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Casey's blog

Ep 13. Fitness & Womxn’s Blood Rites: Tracking Menses, Not Macros and Embracing Menopause with Rachelle Ballard-Clayton

8/7/2020

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​There is a lack of representation of women aged 40+ in fitness. Rachelle Ballard-Clayton is shifting that pattern by basing her approach to training womxn on their shifting internal landscape and cyclical patterns.


​In this episode:
  • A little pre-interview solo ramble on systemic racism and unrecognised privilege in yoga/wellness/spirituality worlds
  • Training womxn and running a fitness business, without body transformations or weight loss challenges (!)
  • The importance of strength training – as opposed to just cardio and yoga - for womxn, especially those over 30 years of age
  • Movement and the menstrual cycle: adapting your training to the hormonal fluctuations of one’s menstrual cycle - or mood cycle for peri-menopausal womxn
  • What movement might look like for a midlife womxn 
  • Why we might find ourselves at this stage of life feeling less likely to move, more burnt out than ever and what we can do about that
  • Throwing all expectations of what we should be doing out the window
  • Understanding what our bodies are doing by tracking cycles
  • How to work with and not against your body 
  • Why some weight gain around menopause is normal and protective
  • “Focus on what you can do, and understand YOU better”

​PLUS, some post interview-thoughts on:
  • Rites of Passage in womxn’s lives, also known as the blood mysteries – menarche, childbirth, menopause
  • The phenomenal benefits womxn get from strength training
  • Better indicators of fitness than six pack or how lean you are
  • “Does weight training make you bulky?” 
  • #YogaEveryDamnDay – with no other form of movement - is non-sensical
  • What yoga is missing that strength training can provide
  • What my own personal movement practice looks like

About Rachelle:
​Rachelle Ballard-Clayton owns MEE Active a Womxn’s health and movement coaching practice on the Gold Coast, Australia and delivers her programs worldwide. She creates a safe space for midlife womxn to step off the sidelines & connect deeply with their mind & body.

Rachelle's Website, Instagram & Facebook

Resources mentioned:
  • Wild Power by Alexandra Pope
  • The Optimised Woman by Miranda Grey
  • The work of Jane Hardwicke-Collings
  • Casey's articles on why strength training is especially helpful for breastfeeding women here and here
  • Will Lifting Weights Make Me Bulky?

Support the show!

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Ep 10. Gym Culture without Weight Loss Challenges: Bringing HAES®, Intuitive Eating and Body Positivity into Fitness

28/4/2020

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Gym culture can be incredibly toxic for people struggling with body image and eating concerns. Monique Jephcote, APD, PT and Intuitive Eating Counsellor, is infusing weight-neutral principles into the fitness world with compassion, respect and gusto.
​

In this episode:
  • How and why Monique opened her non-diet private practice soon after graduating
  • HAES just makes sense: “Every single body deserves dignity and respect” (and weight loss dietetics is SO boring!)
  • Monique’s lived experience of disordered eating recovery from her days as a competitive bodybuilder (including the fun, sassy “Beyonce” side of things)
  • “We get obsessed with food when we’re under-eating”
  • How Monique never disliked her body as much as she did when she was closest to society’s ideal body shape
  • The contrast in body diversity and body acceptance between the bodybuilding VS powerlifting scenes
  • The myriad ways diet culture manifests in the gym setting
  • On being a non-diet dietitian in a gym, and dealing respectfully with weight-centric fitness professionals: “We don’t know what we don’t know”
  • The way Monique is challenging perspectives on weight and health in the gym world
  • The importance of informed consent, body autonomy and compassion regardless of whether clients take a weight-centric or weight-neutral approach
  • Low energy availability or RED-S (Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport), Hypothalamic Amenorrhoea in female athletes, and the problem with dismissing menstrual disturbances as “just what happens to active women”
  • Monique’s experiences with Vipassana meditation, and where this fits in with her work as a dietitian and fitness professional
Links:
  • Monique's Instagram
  • The Intuitive Dietitian on Facebook
  • Monique's website
  • Support the show by becoming a Patreon!
​
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Ep 7. Motherload: warrior mama musings for womxn who Nurture

13/3/2020

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In this solo episode, I riff about the ups and downs of motherhood, and my personal experience as a (mostly) work at home mum.
​

In this episode:
  • Being a mum is amazing, and it's also hard
  • The impact of parenthood on my friendships and relationships
  • How the Mother and the Warrior archetypes are one and the same
  • My experiences with extended breastfeeding, tandem breastfeeding and co-sleeping
  • The insane expectations and judgements placed on mums, whether you’re a stay at home, a working mum or somewhere in between
  • Earth mamas VS Creative Rainbow mamas
  • My top 6 tips for nurturing ourselves as mothers / womxn / carers
  • How it takes a village. And even then it's not easy.

Links:
The Mother and the Warrior
I'm no Earth mama, and it's OK
​Why most mums need to eat more calories and carbs
The magic and medicine of mugwort
How the "Sexy, Successful, Spiritual Woman" ideal hurts us
My article discussing Aliens and intuitive eating

Support the podcast at the Non-Diet Yogi Patreon!
​
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Ep 6. HAES® Naturopathy with Chandrika Gibson

27/2/2020

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A Health at Every Size (HAES®)-informed, weight neutral practice is old school naturopathy in its best sense. In this interview with Chandrika Gibson, ND we take a deep dive into HAES naturopathy and yoga therapy.
​
In this episode:
  • The co-opting of wellness to sell stuff and the accessibility issues this creates
  • Differences between health, wellness and wellbeing
  • The problematic belief that living a “clean” lifestyle guarantees you won’t get sick
  • Healthism
  • “Wellness is about the direction you’re facing” - you can live with chronic illness and still have high level wellness
  • The trouble with naturopaths (!)
  • How qualified naturopaths can set themselves apart from under-qualified people with questionable training (hint: client-centred practice!)
  • Homeopathy, reiki, and “meeting the client where they are at”
  • Navigating a client’s desire to follow extreme diets for cancer
  • Why a HAES-informed, weight neutral practice is "old school naturopathy in its best sense"
  • Yoga therapy and the koshas
  • Finding truly body inclusive and accessible yoga 
  • Chandrika’s research in head and neck cancer and her lived experience with skin cancer

​Links:
Support the show at the Non-Diet Yogi Patreon

Chandrika's personal Facebook page, Surya Health and Wisdom Yoga Institute
​

Chandrika's articles on Medium:
The Trouble With Naturopaths
Body Positive Yoga
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Ep 4. Yoga Guru ≠ Nutrition Guru: The Cult of the Unqualified Wellness Expert

26/1/2020

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Yoga teachers, please stop giving terrible dietary advice to your students. This episode is based on an article I wrote in 2017. You will also hear my two year-old mumbling in the background. Whatcha gonna do.

In this episode:
  • That time I gave terrible nutritional advice
  • Why people ask yoga teachers for nutritional advice
  • Some of the crappy nutritional advice yoga teachers pass on to their students
  • The perils of getting nutrition advice from a yoga teacher, personal trainer, or health coach
  • The likely prevalence of disordered eating in yoga circles
  • MLM health products in yoga studios
  • Even when yoga teachers are also nutritionists, be careful!
  • Where to go for safe, individualised dietary guidance

​LINKS:
Original blog post:
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/blog/yoga-teachers-please-stop-giving-terrible-dietary-advice-to-your-students

Funky Forest Health & Wellbeing - online non-diet nutrition consulting services and in-person yoga classes

Grab your copy of my e-book The Modern Yogi's BS-Free Guide to Wellbeing

Funky Forest Health & Wellbeing Facebook page

Casey's Instagram

Support the show at Non-Diet Yogi Patreon
​
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Ep 3: Ayurveda and The "C" Word

16/1/2020

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Cleansing from a western fad perspective is pure diet culture BS. But in Ayurveda the "C" word takes on a somewhat different, multifaceted meaning. This can be both problematic and refreshing depending on your perspective. 

In this episode I interview Narayana Commerford, Ayurvedic Lifestyle Consultant, Yoga Teacher, and owner of Evolution Botanicals.
In this episode:
  • How Ayurveda didn’t accompany yoga to the west, and the effects of this on contemporary yoga practice
  • Different spiritual practices (e.g. Vipassana, Tantra) are not suited to everyone
  • Everything can be medicine or harmful, depending on context
  • Your constitution informs the medicine you need
  • Diet culture vs. the introspective curiosity inherent to Ayurveda
  • Ojas, or vitality: is your “cleanse” giving you that?
  • Cleanses are effective at short-term weight loss, but not effective at long-term weight loss
  • Keeping digestion healthy is key in Ayurveda
  • Cleanses and fasting can disrupt agni and metabolism, and aggravate vata
  • The Magic Bullet Syndrome: cleanses won’t fix the lifestyle problems causing your health issues in the first place
  • Nara’s experience with chronic fatigue, discovering how stressful dieting was on his body, and how he recovered
Post-interview solo:
  • Navigating the touchy issue of Ayurvedic “cleansing” amidst the sea of diet culture and accusations of pseudo-science
  • The differences between a juice cleanse, and pancha karma or “cleansing” in the traditional Ayurvedic sense
  • Where I feel a few days of kitchari might be appropriate, and where it definitely would not be appropriate
  • Hardcore cleanses in Ayurveda

Links: 
​
Nara’s company Evolution Botanicals
Website: https://evolutionbotanicals.com.au/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/evolutionbotanicals
Instagram: @evolutionbotanicals
Non-Diet Yogi Patreon

Pre-launch waiting list for interest in Casey’s Non-Diet Ayurveda Course:
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/courses.html
​

Casey's articles on Ayurveda, TCM and Intuitive Eating
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/blog/ayurveda-tcm-intuitive-eating-or-dietary-dogma
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/blog/beyond-pitta-kapha-vata-ayurveda-tcm-intuitive-eating

Funky Forest Health & Wellbeing - online non-diet nutrition & naturopathic consulting services and in-person yoga classes

Grab your free e-book The Modern Yogi's BS-Free Guide to Wellbeing

Funky Forest Health & Wellbeing Facebook page

Instagram @nondietyogi  @caseyaconroy  @funkyforesthealth
​

Support the show
​

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Ep 2. Cleanse, Detox, Hurt: The Allure of Unhealthily Strict Diets to the Ascetic Yogi Psyche

26/12/2019

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Why is juice cleansing so popular in yoga culture? In this solo episode I take a deep dive and try to answer this question.

I also give a crash course in how detoxification actually works, and what you can do to support your body's detoxification processes without starving yourself.

In this episode:
  • What is juice cleansing? How it’s marketed vs. what’s actually going on
  • Why it’s so popular in yoga culture
  • How tapas and saucha may underlie and amplify the tendency towards spiritually-endorsed disordered eating and body dysmorphia
  • Ayurveda and juice cleansing
  • Disordered eating and eating disorders in Yogaland
  • My personal experiences with harsh yoga practices, fasting and orthorexia
  • The physiology of detoxification and how juice cleanses impede this
  • Why those initial “detox symptoms” and later, that feeling of “energised bliss” occur on a juice cleanse (it’s not what you think)
  • What you can do to safely support detoxification (if you wish to do so)
  • The next level of cray: water fasting in yoga circles

LINKS: 
My articles on Ayurveda, TCM and Intuitive Eating:
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/blog/ayurveda-tcm-intuitive-eating-or-dietary-dogma
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/blog/beyond-pitta-kapha-vata-ayurveda-tcm-intuitive-eating

A biomedical look at the physiology of detoxification, how juice cleanses impede this, and what you can do to support detoxification:
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/blog/detoxification-so-not-about-juice-fasts-colonics
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/blog/your-bodys-lifelong-detoxification-kit

My article on the stress response of restrictive eating:
https://www.funkyforest.com.au/blog/the-honeymoon-period

Funky Forest Health & Wellbeing - online non-diet nutrition consulting services and in-person yoga classes

Grab your copy of my e-book The Modern Yogi's BS-Free Guide to Wellbeing

Funky Forest Health & Wellbeing Facebook page

Casey's Instagram

Support the show at Non-Diet Yogi Patreon

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All content copyright Casey Conroy - Funky Forest Health & Wellbeing. For more information please click here to see my disclaimer.
Natural health for EVERY body. Copyright © 2019  
0432 618 279 | info@funkyforest.com.au