Ep 39. What We Eat and Drink

I am Kym Showers, and this is Reinvented After 40, episode number 39: What we Eat and Drink.

Hey, friends. Welcome to Reinvented After 40, a podcast for all you women in the second half of life who are ready to take responsibility for your own wellbeing and create a life you love living.

I’m your host, Kym Showers, and after spending the first 40 years of my life people-pleasing and following all the rules, I was exhausted and ready for a change. I reinvented myself. I stopped outsourcing my happiness. And I’ve been brave enough to live a different kind of life.

I’ll be here each week to help you do the same thing. It’s gonna be fun. Let’s go.

Hey everyone, how are you today? Happy Thursday. If you’re listening to this on the first day that it’s out, I like, Thursdays are my favorite day. I love Thursdays so much. I love when podcast episodes, new episodes come out, very encouraging. And this is my 39th podcast episode, 39 straight weeks for me. Oh my gosh, it’s been so much fun. So today I want to talk to you about what we eat and drink and our relationship, our thoughts about food and drink. I think we have a lot of them.

I’d like to keep it as simple as I can. I want to just tell you a little bit about what I eat and drink and my thoughts about food and alcohol. I just of course evolved over the years, I think I’ve always had a pretty decent healthy kind of non-dramatic relationship with food and alcohol. I actually didn’t even start drinking alcohol until I was, gosh, in my mid-30s to late 30s. I discovered the pleasure of wine, and I really didn’t drink really alcohol until then.

So, I would say the next 10 years, maybe late 30s, throughout my 40s, before I turned 50 I discovered wine and happy hour with my girlfriends. And that just kind of became a thing. When the kids were in high school before they both went away to college. I feel like that was a highlight of my life when they were in high school. I loved, I loved having happy hour with my friends and drink a lot of wine. And then of course with wine came all the cheese.

And so, when I look back at pictures of myself in my 40s, I just looked puffy. I didn’t look, I don’t know, I think I look younger now. And I do think it’s because I pretty much stopped drinking wine. I don’t think my body liked wine. And the older I got the more I was affected by it. So, I drink it very sparingly and I am really good with that decision. It’s taken some, actually some work, some intention, some discipline, allowing a lot of urges. And just making better decisions than wine. Every once in a while, chardonnay is what I drink in my 40s.

And I rarely have any chardonnay, I can’t even remember, maybe at a wedding was the last time I had a glass. And if I do have white wine or any wine at all I’ll have a sauvignon blanc or a pinot gris or something very, very light with just, I think, very little sugar. I’m not sure how it all goes but I’ll have a glass or two at the most. And that will be maybe once a month. But in my 40s I was drinking wine pretty much I would say five to seven days a week which was way too much. And it’s so interesting when I look back at pictures of myself, I’m like, “Wow, I didn’t even see it when I was in it.”

So, I just looked a little bloated. I looked a little tired. I did not look like I was loving my life. And I didn’t look like I was thriving. I looked like maybe I was hiding from it or numbing from it. And I really do think I was, and wine was the medicine of choice back then. So, I’m glad I discovered that my body – I’m kind of very grateful to my body for not loving wine as much as I thought I loved wine. And I’m really glad I paid attention to it. So, I just want to tell you that little story in case you’re kind of feeling the same way, you feel like maybe your body doesn’t love wine like it used to.

You see a lot of effects, like headaches, not being able to get up in the morning and feel energetic the way that you would love to. I promise you, it’s because of that chardonnay you’re drinking at night. So, if I can do it, you can do it, wean yourself off and look at substitutes that your body will like so much better, which will be so much better for your mind, for your emotions and just the way you feel about yourself overall.

Okay, so I’m starting with that. And then I’m going to talk about food. So, I love food just like everyone loves food. But food is definitely not the joy of my life. And I have decided to think that on purpose. I just don’t want food to be the highlight of my life. I want my life to be so much more exciting than food. And just thinking like that has helped me a great deal in the way that I eat and the way that I think about food, my relationship with food. I think I have a very clean healthy relationship with food. And I really like the way I treat it and the way that it treats me.

So, I pay attention to my body, again, just like with drinking alcohol, I pay attention to what my body responds well to and what my body doesn’t respond well to. So, with food I’m going to tell you that I have, I call it the 80/20 with food, 20% I can just have all the sugar, flour, alcohol, whatever I want 20% of the time. 80% of the time I have these particular foods, this is my 80% diet, I’m going to tell you exactly what it is because it’s pretty steady and I mean this is just what I buy when I go to the store. Jeff is on a totally different diet, so I’m just talking about me.

So, I have a little list of anti-inflammatory foods that I love. And if you’re over 40 this applies to you because if you’re under 40 you can get away with eating flammatory foods, a lot more than when you’re over 40, you just can’t. If you’re puffy, if you don’t feel good, if you feel sluggish, if you’re gaining weight it’s because you’re not eating foods that your body responds well to. So, I’m going to read you my little list that I keep inside my cupboard door that I made for myself to remind myself that these are the foods my body loves. And these are the foods that I eat a lot.

80% of the foods I eat are these foods. So, tomatoes, walnuts, almonds, raw almonds, raw walnuts, olive oil, spinach, kale, salmon. Berries, all kinds of berries, blueberries, blackberries, boysenberries, raspberries, cherries, oranges, broccoli, beans, cabbage and the most favorite one of all, avocado. Aren’t you glad avocado is on that list? So, don’t those foods sound delicious? Those are wholefoods that all of us after 40 love. Our body, I would say probably most of our bodies, most everybody that’s listening to this right now, your body will love this list of foods.

So, take this list to the grocery store with you until you have it memorized and buy these foods and eat these foods. Then I’m going to add to that. With my 80/20 diet, every single day this is what I do. I make my green juice after I get back from the gym every single morning. So, every single morning with my Omega juice presser I press one bag of cut Tuscan kale from Trader Joe’s, it’s just a bag. And it’s a lot of kale and I press that and then I press two big stalks of celery, a whole stalk that has like 10 little celeries on it. I press two of those and then I press two to three lemons off of my tree.

And it gives me a big glass of dark green juice that is so good for me. So that’s my breakfast along with a bunch of raw nuts. So, I eat this five days a week, this is what I do five days a week. I do my green juice every single day. But my raw nuts that I buy at Trader Joe’s and that I always have a ton of, raw walnuts, raw pistachios, raw pecans, raw cashews, raw almonds. And then I add some unsweetened dried cranberries to that mix. I just mix those nuts up with the unsweetened dried cranberries and I eat those nuts.

There’s probably a little tiny cupful, maybe a coffee cupful, not a big coffee cupful but a medium coffee cupful of those nuts with the unsweetened dried cranberries with my green juice. And that’s my breakfast. And that holds me for a long time because I drink so much water during the day, that my next meal is usually in the afternoon when I’m done working.

So around three-thirty I get out my pan and put it on the stove and put a little olive oil in it and chop up a half of an onion, chop up some broccoli, some cauliflower, some zucchini, chop up a yellow squash and I put it all in my pan and I sauté it until it’s just that perfect amount of crispness. I salt and pepper it, I put a little shredded mozzarella on it. I put the lid on the pan, I let the mozzarella melt and then I put it all in a bowl or on a big plate and I eat the whole thing. And that’s what I eat in the afternoon. And I call that my early dinner, my late lunch. That’s what I eat.

And then at night or when I am snacking, if I need a little snack later I pull out popcorn that I get at Trader Joe’s, then I have some popcorn. And that, you guys, basically that’s my everyday diet, Monday through Friday unless we go out, which we rarely go out to dinner during the week. But if we maybe go out to dinner, I’ll eat a salad, or I’ll eat some salmon and sometimes I have dessert and I’ll have a cocktail or whatever. But we don’t go out that much.

Of course, when we go on vacation I’m just probably more like 50/50, I’ll eat snacks that I don’t normally eat. I’ll have sugar that I don’t normally have. I’ll probably drink more alcohol than I normally have in my regular life. And I am totally fine with that because I know I’ll get back to this way of living, which is most of my life, I’m just going to keep calling it the 80/20 because the 80/20 is what keeps me thriving, 80% super clean healthy eating and drinking lots of water, coconut water. I have even thrown in a Gatorade here and there lately and just to keep myself super hydrated.

And this is what works for me. Last night, Jeff, I made Jeff and I a salad for dinner around five and we both just had a salad and that’s what we had for dinner. And I had a little bit of popcorn afterwards. But lots of water, I just don’t drink alcohol during the week unless it’s someone’s birthday or a special occasion which is just very rare. And I do eat a lot of eggs. So, I always have lots of fresh organic eggs on hand. I’ll scramble up a couple of eggs if I’m hungry, if I know I need some more protein.

I hard boil eggs, so I always have a hard boiled egg at hand if I feel a little hungry in between sessions, something like that. But this is my diet. This is what I eat, and I love it so much. My body loves it. It keeps me in high energy. It keeps me waking up at four o’clock in the morning ready to go with a clear mind. It keeps me sleeping so well at night. It really is the answer to a 61 year old body that wants to stay healthy and thriving every day in her life. That’s me.

So, I just kind of created this diet for myself just from knowing my body and listening to my body, and knowing the foods that I enjoy. And now my body actually craves all of these foods. I can’t wait. After I record this podcast I’m going to go upstairs and make my little pot of sauteed vegetables. And I can’t wait to eat it, it’s so delicious. So, I don’t eat processed foods hardly ever, I don’t. I mean on occasion. I don’t eat fast food. I might have an In-N-Out Burger once every couple of months. We eat out rarely. But on the weekends or on vacation of course and that’s all amazing and great.

But I wanted to tell you this because if it’s something – well, first of all everybody’s always asking me about what I eat. And so, I just thought, well, I’m just going to do a podcast. I’m going to tell you all what I eat because it’s so simple. It is so, so simple. I go to the same stores, I go to Trader Joe’s twice a week. I get all my greens. I get all my vegetables. I get all my nuts at Trader Joe’s. And that’s basically my diet. And Whole Foods, I’ll pop into Whole Foods once or twice a week. And I get their little salmon bowl and I eat the salmon off the top of it and Jeff eats the rice. So that’s where I get my salmon.

And usually if salmon’s a choice at a restaurant I’ll order the salmon, or salmon salad or whatever yummy salmon they have. But anyway, so that is what I eat and drink. I do love a good fresh squeezed cocktail every once in a while, maybe once a week I’ll have one. And I told you about my wine thing. So, I have just a really good mindset around it. I have a really good relationship with what I eat and drink because I just know that it’s the fuel that I need to live the exact life I want to live.

And so, I really want you to be aware of what you’re putting in your body and why you’re putting in your body and do you actually like it? And does your body like it? Does it respond well to it? Do you wake up in the morning feeling sluggish? If you do, then it’s what you’re eating and drinking, I promise you it is. So, play around with it. Try the things that I’m eating. Try the way that I do it or set up your own little meal food plan. And I don’t even eat and drink that much. My body just doesn’t need that much anymore, the older we get the less food we actually need.

And the anti-inflammatory foods are everything for us as well as staying really hydrated. So those work hand-in-hand. And I really think that if you cut back on the cheeses, if you cut back on the dairy, if you cut, I went from, you know I have my cappuccino every morning when I get up, I have one cappuccino. But I went from doing the half and half thing which I did half and half like cream, dairy, which I did forever. I changed that to oat milk and so I do oat milk instead and I know my body responds so much better to that as well. So, I don’t have the puffiness I used to have.

I have so much more, I don’t have the sluggishness, I never wake up with a headache. I always wake up just raring to go with lots of energy and I really do owe most of it all to what I eat and drink. So, this is meant to encourage you and to give you some new thoughts and ideas around what you eat and drink, and the relationship you have with food and alcohol. And I want you to know that if you want to make changes you absolutely can make changes and coaching will help you make those changes that you want to make.

I have a group starting at the end of June that you can go to my website and sign up for. I have a small group starting at the end of June and I will contact you right away and give you all the information on that. You can still work with me one-on-one. There are spots available for you there. And let’s just clean up your relationship with food and drink my friend. It will change everything about your life, and it will be so worth it.

Okay, I love you for showing up today. Happy summertime. Here we go, guys, share this podcast episode with your family and friends, that always helps me. And if you haven’t rated and reviewed it, and you really like it and it’s helping you, please go to my page on Apple iTunes and scroll down to the bottom and it will give you the opportunity to give me five bright stars and to add some sweet words, some reasons why you enjoy it. Alright, I will appreciate that forever, I read every single one of them. Have a great Thursday, have a great weekend and I will see you next week.

Thanks for listening to Reinvented After 40. If you want more information or resources from the podcast, please visit KymShowersLifeCoach.com.