Dear Personal Trainers, Stop Screwing with Client's Hormones
There are certain things in the fitness industry that are just not congruent to supporting our female client’s hormones. This post is going to go over some of those things and give you ways where you can help train and guide your female clients in ways that actually support their hormones.
If you don’t know me yet, I’m Omega - I’m an exercise scientist and founder of the Confident Menstrual Cycle Coaching Academy and this is one of my personal training students who has been able to help her clients become more consistent in reaching their goals using the methods I teach in the Academy and in this blog post. So if you want to know how to help your clients become more consistent in reaching their goals…read on! The first thing that fitness coaches can re-vamp is…
Counting Macros
Counting macros is great if your client wants to hop on stage. But what counting macros doesn’t take into account is the micro-nutrients that a cycling female needs in order to have healthy ovulation, little to no PMS and an easy period. So let’s break down a few micro nutrients that help with each of those things:First, healthy ovulation:Healthy ovulation is supporting by micronutrients like phyto-estrogens and zinc just to name a couple.If you’ve watched this video on cyclical biology, then you know that estrogen starts to rise and must reach a critical point for ovulation to occur. Phyto-estrogens support that process by helping raise estrogen levels.
Phyto-estrogen rich foods include: flax seeds, pumpkin seeds, sprouts, lentils, wheatgerm and garlic.
Secondly, with ovulation there is a rise in testosterone (we’ll get into why this is exciting when we talk about cyclical periodization, but if you watched this video on this science on cyclical nutrition you already know) anyway… zinc supports this ovulatory rise in testosterone and therefore supports libido too
Now let's address your clients who have stubborn weight gain.
As personal trainers, we want to get our clients results. And when we don’t, it can be frustrating for us, so this tip will be super helpful if you ever run into this. Enter estrogen dominance. Now you may remember me talking about estrogen dominance in this video. Estrogen dominance is the leading hormonal imbalance and one of the things that can happen with estrogen dominance is weight gain.
This happens when the liver is not efficiently clearing estrogen or other toxins from the body. And when this happens, the body cannot efficiently metabolize fat either. Couple that with the fact that clients with estrogen dominance are usually desperate to lose weight and usually choose to do high intensity exercise and feel like they’re not getting anywhere!But, here’s the thing about estrogen dominance and high intensity training…
…higher intensity workouts aren’t necessarily beneficial for the type of body that isn’t detoxifying toxins well. In fact, this type of exercise can actually cause more stress on the body and can lead to more estrogen dominance.
Now, for the third and final point of this video:
Traditional Periodization…
The periodization model is great, but if we’re not taking into account cyclical biology, we could be interfering with our female client’s body’s natural ability to use fat or glucose for energy.
There have been many studies that show that females have different physical capacities throughout the cycle. Like this study from Wohlgemuth, this study from Carmichael and this study or this study by Joo et. al. For instance, the study by carmichael showed us that there is a optimal time to do aerobic, anaerobic and strength based workouts. The study by Joo showed us that when estrogen is high, we have less free radical damage from exercise. The study by Wohlgemuth showed us that we use fat and sugar differently depending on which phase of the cycle we’re in.Transposing periodization into the cyclical periodization model that I teach in the Confident Menstrual Cycle Coach Academy, we can see that there are optimal cycle times to program in cardio, strength and power-based exercises.
For instance, in the luteal phase, we have less muscle recoverability, but we use fat for energy WAY more efficiently when compared to other phases of the cycle.
If you could help your client’s use fat for energy and gain muscle easier, just by changing how she works out, wouldn’t you want you to help her get that edge?
Apply to Become a Menstrual Cycle Coach
So if you want to go from not fully understanding the cycle to helping your clients not only get fit, but also be the most aligned with their cycle so that they can maintain their fitness easier and make you look even better, I’d love to show you how to do that in the Confident Menstrual Cycle Coach Academy. The Academy is application only and the application process is really simple. All you need to do is click this link to set up an application call. On our call I’ll ask a few application questions and together, you and I will decide if working together is a fit for both of us.