The 3 P's that no student athletes are talking about and how they are actually critical indicators of health and performance.
Diane Johnson
Empowering youth athletes with simple and strategic nutrition & wellness support.
An easy 4 minute read today.
Our bodies are highly intelligent and amazing and we don’t often realize that they are in constant communication with us. They give us feedback and information all of the time!?
Student athletes are taught from a young age to do more, push harder, push through the pain. Through this mentality, they are basically taught to ignore the messages that their body is sending them. This, paired with their highly scheduled and fast paced lifestyle means that most have no idea how to listen to their body.?
If you've been following along, you'll know that I tend to think about nutrition for student athletes differently.
PS - If you don’t regularly follow, you can do that easily at?Diane Johnson
Over the years, as life has moved faster and technological advances have given us quicker solutions to ‘body inconveniences’, we’ve forgotten how our body communicates with us.?
Luckily we can learn!
Our body gives us quick, consistent and deeply informative feedback every day through the 3 P’s. And helping student athletes understand these messages should be a priority.?
The only thing is, these 3 P's tend to be things that ‘we don’t talk about’.???
It’s just not ‘done’
It’s yucky.?
And sometimes even shameful.
(We help student athletes get curious about the messages their body is sending them at GUTS.)
The 1st P is PEE!
Most student athletes don’t think about it much.
But every time they pee, they are given information from their body about their hydration status (among other things).
PEE (aka urine) that is lightly coloured to clear-ish and that doesn’t have a really strong ‘pee’ smell, indicates a good hydration status.?
On the other hand, if a student athlete notices that their urine is darker than usual and has a stronger odor (they probably also could notice they haven't been going to the bathroom as often) then the message they can take from this is that they are dehydrated and need to consume more water.?
Quick.?
Simple.
And actionable.?
Just look in the toilet.?
Improving hydration status is one of the simplest and most important factors to improving health and performance in school and sport.?
(If you're a Coach who needs some guidance or a resource to follow to engage your athletes in this conversation, check out The Coaches' Easy Nutrition Playbook.)
The second ‘P’ is POOP! ??
Again, this is something that student athletes do every day that provides quick, reliable information IF they consider it that way (which most don't).
**(If pooping daily isn't happening, consider this an important message to receive.)
Bowel movements, despite being something we don’t like to talk about, offer a wide variety of insights as to what is going on in our digestive system. Changes in bowel movements may also coincide with other sensations or unpleasant feelings in the belly which we can also receive as messages from our body.?
These are really, REALLY important messages to help student athletes tune into! The health of the digestive system will determine how efficiently they are able to extract nutrients from food which are key to both their overall health and their performance in sport.?
If you've been experiencing digestive symptoms and you are nervous to talk to someone about it, please reach out. Those conversations are where my own nutrition journey started. Your poop stories won't phase me. ??
Email me at [email protected]
Unfortunately, because talking about poop isn’t really the norm, if things aren’t running smoothly, these messages tend to get ignored, pushed away and avoided. The root of the problem is typically left unattended which can lead to greater issues arising down the road.?
Think about it from your body’s perspective. Your body can’t communicate to you in words, but it uses symptoms like…
To alert you that something isn’t quite right.?
Learning how to see these ‘inconveniences’ as information, normalizing conversations about these critical body functions and taking time to investigate and address their root cause is truly a vital and missing piece of our healthcare and sport nutrition models.?
After going 1 or 2, turn around, look in the toilet, really notice what you see and get curious about what your body is trying to tell you.?
And if there is a message there for you that perhaps something isn’t quite right, get help digging into your eating routine and nutrition habits because food has a direct impact on and correlation to the health of the digestive system.?
(If you need some help de-coding your body's messages, DM me.)
The health of this system impacts EVERYTHING else.?
The 3rd P is PERIOD.
This obviously applies to female student athletes and is something even less talked about and more shameful than poop.?
Despite what the media, movies, tv and most mainstream discussions about menstruation would have you believe, a woman’s monthly period is pretty freaking important and totally normal.
Life as we know it wouldn’t be possible on this planet without it.?
It’s not dirty.?
It’s not wrong.?
And it offers us a TON of information about or overall health.?
Unfortunately this is a tricky one because the typical response to any kind of monthly discomfort, heavy or light periods, acne, mood shifts and other ‘inconveniences’ that young developing females experience is some form of birth control.?
And it’s often prescribed before young women ever have a chance to...?
Just like every other body system, the reproductive system requires key nutrients and energy to function optimally. It is normal for females to experience cravings, fatigue, mild cramping, and emotional changes during the course of their monthly cycle.
However, if their period becomes very heavy or stops, if they notice clotting or changes in color, if cramping worsens or mood swings become more intense, these again can all be received as messages from their body that attention is required.?
Young women should be encouraged to KNOW what their cycle looks and feels like.
Amenorrhea (or sensation of the monthly period) in particular is a direct indicator that the body is in need of energy and nutrients and is a concern in the sporting world.
Many female student athletes experience amenorrhea when their activity level is high and their nutritional intake does not meet the needs of their body. In this energy deficient state, their highly intelligent body essentially chooses non-essential systems to ‘turn off’ so that energy can be directed to more critical systems.?
Being diagnosed with Amenorrhea can leave female student athletes feeling like they’ve failed at maintaining their athletic performance and health needs. What we need to do again is normalize the conversation around menstruation so that female athletes can notice changes early on and receive this as communications from their body that they can start to address or get help they need to do so.?
In the case of Amenorrhea (and most other menstrual complaints) nutrition is a contributing factor.
And this is just one of the many reasons that I advocate for more discussion around nutrition and health for student athletes everywhere.
(PS - just because male athletes don't have periods, doesn't' meant that their hormones and reproductive systems aren't impacted by a lack of nutrition.)
It's time to change our thinking around these important body processes and help student athletes have a deeper connection with their bodies so they can use the information that it gives them every day to elevate their health and performance to new heights.?
(This is a part of our conversation in the GUTS 6 week interactive program. Email me to register [email protected])
'Listening to the body' isn't the norm anymore.
And it might sound fluffy or weird to a student athlete who has come up through their sport pushing their body through all kinds of experiences and sensations.
But that doesn't mean we shouldn't start the conversation.
When you are ready, there are a few ways that I can help you.
Until next week.
~ Diane
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