Episode 156: When the Pursuit of Healthy Becomes Unhealthy with Abbie Attwood
Can the pursuit of healthy become unhealthy?
In this episode, I’m joined by Abbie Attwood, a clinical nutritionist and an endurance athlete coach based in San Francisco. Abbie specializes in the intersection of sports nutrition and disordered eating and is passionate about helping athletes of all abilities improve their body image, their relationship with food, and their mindset around exercise.
You’ll hear us discuss:
Abbie’s experience as a marathon runner training for the Olympic Trials
What led to her to discover an undiagnosed autoimmune condition and how it shifted her training and ultimately her life
My experience with overtraining and burnout
Disordered eating, body image, and mindset in endurance athletes
What recovery actually looks like
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Mentioned in the Episode:
Connect with Abbie Attwood:
Share the Episode:
“What beliefs do I have that are leading me to think it’s not okay for this to happen to my body? Where does that come from? That took really deep work because I didn’t realize I had those, I didn’t realize I had weight stigma, I didn’t realize I carried around fatphobia because I had had thin privilege my whole life. But the hormones come with all sorts of side effects, and I had to let go, and I had to just be like, “All right, my body is going to just do what it needs to do right now, and I have to let it happen.” That was hard.”
Read the Transcript...
Naomi Nakamura: Hey there, and welcome back to the Live FAB Life Podcast. I'm your host, Naomi Nakamura, and I am so excited to bring this episode to you because I am joined by my friend, Abbie Attwood.
Abbie is a clinical nutritionist and an endurance athlete coach based right here in San Francisco. In her practice, she works with active folks of all abilities through the lens of an evidence-based, weight-inclusive, and integrative approach to nutrition that takes into account the physical, mental, and emotional components of athletic performance and overall health.
Abbie specializes in the intersection of sports nutrition and disordered eating and is passionate about helping athletes improve their body image, their relationship with food, and their mindset around exercise.
Now, many of you know a lot of my story began when I was an endurance athlete, and I've talked in many past episodes about how I over-trained, about what my mindset was like, especially when it came to food and to body image and weight, and so this episode really means a lot to me because Abbie and I were able to talk about a lot of things that I wish I had known and had the conversations when endurance training was such an important part of my life.
So, whether you are an athlete or not, I think you will find this episode so informative and so real because we talk about a lot of different things. Yeah, I found it really helpful myself, and even after we recorded it, I found myself days later still thinking about the discussion that we had. So, with that, I'm just going to leave it there and let you hear for yourself. So let's get to the show.
Hi, Abbie. Welcome to the show.
Abbie Attwood: Hi, Naomi. Thanks for having me.
Naomi Nakamura: I am so glad we ran into each other at Dr. Scott's chiropractic office-
Abbie Attwood: I know.
Naomi Nakamura: ... a couple months ago because I had heard about you but we're both in the Bay Area and we just never met face-to-face, especially this year in the pandemic. So I'm so glad we met and we got to connect, and I'm so glad you're here joining me today.
Abbie Attwood: I know, and I creepily was like, "Naomi?" You're in your mask. You're like, "What?"
Naomi Nakamura: Well, I think it was the first time I got there, and there was another patient in there. I had only been there when I was the only one there, so I didn't know if I was allowed to go in, and so I was creeping on the outside.
Abbie Attwood: Oh, yeah, you were, you were. You were like, "Can we go in?"
Naomi Nakamura: I didn't know.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. Oh, he's the best. Dr. Scott. Shout-out to him, right?
Naomi Nakamura: Shout out to Dr. Scott.
Abbie Attwood: We'll have to mention that later because that is part of my running story.
Naomi Nakamura: Awesome. Okay. So, that being said, for long-time listeners, they know that this whole thing for me started years ago when I myself was into long distance running and it kind of went awry. So whenever I hear people's story about how long distance running was transformative for them, I always want to hear their story, too. So, tell us, what is your story? I know there's so much to it, but we'll break it down.
Abbie Attwood: We'll break it down. There is so much. Where to start? So I guess the best place to start is, just to set the stage, I grew up in Maine. Yeah. So East Coast, far from home. But the point being that my parents were big marathoners, cyclists. Honestly, the day I was born I was just moving and grooving, and so it was just the environment that I was brought up in. But funny enough, I didn't get into running until later. I actually was more of a team sport athlete growing up. The reason I actually started running and actually running running, not as in the punishment for the sport that you're playing, right, is, thinking back, it was entirely because of my anxiety. I struggled with anxiety, now, hindsight, since I was so young. I managed it fine, and I think it was probably just socializing helped me. I was just a really social kid.
But midway through college, I went through some traumatic stuff and I was having panic attacks and just really bad sleep anxiety. One day, I just went for a run, and it helped. I think anyone who's suffered from pretty bad anxiety knows that you can get too fixated on what's going on in your body in those moments, like for me, I was like, "Oh, my breathing," or whatever. It would trigger my anxiety. Running in the same way that connected me to my body, it also got me out of it in this weird way. My body was just moving, and I was just breathing, and it was just cathartic.
Naomi Nakamura: Almost meditative.
Abbie Attwood: Absolutely, yeah, yeah. So I think that's what really propelled me into this sport. Gradually, over those next few years, I started running more and more. I think most runners know, you start doing it and then you're like, "Ooh, let me do this and let me do this 5K. Ooh, let me run a marathon."
Naomi Nakamura: Oh, what can I do next?
Abbie Attwood: "Should I be doing 100Ks in the woods?" So I was in school in Boston. I ended up running the Boston Marathon a couple times. Basically, I guess, I had no idea that I had a gift for it. It happened rapidly. My marathon times just started going down and down and down and down, and I just realized, "Wow. Oh, I have something here." The problem, though, as I look back, is that it was kind of this band-aid for my anxiety. I didn't actually address what was truly going on, and so as I started getting deeper into what started becoming a little obsessive, right, running became very ... It took a while. I'm kind of speeding through my story in the interest of everyone not falling asleep here, but it got obsessive, and it was because I actually redirected my anxiety onto running. It was the way that I could control my anxiety, but then my anxiety would kick in, and it became compulsive behaviors, right?
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, I had that same experience. So I was never an athlete at all, athletic my whole life, and then I got into gym workouts, and then, four years later, I signed up for my first half-marathon, and then that was the hook, right? Then eventually I found myself signing up for full marathons. But the reason I signed up for that first half-marathon is earlier that year, I had started a new job that was very stressful, in that I was micromanaged heavily, and I had never been that stressed, not because of workload but because of other people in a job, before. So I found that stress release in running. It also gave me a sense of control.
Abbie Attwood: Totally.
Naomi Nakamura: But then it gets to the point where, oh, actually, the running is starting to stress me out, which, deep down, you know, but-
Abbie Attwood: Ironic, right?
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah. When you also don't want to admit it because it's something that you really love doing.
Abbie Attwood: No. Yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: So, yeah, similar in that way.
Abbie Attwood: Definitely. Yeah. It was absolutely that. Then the other problem is I think as human beings we want to feel valuable and successful and-
Naomi Nakamura: Accomplished.
Abbie Attwood: ... accomplished and to find something that not only are you good at but you're kind of better at it than a lot of people. It fuels that fire, and it really did.
Naomi Nakamura: Just so our folks know, you were trained for Olympic trials, right?
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I was running crazy times, like crazy, crazy times in practice.
Naomi Nakamura: I just want to say I watch Olympic trials on TV, so I appreciate-
Abbie Attwood: Oh, I love it.
Naomi Nakamura: ... what that is. I mean, I watch them on TV.
Abbie Attwood: The six-minute marathon miles, that kind of thing. But, gosh, it happened so fast. So what happened is I think a lot of things were going on in my life. This was probably three years of me just starting to run. This was end of college. I graduated, and I think I fell into what was really unfamiliar to me, a feeling of ... As I look back, I think I was kind of depressed, and that's really unfamiliar to me as someone who ... I just tend towards anxiety. Sadness isn't really something that I experienced a lot, but I definitely did then, and I was just kind of grappling at things and trying to make sense of what I wanted to do. I just started isolating more. It's so hard to explain-
Naomi Nakamura: So was it like you're feeling these things, but you know it's not you?
Abbie Attwood: Yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah.
Abbie Attwood: It was this really overwhelming oppressive feeling, and I don't know how to explain any better than the smaller you make your world, the bigger the things in your world become that sustain you, right? Especially, and we can get into this later, but I do a lot of work with eating disorders and disordered eating recovery in athletes, and it's like that. Those things become so big in your life, and then you shut everything else out because you have to control that thing. So running took on this life of its own in my life, and it became so obsessive because it was the only thing that made me feel okay. At this time, I started developing a lot of physiological signs that things were not right, and I started seeing some doctors. So I lost my period, and I didn't have mine for 10 years, 10 years, and there's a big long story there that I'll tell.
Naomi Nakamura: Which you think is a great thing, but then when you start to-
Abbie Attwood: Like, "This is so convenient."
Naomi Nakamura: Exactly. When you start to think about it, you're like, "Actually, this is not a good thing."
Abbie Attwood: No, it's not a good thing, and I'll get into this later, but one of the things I'm so passionate about now is just education around that. I think we as women are done such a disservice in terms of understanding the really, really, really big implications to our health of not eating properly, not eating enough, and over-training. It's dangerous. It's dangerous because it's normalized, right? It's normalized, like go eat less and exercise more. No, that's the worst thing you could do. But I digress. That's what I was doing.
Naomi Nakamura: Well, it's very common in that world.
Abbie Attwood: Right. Yes. So a lot of things were happening. I lost my period, but then other things were happening. At that time, I got diagnosed with celiac disease, and I was also ... I've always had a-
Naomi Nakamura: You'd carb-load on pasta and-
Abbie Attwood: Yeah. And I've always been genetically a lean person, and I lost a lot of weight really fast coming from a place where I didn't need to at all, no one needs to, but I really didn't need to, because I was having malabsorption issues from this undiagnosed celiac. That started causing a whole host of problems, and then I started getting injuries. Unbeknownst to me, these injuries were because of an autoimmune disease that was only detected about two and a half years ago in me, but it's a pituitary autoimmune disease, so that master governor of your hormones. I was getting stress fractures all the time, didn't have my period, and doctors still weren't ... They were like, "No, you're just a runner. It's normal. It's normal to not have your period."
10 years later, I discovered this autoimmune disease, which I'll finish my running story and then get to that. But what was happening was my body was breaking down. I went vegan because all the people in my running community were vegan and oh my God. That can work for some people, but it did not work for me, and I just became so unhealthy. I wasn't fueling my body.
Naomi Nakamura: It's hard to think about being unhealthy when you're this athlete doing these amazing things. It's just so ironic. At the time, I didn't know that you could be unhealthy as an athlete.
Abbie Attwood: Or that the pursuit of health could be unhealthy, right?
Naomi Nakamura: Yes. I didn't even know over-training was a thing.
Abbie Attwood: Right. And it goes back to these normalized concepts of eating quote-unquote clean. Eating healthy is only so healthy as your mindset is, right?
Naomi Nakamura: And what your body can do with whatever it is you're putting in.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, exactly. At that time, I had no intention of losing weight, I had no intention of harming my health, but yet here I was, eating vegan, training like a very competitive marathoner, and my body was-
Naomi Nakamura: For the Olympics.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, my body was-
Naomi Nakamura: For the Olympics trial.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, my body was ... I always say, it's funny, running saved my life, for sure. For sure, it saved my life. But it also almost killed me. It drove me to a place where I was so blinded by everything that I was pursuing within the sport that I couldn't see how much my body was suffering. Yeah, it took getting to that point for me to reach a breaking point because my bones were literally breaking but-
Naomi Nakamura: But was that your breaking point? Was it all your stress fractures, or was there something else that was your breaking point?
Abbie Attwood: That's such a good question. Like I said earlier, I was telling you running was originally this solution to my anxiety. It really ended up being a band-aid and not addressing the real problem, and when I realized that was when I got injured for the first time. I can't tell you, Naomi, the intense depression I went into. It was all-consuming, right, like, "I can't run. What do I do?" I think that's when food started playing more of a ... I got a little more obsessive about nutrition at that point.
Naomi Nakamura: Because you couldn't control running at that point, right, so something else you needed to focus on.
Abbie Attwood: Right, so let's do something else. Yeah, exactly, to stay healthy or whatever. I say that with air quotes. So when you asked if that was my breaking point, it happened slowly but yes. It took multiple injuries for me to see, okay, there's something really wrong here. It's okay to be sad. It's okay to grieve something you love that you can't do. It's okay. But what's not okay is for it to feel like your entire life is out of control and that there's days when you just feel like what is the point of all of my life if I can't do this thing. That's not okay.
Naomi Nakamura: Well, because when you're training at that level, literally, your whole life revolves around that. It's when you're going to eat-
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, it was my whole community, and the only friends I had were ... So when you can't run, you can't see your friends, and then you feel really disconnected from everything that's going on and ... Ugh. And then the routine.
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, but your whole day, it's like, "Okay"-
Abbie Attwood: You get up in the morning.
Naomi Nakamura: You get up in the morning. What am I going to eat? When am I going to shower? You have all these huge blocks of time that you now have available that you almost just don't even know what to do with yourself.
Abbie Attwood: Totally. I remember so vividly the feeling of waking up in the morning and being like, "Wait, what do I do? Do I just go to work? Do I go to work at 7:00 in the morning?" But it was that. I knew and I wasn't ready to admit to it that there was some mental health component going on here that really needed to be addressed. My anxiety was coming out full-force when I couldn't run, and so running was my only coping mechanism. As I'm sure you know, doing what you do, we have to have a variety of ways to cope with our emotions and we also have to face our emotions. Ultimately, I was putting my body under tremendous stress. I was over-training, I was not eating enough. Then I developed asthma, really bad asthma.
So I had celiac, I had asthma, and I won't go into this too deeply, just to mention it, but just to show this impact of stress on your body, I had developed Guillain-Barre. Are you familiar with it?
It's a neurological autoimmune disease. Your body attacks your nervous system, and you get a bilateral paralysis in your body. I had to go to the hospital, I was there for a while, I had to go on all sorts of treatment for it, and it can be life-threatening. So that happened, and that's when I was like, "Okay, I need to reevaluate what's going on here. I'm clearly doing too much. My body can't take this anymore." Also, I hate to admit it, but I think even all those signs aside, the thing that was the biggest glaring thing for me was I didn't want to feel this way anymore. I didn't want to feel like my life was over every time I got injured.
Naomi Nakamura: You're tired of being so defeated all the time.
Abbie Attwood: Yes, yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: Like it doesn't need to be this way.
Abbie Attwood: No, exactly, and I didn't need to feel so much stress around movement and food. What was it even for if my body was screaming for help? Every time I would get back to a place where I felt back to the level where I could go back and compete and hit these competitive Olympic trial type times, I'd get another injury, and it was such ... They were defeating. It was just such a defeating feeling to just continue to feel like you were climbing this ladder and then you'd get knocked back down again and then you'd climb back up and you'd knock back down again.
It was at that time that my husband and I ended up moving out to the Bay Area. We were in DC all this time, in Washington, DC. I gave up on running at that point. I just said, "You know what? I need to take time away from this thing." It was then that I was-
Naomi Nakamura: Were you already diagnosed with your autoimmune condition at this point?
Abbie Attwood: Not yet.
Naomi Nakamura: Not yet.
Abbie Attwood: It happened about a year and a half later. So I kind of gave it up. I went back to school to get my master's in clinical nutrition, and I really focused on sports nutrition and disordered eating and eating disorders. That started teaching me in hindsight a lot about what I had been going through, which was really healing for me, and I started going to therapy, which is the best thing that ever happened to me.
Naomi Nakamura: Oh, I love therapy. I've had the same therapist since 2009, I think.
Abbie Attwood: Oh, it's the best. It's the best.
Naomi Nakamura: It's the best. I think everybody should be in therapy.
Abbie Attwood: I know. And it's definitely a privileged kind of thing to be able to do, and I feel really lucky to be able to do that. I want that to be something that's more accessible to people because it was so helpful for me in working through a lot of the trauma that happened to me early in my life and how that came out in all this. Because I think the big theme here is have compassion for yourself, accept who you are, accept what you've been through, and also don't blame yourself for it. This is a systemic problem in sports culture that women aren't educated on these things, that we're driven to certain aesthetic ideals in terms of bodies and being lean and looking a certain way for your sport, and this is not an individual problem. So to not blame myself was a big thing in that.
Naomi Nakamura: I do have to say, from someone who was not an athlete for most of my life and then finding success in the gym and then taking it outside on the roads with running, I was really proud of myself until I got more into the running world, primarily through social media, and then you have more context as to, oh, I guess, what's times and what people are considered fast and what's not. That also messes with your psyche, too-
Abbie Attwood: Absolutely.
Naomi Nakamura: ... and it made it not enjoyable, just not other people but the way that I was processing and comparing to all those things, too.
Abbie Attwood: Absolutely. What you just said is so true. I didn't introduce necessarily what I do now, but I do have a nutrition practice and I coach athletes. I have every level of athlete I coach, people up to a very elite level and beginners, amateurs, whatever you want to call it. But that, what you just said, it's so true, and I talk to people about it all the time. I'm like, "You're an athlete. It doesn't matter. All this stuff doesn't matter. The more that we compare ourselves to what other people are doing, the harder we are on ourselves and the less joy we're getting from that thing in the first place that we love." We kind of lose that, right?
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, I know. It's hard. You were asking about the pituitary autoimmune disease, when that happened.
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, what was your ... Or, I guess, what brought that on, to have you diagnosed with that?
Abbie Attwood: So when we moved to San Francisco, I was like, "I'm just going to step away from running," so I left the team that I was on, we moved out here, I went back to school. After a while, I was like, "Okay, I think that I feel in a better headspace to run here and there," because I used to train ... You mentioned it earlier. It was very structured. I had workouts that I had to be at. I had a team that I met for track workouts. I had races. I had long runs on the weekend. It was a schedule. I let that all go. Gradually, I was like, "Okay, what if I just start walk-running?" So I started doing that, and then, Naomi, I got a freaking stress fracture, and I was like, "This isn't a"-
Naomi Nakamura: I'm not laughing at you, I'm-
Abbie Attwood: I know, but I'm like-
Naomi Nakamura: Because I relate to the whole situation.
Abbie Attwood: I was like, "What is going on," because it was insane to me. Coming from someone who ran the number of miles a week that I used to run, I'm like, "I am not doing anything. How did this happen?" So I went into my doctor, they got me an MRI, diagnosed me with a stress fracture. It was in my femur. So, at this point, I'd had a stress fracture in my pelvis, in my sacrum, and in my femur in my life. I know, your face.
Naomi Nakamura: Well, I'm like, "Those are tough places to have them"-
Abbie Attwood: You can see her.
Naomi Nakamura: ... and to have to recover from them, that's tough.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, really hard. Yeah. So it's funny. Actually, what happened, and to try and be brief because I'm not brief ever, so my parents are actually both doctors. I called my mom, and I was just crying to her. I'm very close to my mom. I was like, "You know what, Mom? I do not understand." She's like, "This is weird." She's like, "You've gotten your fair share of injuries, but this is weird. You're not really running at all." She's like, "Do you get your period?" I was like, "No, I haven't had it for almost 10 years, and doctors are always like, 'Well, that's normal for you. You're a lean runner. It's normal.'" She's like, "That's not okay, Abbie." She's like, "You need to go see your GP. You need to go talk to them about this."
So I went to see my doctor, like, "Look, I just had this other stress fracture." Then I finally was like, "I'm having all these other symptoms, I don't sleep, my anxiety is crazy, all this stuff." She's like, "Okay, let's test your hormones." Everything was flat-lined. My estrogen, and maybe this won't mean anything to people listening who don't know the numbers, it was five. For reference, it's supposed to be above 40 in someone my age. She was like, "Okay. I just want to rule out the rare case that this could be something going on in your brain, so let's get an MRI." She's like, "I doubt it is. I'm sure we'll just have to address some hormonal stuff. So let's just do it for kicks."
So I got a brain MRI, and I just knew. I knew. I told my husband, and I had the MRI, I hadn't had the results yet, I was like, "I know something's wrong." He's like, "Just wait, just wait. Let's just see what's going on. I'm sure it's nothing." I had a tumor on my pituitary stalk, in my pituitary gland. Then I also had what is a autoimmune disease of the pituitary gland, which all of this just means that there was pressure on my pituitary gland preventing it from producing hormones in adequate amounts. So I was low in everything. I was low in estrogen and progesterone and thyroid, in everything you could name, follicle-stimulating hormone, luteinizing hormone, growth hormone, testosterone, nothing. Yeah, so that's how I found that out.
I was angry at first because I was thinking to myself, "How long has this been here that my doctor eight years ago that I was sitting in front of saying, 'I don't have a period,' was saying, 'It's fine, you'll get it once you decrease your mileage in running?'" At first, it made me angry because I'm thinking to myself, "How many women are told that it's okay to not have a period if you're really active," while all the time my bone density was declining, my fertility was shot. Yeah, I lost my sport because of it, right? I got these stress fractures because of it. So that's when I found it out.
Naomi Nakamura: Wow. So then what happened?
Abbie Attwood: You know, I wonder if you can relate to this. Sometimes, there's some relief in finding out that something's wrong.
Naomi Nakamura: Because at least you know.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, you know. You know you're not crazy. As someone who was educated really well in all this stuff now, at this point, I had really ... Because we're talking about this diagnosis happened about two and a half years ago. At this point, it had been several years into me really nourishing myself well, like taking away any food rule I've ever had and totally decreasing my training, like I told you. So for me to get another stress fracture when I felt like all the things that I was doing should be preventing that ... And I'm a coach. I coach runners, too. I'm like, "Oh my god, I thought I'm being smart here. How did I get this injury?" There was some relief in that, knowing, "Okay, this isn't my body just failing me in these other ways."
Naomi Nakamura: Because then you can put together a plan of what you can do to move forward.
Abbie Attwood: Right. Right. So that's what I did. I've been on hormone replacement therapy, very aggressive, ever since then. It'll basically look like that for the rest of my life, I think. So I take every kind of hormone there is. But it did give me ... Like you said, it gave me a plan because, basically, the physiology that surrounds bone health in women is that we need estrogen in order to absorb calcium in our bones, and with low estrogen, and that happens ... You can just develop low estrogen when you're training hard and just not eating quite enough. That can just happen. There's also this autoimmune component going on for me, but there's not a doubt in my mind that other stuff was playing into that, too, that I had gone through.
But what I knew is that if I went on estrogen, it would take a couple months for my body to regulate a little bit and my bones to start at least getting a little stronger. It was going to take a while, but I at least knew give it a few months, and then I can start doing some things again without fear of getting an injury. So it kind of took shape like that, but I also went through a lot of just grief around my body, and that brought me into a lot of the work that I do with athletes and nutrition clients around body image, too, because I had to let go of this identity that I'd had my whole life of just looking this certain way, and it brought to light these phobias I had around the weight gain that I had never even realized. I had to really address that with myself and be like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, why are you scared of gaining some weight?" Because the hormones had-
Naomi Nakamura: I love that because it's not like, "Why am I gaining weight," it's like, "Why am I feeling this way about it?"
Abbie Attwood: Right, right. And I ask myself all the time, I'm like, "What is that?" Because I think, as women, we are programmed that way, and it's kind of the fatphobia in our society, the weight stigma that's out there, and we know that-
Naomi Nakamura: That's even just separate from the sport.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah. And in sports, it's crazy, right, because you have to look a certain way, of course. I had to sit there and be like, "Wow, what beliefs do I have that are leading me to think it's not okay for this to happen to my body? Where does that come from?" That took really deep work because I didn't realize I had those, I didn't realize I had weight stigma, I didn't realize I carried around fatphobia because I had had thin privilege my whole life. But the hormones come with all sorts of side effects, and I had to let go, and I had to just be like, "All right, my body is going to just do what it needs to do right now, and I have to let it happen." That was hard.
Naomi Nakamura: I don't know if this happened to you, but you get to the point where you realize that all those spots are just contributing to your stress load.
Abbie Attwood: Oh my God, yes.
Naomi Nakamura: If you want to get better, whatever better looks like or means to you, you're going to have to find a way to manage all of these sources of stress, and that's one of them.
Abbie Attwood: Yes. And this all comes full circle, right, because you go back 15 years ago and what was I originally doing to manage stress and anxiety? I was running. That's what drove all of this in the first place. Here I am, over a decade later. I am not running the way that I used to, and I'm face-to-face with all of these core beliefs that were driving my anxiety for so long that I was never able to put to bed with running. In fact, in this kind of unfair but valuable way, running taught me ... I had to run myself into the ground to realize all this stuff. I always talk about this, like it sucks that we have to often hit rock bottom to change. It does. But it often is the catalyst to change.
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah. So what's different now with your approach to running? I don't know if you're training for anything at this point. But what's different now with your approach, whether that be mentally, emotionally, or even your tactical stuff in how you eat or how you train?
Abbie Attwood: So I haven't quote-unquote trained since we moved here in a way that feels like training that I used to do at all, of course. But I have to tell you, it is the most unsexy thing you've ever heard in your life. I work on this with the patients I work with on nutrition and the athletes I coach. It is a slow-ass process. I took my mileage up so slowly that it's almost negligible. So I did that. Two and a half years ago, this diagnosis happens. A few months in-
Naomi Nakamura: No, I want you to share it because people need to hear that it's okay for this to happen.
Abbie Attwood: The slow.
Naomi Nakamura: The slow, yes.
Abbie Attwood: Oh, it was so slow. And you're in a time of not running right now, right?
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, but it's more by choice.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: For me, running feels like ... For me mentally, to get back into that place again, I'm enjoying doing other things. Not that I'm swearing it off forever, I still go on long walks, and my long walks may incorporate a couple of sprints of run.
Abbie Attwood: I could just hug you through the Zoom right now because I had that feeling for so long, where I was like, "You know what? I'm okay." It feels good to get to a place where you're okay without it. Then you almost don't want to lose that. You're like, "Well, I feel okay." I wrote about this, God, a year and a half ago, I think. I actually ended up writing a blog post on this. I had a lot of fear about coming back to running, and I guess that's an important thing for people to know, too. If you're coming back from an injury, there is some psychological trauma there. You've gone through something that was hard, that you put in some physical and emotional pain. For me, there was almost ... The emotional and mental pain was far worse than the physical pain of being injured and not being able to run. Then-
Naomi Nakamura: [inaudible 00:31:09].
Abbie Attwood: Absolutely. I was afraid of feeling that again. I didn't want to ever be there again. That's the whole reason I stopped running, is because, like I told you, I was so tired of feeling that way. So to think I had this new lease on running, like, "Okay, your bones are going to get healthier. What do you want to do now?" I was like, "Gosh, I don't even know how." But this is what it looked like. It's been two and a half years of running when I want to, if I feel like it, only if I feel like it.
Naomi Nakamura: I mean, we live in such a runnable city, where there's so many great places to run.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah. We live right near the park in the Presidio, and it's beautiful. So, actually, a couple things. I would say I pay extremely close attention to my injury prevention routine. I mentioned Scott at the beginning of the episode. I see him every week, and I don't care if something's not hurting or not. I go, and it keeps me in check. We evaluate stuff that's going on in my body. Any time, if I ever run, I am doing a pre-run routine. I have all these injury prevention routines that I do, and I'm very diligent about that. Then I'm very-
Naomi Nakamura: Do you do those even if you're not going for a run?
Abbie Attwood: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Naomi Nakamura: Okay.
Abbie Attwood: Usually, yeah. But I'm much more diligent about it ... I will not let myself, in the same way that I do this thing where I don't let myself have my coffee before I drink some water in the morning-
Naomi Nakamura: Because otherwise I won't drink water.
Abbie Attwood: I do not let myself walk out the door for a run if I ... I'm like, "No, sorry, you can't do it. If you don't get on the floor and do your exercises, you're not going." So I do that. I have become a trail runner pretty much entirely. Yeah. So I really only do trails, which has felt really great on my body, and whether it's psychological or not, it feels better on my bones. Yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: [inaudible 00:32:57] trails in the park?
Abbie Attwood: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. So I only do trails when I run, and I leave the house with no expectations because for so much of my life I had a plan that told me, "You're going to do this today. You're going to run this many miles, and you're going to hit this pace. Or you're going to go do this track workout because you have this race." Now, I leave the house, and I do not even allow myself to mentally think how far I'm going to go. I'm like, "You know what"-
Naomi Nakamura: Do you wear a watch? Do you wear a Garmin?
Abbie Attwood: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Naomi Nakamura: You do?
Abbie Attwood: I do, to keep myself in check. But I'll go out and I'll be like, "You know what? I have no goal today." I have no preconceived idea of what this run should be, what it should feel like, where I should go, how long it should take. The only thing I know is that I won't go over a certain amount, right, because I was just very cautious about ... Like I told you, I'm not kidding, it took me two and a half years to get to a 30-minute run. I took it so slowly. So I leave my house, and I think that that has given me a lot of freedom because as soon as I start running, that's the sign to me that tells me how I feel that day. I can't tell myself how I'm going to feel before the run. I start running and then I'm like, "Oh, okay. I feel okay today. I feel pretty good. Let's just see how this feels and go as far as you feel like and come home."
Naomi Nakamura: So if you don't feel great, what do you do?
Abbie Attwood: Turn around.
Naomi Nakamura: You just go home, or do you just-
Abbie Attwood: I just go home.
Naomi Nakamura: ... keep walking or-
Abbie Attwood: I go home. Yeah. Sometimes, I walk-
Naomi Nakamura: What do you do instead?
Abbie Attwood: I'll walk my dog. What do I do instead? I would say, overall, my life is like I work out at a fraction of what I used to years ago and I eat way more. I feel so much stronger and so much more energetic, and I sleep, and I'm happy, and I don't have anxiety, and I feel really fulfilled in my business. Movement is not stressful anymore. It's not, and it's not the only thing I have to manage hard days or hard emotions or hard feelings. I can get through a hard day without working out, and that's big for me.
Naomi Nakamura: So what are some of these other tools that you use?
Abbie Attwood: I do a lot of grounding techniques where I just have to practice stillness because in my life stillness has been one of the hardest things for me. I devote myself to working, and I'm very good at boundaries. I have trouble because I'm a type eight Enneagram and I'm a rebel, so it's really hard for me to make myself do anything, right? But I do set boundaries really well, and so I don't overwork at all. But I pour myself into it in that it gives me a lot of purpose and fulfillment and I care so deeply about the people that I work with. I care so deeply that no one experience what I experienced. I feel so strongly that I know that, yes, I had to hit rock bottom to change but you don't have to. You don't have to hit that. You can change before then, and I hope that for other people. I bike. I love to bike, so that's something that ... I just love to be outdoors, so I'll walk my dog. You asked what else I do. I walk my dog. I ride my bike sometimes. Walking, though ... You said you walk a lot now?
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, but sometimes I feel like walking's harder than running.
Abbie Attwood: I know. It's actually [inaudible 00:36:19]-
Naomi Nakamura: You know, I will go out for a three mile walk, which I'm not even tracking, but I know my neighborhood so well that I know the distances. I'll come home, and I'm like, "That felt really hard on my body."
Abbie Attwood: Yeah. I love walking. It's-
Naomi Nakamura: I do, too. It's different when you're at a slower pace and you're able to take in more of what's around you.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, it's been great.
Naomi Nakamura: It's just hard on my feet.
Abbie Attwood: I know, it is. It totally is.
Naomi Nakamura: It's really hard on my feet.
Abbie Attwood: I didn't talk about this, but I had planter fasciitis, and that was my least favorite injury ever. So I'm very sensitive to that. It's like if I have any foot pain, I'm like, "Oh, no. No walks." But, yeah, no, I love walking, and I think what had to change, honestly, in all of this was my mindset around exercise, around food, definitely, but exercise mostly, what counted as exercise, you know what I mean? Now, I don't have that mentality that something has to be hard or sweaty or that I have to do anything at all.
Naomi Nakamura: I know. I used to do two-a-days and three-a-days, and the three-a-days would be yoga, and I would not count yoga as a workout because I didn't sweat. But yet yoga's really hard.
Abbie Attwood: Totally, and it's a different workout. My philosophy now, my coaching philosophy, is built around all these things that I've learned, and that is that most of the time, things shouldn't be hard. They shouldn't, even when you're training at a really high level. You only need one or two quality efforts a week, and it's true. Your body adapts better that way. So I've changed my mindset around ... Yeah, yoga is a freaking workout, right? A walk is movement, it is. Gosh, yeah, so that's what it looks like. Coming on here made me think about what do I want it to be in the future because I haven't thought about racing in so long.
Naomi Nakamura: Well, what about ... Would you sign up for a race but not race it?
Abbie Attwood: I thought about this, and I'm like, "Would it be hard for me," because I think-
Naomi Nakamura: Because San Francisco has so many great races.
Abbie Attwood: Oh, I know.
Naomi Nakamura: Of course, they're not happening right now, but my most favorite half-marathon is the Kaiser Half in Golden Gate Park.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, I have so many athletes that run that. You know what? I've been really proud of myself for not having that itch while coaching people, too, because I think if this had been where I was 10 years ago, I would've been too jealous to coach people. I wouldn't have been able to even watch people run. I'd have been like, "Gosh, I wish that was me." But I have to be honest, I think this is some self-awareness coming into play here, I do think part of the reason I haven't entered a race is because it would be hard for me to line up and not race it and not put that pressure on myself after years of being in that mindset. So I don't know. I would hope so because it's great. When they come back, it is just such a great way to take part in something in your community and see other people.
Naomi Nakamura: Bay to Breakers is a good one for that because-
Abbie Attwood: I know. That's so true, Naomi.
Naomi Nakamura: ... most people don't even race it.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, it's just craziness, right? You're right. That is a good one to do.
Naomi Nakamura: Have you done that before?
Abbie Attwood: I haven't, no. But I-
Naomi Nakamura: I did it once. I was a one and done. [inaudible 00:39:22].
Abbie Attwood: But I've been thinking about some trail stuff maybe in the future, and that's a different community than road racing, for sure. It's less intense in that way. So I have thought about that maybe in the future. But I am starting to hit my stride a little bit, no pun intended.
Naomi Nakamura: Are you familiar with the DSE Runners in San Francisco?
Abbie Attwood: I don't think so.
Naomi Nakamura: They're the oldest running club, at least in San Francisco. They're totally laid-back. They do these really, really affordable races just around different parts of the city and the peninsula. We're talking five dollar races.
Abbie Attwood: That's amazing.
Naomi Nakamura: It's just such a chill group. There are people who have been there from the '80s who are much older, but it's like they just publish their schedule and have their little clock that's totally homemade and they give ribbons to everybody. You can pay an annual fee, and then you get a discount on ... You're paying three dollars for a race instead of five dollars. But they have 5Ks and 8Ks and 10Ks. They might have one or two half-marathons a year, but they're totally low-key.
Abbie Attwood: Oh, I love 8Ks. That's a fun distance.
Naomi Nakamura: It's not like this whole-
Abbie Attwood: Totally.
Naomi Nakamura: ... competitive thing. So I would check them out.
Abbie Attwood: I love that. Okay. I'm going to right that down. DSE.
Naomi Nakamura: DSE Runners.
Abbie Attwood: Okay.
Naomi Nakamura: Usually, before the San Francisco Marathon, I don't know if they do this anymore, but they have this thing. They set up camp at Crissy Field because you know when you run around the lagoon thing, it's a mile?
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: So they literally set up a white board with the clock, and for whoever is training for the San Francisco Marathon, that can be your [inaudible 00:41:02] long run and you just keep running it, and they tally every time you cross, so you can see how many laps you've done.
Abbie Attwood: It's a mile, yeah. Yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: They have snacks set up for you, whether it be pretzels or-
Abbie Attwood: That's all you had to tell me. That's literally all you had to tell me. I'm there. Oh my God.
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, and it's fun because I've gone there where other friends were going, and you know when you run different friends with different paces, you never see each other, but that's the one race where you can all see each other.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah. Oh, that is great.
Naomi Nakamura: Sometimes, I'll go and I'll just run two times around. It's really fun.
Abbie Attwood: Oh, I love that. I love that. You're right. It is nice when you have laps and you can see people really often. Yeah. I should go get into some fun kind of runs like that to get myself back into the community because it's been very much a solo venture for me for a long time now. I used to run with people a lot back when I was competitive, and coming back from an injury, part of it for me ... I say coming back from an injury, but it's coming back from everything. I always say that, and it's not even recovering from an injury. It's been years, and I don't know.
But it had to be a solitary thing for me for a while to prevent injury because I couldn't really go for a run with someone because I was doing a lot of walk-running. When I said that I would leave my house without a plan, you can't do that and go run with someone, right? So it's been very solitary for me, and that's been okay. It's been okay. But I do miss that piece, for sure. Yeah, no, it would be good to have that back in my life. I think, other than that, the training is the gradual mileage increase, the weekly chiropractor sessions, the injury prevention routines-
Naomi Nakamura: The rehab and the-
Abbie Attwood: Yeah. And then, oh, man, just freedom with taking as much rest as I need and sleeping. I used to think I was that kind of person that didn't need a lot of sleep. Turns out I was just crazy and thought I could get up at 5:00 in the morning and go for a run all the time. Turns out I need sleep. So I sleep a lot, and I can't even tell you. It feels a little weird to say this, but the pandemic gave me the opportunity to slow down even more, and it was a gift. Knock on wood, seriously. My autoimmune flairs have drastically decreased, haven't had injuries, I sleep more, I work out way less, I'm able to ... Just my stress level has been lower, despite the global stress, my individual. That's a lot of privilege again, a lot privileged.
Naomi Nakamura: I mean, also, when you're on the go all the time, too.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, it takes that away, right? I was teaching fitness classes a lot before, too. But it's been this really powerful lesson in what I always knew was true but needed to live it out, is that stress is paramount in healing and just finding ways to reduce that. It's going to look different for everyone, but for me, it meant letting go of running in the way that I had always held onto it and seeing it in a different way.
Naomi Nakamura: And that really just comes down to mindset.
Abbie Attwood: It does. It all comes down to intentionality, right? Why are you doing what you're doing? You have to constantly ask yourself that? Like, what is this for?
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, I remember when I was ... Like you, I was always injured, and it was always a source of frustration, and I felt like I was always in physical therapy, always trying to come back. Actually, it was after a Kaiser race, and I ran with a friend of mine. I remember talking about, "Oh, okay, I did this race well, I'm going to do my next marathon," because I always had another race in the book. She asked me, she's like, "What do you want to get out of it that you haven't already gotten," because I had already done those distances before. I remember at the time feeling so offended, so offended that she asked me that, like how dare she ask me that? But then in hindsight she was actually really trying to help me out by asking me that. I just wasn't ready to hear that-
Abbie Attwood: 100%.
Naomi Nakamura: ... or have that conversation yet.
Abbie Attwood: And that's right, yeah. You have to be ready, absolutely. I think that's what comes down to everything that we do. What I do now is so based in this understanding that we all have very unique ... We all are bio-individual in the way that our bodies work and what they need and how they need to be fed and how we need to move or rest. Embracing that and embracing diversity of bodies and the body that we were given and to not try and push it so hard that we break it in this attempt to fit into some sports culture mold of what it should look like or what it should be able to do or-
Naomi Nakamura: And, I mean, let's be honest, none of us are professionals where we're getting paid for that.
Abbie Attwood: Well, that's a thing. I hoped to be there, right, where that was really just all that I did. But what you just said is ... Oh my God, I have to say that to people. I have to say that to a lot of the women that I work on sports nutrition and where they're recovering from disordered eating and an obsession with exercise. We have to talk about why are you pushing yourself so hard, what's behind that? Yeah, what you just said, you're not a professional athlete. Your livelihood does not depend on this, and even if it did, if it was harming you, I wouldn't want you to be doing it anyways. But that's really it. What are we doing this for? what do we want from our bodies, and what's going to actually bring us joy and through holistic health? Because one of the biggest problems in sports culture is that we're so focused on performance, and with that comes body weight and all these things that we neglect the health of the whole person, right, the mental and emotional health of that person. That's the most important thing that we have.
Naomi Nakamura: That's kind of why we do this, right?
Abbie Attwood: Right. Yeah. It's so ironic. It's so ironic, Naomi. The whole reason I found running was to help that side of my health. It wasn't about my physical health. It was about debilitating anxiety.
Naomi Nakamura: And managing stress. Then all of a sudden it becomes the cause of your stress.
Abbie Attwood: And then it becomes the thing that takes everything from you because all of a sudden it's the only thing that matters. Not all of a sudden, you go through these stages. Some of us are predisposed to that kind of stuff, but, yeah, it's just a lesson in having to confront your demons and understand why you're doing what you're doing. Because had I been able to do that, I might not have gotten to the point where I did, where my health was so compromised, and could've had a more rational head on my shoulders and been like, "Hmm, maybe I should address some of what's really happening in my head versus trying to run away from it all the time."
Naomi Nakamura: Well, you also wouldn't have been doing the work that you're doing now. I wouldn't be doing the work that I'm doing now if it didn't happen.
Abbie Attwood: I know. You're right. I always say that. Would I change anything? It pains me to say this because I've tried to condense this into a podcastable length, but I was pretty close to losing my life at a couple points in there, and I still wouldn't change it. I still wouldn't because I think in order to live life fully, you have to be able to find acceptance and that compassion that I was talking about earlier for every version of yourself, even that person that made the mistakes or even that person that was affected by certain systemic or cultural pressures. You have to find acceptance. You can't wish it away. You can't want it to have been different.
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, I think to accept who you are now means having to accept those versions of you because you wouldn't be yourself now without those experiences.
Abbie Attwood: No. Right. You couldn't possibly. And I love who I am now. Because of that, I have to say I love every version of who I've been on the way to this person. Even if I made those mistakes, at least I can use those mistakes to help other people and hopefully keep them from making the same mistakes. But even if they do, then at least I can help them out of it, and the same with what you do now.
Naomi Nakamura: So, on that note, do you work with people locally or people wherever? Who do you work with?
Abbie Attwood: Wherever. I'm entirely virtual now because of everything that's gone on this year. But, yeah, no, I work with people around the world. I have clients everywhere. My day is a little crazy sometimes because I have a couple of clients in Asia and then I have a client in Europe, so it's kind of ballooned into everywhere.
Naomi Nakamura: Can you imagine training in Asia? Humidity and me do not get along.
Abbie Attwood: It's so hot. Actually, the two clients that I have in Asia are nutrition-specific clients, but they tell me all the time, they're like, "I can't even go out for a walk. It's oppressive." No, I cannot imagine. I hate heat. That's why I live here.
Naomi Nakamura: Exactly. Thank you. Thank you.
Abbie Attwood: I was like, "It can be 55 degrees every day, and I'm happy."
Naomi Nakamura: That's why we live here.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: So how can people find you and learn more about your services and just connect with you?
Abbie Attwood: So Instagram is probably the best place. I'm @abbieattwoodwellness. Then abbieattwoodwellness.com is my website where you can reach out, and that's how I usually schedule consults for new clients. I'm working with someone now to do a rebranding and new website, so that'll be coming.
Naomi Nakamura: Oh, that's exciting.
Abbie Attwood: But the website stands for now. Oh, it is exciting.
Naomi Nakamura: That's my secret thing, is I love websites.
Abbie Attwood: You have a great website. Yours is awesome.
Naomi Nakamura: It's okay. It's okay.
Abbie Attwood: Oh, I think it's great.
Naomi Nakamura: Oh, thank you.
Abbie Attwood: I love all your little categories and stuff for the podcast. I'm so excited because I haven't had the time to spend on that, so that's happening. It's underway but hopefully happens soon. So Instagram and my website are the best places.
Naomi Nakamura: And I will link to those in the show notes for this episode.
Abbie Attwood: Okay, wonderful. That'll make it easy for people.
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming on and sharing your story.
Abbie Attwood: Yeah.
Naomi Nakamura: So much of what I love about podcasting is just getting people on to just share their stories of what you do and how you get to do it-
Abbie Attwood: The struggle.
Naomi Nakamura: ... and what was the story behind it because I can tell you now, your story is very relatable to me and to so many others. So it's helpful just to see you taking it slow coming back and what you do now because people who train, we all want to hear, "Ooh, what are you doing?"
Abbie Attwood: Yeah, I know. Well, I've written a lot about it, so I'll keep talking about it on Instagram because I think it is important because the injury cycle can be so frustrating, so defeating.
Naomi Nakamura: Well, especially when you put so much effort into the training.
Abbie Attwood: 100%, and it's just ... Yeah. Then you keep feeling like, "What is wrong with me?" But this secret sauce is the slow sauce and just being smart. I would say having an accountability partner if you can afford it, like hiring somebody to help you, because it's hard to stay accountable. Especially as former athletes or runners, you just want to go. You're like, "Well, now I'm ready, I'll just go run."
Naomi Nakamura: No, yeah, I totally believe in coaches and coaching, and I 100% think that it's just worth the investment. Thank you so much for coming on and for joining me and for sharing your story.
Abbie Attwood: Thank you for having me. It's so nice to talk.
Naomi Nakamura: Same with you. We could talk forever.
Abbie Attwood: I know. I know. I could keep going.
Naomi Nakamura is a Functional Wellness & Human Design Coach. She helps women who struggle with stress, fatigue, and burnout find freedom and empowerment by optimizing their health, finding balance, and upgrading their energy so they can live life on their own terms.
Combining her diverse professional background, and her unique approach integrates Functional Nutrition and Human Design she guide clients on a highly individualized journey of self-discovery, observation, and integration by removing physical, mental, and emotional confusion and overwhelm, simply taking them back to the very basics of health through their Human Design.
She believes that when our bodies function optimally, our personalities and souls can shine through everything that we think and do with empowering clarity and ease.
Naomi resides in the San Francisco Bay Area and can often be found exploring the area with her puppy girl, Coco Pop!
Connect with Naomi on: Instagram
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