What am I supposed to eat?

Posted on 1 September, 2017

Dr Libby Weaver is one of my favourite presenters.

She is passionate and vibrant, and she holds a firm belief that we are all able to feel better in our every day, providing sensible yet simple advice on how this can be achieved. I was fortunate enough to hear her speak as part of her last book tour and to this day, the notes I took from that talk are in the front cover of my planner – reminding me of the importance of calm and the value of health.

Dr Libby’s passion for improving people’s wellbeing is evidenced by her many books on a wide range of topics. In her most recent release What Am I Supposed to Eat? she shares her no nonsense approach to food.

We caught up with Dr Libby to delve deeper and explore what is happening with our relationship with food.

What do you think has lead to the modern day confusion in food?

 With conflicting research and everything else we read online from people sharing their individual successes, it can be challenging to know what’s right for us. I think the problem is twofold. We are bombarded with too much information and it is simply overwhelming. We’re told to make ‘healthy’ choices but that word can be used to describe anything from a low-fat yoghurt or packet of biscuits to a banana. “Nutritious” (or not) is a more accurate word to describe food.

On the other side of the coin, we’ve also lost faith in our body’s wisdom and we no longer trust that we can make decisions for ourselves that best support our health. So we go looking for answers externally. When we don’t know who to trust, but we also don’t trust ourselves, it can make things incredibly complicated.

Do you think food intolerances are on the rise, and if so, why do you think this might be?

They certainly seem to be. The field of food intolerances is one that I think we’ve really only scratched the surface of, in terms of the science and our understanding of this. It’s a complex area and there are numerous contributing factors, but one that I believe is enormously important is stress. The link between the gut and the brain is well established, and stress is known to exacerbate symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Stress can also affect the integrity of the gut wall, which acts as a selective barrier that allows the substances we need (i.e. nutrients) to move across into our bloodstream, but prevents those we don’t need (i.e. waste) from doing so. If gut health is compromised, this can affect gut barrier function and can trigger inflammation, an immune response and/or hypersensitivity to certain components of food.

There are so many different philosophies around how/what/when to eat – where should people begin?

I think it is incredibly important to remember that, while there are some core nutrition fundamentals that benefit most people, there is no one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to how we nourish our bodies. But to help people get started, a great way to strip nutrition or health information back and make sense of it all is to bring it back to the fundamentals of good health, which most health professionals, regardless of their background, agree on, such as eating more vegetables and decreasing or avoiding processed foods.

Only seven per cent of Australian adults eat the recommended minimum of five serves of vegetables daily. Eating more vegies might seem small and insignificant but it really does have an incredible impact on our health when we nourish ourselves this way.

Do you feel we are losing the joy of eating? And if so, is it possible to regain?

It breaks my heart that so many people, women especially, look at food primarily through the lens of weight loss or weight gain. And that food to them means stress, anxiety or guilt. Just imagine what your life would be like and what you could achieve if food wasn’t taking up so much of your headspace.

I believe the way we feed ourselves is the most basic form of self-care (love). It can take some time and some work to break habits that have been ingrained in us for years, but I want women to know that it’s possible to change their relationship with food, forever. For lasting change to take place, we need to change the conversation we have with ourselves. We need to prioritise our own health and see that we are worth taking care of.

If we want to improve our overall wellbeing, where should we start – the gut or the brain?

 This is a tricky one, because the gut-brain axis is bidirectional – information flows in both directions so they both affect each other. Gut health is so critical to our overall health and vitality; it’s where we absorb all of the nutrients that our body – including our brain – needs to function properly, and we are learning more and more about the influence of our gut bacteria on so many aspects of our health and wellbeing.

With that said, I think the most gold in terms of our overall wellbeing lies in exploring our beliefs and perceptions. For example, when we understand that the pressure of an out-of-control email inbox or an impending deadline is actually a perception, we can change our response, and this can be game-changing in terms of the stress that we experience on a daily basis (which can affect our food choices, as well as the brain and the gut!).

What can people expect from your “What Am I Supposed To Eat?” Tour? If they were to only have one take away from your event, what would you hope it would be?  

My What Am I Supposed to Eat? tour event is about getting to the heart of people’s biggest frustrations with food. Some people are honestly confused about what health information is accurate and helpful to their health. Other people are stuck in a cycle of eating things they know they shouldn’t but they’ve been doing it for years and don’t know where to begin to change their habits.

I want to give people a greater understanding of the biochemistry of their body, to enable them to identify which food choices will best serve their health and help them break through old paradigms of eating. If they take away just one thing, I hope they leave with the knowledge that their body has their back and that it truly is the expert on what is best for them.

If you could encourage one thing in relation to people’s approach to food – what would it be?

I cannot encourage people enough to base their food choices on nourishment. One of the traps that can lead people away from great health is seeing food only as calories. The food we eat literally becomes part of us, and it has the power to support or detract from our health. If we view it as only calories and primarily associated with burning or storing body fat, we’re potentially missing a great deal of nutrition.

If you are inspired to hear more from Dr Libby she will be speaking in Canberra on 5^th September 2017, 7-9pm at UC. Visit Dr Libby’s website to purchase tickets.