Healthy Meal Blueprint with ADHD Specialist and Coach Gaia Broda [Ep. 69]

Lisa (2): 0:00

This is the Eat Well, Think Well, Live Well podcast. I'm Lisa Saulsbury. And this is episode 69 healthy meal blueprint with ADHD specialist and coach Gaia broda. I'm so glad you tuned into this episode, because even if you don't have ADHD, the healthy meal blueprint that Gaia shares today is helpful. Honestly, for anyone. I think we all suffer with a little bit of attention problems these days. I mean, who hasn't started scrolling and looked up an hour later. Most of us could help ourselves out by simplifying things. And that's exactly what Gaia is here to help us with today. She focuses on and coaches, folks with ADHD. So her tools work especially well for that population, but I don't know a single neuro-typical brain that wouldn't also benefit from some simplification. Also before we get into this episode, I want to let you know, I am extending my get unstuck sessions availability through the end of this calendar year. I know originally I said it was just for six weeks, but they've been so fun and I've enjoyed getting to know a lot of my listeners. So I just want to make sure you're ready to hit 2020 for running link to get your session scheduled is in the show notes. Of course, I've had a few people come just to discuss how to make it through the holidays. And that has been super helpful for them. I know. So I can't wait to talk to you. You too.

Lisa: 1:25

Welcome to Eat Well, Think Well, Live Well; the podcast for women who want to lose weight, but are tired of counting and calculating all the food. I'm your host, Lisa Salsbury. I'm a certified health and weight loss coach and life coach, and most importantly a recovered chronic dieter. I'll teach you to figure out why you are eating when you aren't hungry, instead of worrying so much about what you are eating. I am so pleased to have Gaia Broda here with me today on the podcast. She is going to be talking to us, all things a D H D, such a popular and timely, really just a pertinent topic to our world and to just a lot of things that are going on for us right now. So we're going to really be diving into how A D H D impacts our ability to make food. Choices that are good, whether you have it or not. Diagnosed sometimes are attend. Can be swayed by a lot of things going on in the world. So Gaia, welcome to the podcast. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Tell us how you came to this work and you know, how you got here today with me.

Gaia: 2:31

Definitely. Thank you so much for having me, Lisa. It's just, this is exciting. my background is in fitness and wellness, so to talk about nutrition and eating healthy with all of your listeners today, I'm very excited for it. Uh, so how I. I kind of fell into this. I started as a personal trainer and doing the fitness and wellness coaching. I loved it. And then was diagnosed with A D H D about two and a half years ago, and that was when, I mean, if any of your listeners are like diagnosed as a d h, ADHD or it's like everything kind of makes sense. Everything falls into place. You're like, oh, that was why this worked for me and all these other things, you know, didn't work for me. So at that time, it made sense for me to switch my coaching to helping folks with A D H D, and that was in a wellness capacity. And over the course of those two and a half years of navigating that recent diagnosis, I needed access to meds. I was really struggling, but it just didn't work for me. I didn't like how I felt. So from there it was this journey of like, okay, I'm really struggling. I really don't like how these meds affect me. So how can I approach and, and live my life feeling as great as I can and living every day with so much attention in a natural way. So now I do help A D H Ds find those long-term natural approaches to their A D H D so that they can show up every day with intention and, and really fulfill their dreams and desires.

Lisa: 3:58

Awesome. I think. I wanna first talk about how A D H D impacts your ability to eat well, but also because that is kind of a small percentage of my listeners, because. even if you don't have diagnosed A D H D, I think attention is something that is really a concern in 2023. And what I mean by that is it's just sucked by so many things. Social media in particular, but just general internet generally being busy, generally just having a. Thousand things to do. I find that a lot of times my clients and you know, people I do free sessions with, they just tell me, I am just so busy, I can't eat well, and I think that some of these tools are going to be appropriate even if you don't have this diagnosis. Can you speak to that a little bit before we jump into some of these tools and tips that we're going to be discussing?

Gaia: 5:03

Definitely. I love that you just laid that out for your listeners, Lisa, because what I'm gonna be sharing. I'm sure many of you will resonate with. It's just if you are someone with a D H D, it's too more of an extreme. It's just that little bit more and makes it that bigger obstacle. But a lot of the things we struggle with is what most of us, you know, everyone else struggles with as well. And just to make it, uh, some basic facts about a D H D, this means either hyperactive or an attentive or a bit of bow. So it's a d H is optional D, and that doesn't mean. We can't focus, it just means we focus maybe on the wrong things. We can hyperfocus on something that can be to our detriment or can really help us. And our brains are just so busy. It's a just a simple way to put it where it's like a traffic jam, but all the traffic lights are completely out and you're trying to navigate traffic, but it's rush hour and there's a jam. Like what do you do? So we have all these thoughts and all the information. We know how to eat well, but we're like, I don't know the next step. I don't know how to put all these pieces together.

Lisa: 6:14

I think in another. Way that we can, that some of us who don't have this diagnosis can see ourselves, which just reminds me of when I was in college and I took an abnormal psychology class and it was really an impactful class for me. I remember a lot of it. It could be because I took it with my then fiance, who's now my husband, and we studied a lot together, so it was, it was fun to do that, but our teacher was like, listen, On the first day, she was like, listen, you're going to see yourself in almost every one of these disorders we talk about. Everybody has a little of this and a little of that, and She just would remind us, like all semester long, do not diagnose yourself. And it's totally normal to find. And so some days, like some days you're kind of sad and it doesn't mean you have clinical depression. I mean, if you do, please get help. I, I'm not saying nobody does, right? But we can have small D depression, which is like the emotion of sadness. We can have small, a anxiety, not big a diagnosable, you know, clinical anxiety. Everyone gets anxious sometimes, and I think. Everyone has attention issues sometimes, especially when we get sucked into, like I said, social media especially. I guess that's just been on my mind a lot lately that I feel like it's like a time suck. So you'll notice me if you follow me on Instagram, you'll be like, oh, she's back. And she'll, she'll post, you know, a reel and tons of stories and then all of a sudden I'll be gone for a week, week and a half.'cause I'm like, I can't take it. I can't take the time suck that I like. I get. Stuck on social media and I feel like I have a hard time pulling my attention away. So I just think we can always see ourselves in some of these situations and don't diagnose yourself. But then also if you're like, oh my gosh, that's totally me, then absolutely use these tools. So huge issue is, like you said, we know what to eat. And I think this is true for a lot of us, like a lot of times. Lack of information is not the problem. We can Google and figure out pretty easily that, you know, vegetables and some protein is the way to go, right? My listeners have heard me preach like protein, fiber, and fat at every meal. We know these things. Why don't we do it when we have a D H D or other, you know, attention problems.

Gaia: 8:37

I break this into almost two branches. We get this overwhelm of information and. If you do have a D h D or just resonate with this tendency of like constantly getting more information because you're like, it's not perfect. Like I need to have it all. And it's the strive for perfection.

Lisa: 8:55

like analysis paralysis.

Gaia: 8:57

Yeah. And what happens, it leads to paralysis because if it's not perfect. Then what's the point, right? Is this really all or nothing thinking and to the extreme? For us with a D H D, it's either, you know, black or white, all or nothing. And we really struggle with finding that balance. So what happens? It's like, okay, I'm either gonna be paralyzed from taking any action and it's Monday morning and I was ready to start this healthy, healthy eating plan for the weekend. Because it's just too much. I'm so overwhelmed I do nothing. Or it goes the other way. It's like, hmm, I'm gonna implement everything I know, but that's not sustainable. You can't try and, you know, follow everything you read online because you're essentially putting together all these puzzle pieces that are all from different puzzles. It's just not sustainable. So in two weeks you fall off and then this negative thought spiral. Just comes up and folks with a d h, adhd, we have a very intense negative thought spiral. Often this self-loathing, this, you know, this self-hate, this negative talk. It leaves us in that why bother? It's too overwhelming, I'm just not gonna try it. Or we get that wave of I'm gonna do it. It wasn't perfect. I'm falling off. So it's like this back and forth.

Lisa: 10:14

Yeah, major perfection. Tendencies as well with a D H D? Is that what we see a lot? Yeah.

Gaia: 10:21

definitely. definitely. And I like to think of this. This negative thought spiral as this newsreel clean our minds of this negative self-talk, like, you know what, you're not good enough. It's what you're doing isn't enough. It's never gonna be enough. You're a failure already. Why bother even trying? It's never worked before. And we all have that in our brains where we have an ego, but it's too that extreme. With a D H D, often not for everyone. Everyone has a range of symptoms and to different degrees, but it's just constantly looping in really loud, and it's really hard to start to quiet that down and find the clarity.

Lisa (2): 10:59

Yeah, I think for women that like it's never gonna be good enough is just so constant, you know, if I can't follow this to a t I know that was a really big issue for me when I was kind of, As, as my listeners know on the, the diet that broke the camel's back, which was macro counting for me, and I was like, well, if I can't do it perfectly, plus or minus five grams of on every macro every day, like why bother? And so it was like a, yo-yo between the anxiety of making sure it was perfect and. Well, if it's not gonna be perfect, then I'll just screw up the whole day. It was, it's very confusing. Like when I look back, I'm like, what was my brain doing? But,, you have four simple tips to eating well, which I don't know if you are picking that up from the title or if it's how you phrase it too, but I love that. Right in our Eat Well pillar, what are your four simple tips to eating well with ease when you are challenged? D. D perfectionism.

Gaia: 12:00

And the reason these are four simple tips is really a big pillar of all of the tips is. With a D H D, we over complicate everything. We get overwhelmed with having so much, right, that busy brain, that traffic jam. But when the cars are cleared, it's like, hmm, now I can make decisions. Now I know my next step. So these are gonna be simple tips, you know, let go, blah, the fluff. So the first tip is just that. It's radical permission. It's giving yourself radical permission to do things your way, ignore the shoulds, and create your own rules. And this was a very, very big one for myself and my own journey being diagnosed with A D H D and throughout my life of learning to eat well and exercise well from a healthy place is. When we keep trying to fit into this box that society has created for us, and with a D H D, it's, you know, our whole life, whether you're diagnosed or not, you're trying to fit in.'cause you never feel like you quite do. In reality, when you create our own box and decorate it exactly as we want to. So it's gimme yourself radical permission to be like, Hmm, I really like quinoa. I'm gonna eat that all the time. Or it's like, I hate quinoa. I don't care if it's healthy, I'm not going to eat it'cause I don't like it because we are trying so hard to, you know, follow the rules versus I can create my own rules and I know what's healthy and what feels good for me. So giving yourself, yeah, radical permission.

Lisa: 13:29

I, I love that. I think we can learn so much about that from our past food journals. I'm constantly like Your food journal is the most important nutritional study you'll ever read because, It tells you what works for you. You don't need to know what works for the guy that's promoting keto on Instagram. You don't need to know what works for the nutrition study they did at Stanford with like the random meal timings like that. You can like read all that, but. Until you do it for yourself and note down how you feel and where your hunger scale was and if you had any digestive symptoms or mood symptoms like you can't know. So this bioindividuality of looking at your own food journal and really just saying, you know what, but this is good for me. I had a client the other day actually just a prospective client. She was like, I typically eat a roasted Turkey breast for breakfast. That's her like protein of choice. And I'm like, Awesome. is there anyone else out there that's like eating roasted Turkey, breast for breakfast? Probably not, but she's like, I don't need to eat food that everybody else labels as breakfast food because this is what works for me. I'm like, I love it.

Gaia: 14:44

I love that example, and I, I hear similar things all of the time from folks with d h D. It's like, I can't have breakfast.'cause it's a, we also deal with all the sensory issues. It's like, I can't have breakfast. Like I just can't digest it, but I need to eat breakfast. And it's like, do you, well, you know, maybe it's having a smoothie'cause that feels good for you. Or maybe it's having something really small'cause you need that energy boost or that protein because having something in an hour. It's really going back to like your, like you said, your food journal, like what makes you feel good. Your body knows what it needs and what it wants. And I also wanna tell all ladies years out there, if you love a food, you're like, I could eat this every day. Go ahead and eat every day. Because we often think that's wrong and it's, it's not

Lisa: 15:27

yeah, yeah. Totally. Okay.

Gaia: 15:30

so simple tip two. This one, I hope you really embrace this and run with this. It's my science experiment tip, because if you think of. All of the other tips and everything you've read and heard about healthy eating as a science experiment, a fun two week science experiment, it takes off that pressure of it being perfect. It's like, take your hypothesis. It's like, hmm, could I eat the same breakfast for two weeks straight and not get sick of it and, and feel good? It's like, I don't know, can we just test it for two weeks? So see how it goes. There's no wrong answer'cause it's an experiment. So once you try test that hypothesis, you have the data and then you'll know. And this is such a great way to overcome the overwhelming paralysis because with us, with a h d, our concept of time is not the same as someone with neuro A neurotypical. So, To stick to a meal plan for 30, 60 days, that is like, oh my God, that is just so overwhelming. Yeah. But 14 days, it's like that's just that right amount of time that we can see the effect, but it feels so manageable in our minds. If you think of it as a fun experiment, there's no wrong answer, I promise, and it's going to work for you. You're gonna get the data and you're gonna know, make your next step from there.

Lisa: 16:50

That is awesome. I love the idea also. This really just speaks to, there's no rush. I think a lot of us feel in. A rush to lose weight or in a rush to I gotta change my lifestyle. I gotta be healthy. And maybe you've seen someone in your life go through, you know, a, a health crisis and you're like, okay, I gotta do it. Or you have a deadline, you've got a wedding or a, you know, high school reunion or some arbitrary thing that you have in your mind, you think you've got to lose weight for. But I promise you, like there is no deadline for you to be healthy. And taking two weeks to see what works. Like let's just see if this breakfast works. Just really helps you kind of give up that deadline, like you've got your whole life to be healthy. And if it takes you a year, I ask my clients all this all the time. I'm like, what if it took you a year to get this weight off? Like, are you willing to do it? And that's where we've gotta be willing to just try things for a couple weeks and let it be okay. If it doesn't work too. Right, because sometimes you get the science experiment where you're like, okay, well that didn't work. Now I gotta try something else.

Gaia: 18:01

I love that perspective. And with those, you know, two week stints or just if you wanna do something longer, this is something you can do forever. You could be like, Hmm, that didn't work for me, but in three years I'm gonna run it. That experiment again. Oh, it totally does work for me. Right? Your, you change what your, your likes change. Your body's also very adaptable.

Lisa: 18:21

And I noticed too, my schedule changes, and maybe this is just because of the stage of life I'm in, I'm a lot older than Gaia, by the way. She. So, you know, we've already gone through all of the elementary school days as school started at nine, and then I had some in elementary and some in high school, and they were going to school at like six. And so I just find my mornings, especially my morning routine, has changed. Drastically over the time that I have been raising kids, and now I just have one left in high school in California. They decided a year ago that high schoolers were getting up too early. They need more sleep, and so they pushed back the time of high school starting so she doesn't start till like eight 30. So I've been like gloriously sleeping in is what I consider. And anyway, point being. I notice my schedule changes and therefore what I want to eat, particularly for breakfast changes because of the time that I have. Because if I'm fixing breakfast for little kids as opposed to now my big kids just, I. You know, they're on their own. So I think allow yourself knowing, you know, maybe you've started a new job or your husband did, or your, you know, your partner, something has changed in your life. Your schedule changes. I think time to run a new experiment sometimes.

Gaia: 19:36

Yeah, definitely. I'm excited. What come from the change into, you know, the school year that you started and after for summer break?

Lisa: 19:45

Yeah.

Gaia: 19:47

So simple tip number three is keeping it basic and giving yourself permission to throw away the recipes for meals. Folks with A D H D, we want to follow recipes. We really do, but they're so overwhelming, like, Ingredients, the steps. And I have personally found every time I, you know, muster all that clarity to follow a recipe, it never seems to turn out. So I'm like this note, it's not worth the mental, mental struggle. So what I personally follow, and it helped all my previous wellness clients with. Is choose, you know, your protein, fat, and carb, or, I know for your listeners, Lisa, it's, you know, fiber, if whatever is gonna connect with you and your brain of what, how you know your foods. So choose your favorite protein, choose your favorite carb or fiber source. Choose your favorite fat because if you like all the parts, you're gonna love the sum. You're gonna love the total of what's gonna come from this. So for myself, I don't like that stuff. I like some rices, but I love corn tortillas, so I will literally eat that for every meal. Corn tortilla as like my carb source, and then I'm gonna have. A fish for my protein. I love fish. My fat source. Often some oil, maybe like some feta cheese, and then often I'll play your fiber with maybe some chickpeas. I love that. Some people may hate that or look at it, be like, that's weird. Doesn't matter. I love all those individual things. So together of course, it's going to be good. So when you open your fridge and you're like, I don't know what to have for supper or for lunch, What a favorite protein source. What's a favorite fat source? What's a favorite carb and fiber source? And reach for those, and I promise you, you'll enjoy your meal.

Lisa: 21:33

That's fun. I, I think that was really fun. I think cooking can be really overwhelming for people. I'm curious when you were saying throw away the recipe, something I've talked with some of my clients with lately, especially, Getting going in the school year and just the busy nature of, I mean, honestly, the holiday season coming up, I know it feels far away. Guy and I are talking in August, and so this will publish in a couple of weeks, so, I'm wondering about meal delivery services, so things like, I, I don't have an affiliation with any of them, but I'm talking like HelloFresh, blue Apron, those sorts of things. Do those work for a D H D folks when they come with all the parts like cut and ready or individually packaged and just a steps. does that work?

Gaia: 22:24

That's a great, great, question. So, Some of my clients love that they found great success with it. For myself too, I've used those. I'm like, oh, this is so wonderful to like know what you're eating. Everything's there, and this is where it comes back to tip one, which really underpins them all of give yourself radical permission if that works for you. Fantastic. And the other part I'll add to it, because I've noticed this myself and some clients, is that we almost need to like make things our own. It's never quite enough. And there's this underlying, you know, a D H D of like, it's not quite enough. I need a little bit more. It's never enough. It's never enough. So we can create that meal and we're like, but maybe I wanna, you know, add in my own ingredients. Maybe I wanna combine two, two of these recipes together. We tend to want to do that. Not everyone, but it is something that comes up. So give yourself permission. Know that, hey, if I have, you know, some almonds in my cupboard and that would be so good on the salad, even though it wasn't the recipe. I can add those and that's okay. And it's just coming back to giving yourself permission to know that this works for me. This tastes good, this feels good, but meal prep, awesome. I love it.

Lisa: 23:33

Yeah, sounds a little bit like also just kind of giving yourself permission to let go of a little perfectionism. Like not following the recipe perfectly is totally okay, and just giving yourself that permission.

Gaia: 23:46

Absolutely. There's many times when I've had the meal delivery services and I'm like, Hmm, I don't like this part of the meal. And that's okay to let that go, but previously wouldn't, wouldn't have been able to do that. And then you're eating a meal, you're like, Hmm, I don't fully like this.

Lisa: 24:01

Yeah. Another thing I just saw, which I thought was a great idea, it was just like a random reel on Instagram, It was a sandwich place that basically I. I dunno. Some sort of like un witch, which was basically their lettuce wrapped sandwich and they. Purchase the lettuce wrap sandwich and then came home and stuck it on a cutting board and just chopped it all up and it was a salad. And I was like, what? Because way more protein in a sandwich than if, you know, you just get sprinkled on top. And I thought that just kind of speaks to this, like you don't need a recipe. You can just make it your own things that you like. If those are flavors you like, but you feel like a salad. I don't know. I just thought it was a good idea anyway.

Gaia: 24:46

me right into this, uh, tip number four, which beautiful segue, which I call my Healthy Eat meal blueprint, which you're gonna get as a freebie. Maybe we can link in the show notes. I have a training video on how to go about this and really following this blueprint's gonna show you how to meal plan your entire week in 10 minutes. It's what I do all, all the time, and it combine tip one and three, The first one being permission, radical permission. A third tip being keep it it basic. So how this Healthy Meal Blueprint works is that you're going to choose one meal to be exactly the same every single day. For me, that's breakfast. So choose something that you absolutely love, that you're like, I could eat this forever, and then give yourself permission to change it when you do get sick of it. Now, the other two meals of the day, assuming three meals in a day, if you have more meals perfectly, okay, you'll just repeat this framework for the other meals. Is that they're gonna be the same theme or the same format. Meaning if you have a salad and you love salads for lunch, great. Have a salad every day. But the ingredients change and give yourself permission to put whatever you want into it. It's just an uncooked meal. And now you could also change that to, I'm gonna have a stir fry as that format, meaning the ingredients change, but it's always the same type of cooking method. But you could also play with, you know, like Lisa said, this. Lettuce wrap and then turn into a salad. It's like maybe I always have the same ingredients, but I cook them differently. So it's like I'm always having some sort of like lettuce and some greens, some chicken, maybe some tomatoes and cucumber. But one day I'm gonna put in a wrap with some ranch dressing. The other day it's gonna be a salad with, you know, some botham vinegar and oil on top. So this way you have a system in place and it's gonna reduce the decisions you're making every day for what to eat. It's like minimizing that traffic jam of cars in your mind. You're like, Hmm, I've cleared some cars. I know breakfast always the same. I know I'm always doing a stir fry for lunch. I know for supper, I'm always making something with chicken. When we can reduce those decisions, you still have that flexibility that we crave that creativity and freedom of, you know, Ooh, I wanna have chicken with rice today, or chicken with pasta. But it's not giving you too much freedom that would get overwhelmed and fall into paralysis.

Lisa (2): 27:08

Perfect. That's so great. It's just really, um, similar to my go-to meals, which a lot of my listeners have heard me talk about. So it's just a different way to think about Making meal planning easier. We've got to have ways to make it simpler because otherwise you just walk into the kitchen and open the fridge. And the thought my brain likes to offer me is, well, you've never made anything good in your life and lunch, so I don't know what you're gonna have today. And I'm like, really? Really? I'm still thinking that. And so having go-to meals is the way I phrase it, or having this framework that Gaia's going to give you in her freebie will really help reduce those kind of runaway thoughts in your brain and also just that whole perfection thing of like, well, it's gotta be perfect. I have to make the perfect meal to make sure I lose weight or be healthy, or whatever it is that's going for you as far as your goals at the time. So that, that sounds really great. And yes, we will put the link to that in the show notes. How else can people get ahold of you or find you in the world?

Gaia: 28:10

So I am on YouTube and we can link my YouTube in the show notes as well. And I have all my full link training videos on natural solutions for A D H D as well as the wellness. Pillars, you know, sleep, stress management, eating healthy and exercise, you can go binge that. I am on Instagram. I am no longer active on there, but I do have just a ton of content from over the last couple years that you can also go check out, so you can link that as well. It's all at A D H D Wellness Co, so you will be able to find it fairly easily.

Lisa: 28:40

Perfect. Thanks so much, Gaia. You've been really fun to talk to and I think this has just been a great topic.

Gaia: 28:47

Thank you so much for having me, Lisa,

Lisa: 28:49

If this episode has helped you in any way, all I ask is for you to share it. Share it with one friend or share it on your social media tag me. And I'll give you a shout out as well. I have been getting a lot of comments lately about how beneficial the free content is that I have been putting out in the world and sharing it can really help someone else. You can also leave a five star rating on apple and Spotify and review the show on apple podcasts. That also really makes it easier for other people to find it because apple loves that and then they push it out to more people. So your review actually helps other women. Have a great week and as always, thanks for listening to the Eat Well, Think Well, Live Well podcast.