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What is "Healthy"?
During my 17 plus years at the Co-op, I’ve heard the questions, “Is this healthy?” “Is this good for you?” I didn’t know how to answer these questions for a long time. Some folks have confidently told me what the healthiest diet is (vegan, paleo, Mediterranean, keto…) and the results they’ve experienced with it. There were other people who had been told by their doctor that they needed to eat healthier but were given little information, so they headed to the Co-op and had so many questions!
My desire to answer these questions along with my own passion for nutrition prompted me to become a Nutritional Therapy Practitioner. I chose this particular route because it aligned with what I had discovered during my own natural foods health journey. The whole food, ancestral health approach connected a lot of dots for me and gave me a format and language to begin to answer those questions.
What is Nutritional Therapy?
Nutritional Therapy is a foundational, holistic approach to wellness that focuses on allowing the body to come into balance through a properly prepared, nutrient-dense, whole food diet and well-balanced lifestyle. It acknowledges bio-individuality–the fact that each individual has genetic, ancestral, geographical factors combined with preferences, lifestyle and previous experience with foods that determines an individual’s unique nutritional needs. What makes one person thrive may make another person sick.
There is no one-size-fits-all “healthy” diet. In Nutritional Therapy, we focus on six areas that are foundational to everyone:
- varied, properly-prepared, nutrient dense, WHOLE FOOD DIET
- optimize DIGESTION
- BLOOD SUGAR balance
- essential FATTY ACID balance
- MINERAL status
- HYDRATION
"Figuring out our own bio-individual diet is a journey in self-discovery and self love. It is about getting in touch with ourselves and the foods we eat. It’s about owning what’s right for our own bodies and not judging others for what they eat."
Down with Diet Culture
An important thing to acknowledge is the huge negative impact diet culture has made. It has equated weight loss with health which for a lot of people has meant that thinner is healthier. This is pervasive in the media and it has led to a culture of disordered eating. It has encouraged people to value what their body looks like over everything else. It has people categorizing foods as “good” or “bad” and then applying those words to themselves for eating those foods (I feel compassion for people when they say “I’m being bad today…” because of something they are eating.)
Diet culture normalizes looking outside of ourselves for how much to eat (calorie counting) and ignoring our body’s cues. It disregards that healthy eating can and should be joyful. I could go on and on! The biggest issue I have with diet culture is that the motivating factor of changing to a healthier diet is often to lose weight.
I would like to propose that if we care for our bodies in a holistic way by eating a bio-individualized whole food diet, including movement, sufficient sleep and reduce our stress, we will support our body’s innate wisdom and have healthy bodies. This often leads to dropping unnecessary weight that our body was hanging on to. Weight loss is a common side effect to a healthy lifestyle as well as a clearer mind, more energy, reduction of inflammation and improved skin.
Figuring out our own bio-individual diet is a journey in self-discovery and self love. It is about getting in touch with ourselves and the foods we eat. It’s about owning what’s right for our own bodies and not judging others for what they eat.
In future posts, I will go deeper into how you can support the foundations for health to lead to a healthier body.
In the meantime, ask yourself the following questions:
What do you think are the healthiest foods to eat and why?
What do you think are the most unhealthy foods?
When was the last time you really enjoyed your entire meal?
What are some specific nostalgic food memories you have?
What kind of diet culture messages have you adopted?
Jolie Laudicina
Nutrition & Wellness Educator, Sacramento Natural Foods Co-op
This information is intended for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice.
Consult your physician or healthcare provider.
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