Protein Guilt

When I was in Toronto last weekend, I had the opportunity to sit down and share a meal with my friend Brad Pilon, author of Eat-Stop-Eat.  One of the topics that came up was what Brad calls "Protein Guilt."  Any of you who have ever indulged in the mentality of needing to eat quality protein 6 times a day to avoid immediate sarcopenia will probably intuitively understand what Brad is talking about.  I experienced a great first hand example of this at breakfast this morning.  My daughter asked for oatmeal. 

Generally I eat leftovers of whatever was for diner the day before (which totally grosses my wife out...).  But since today was mother's day I decided to indulge with the rest of the family and have some oatmeal.  It was really nice.  I like to add some stevia and almond butter to mine, then I top it with some blueberries, strawberries and a couple dates.  It was really delicious, but stuffed as I was when the bowl was emptied, I sensed a certain wrongness!  What could it be?  Oh no!  No protein (of course there was some... but no steak, eggs, chicken, fish or protein powder).  What a horror!  I almost got sucked in.  I almost went to the fridge and took out the leftover meat from last night.  Even though I was full I still was tempted to give in to my protein guilt...  Now you know what I'm talking about don't you?

Sure, it is super important to get enough protein, especially if you are training hard.  But if you miss your protein here and there, you don't need to stuff yourself in order to get it.  There is still some truth to the the concept of calories!  Yes, I firmly believe that hormonal profile and the effect nutrition has on our hormones is an important component of our health, performance and body composition.  But calories in and calories out can't be totally ignored.  So if you are already stuffed, chances are you don't need any more calories in that sitting, even if you haven't eaten your beloved protein.  Chances are you won't waste away...

Comments

[Kristen]

Just found your blog through 6 degrees of blog separation or something, but I found it very interesting. I totally have protein guilt when I don't have equal protein to carb ratios with each meal...although I'd never heard anyone coin a phrase for it. Anyway, I can totally relate!