Dr Libby Weaver - Dr Libby

The 10 best things you can do for yourself

March 1, 2023February 28, 2023 by Dr Libby Weaver

When our lives are very full, it can be easy to let self-care slip to the bottom of the priority list. Yet, if you don’t ‘put your own oxygen mask on first’, eventually you’re going to burn your health and energy out and then you won’t be able to show up each day to contribute in the way that you want to.

The good news is small, simple changes can make a big difference to how you experience each day. Below are some strategies to help you experience greater vitality—excerpts inspired by my Wellness Cards, a deck of 90 cards designed to educate and inspire people to take better care of themselves in practical ways.

1. Become breath aware

Notice if your breath is short, sharp and shallow in the upper chest, or if it slowly moves the belly in and out. Consciously switching to the latter—particularly extending the length of the exhalation—is one of the most effective ways that we can reduce stress hormone production. This can have a profound effect on numerous aspects of our health, including energy levels, sleep and digestion, to name just a few.

2. Care for your liver

Your liver function contributes to so many processes inside you including the storage and dissemination of nutrients, as well as detoxification. It plays a major role in how you feel, function and look each day. Focus on giving your liver more of what it loves, and less of what it doesn’t––more whole foods, particularly bitter foods like green leafy vegetables, and less alcohol and highly processed foods.

3. Expand the variety of foods you eat

A great way to help you obtain the essential nutrients your body needs is by expanding the variety of whole foods that you eat. Consuming a wider variety of plant foods in particular is a powerful way to support your gut microbiome, as diversity in how we eat translates to diversity in our microbiome.

4. Let yourself have what you already have

Even if it is right in front of you every day, and you don’t let yourself have it—which means noticing it, taking it in, allowing yourself the pleasure of it—it is never really yours. Because if you don’t ‘let yourself have’ a glorious sunrise, a cool evening breeze on your face after a hot day, an awe-inspiring view, then what else are you denying yourself? We can become so focused on the big things we want to achieve that we miss the micro-moments that are happening all the time—and all the delight in them. We can experience that joy now, if we just allow ourselves.

5. Chew your food

Chewing thoroughly helps us to slow down and experience enjoyment from our food, which can help prevent overeating, plus it’s key for stimulating stomach acid production which is essential for proper digestion. It might sound too simple to make a difference but focusing on chewing each mouthful well can often significantly improve symptoms like bloating.

6. Make water your main drink

Staying hydrated is crucial to how you think, feel and look. Your body is, on average, about 70% water and your kidneys use water to filter and clean your blood—keeping what you need and creating urine for the waste to be disposed of. If you struggle to drink enough water, try keeping a water bottle with you to prompt you to take sips regularly across the day.

7. Look for laughs

Moments of laughter can help to lighten our load, see things with fresh eyes and alleviate stress. Try creating a playlist of video clips that crack you up, or seek out or reflect on scenarios that make you laugh out loud.

8. Prioritise sleep

If you struggle with sleep, consider if this might be driven by too much caffeine or perhaps from bright light and screen use too late into the evening. Or, is your fight-or-flight response in overdrive due to perceptions of pressure and worries? Make it a priority to work out what is disrupting your sleep, as this will help you understand how to improve it.

9. Flex your ‘no’ muscle

If you frequently say ‘yes’ when you really want to say ‘no’, notice if it’s because you’re fearful of what others might think of you. Instead of judging you harshly as you worry they will, they might instead appreciate your honesty or show concern for your workload. How others perceive us is ultimately up to them. It’s important to stay true to yourself and your values.

10. Focus on health, nourishment and energy, rather than weight

This shift in focus fosters greater energy, vitality, happiness and freedom, as well as optimal health. A dieting mentality is all about restriction, and it typically distinguishes foods as ‘good’ or ‘bad’, which easily translates to a person perceiving they are ‘bad’ when they don’t follow the diet. Harsh self-judgement contributes significantly to someone making ongoing poor-quality food choices so to break this cycle, focus instead on nourishment and having great energy. This way, it’s all about the plethora of foods that support you to have optimal health.

Why you can’t seem to sustain your changes

February 28, 2023 by Dr Libby Weaver

Sustaining change

When it comes to health, many people declare that they are finally going to make their own health a priority and make some changes. And things usually start off so well. But, despite the best of intentions and great knowledge, it doesn’t always last and many people return to some of their less supportive habits. Have you ever wondered why?

Something that I love to explore is why we do what we do, even though we know what we know. There is so much gold in understanding what is really driving our choices because, with such insight, it becomes much easier for us to make sustainable changes that support our health. So, let’s look at a few common reasons why you might struggle to put your knowledge into practice and what you can do to help.

You haven’t reflected on your ‘why’

It’s natural for change to feel difficult or uncomfortable at first, so connecting the change you want to make with your ‘why’ is so important. Take some time to reflect on this and perhaps use a journal to capture your thoughts. Think about what you are really wanting to achieve and what this change will mean for you. How does this change link with your values? Where will you be in a year’s time if you make this change? Where will you be if you don’t? It can be helpful to revisit this during those extra challenging days.

You’re all in (or all out)

When we’re super motivated to start the year off well, it can be tempting to try to overhaul everything in our life at once. But if we’re not able to sustain it all we can often feel like we’ve failed and have to ‘start again’. Commit to one or two small changes first, and then go from there. Small, incremental changes can add up over time to make an enormous difference to our health. One exception to this though is with sugar consumption. Sustained change is more likely when we cut it out thoroughly for six weeks, before contemplating any potential minor reintroductions.

Your benefits outweigh your drawbacks

Sometimes your benefits for staying the way you are unconsciously outweigh your drawbacks. In other words, somewhere in your brain you have more reasons not to change than you do to change. Or perhaps some reasons carry more weight than others. For example, if your health and wellbeing isn’t high enough on your priority list, you won’t truly value investing your time, energy and resources into bringing about change. So you will more easily fall back into habits that don’t support your health because other things will continue to be of a higher priority for you. Sometimes, your list of drawbacks – or the weight of those drawbacks – needs to grow.

Your measures of success aren’t supportive

When we’re making changes, we tend to want some way of tracking our progress. The problem is, if we only focus on one specific measure – a good example here is total body weight – it can be easy to think that what we’re doing isn’t working if we don’t see this one measure change in the way we were hoping right away. Yet, there could be other changes happening that indicate that what we’re doing is incredibly beneficial, such as improved energy, a clear complexion, a more even mood, clearer thinking, better digestion… the list goes on! Focus on how you are feeling and celebrate all of the wins along the way.

Demystifying food trends

January 24, 2023 by Dr Libby Weaver

Food trends… just when we think we’ve heard them all, there’s a new kid on the block claiming to be the saving grace for all health concerns. Many people are forever looking for answers – they want to know exactly what to eat and which ‘pill’ will solve everything. They are looking for a prescription, a guarantee that if they follow the rules, they’ll be ‘fixed’ once and for all.

It is understandable why food has become so confusing. One day you might read that low fat yoghurt is good for your health and the next that it’s not, and that kale is far more beneficial. One way to decipher the mixed messages is to consider if a food is nourishing, rather than healthy. Food is not actually healthy. People are or they aren’t. Food is nutritious or it isn’t. Seeing food through this lens can help us to bring more common sense and ease to food choices.

The way to not get caught up in food and nutrition fads is to remember that when it comes to food, Nature gets it right, and it is potentially human intervention that can get it so wrong. In other words, what have become known as ultra-processed foods, are not really ‘foods’ at all, often made from fake food substances and offering very little, if any, nutritional value. Yet when we choose predominantly whole, real foods, our health is rewarded from the nutrient density they provide.

Education is part of any health journey and change process. Sometimes we don’t understand what’s going on for us and we need assistance to get to the heart of it. But when we continue to seek authority, jumping from one expert to the next, without also looking inward for our own answers and paying attention to what our body is communicating through symptoms, we are doing ourselves a great disservice.

There is no one set way to approach health that works for all of us. It might suit your friend to be vegan, but when you try it, you feel completely exhausted no matter how much or how frequently you eat, and you are always iron deficient. Our body gives us messages all the time, trying to help us understand what it needs. Try to look at the symptoms you experience as messages offering you feedback about your choices. Is that headache you get most afternoons at 3pm from a lack of pain killers? (I’m joking!) Or is it your body prompting you to eat afternoon tea or up your hydration or to slow your breathing or to take a break from your computer and go outside and change your posture? When you tune in, you’ll likely hear a response bubble up, guiding you forward.

It’s your choice (of course) how you eat, whereas it’s my job to make sure people get everything they need from the way they eat. Let’s examine some common ways of eating and their subsequent potential for nutrient deficiencies:

Vegetarian

Iron: If you’re a menstruating female, you need 18mg of iron per day. With eggs being one of the richest vegetarian sources of iron at 0.7mg of iron per egg—you can see how easily a deficiency can occur when you need 18mg every day.
Zinc: you require 8-14mg per day. Sunflower and pumpkin seeds are some of the only vegetarian sources of zinc and they contain 0.9 mg zinc per 100 grams—taking into consideration how little seeds weigh.

Vegan

Iron and zinc are common deficiencies (as outlined above).
Vitamin B12: stores will generally last between two and five years, and as animal foods are the only source, supplementation is essential before stores run out.
Calcium: if you drink caffeinated drinks or soft drinks, your requirement for calcium will be higher than if you don’t. Calcium is widely spread throughout plant foods but a focus on eating enough is important given adult women need 1000 – 1300mg per day.
Omega 3 essential fats: the body can convert EPA (one type of essential fat) from plants into DHA (another essential fat) found in algae and fish, yet in many people this is inefficiently done. Sources of EPA include flaxseeds, chia seeds, and walnuts.

Low-Carb

If you eat a very low-carb diet in any form, you need to ensure you obtain enough B group vitamins.

Low-Fat

Essential fats: the omga-3 and omega-6 essential fatty acids are just that—essential!
Fat soluble vitamins: Vitamins A, D, E and K are widely spread throughout foods that contain fat.

As you can see it’s important to ensure you are obtaining all of the nutrients your body needs for optimal health and function and in some situations where dietary intake is insufficient, supplementation is required. Zinc, for example, contributes to hundreds of processes inside your body including the creation of over 300 enzymes, many of which are necessary for great digestion, the foundation of all health. Yet this is one of the most common dietary mineral deficiencies. Obtaining adequate zinc in our diets can be a task in itself, let alone when we follow a restricted way of eating.

If you’re still asking “what am I supposed to eat?”, I gently offer you these guiding principles:

Eat mostly whole, real foods
Stop counting calories and if you need to count anything, count nutrients
Consider how your food has been grown and produced—not just for your health but also for that of your family, the planet, and other animals. Get to know and thank your farmers if you can
All whole, real foods are superstars! Try not to get caught up in food trends and fads
Consider ‘how’ you’re eating and do your best to eat in a calm state to maximise digestion capability
Ensure the meat you eat is organic and grass/pasture-fed, not grain-fed
If a particular way of eating suits your body or your beliefs, ensure you are obtaining all the nutrients your body needs for optimal health and function
Consider whether you need to supplement your nutrient intake

Allow your inner wisdom to guide your choices. Apply common sense. Be so kind to yourself and remember that it is what you do every day that impacts on your health, not what you occasionally do – hot chips twice a week has very different effects to hot chips 10 times a year. No long term, sustained change I have ever witnessed has stemmed from a headspace of deprivation.

Live each day in touch with how precious life is, how precious you are—and treat yourself accordingly.

9 tell-tale signs you have blood sugar issues

January 24, 2023 by Dr Libby Weaver

When it comes to blood sugar levels throughout the day, even undulations is the ideal pattern. Yet, for many people their blood sugar picture across the day resembles a rollercoaster. Not only can this have a significant impact on how we look and feel each day, but it can also have a flow on effect on our health, setting us up for metabolic disease and other chronic health conditions.

Troublingly, many people don’t realise they have issues with their blood sugar until they are diagnosed with impaired glucose tolerance, or as pre-diabetic (type 2), or with type 2 diabetes by their GP. Like anything, the sooner you catch something the easier it is to improve or correct. So, if you identify with any of the following tell-tale blood sugar issue signs, I can’t encourage you enough to take steps towards stabilising them for your health now and into the future.

1. There’s an urgency to your hunger

If you get shaky, lightheaded, dizzy or hangry in the lead up to mealtimes, it can be a sign that your blood sugar levels have crashed. You may experience this if you drink coffee on an empty (or relatively empty) stomach too.

2. You keep craving sugar

Can’t shake those sugar cravings? When our blood sugar crashes, our body looks for a quick source of energy to boost it back up. Our body has two sources of fuel – glucose (aka sugar) and fat and guess which is faster to act? Glucose. So if despite your best efforts you can’t help but reach for that muffin to get you through the afternoon, it can be a sign that your body is hunting down quick energy.

3. You experience anxious feelings or irritability, that eating relieves

Snapping at loved ones or feel as though your moods are as variable as the tides? Blood sugar levels have a significant impact on mood, including low mood and anxious feelings. While there are many other things behind mood challenges, if you identify with other points here, blood sugar issues may be contributing.

4. You have brain fog or concentration challenges

Your brain requires significant amounts of energy and it primarily uses glucose as its fuel. So when your blood sugar levels are out of whack, your brain’s ability to function optimally can become compromised and you may experience brain fog, memory loss and forgetfulness. You may also have trouble concentrating.

5. You experience cycle or menopausal challenges

When your blood sugar elevates, your body has to produce insulin to deal with the spike. In the right amount, this is healthy, in excess it can lead to insulin resistance (constantly elevated blood insulin levels). Insulin resistance disrupts the actions of other important hormones including your sex hormones, and compromising the delicate balance of these tiny substances can have a significant impact. This means that poorly regulated blood sugar and elevated insulin can be behind symptoms associated with your monthly cycle or menopause or make them worse.

6. You can’t shift body fat

There are nine factors that influence whether the body gets the message to burn body fat as a fuel or store it and insulin/blood sugar regulation is one of them. You may be noticing that your clothes are fitting differently or perhaps you’re trying to decrease body fat and it just won’t seem to budge.

7. Your energy crashes or you often wonder where it went

When your blood sugar levels peak and dip, your energy levels usually do the same. A typical crash time is mid-afternoon, yet after living this way consistently, it can lead to energy that flatlines all across the day. You may also experience a desperate need for caffeine to ‘wake up’ in the morning and/or to keep you going throughout the day.

8. You’re wired yet tired come bedtime

All that caffeine and sugar can impact on your body’s ability to sleep restoratively. Despite a bone-deep fatigue, you may feel too wired to fall asleep or might drift in and out of consciousness without properly dropping off. And you consistently wake up tired.

9. Your sleep is disturbed

There’s a corresponding relationship between sugar and your sleep – both affect each other. When you don’t get sufficient sleep, you tend to crave sugar (or carbohydrates) to boost your energy. Plus, hormones like ghrelin that help to regulate appetite, are disrupted with too little sleep. Blood sugar issues can also affect the quality of your sleep – and not just because you may be leaning on more caffeine. If your blood sugar levels are all over the place, you may find yourself waking up starving and not being able to get back to sleep. You may also wake up feeling exhausted, even if you have had a full night of sleep.

To address blood sugar issues, one of the first steps is to consider how you nourish yourself. Focus on eating mostly whole real foods, make water your main drink and minimise ultra-processed foods. While it can help to focus on eating regularly (e.g. three satiating meals per day), simply eating more regular meals isn’t going to address the underlying blood sugar issues if food choice quality is poor. That said, if you’re pregnant or breastfeeding, your energy needs will be much higher, and you will most likely need to eat more frequently. Either way, try eating protein with each meal and include a source of whole food fat such as avocado, coconut, nuts or oily fish as well. Obtain your carbohydrates from real food – root vegetables for example – rather than refined packaged ‘foods’, avoid eating carbohydrate-rich foods on their own, and keep caffeine intake to a minimum. See what makes a difference to your blood glucose patterns.

Which oils are best for your health and which are best to avoid?

January 19, 2023 by Dr Libby Weaver

I’m often asked which oils are best for cooking with, yet oils often play a much bigger role in people’s diets without them realising. The vast majority of packaged, processed, frozen and deep-fried foods are laden with poor quality oils which you may be inadvertently consuming on a regular basis. Like foods in general, when it comes to oils, the closer to nature an oil comes, the more nourishment it can offer. Of course, it’s not quite as simple as that because oils also have a unique smoke point—that is, a temperature they can tolerate before they begin to oxidise, changing structure and releasing free radicals.

To help, here’s a guide on which oils are best to minimise or avoid and which are wiser to consume, including how best to serve them.

Oils to avoid

The oils to avoid fall under the blanket category of industrial seed oils. These include:

canola (also known as rapeseed) oil
soy oil
sunflower oil
safflower oil
corn oil
rice bran oil
cottonseed oil
peanut oil

Sometimes these oils are given the more vague term of ‘vegetable oil’ but this simply means it is one or more of these oils.

Food manufacturers typically use industrial seed oils in their products as they are much more cost effective than traditional oils. These oils are highly refined—often using chemicals, solvents and bleaches in the production process, or heating the oil to such a high degree that it damages the oil. Not only can these oils drive inflammation in the body, they can also contribute to insulin resistance. They are more prevalent than you may realise—commonly found in products such as mayonnaise, crackers, long life milks, salad dressings, confectionary, protein bars and so much more. Always check the ingredients list of a product and avoid or minimise anything that contains industrial seed oils. It’s also worth noting that many fast food, takeaway outlets and restaurants also cook with poor quality oils so check in with your favourite establishments and ask and/or keep your eating out to a minimum.

Oils to enjoy

Avocado oil has a mild, buttery flavour making it great as a dressing for salads or vegetables. And with one of the highest smoke points (around 255°C), it’s also a great oil to use for cooking. Avocado is a great source of antioxidants and monounsaturated fat which offers the body a host of heart health benefits.

Extra Virgin Olive oil is another mild (though can also be flavourful depending on the variety) oil full of monounsaturated fats that can be used for numerous purposes. It blends well with other herbs and vinegars to make a delicious vinaigrette and is good for cooking at lower temperatures (up to around 180°C). Extra virgin olive oil (the extra virgin means it is less refined than regular olive oil retaining more of its nutrients) is an excellent source of vitamins E and K, antioxidants and oleic acid which has anti-inflammatory properties.

Coconut oil has quite a strong flavour but is great in baking as a dairy free alternative to butter and is delicious with roast vegetables. It also has a relatively high smoke point (around 175°C) so can be good as a cooking oil, however, it may alter the flavour of some foods. Coconut oil is a source of whole food saturated fat and MCTs (medium chain triglycerides) which are can be an efficient energy source for the body. Coconut oil seems to increase some people’s blood levels of cholesterol when eaten daily, but not everyone’s. So if you decide to include it regularly, have a blood test done three months down the track to see how you respond.

Macadamia oil offers a mild buttery flavour and a relatively high smoke point (210°C) so it’s a good all-rounder (and another more mildly flavoured dairy free baking addition). Macadamias are high in monounsaturated fats, antioxidants and vitamin E.

Why your insulin levels are so important (whether you’re a diabetic or not)

January 19, 2023 by Dr Libby Weaver

Most people know that insulin is linked to blood sugar levels and that too much or too little is associated with type 1 and type 2 diabetes (which are very different illnesses). Yet, that’s often where people’s understanding ends.

Insulin, which is made in the pancreas, is a type of growth hormone—hence its capacity to drive energy storage – both glucose (as glycogen) and fat. This is vital and helpful, however in excess can become a problem. We make insulin when we eat and it helps to transport energy to our cells by communicating to them to open up and absorb the nutrients available in our bloodstream. Carbohydrates elicit the most significant production, while protein drives a small amount. The insulin produced when you consume protein is usually offset by another hormone that protein elicits, called glucagon, which acts in the opposite way to insulin.

Insulin and carbohydrates

When you consume carbohydrates, whether they are starchy or sweet carbs, they are broken down into glucose. Typical sources of carbohydrates in the modern diet include bread, pasta, rice, all types of potatoes and the other starchy vegetables (including pumpkin and corn), fruit, dairy products, lollies/sweets, cakes, biscuits, pastries, honey, maple syrup and sugar. I encourage people to consume carbohydrates from real food, whole food sources such as root vegetables and wholegrains, such as a brown rice.

Glucose from the carbohydrates ends up in your blood stream, and your body identifies that blood sugar levels have been elevated. Your body does not like it when blood glucose levels go high, as too much sugar in the blood can damage the lining of the blood vessels. To protect the blood vessels from being damaged, the pancreas secretes insulin into the blood. It is the job of insulin to remove the glucose from the blood so that homeostasis (balance) returns to the blood. The health of the blood must be maintained at all costs.

Insulin first takes the sugar to the muscles and the liver, where it is stored as glycogen, places from which it can be released easily if we need a fast source of energy if we have not eaten for a while. But the size of our muscles is finite, meaning they have their storage limit. Once they are full of glycogen, if more sugar from the blood needs to be removed, then insulin will transport it to the fat cells because of their infinite capacity to expand.

The insulin puzzle

The only carbohydrates humans once ate were root vegetables, legumes, pulses and berries. These days, there are over 3000 snack-food items alone on the shelves of the average supermarket, and this number is growing constantly. It is big surges of insulin on and off over the day, or constantly high circulating insulin, that are problems when it comes to every aspect of our health, including using body fat efficiently. These big surges most often come from consuming large quantities of highly processed or packaged foods. If you have spent months committed to exercising and eating well with little or no reward, have your fasting blood glucose level (BGL) as well as your fasting blood insulin level tested. I have had clients with perfect BGLs, but their bodies are making huge amounts of insulin to keep their blood glucose inside the normal range, and you never know this until you test the insulin. No matter how much you exercise or how seemingly amazingly you eat, you will not access your fat stores to burn in this biochemical state. Insulin must be addressed.

So how do you maintain optimum insulin levels?

Avoid ultra-processed foods and consuming carbohydrates on their own—always pair them with protein and/or nourishing whole food fats. People have become confused about and fearful of carbs, and yet we must consume some carbohydrates, as they are vital to the function of our brain, kidneys and red blood cells. The amount that’s ideal to consume is highly individual and dependent on many factors. Also minimise highly processed and packaged foods and focus on eating whole real foods as close as they come to nature.

Adopt these 7 habits to age well

January 16, 2023December 20, 2022 by Dr Libby Weaver

Ageing is a natural part of life that we don’t need to fear; we will all go through it. Your changing skin, hair colour or body in no way detract from who you are and the goodness in your heart. The passing years also bring wisdom and that has a radiance all of its own.

Yet, ageing isn’t just about what happens on the outside, it’s also about our structure, mobility and internal health. Due to the incredible advances of Western medicine, we are going to continue to live longer and longer. We are so fortunate to live in a time where there is such extraordinary emergency medicine available to us. Yet, in reality, are we living too short and dying too long? This is an important question to ponder; for what I care about is the quality of your life.

Today, as well as in the later part of your life, you want to be able to bend over and do up your own shoelaces. Imagine what life would be like if you had to rely on someone else to do this? How would your once-independent self feel? You don’t want this to happen because your tummy has grown too large for you to be able to reach your feet, and so in later years you sit back and wish you had made lifestyle changes earlier. You don’t want to not be able to reach your feet because you have led a sedentary lifestyle and in later years your spine is relatively inflexible and you can’t bend to reach your feet. You don’t want that to occur.

With this in mind, here are several habits that you can adopt to prevent degenerative diseases, maintain your own independence and live an energised, healthy and full life right through to your twilight years.

1. Eat whole real foods (including plenty of vegetables)

Three biochemical processes through which we age are oxidation, inflammation and glycation and great nutrition goes a long way to providing our body with the substances it needs to ensure these processes happen slowly rather than rapidly.

The substances that give vegetables their colours act as antioxidants in the human body. Antioxidants help to combat oxidative stress by pairing up with the free radicals which, when in excess, cause damage to our cells. Scientists are also starting to understand that antioxidants potentially play a role is slowing telomere shortening. But eating whole real foods isn’t just about what you get, it’s about what you miss out on too. Reducing your intake of processed foods, or what I like to call high human intervention foods, means you’re less likely to overconsume sugar, trans fats, additives and preservatives all of which take a toll on our health through diminishing our digestive power via detrimental effects on the gut microbiome and giving our liver more to detoxify. No amount of exercise can combat the effects of a lousy way of eating. Changing your diet is a powerful way to promote anti-ageing processes and increase your quality of life into your elderly years.

2. Reduce sugar

Not that long ago in human evolution, ultra-processed, high-sugar foods didn’t exist. Then, in the not-too-distant past, they were eaten only on special occasions, like birthday parties, but now they have become part of every day for too many people. I cannot say this enough: it is what you do every day that impacts on your health, not what you do sometimes. The ageing process will potentially be slowed if you consume less refined sugars since refined sugars can drive inflammation and glycation, two of the primary drivers of ageing. Plus, excess sugar consumption puts us at risk of very concerning metabolic changes, like insulin resistance, leptin resistance and type 2 diabetes.

3. Build muscle and maintain mobility

From the age of 30 onwards, if we don’t actively build muscle we gradually lose it. Embrace resistance training. This doesn’t have to mean going to gym unless that spins your tyres. In a yoga practice, you resist your own body weight. Pilates, too, is excellent resistance training, as is gardening, farm work, carrying groceries and children. Don’t avoid movement. Take the stairs regularly, for example. Build muscle.

A concept I also encourage you to explore is “functional movement”. It is based on real-world situational biomechanics, which is not my area of expertise. I have, however, worked alongside pioneers in this field who possess the health, youthfulness, vitality and physique that are testaments to these practices. We need to make sure that for our whole life, not just when we are young, our body is able to perform all the movements that are necessary for daily life and an active lifestyle. Every movement our body performs can be broken down into a series of one of seven movement patterns. These are often referred to as the Seven Primal Movement Patterns, and they are the squat, lunge, push, pull, bend, twist, gait. We all need a general functionality in each one of these patterns for normal daily activities, such as loading groceries, lifting boxes, or running to catch the bus.

4. Make water your main drink

Water is the basis of all life, and that includes your body. The muscles that move your body are 75 per cent water. Your blood, responsible for transporting nutrients throughout your body, is 82 per cent water. Your lungs, that take oxygen from the air, are 90 per cent water, while your brain is 76 per cent water. Even your bones are 25 per cent water!

Most people are aware of the critical importance of great hydration for their health, and of course for their skin, in particular. Yet, so many people tell me that they know they would be better off drinking more water. Unintentional chronic dehydration can contribute to pain and inflammation, not to mention fatigue, which can have an enormous impact on whether we feel youthful or not.

5. Become breath aware

More rapid breathing leads to more free radical production, which requires more antioxidants to be consumed in order to avoid excessive damage. When we are stressed, we tend to take short, sharp, shallow breaths that move the chest. Begin to notice your breath – does it stay up in your chest, or does it move your belly? Diaphragmatic breathing (long, slow breaths that move the belly in and out) slows down our rate of breathing and is one of the fastest ways we can lower stress hormone production.

6. Address niggling symptoms

If you’re experiencing digestive complaints or bloating, PMS or menopausal symptoms, recurring headaches or general fatigue, this is your body trying to communicate to you that something isn’t right. These symptoms may be common, but they’re not normal –they’re a sign that something within the body needs to be addressed. Investigate them, bring curiosity to each symptom and begin to take notice of what might be driving these. For some of you, seeking professional advice may be of benefit. Others may know deep down what needs to change and are just avoiding it. The reality is, if you don’t address these symptoms now, they’re likely to get louder and more challenging as time goes on. Prioritise your own health and take action today.

7. Embrace the changes

In today’s society we place so much emphasis on youth being attractive, yet there is nothing more attractive than someone who is comfortable in their own skin, regardless of their age. True beauty radiates from the inside out.

Also consider how you see yourself and the way you speak to yourself within this context of diminishing your quality of life. Are your judgements of your appearance or on aspects of your personality harsh? And are you harsh on others as a result? What do you say about yourself, to yourself? Is it kind, thoughtful, supportive and encouraging most of the time? Or the opposite? When you sit back and reflect at the end of your life (if you get the opportunity to do so) will you feel good about the way you spoke to yourself? Imagine all of the energy you waste putting yourself down that could be put to better use.

5 healthful resolutions to embrace this year

December 20, 2022 by Dr Libby Weaver

New Year resolutions are not my jam. That said, I’m all for whatever works for people. I’ve found that for the majority of people, they start off with the best of intentions only to find that their resolutions fizzle out a few weeks or months into the year.

So, for me personally (and what I encourage people to do), if I want to make a change, I start it then and there. If you feel called to make a change, why wait? If it’s a big change that might be a little difficult to adjust to all at once, break it down into smaller steps you take and incorporate those. That way, over a period of time, you gradually work towards where you want to be. Small incremental changes tend to be much more sustainable and they become part of our daily routines, rather than yet another task that requires great effort.

Consider too, how specific your resolutions are and how achievable they are when you reflect upon your current lifestyle. You may benefit from changes that don’t require you to find a whole lot more time in your schedule. With this in mind, here are some healthful resolutions to consider embracing this year that won’t have you trying to squeeze something more into an already full schedule.

1. Be kinder to yourself

I’ve not seen long term change ever stem from a mindset of deprivation, but rather from kindness and a deep, inner knowing that you are worth taking care of. And I love the ripple effect this creates in the world – not only do we tend to approach the world around us with less judgement when we are gentler on ourselves but we also teach the next generation to treat themselves with more compassion and care.

2. Stop dieting and start nourishing

Dieting puts us into a mindset of deprivation and as I’ve already said, this rarely leads to long-term change. When nourishment becomes your focus, you naturally start thinking about “what I can have” instead of “what I can’t have”. Nourishment too, can be applied to many things beyond just food. Nourishing your body may look like eating mostly whole real foods, ensuring you get adequate rest, and incorporating more movement into your routine. Nourishing your soul may look like enjoying a beer alongside a take away dinner with a friend or going to see a band and dancing into the wee hours of the morning.

3. Manage your energy not your time.

I truly believe one of the reasons people consume more caffeine is because they’re often working against their own natural patterns. For example, many people find that their creative energy is highest in the morning, so that’s a great time do creative tasks such as writing. By comparison, you may decide to block out afternoons for phone calls and emails or admin-related tasks. You don’t necessarily need your creative energy to be high for admin tasks, so that may be the best time to get them done. Start to keep a diary of when your energy is high, low and whether or not it’s your creative or productive time. Not only will you be making the best use of your time you’ll feel much more energised when you’re working.

4. Find a way to move your body that you love.

Paddle boarding, yoga, walking, aerobics, swimming whatever it is that you love doing – you’re more likely to commit to a style of movement you enjoy. Regular movement is not only good for your mood, it also decreases your risk of osteoporosis, bowel cancer and improves glucose metabolism keeping your energy levels even. Do you need any other reason?

5. Drink less alcohol.

Whilst I run the risk of being labelled the ‘fun police’ this change is by far the most powerful. Hands down, reducing your alcohol consumption is one of the best things you can do for your health. Even moderate consumption of alcohol has been linked to an increased risk of numerous cancers. Most people can agree that they feel better without alcohol in their lives – it’s an added expense and it dulls your shine – not to mention the numerous detrimental effects it has on your health. Replace alcoholic drinks with sparkling water, with fresh lemon and lime or simply just more natural water. Try making drinking less alcohol the top of your to-do list this year. Reducing your intake also doesn’t have to mean removing it altogether. Do what feels comfortable and then see if you can stretch a little further.

3 principles to help you eat intuitively

December 14, 2022 by Dr Libby Weaver

When it comes to what, when and how much you eat, do you let your body guide you, or do you look to someone or something else for answers? Do you count calories, no longer trusting your body to tell you to stop once you’ve had enough? Or, do you eat according to a prescribed meal plan, regardless of how your body’s needs change day-to-day?

I believe every human has a wisdom inside of them that knows what serves them and what doesn’t. Yet, so many of us have lost touch with this when it comes to food. If you’ve ever wondered how much avocado you’re “allowed” to have, or if you tend to jump onboard every new dieting trend, you may be stuck in a dieting mentality.

Intuitive eating is about listening to your body and what is right for you in each moment. It fosters a sense of freedom that inspires a healthy relationship with food and your body, and it’s an approach that aims to bring the joy back into eating without any of the guilt. I’m not saying you can eat like a piglet and still expect to have amazing health – of course not – but being rigid in our food choices or experiencing guilt around food isn’t healthy either. It is what we do every day that impacts our health, not what we do occasionally, so base your everyday choices on real, whole foods – rather than processed foods – that you know in your heart serve your body and your health.

If you would like to begin your intuitive eating journey, I cannot encourage you enough to embrace these principles:

Say no to dieting

More often than not, people who go on a diet regain the weight they lost, plus more. Diets don’t work in the long-term – they’re not sustainable. I have witnessed countless people transform their body by relaxing and moving away from basing their food choices on the calorie equation. They don’t weigh themselves and they don’t obsess over what they eat or don’t eat. Their clothes fit comfortably. They have great energy and excellent health. It is truly transformational when you shift your focus away from weight and calories to health, energy and nourishment. It’s time to stop dieting, and start nourishing. Choose nutrient-dense, whole, real foods.

Tune in to your body’s hunger and fullness cues

This can take a little practise, particularly if you’ve been eating refined sugars (as these make you want more and more sugar) or if you’ve been dieting and tuning these signals out for a long time, so please don’t judge yourself or give up if it doesn’t come easily to you from the get-go. When we’re eating highly refined, processed foods, it can be very difficult to regulate our appetite, so focus on eating whole, real foods to support you in this process.

Notice how your body tells you that you are hungry and observe how it lets you know when you’re no longer hungry. Some people find rating their hunger on a scale of one to ten helpful, so if this appeals, try doing this before, during and/or after a meal for a period of time to help you get back in touch with the messages your body is sending you.

We are so incredibly fortunate in the Western world to have more food available to us than we physically need. Remind yourself of this and know that you can choose to eat more when you are hungry again. Remember, your hunger and fullness signals are your body’s way of telling you what it needs, so do your best to appreciate these messages as the gifts that they are. Remember too, the importance of chewing your food well and slowing down your eating. Scoffing your food can also mess up your fullness cues as your body doesn’t have the time to communicate to you that it’s full.

Respect your body

The way you feed yourself is a form of self-care (love) you can show yourself, and as cheesy as it might sound, the key to any effective diet or lifestyle change is to truly believe that you are worthy of love – your own. Please remember that you are precious, that life is precious, and to treat yourself accordingly.

3 ways to regain a sense of ‘balance’ in your life

December 13, 2022 by Dr Libby Weaver

With the pace most people live at, it can be easy to lose ourselves to the demands of modern life and realise months (or sometimes years) down the track that we aren’t making enough time for the things we really value. Many people feel that they need to find a better balance when it comes to managing the different departments of their lives.

Balance is highly subjective – it will look different to everyone and it is essentially a futile pursuit – it’s more like a feedback mechanism. When you feel like you need more balance, it’s usually a sign that you feel as though you are compromising something important in order to maintain the pace or lifestyle you are currently living – whether it be your health, happiness time with loved ones or to yourself – it is an indication that something needs to change. Let’s explore five ways you can regain a sense of balance in your life, however that looks for you.

Lose the ‘all or nothing’ mentality

If you use the phrase ‘fallen off the wagon’ to describe your daily choices, remember that there is actually no wagon to fall off. This kind of thinking can really sabotage our health efforts because we feel as though if we’re not doing everything ‘right’, we may as well not try at all. The truth is, we either make choices that are more or less nourishing, closer to or further away from what we truly value. The choice that you made yesterday has nothing to do with the choice you make today or tomorrow. You haven’t ‘ruined’ anything, you’ve just made one single choice – and there are plenty more to follow.

Align your priorities with your values

If you look at what you spend the majority of your time doing, you will see your priorities. We always make time for what we prioritise. So if you find yourself saying ‘I don’t have time for that’, consider that what you are essentially saying is ‘that is not a priority for me’. So, try that on. How do you feel when you say to yourself, for example, that preparing a nourishing dinner is not a priority for you? The reality is we cannot compromise our nutrition or continue to meet everyone’s needs above our own and expect to still have fantastic health. Working towards aligning your priorities and your values will help you to feel like you’re living a life true to you and that will give you a sense of balance like nothing else.

Consider your perception of pressure and urgency

Are you driving a sense of imbalance with your thoughts? Have you made what you have to do each day full of pressure and urgency? For too many, it doesn’t seem to matter if they have two things to do or 200, they are in a pressing rush to do it all. Yet for most, it rarely feels as if they are in control, or on top of any of it. In fact, a desire to control even the smallest details of life can be part of the challenge. There are moments, of course, that require us to act with urgency but these are generally few and far between. Try to save your sense of urgency for when it really matters and not drive the production of stress hormones in your body by living as if everything is urgent.