

Long story short, we essentially moved away from seeing “plumpness” as a sign of wealth and abundance to “slenderness” as a sign of affluence and status and, as a result, taking the sought after center stage.

Bio-individuality and How Coaching Fits In

Karr et al. (2023) created a fantastic graphic showing how relationships, perspective, lifestyle and wellbeing contribute to bio-individuality and impact action and change. When we talk about health, each cornerstone matters and underscores how there is no “right” way to eat for best health.

In the context of peak performance coaching, bio-individuality inherently aligns with the Co-Active principles of 1) focus on the whole person and 2) people are naturally creative, resourceful and whole (Co-Active Training Institute, n.d.).

The mindbodygreen message to women to fill up their plates, lift weights and shift mindset from smaller to stronger is needed and clear.

Yet, when aspects of culture like cutting calories for weight loss and shape and body ideals date back to the early 1900s, they are deeply etched into our psyches and can therefore be difficult to change. When put into practice, the messaging needs more support.

In coaching, we hold up a mirror. We partner with clients, utilize active listening and establish an environment of safety and trust. Compassion and empathy are prerequisites, as well as the willingness to challenge to evoke awareness and facilitate meaningful growth and change.

In practice, challenging can mean shedding light on a belief that has been holding you back.

I will never forget the day that my former high-performance coach, in the year leading up to my World Championship win, called me out when I said that I wasn’t a racer.

“What do you mean you’re ‘not a racer?’” she exclaimed!

I can still hear her words. I can still see her smile. It was a moment that may just have changed the trajectory of my elite rowing career.

Success, Action and Change

At the close of their chapter on bio-individuality, Karr et al. (2023) talk about being proactive and building your team. Success does not happen in a vacuum. Reaching big health and performance goals does not happen without intention and conscious support. Meaningful, long-lasting change, no matter how big or small, does not happen by accident or without earned confidence, willingness, commitment and time.

When you think about your best self or vision of health, what does it look like? What factors are having an impact? Who and what is there to support you? What might be derailing you? What beliefs might you need to challenge or change?

Happy training, my friends! Cheers to good health and strong bodies and minds.

Please reach out with questions, comments or other topics of interest.

References

Co-Active Training Institute. (n.d.). What Is Co-Active? Retrieved July 22, 2024, from https://coactive.com/about/what-is-coactive

Jagim, A. R., Fields, J., Magee, M. K., Kerksick, C. M., & Jones, M. T. (2022). Contributing Factors to Low Energy Availability in Female Athletes: A Narrative Review of Energy Availability, Training Demands, Nutrition Barriers, Body Image, and Disordered Eating. Nutrients, 14(5), 986. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu14050986

Karr, T. J., Bell, K., & Guptha, L. S. (2023). Our Journey with Food (3rd ed.). Summerland Publishing.

Neustadt, J., & Pieczenik, S. (2007). The Important Role of Biochemical Individuality. Integrative Medicine, 6(3), 38-39.

Sarafrazi, N., Wambogo, E. A., & Shepherd, J. A. (2021). Osteoporosis or Low Bone Mass in Older Adults: United States, 2017-2018. NCHS data brief, (405), 1–8. https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/103477

Stacey, M. (2024, June). This Doctor Pioneered Counting Calories a Century Ago, and We’re Still Dealing With the Consequences. Smithsonian Magazine. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/doctor-pioneered-counting-calories-century-ago-were-still-dealing-with-consequences-180984282/

Watson, S. L., Weeks, B. K., Weis, L. J., Harding, A. T., Horan, S. A., & Beck, B. R. (2018). High-Intensity Resistance and Impact Training Improves Bone Mineral Density and Physical Function in Postmenopausal Women With Osteopenia and Osteoporosis: The LIFTMOR Randomized Controlled Trial. Journal of bone and mineral research : the official journal of the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research, 33(2), 211–220. https://doi-org.pacificcollege.idm.oclc.org/10.1002/jbmr.3284