Hello again, I’m back for another guest blog session, and I’m so excited to share with you my appreciation, and careful exploration of protein powders AND essential amino acids.
Winding back to about two weeks ago, I was consciously complaining to Sam that I hate breakfast. Winding back a bit more here, I was originally doing intermittent fasting, eating between 1 and 8 pm and I freaking loved it. I have always struggled with having to eat at breakfast time, so I should rephrase my previous statement and say that I do love breakfast food, yogurt chia berry bowls are my favorite go-to snack food after all, but my body has never really revved up, and been ready to consume and chew food in the mornings. I don’t think I’m alone either, in fact, much of the advice relating to the importance of breakfast is based on observational studies, meaning that these studies don’t actually prove its importance as it relates to our health and wellbeing. So if skipping breakfast works for you, do it!
Back to my breakfast snuggles – as I mentioned in my previous post, I’m doing IVF, and along with IVF comes a host of supplements and medications that I am taking daily (these do not include the hormone injections and such). As a result, I have to take the majority of these pills with food, and I usually have a morning and evening dose. To make things interesting, I have hashimotos thyroiditis, which limits the kinds of food I can eat, and makes it difficult to take my thyroid medication at the same time as my other supplements – meaning I have no choice but to spread my medications and supplements out throughout the day and eat breakfast of some kind. Hence where my breakfast troubles began, and I am going to be brutally honest now and say that I was gagging food down. Since one of my medications is digested easier with protein, I even tried munching down a couple of tablespoons of peanut butter. The peanut butter was a hard swallow (pun intended), so Sam and I started discussing protein shakes.
Now, there are so many different kinds, brands, varieties of powered protein, it will make your head hurt, at least that was my outcome after about 2 hours online trying to find one that would actually be healthy and beneficial and not be a waste of my money. Now, the key with protein is your amino acids. Your Essential Amino Acids to be precise. There are plenty of articles online that give you more detail about each one – I recommend this one, but just a quick list for reference, there are a total of 9, in no particular order;
- Phenylalanine
- Valine
- Threonine
- Tryptophan
- Methionine
- Leucine
- Isoleucine
- Lysine
- Histidine
When protein is broken down, what is left is amino acids. There are more than these 9 essential amino acids, but what makes them so special is that if you don’t get all 9 of these essentials in your protein, your body won’t make the peptides necessary in order to get these amino acids into your bloodstream (think protein synthesis). The benefit of eating meat, animal-based products is that you get all of these amino acids, making meat a “complete protein.” If you are vegan or vegetarian, you have to combine incomplete proteins in order to get the benefit of protein digestion. There are complete plant-based proteins such as quinoa, hempseed, buckwheat, and soy, but many people struggle to incorporate these plant-based proteins into each meal, and although some nutritionist will tell you that you don’t need complete plant proteins after each meal, I’m going to say that’s not true if you are working out, or have a highly active life. If you don’t get these, your body is going to crave energy, and healthy fats, such as with keto-based diets, won’t solve your cravings. Why? Because it’s basic biology, your body needs complete proteins and fats to survive.
You just need these 9 essential amino acids in your protein. There are collagen-based protein shakes that rely on bovine protein that will get you these 9 essentials (remember, animal-based products have all 9 right there for you, even tryptophan – it’s not just in turkey). However, I am trying to address cardiovascular health in addition to my wellbeing, so I’m trying to reduce my animal-based product intake, and substitute them with healthy plant-based fats and proteins. This made my search for a plant-based protein powder difficult because a lot of plant-based protein powders are unfortunately wasting your money, and you are basically drinking empty calories because not all plant-based protein powders are created equal.
Sam came to my rescue and suggested Sunwarrior Warrior Blend, and as you will see on the back label, all 9 essential amino acids are there, and their other products, such as the Classic Plus blend, are just as good.
I have been drinking protein smoothies with the Sunwarrior protein powder (I add frozen beets, bananas, chia seeds, unsweetened coconut milk, frozen berries, and greek yogurt) in the mornings and it has been a true lifesaver. I don’t feel like gagging up breakfast, and I get a great after-morning workout treat along with my medication and supplements that allow me to feel energized for most of my workday. I have never been a protein powder/smoothie kind of nutritionist myself, but I have turned a corner. So much so that if I ever get back into the dietician/nutrition game, I’m going to be a lot more compassionate towards people struggling with macro and micronutrient options. To those of you that I have told that a “whole-food” diet is the only way to go, I’m sorry, I was high off of my nutrition degree, and I was young, and wasn’t struggling with an autoimmune disorder and trying to get pregnant. Options are great, and let’s be brutally honest here, we are busy, we have kids, we have medication and health issues, and we are trying just trying to do our best….we need a break, we need cheats, we need to be able to substitute protein smoothies in the morning because we sometimes just can’t.
Just make sure what you are putting in your body is still nutrient-rich, don’t go for the stuff that promises fast results and isn’t transparent about the ingredients. You know better, you are smart and awesome, so do your research, and if after 2 hours you feel like you wanna give up, shoot Sam (or me) a comment below, and we will come to your rescue.
#ProteinPowder #SunWarriorProtein #ProteinSupplementaion #CompleteProteins #IncompleteProteins #EssentiaAminoAcids #ProteinSynthesis #RushIntoFitness
