Dr. Kerri Fullerton ND

Intuitive Eating. Health At Every Size Doctor

Uncategorized

Why am I so Freaking Tired?!?

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I find that my patients are especially hard on themselves. They say to me “I know that if I’d just eat better and exercise that I’d feel better” as though their lack of energy is all their fault.

Know what I see?

When people are feeling better they tend to eat more nutritiously and want to move their bodies more regularly.

Before you make it all about diet and exercise, as yourself these questions:

  1. Are you eating enough? I cannot tell you how many of my patients are undernourished throughout the day. This leads to night time eating and then they restrict in the morning and start the cycle all over again. Our bodies need fuel. Most people need to eat every 3-5 hours to feel alert and energetic.
  2. Are you getting enough sleep? Not “are you getting enough to GET BY”, but enough that you wake feeling refreshed. Most people need AT LEAST 7 hours and others need up to 9 hours. If your body needs 9 hours and you’re only sleeping for 7 hours, you’re not going to be feeling your best.
  3. Have you checked on your iron levels lately? How about your insulin levels? There are many chemical contributors to your energy and alertness.

When you’re eating and sleeping enough that workout doesn’t seem so daunting. Neither does cooking dinner 😉

All I’m saying is that we tend to put the cart before the horse where diet and exercise are concerned. Your fatigue is your body’s way of telling you that something is amiss. It doesn’t matter what the latest influencer says ‘should’ be good for you. Your body will tell you what is ACTUALLY good for you.

I’m the kind of practitioner who will help you learn your body’s language, not try to tell you what’s right. My job is to be the interpreter, not the dictator.

Translate Your Body

Why I Won’t Judge You for Wanting to Lose Weight

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I’ve been accused of being anti-weight loss because of my Health At Every Size™ and Intuitive Eating approaches.

Look, I get why weight-loss seems to alluring. We live in a world that not only promotes the thin ideal, but actively rewards it as well. You don’t have to look further than your television to know that thin is valued over fat. Firstly, we don’t see average sized people, let alone large bodied people. The only time my size is on TV is in the ‘before’ picture.

As a small fat I still experience a lot of thin privilege. I can shop at most clothing stores (although my size is the first to sell out because, ya know, it’s what most of us wear) geared to adult women. I’ve never been concerned about fitting into a seat on an airplane or amusement park ride. Without these privileges would my draw to weight loss may be stronger? Maybe.

We’ve all experienced, or at the very least witnessed, the onslaught of praise that comes from pounds lost. “You look so good” “You look so healthy” “You look so happy” “Good for you. Your commitment has payed off”… our character gets praised because our bodies changed.

And of course, the flip side…either the deafening silence when weight is regained or the litany of comments ranging from pity “Oh sweetie, what happened? You were doing so well” to full on disgust “I can’t believe you’d let yourself go like this. Have you no respect?”

So yes, I get why you want to lose weight. I hold so much compassion for you. Diet culture and the thin ideal have been woven into the very fabric of our lives. To not buy in may not feel like an option.

Choosing to reject diet culture is choosing to live as a Rebel. To choose health and happiness on your own terms in the absence of intentional weight loss can feel incredibly liberating and it can also feel lonely.

So no, I won’t help you with your intentional weight loss (IWL) goals but I won’t judge you for them either.

If you find that you’ve lost weight I won’t scold you but neither will I praise you.

I choose to practice the way that I do because I like to empower my patients. Taking charge of one’s life means working with what you CAN control. Weight is not a behaviour and therefore not in your control.

Just because I don’t agree with IWL doesn’t mean that I won’t respect you for making that choice. And it doesn’t mean that I won’t be here to help support your healthcare needs.

Let’s talk about how I CAN help.

How is this legal?

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I’m reviewing some documents given to a patient by a medical doctor. The claim on the website says “weight loss maintained” and I’m like “What? Really?” 🤨

Thankfully they provided citations to this claim. Kudoos there 🙌 (PUBMED ID21673653)

Being the geek that I am, I read the research and I’ve included an image of the long-term data.

You’ll notice that the initial weight loss in year one looks pretty exciting right? That’s what we see in virtually every weight loss intervention. The first 4-12 months are pretty ‘impressive’ (for those who’re able to stick with it). This is what they use to tell you that it’s scientifically proven to work.

But then look what happens to the line. It steadily increases over the next two years so that by year three, they are ‘almost’ back to their starting weight. It’s reasonable to assume by this line and from other longer term studies to show that this like will continue to rise BEYOND the initial starting weight 🤦‍♀️

How is this legal?
Don’t we have measures for accuracy in advertising?
Do you not see this as misleading?

Is this what you imagine when you start on your weight loss journey? Is this what you call successful weight loss?

I have yet to meet anyone who wants to lose weight TEMPORARILY.

They KNOW that you’re going to gain the weight back. And they’ll sell it to you anyway 😤

Please hear me. There is NO scientifically reproducible way to KEEP you thin.

BUT! There are MANY scientifically reproducible ways to improve your health that don’t require you to go through another round of weight cycling 🎉

If you want to talk, I’m here. Connection calls are free.

Book a Connection Call

When you’re brain just won’t stop

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Back in February Patrick got Covid. Since he had to isolate we decided to let Moose spend the two weeks upstairs to keep him company. Normally Moose is not an upstairs dog. He’s a big hairy beast and upstairs is carpeted so he’s only allowed up to cuddle right before bed ie: he’s only allowed up when he’s invited to do so.

Well, after spending two weeks up there with Patrick, he kinda took a shine to being an upstairs dog. So he started to wander up there at any time of day – with or without invitation. It didn’t matter that Patrick was back at school and not up there – Moose liked being upstairs.

It took a few weeks of consistently sending him back downstairs before he understood that the rules had gone back to before. During that time this 100 lbs dog was like a ninja – he tried every which way to get upstairs without our noticing.

This is what it’s like to train your brain. 

YOU decide when you’ll worry NOT your brain. That won’t stop your brain from trying every which way to ferret it’s way in. Just like Moose kept trying to sneak his way upstairs.

It takes time. It’s annoying and frustrating.
You’ll have to be vigilant for while.
And in time, just like Moose, your brain will learn to follow the rules.
Most of the time 😉
Just like Moose, it’ll need reminders from time to time. 

Click here to read the step by step training instructions on how to train your brain to stop worrying at 3am.

You can do everything ‘right’ and still not get the outcome that you desire. That makes it hard to stay in the game. So what if you changed your focus to what is within your control?

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We’ve been told that all we need is grit and will power and we can have any outcome that we desire.

Guru’s abound with the secret formula for weight-loss, list-building, six-figure launches…you name it, it’s out there.

The trouble is, outcomes are not within our realm of control.

We can do all of the right things and still not get the outcomes that we want.

An athlete can train right and still not make the olympic team.
A musician can do all the right things and still not make it big.
An entrepreneur can follow the script and still have a launch fall flat.
You can exercise every single day and not need smaller pants.

There are too many variables outside of our control to guarantee a particular outcome.

This is why I focus on behaviours.

Behaviours are within my realm of control (my OWN behaviours anyway 😆)

This shift in focus allows me to celebrate my success based on whether or not I performed the behaviour, not on whether or not it produced a predetermined result. I can define my own parameter of success.

By not being single minded in my outcome (ie. lose xyz by such and such date), I’m able to see the many other beneficial outcomes from said behaviour. This motivates me to stay in the game instead of my self-esteem being chipped away. I’m far less likely to say eff it and let the pendulum swing way too far the other way.

This is the heart of weight-neutral care. It allows the space to focus on behaviours. After all, it’s the long-term behaviour changes that actually improve health outcomes. No one has ever achieved a long-term benefit from a week long behaviour 🤷‍♀️

Let’s chat

I blew it …

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I went for a walk on a beautiful sunny day and had the pleasure of seeing these deer. About two or three minutes later, I slipped on the ice and landed on my butt. I was not happy to say the least. I quickly got to my feet brushed myself off and carried on with my walk. From the outside it likely looked like no big deal. But what was going on inside my head was another story.

That slip could have ruined the walk – it could have ruined my day. Haven’t I said that eating a cookie ruined my day before? I mean, how many times have I eaten one cookie and then declared that it had ruined whatever day, week or month and particular plan I was following? How many times have I missed a work out and declared that I blew the training program?

The all or nothing mindset is some thing I have been actively challenging through my recovery from disordered eating and body image challenges. I heard an analogy once that went something like this: If someone stole $10 from you would you go to the bank and pull out $1430 and hand it over to them? Not likely. You see, there are 1440 minutes in every single day. When 10 minutes of day goes sideways and then we let it drag out into the rest of the day, it’s like we’re giving over the rest of our money. Or possibly seven times that much if we let that one moment ruin the week. How easily we give away our time because somebody said something unkind; because something went wrong; because I slipped on the ice; because I ate a cookie; because I skipped a work out…you get the point.

There’s a technique that I teach in my Living Life as a Rebel program called A.I.R. The A for a stands for Awareness, the I stands for Identification and the R stands for Reflection.

When I slipped on the ice I became Aware of how quickly I wanted to fall into the ‘the walk is ruined’ narrative. The awareness of that conversation in my head allowed me to reconnect with the sense of joy that I had just experienced standing there looking at those deer. I was able to reconnect
to the feeling of incredible gratitude that I had been experiencing enjoying a beautiful walk on a sunny snowy day and seeing deer right here in my neighbourhood.

If I let that go because of falling it would’ve been like handing over that additional thousand dollars because the fall took the 10 to begin with.

Now there’s a very good biological reason for this. We have something called negativity bias in our minds.

It’s a great survival strategy. It helps us remember the scary stuff to ensure that we don’t do those things again.

Knowing that that we have this natural tendency allows us to have another level of compassion and awareness for ourselves. The fall triggered my ‘reactive primitive’ brain. My awareness of that allowed my ‘thinking’ brain to take over and give a broader assessment of the situation and realize that walking the dog is not a dangerous act.

This was the Identification part of the A.I.R. I was able to identify what was triggered in me.

I’ve already described some of the Reflection part – the reframing of my thoughts to realize that the fall didn’t wipe out the gratitude. I also reflected on the idea of putting some spikes on my boots.

To extend this idea back into eating and body image work, we can become aware of the “I blew it” moments and transform them into a more compassionate reflection.
We can remember that it was just a cookie; that eating the cookie doesn’t mean anything other than we ate the cookie.
We can use self-compassion to decide that we’re not going to give away the other 1430 minutes to the cookie.
We can just let cookies be cookies.