Thyroid Warrior Podcast

Food is something that we know that we should all consume. Some people consider themselves to be a "foodie" and we enjoy the past time of enjoying fine dining while others of us are like oh okay...that thing…

It's time to break things down and walk through why it's important to have a more positive outlook on food. How do we really nourish our bodies? We all have a history, meaning...we grew up eating certain foods or culturally, there are certain things that we consume. There is also something to be said about how science can teach us how to nourish our bodies as well.

In this series, we're going to go DEEP and start by explaining whole food versus processed foods. We hear that all of the time, but WHAT DOES IT MEAN????

It's time to get informed...one step at a time!

In the last episode, I asked you to break down 2019 and look at the good, the bad and the ugly.

What were some of your lessons learned from that?

For me, I realized that I really and truly need to learn how to not be so independent, and that there are people in my life that love me and want to be there for me. I had to learn how to allow them to do that. In many cases, I didn't really have a choice this year, I had to open up and I had to allow other people in.

I realized that I had to in order to move forward, I had to stop being so independent and so focused on "It's okay, I'll get through it, I'll just push through everything is going to be fine."

Yes, everything is going to be fine, but we weren't really meant to be in this world alone. I really truly can't even begin to describe to you how much easier things became when I got out of my own way and allowed other people to be there for me.

I also had a goal for myself this year. I wanted to be in the best shape of my life.

I don't think I've ever done anything like that before in terms of setting a goal like that, and trust me, it was it was a BIG goal. I've never stuck to a goal the way I stuck to this one before.

I'm looking forward to seeing what 2020 is going to hold in terms of my health goals that I have for myself.

It's your turn. I want you to set some goals...goals that are kind of scary to you. I will warn you...the path to accomplishing those goals is going to be hard, it's going to be frustrating. However, once you accomplish those goals, it will be so rewarding.

I can't wait to see what you come up with. Come say hi @joyfulebony on all social media platforms. You can also check out my website at joyfulebony.com

Take care!

Hello friends,

We are in the final stretch.

I want to do an exercise with you:

I want you to write down the good, the bad, and the ugly that happened in 2019.

Now, here's why we're doing this..we have a bad habit of not celebrating how far we've come. For many of us, we're still experiencing symptoms, or there are a lot of things that you have to work on or get better at. Or you still may not feel as good as you think you should feel at this point.

It's really hard to evaluate and acknowledge how far we've come and when I think about this, I get a little emotional because Facebook in particular has been sharing memories with me. In the last six months, I'm starting to see the posts that I was writing…Many of the posts that I was created were related to symptoms and issues of my thyroid disease, many of which I did not know were symptoms, but now that I'm looking at them on that others ide of health, it just makes me emotional.

Now, I've learned to celebrate how far I've come. So much has happened this year.

I want you to take some time to really ponder these things. Dig deep because 2020 is going to be an amazing year for all of us. I promise you, once you continue to put in the work to be the very best version of you, you will start to notice how many doors open and how much changes for you.

The question that I often ask myself, and what I want to pose to you is, "how do you get the most out of your grocery shopping experience"? I shop online most of the time because going into grocery stories can sometimes throw me off completely.

If you haven't tried out Amazon Fresh, highly recommend it, or a lot of grocery stores now are offering meal delivery services,. Know that you may have to pay a slight premium for some of those things, but it can save so much time!

In this episode, I want to share with you some of my strategies for grocery shopping:

• When I go grocery shopping, I either go early in the morning, or I go later in the evening.
• I plan out my meals and then I write down the ingredients for the meals. Due to this, I'm laser focused, and I go in and get exactly what I want, AFTER I've made sure I've eaten something, which brings me to my next point.
• EAT BEFORE YOU GO GROCERY SHOPPING.
• I tend to stay on the outside of the grocery store because that's where my produce and protein sources can be. I spend most of my time on the outside of the store, but also, the inside of the store isn't bad.
• I get a lot of my frozen fruits/vegetables and dried beans/rice from the inside of the store, so don't count it out. Sometimes bulk items are on the inside of the store as well.

Bottom line, you can do it. It may take a little bit of practice to get through a few successful trips, but I believe in you!

Tag me @joyfulebony across all social media platforms and show me your grocery store trip!

Now that you've actually gone through the process of figuring out what you can eat, how to make the most out of grocery shopping, here are some tips to help you with that:

• Write down your meals and think about themes based upon the preferences of you or your family (Meatless Monday, Taco Tuesday, etc.).
• You all know Pinterest is my best friend, so once I figured out which anti inflammatory foods were good for me and I found a way to make other foods fit.
• • Here are some boards that I recommend:

Vegetarian Recipes

https://pin.it/k3wn4xfqx72gj6

Gluten Free Dishes

https://pin.it/xzoacvn4wa7fby

Vegan Recipes

https://pin.it/zxnyop72qxvfh3

Food for Your Thyroid

https://pin.it/x5vieclgfrbkyj

• Once you get in the habit of figuring out what you can eat, you can also learn how to pair foods together to build a nutrient dense plate!

Hopefully this will help you get started!

Also, if you want someone to walk you through all of this step by step, I am happy to announce that I am now offering 1:1 and small group coaching. Spaces are limited, so don't delay!

You can fill out the application at joyfulebony.com/app

Figuring out what to eat can be a challenge….there's so much to consider; however, once you have figured out what you can have, then the next step is how to get started without breaking the bank.

Here were my initial questions:

• When are these things on sale at the grocery store?
• What can I buy in bulk?
• If I go to the farmers market is it really more expensive than going to the grocery store?
• Is organic food REALLY more expensive than let's say conventional, as they like to call it?

In this episode, I walk through how I was able to figure out how to shop for and purchase the foods that I love without blowing through my budget that I set for food.

I share the following tips in this episode:

• What days are good to shop?
• When is a good time to go to the grocery store?
• Does buying in bulk save money?
• Deciding what to purchase using coupons

Also, I am happy to announce that I am now offering 1:1 and small group coaching (3-4 per group).

There are 9 slots left for 1:1 clients and 6 spots for small group coaching.

You can fill out the application at joyfulebony.com/app

Happy day friends!

Diet…I don't like that word, because there's so much confusion around it. It's so confusing because there is so much information out there.

Do any of these things apply to you?:

• Can I eat broccoli?
• Should I count macros?
• Hold on, I'm starting to move a little bit more. Now I'm starving, I don't get it, I don't know what to do.

I realized that I became so I consumed with what to eat and I developed negative feelings about food for a long time because I didn't understand how much I should have and when should I eat.

I want you to start paying more attention to what food makes you feel good and what makes you feel bad.

You know what I'm going to say… I want you to write it down. When you write things down, you can start to see how food triggers inflammation.

Always ask yourself, am I fueling my body and fighting inflammation or am I making things worse?

I want you to dig deep and think about something... "Who Are You?" For me, when I think about being able to get up and move my body and show others how to do that, it makes me so excited. It makes me happy to be able to coach you all in talking through some of the most difficult moments I have had as it relates to my autoimmune disease journey. I've been there and I know what that feels like. I don't want you to suffer anymore. It's easy for us to say, "well, I'm a mom, or I'm a wife or a sister or friend". You are so much more than that. Each of us was created with a gift and a purpose.

I want you to start exploring those more because the world needs more of you.

Start owning that because you're incredible. Work through writing the responses to the questions that I posed in this week's episode.

I think the problem that so many of us face is that we're constantly feeling like we're on a hamster wheel. This means that you're constantly trying to make up for the lack of energy that you have, or the brain fog.

You want to make sure that you're presenting yourself as a professional, and that you're knowledgeable in what you do. I

I felt like I had to work 10x harder than everyone else because I didn't want anyone to think that I was using my condition as an excuse.

With that being said, I had to learn how to give myself grace. To start, I thought about three questions:

1. What are you good at?
2. What are the things that you enjoy doing?
3. How can you do more of what you love?

I have learned that by identifying these things, I operate in my strengths, not my weaknesses and it allows me to improve on the things that I lack, so I challenge you to take some time to write these things down.

Tag me at joyfulebony across all social media platforms. I'd love to see your answers!

I have a question for you:

Who are you?

Let that sink in for a second….

Here's why I'm asking that question.

I lost who I am in many of my relationships and I did not stop to ask things like "Who am I?" "What do I like?" "What do I want to do?"

I want you to ask yourself this as well: "How can I really truly just enjoy my life and who I am as a person?"

In the process of doing this, It made it a lot easier for me to understand how to combat the fear with the truth.

I actually started listening to my body and getting to know myself.

I worked at it and It was hard. However, at the same time, as I started doing that, I noticed that my anxiety and my stress started to minimize.

I became obsessed almost with the idea of what my life would be like if I enjoyed myself…

It literally was when I was driving, I would go back to that question. Right before I went to bed, I would think about it and say, Well, what is it that I want? What can I do? What is my biggest struggle.

We live in such a fast paced society and because we're constantly bombarded with so many things, It can be very difficult to really truly get to know ourselves. I needed to minimize inflammation and learn how to refuel. That forced me to really brainstorm and figure out how to minimize my stress levels.

I challenge you….sit down and think through these things. These are some of the things that we don't really talk about as a community that are so critical to us becoming the best version of ourselves and minimizing our symptoms.

I want to share these things with you because they're so important.

Let's do this together friends!