Q&A With R+R Co-founder, Dabney Poorter, RN, CN
Follow along as we take a deep dive into our Co-founder, Dabney Poorter’s, faves!
Read through for some fun scoop on favorites from our R+R Co-founder, Dabney Poorter, Certified Nutritionist + Registered Nurse! Don’t miss more from Dabney on our #RRtakeover highlight on Instagram.
Name three non-negotiables in your life.
Jesus, Others, My Self i.e. the 'I am 3rd principle'. My faith has brought me through and kept me strong after difficult life circumstances. My faith also gives me tools to love others better. Loving and doing things to help others, including my family, friends, and clients brings me so much joy. Self-care is important to me. It does not come from a selfish place. I am well aware that if I take care of myself I am better able to care for others. I do have non-negotiables when it comes to my personal health as well: consistently exercise, eat healthy, and drink enough water.
Your fave Instagram accounts to follow?
Morning routine?
Weekday or weekend? Weekdays are a little crazy. 4 mornings per week I wake up, check my blood sugar, drink 8 oz of water, and exercise. I wake my girls up at 6:50. While they get dressed I make lunches and breakfasts. I eat breakfast with them and have a cup of coffee. Once they leave for school I get ready to either go to Restore and Revive to see clients, attend meetings, or to do school from home. Weekends we like to sleep in, stay in our jammies, have a cup of coffee, and eat a later breakfast.
Evening routine?
Honestly...right now I am catching up on emails, client follow-ups, or school assignments. I love to take an epsom salt bath, drink a calming herbal tea, and go to bed early. Right now I am not in a season of life that the latter happens often. I am working to get systems in place to have a better evening routine. I am also giving myself grace as I work on hiring and finishing school.
Travel essentials?
Healthy snacks, Swell water bottle, diabetes supplies, and my own personal care products.
Instant energy boost?
A healthy pre-workout snack and exercise.
Most used condiment?
Is guacamole a condiment? I love making homemade guacamole.
Favorite smoothie recipe?
1/2 cup frozen berries
1/4 banana
1/4 zucchini squash
1 handful kale
3 Tbsp ground flax seeds
1/4 small avocado
1 scoop Bulletproof Collagen Powder
filtered water to blend
Great visual here too ;)
How do you take your coffee (or tea)?
I am a totally wussy coffee drinker! I add a plant-based creamer and organic maple syrup.
Go-to cocktail?
Ranch Water or Kombucha Margarita
3 ingredients/foods you can't live without?
Avocado, smoothies, and lentil soup.
Go-to gift?
Facial with Christina Jett , Osea body scrub and anti-aging body balm from Restore and Revive, or Lipstick from Beautycounter
How do you reset?
It depends why I need a reset. General a good night sleep or nap, bone broth and vegetable soups, and lots of water helps me reset. I also love a sauna, lymphatic massage with Tracie Graves, and a walk on a sunny day.
When you feel sickness coming on you…
I do all the things! I drink a homemade tea with apple cider vinegar, lemon, water, and local honey. I take epsom salt baths with Thieves essential oils. I do a foot soak and get an Immunity Boost IV at Restore and Revive. I increase my daily supplements by adding vitamin C, vitamin D, Viracid, Oscillinum, Cold Calm, and elderberry.
What's valuable to you?
I value my faith. My love language is quality time. I value spending time one on one with my girls or husband and together as a family. I value downtime with family and friends. I also value people that help me in my day to day life.
Thank you Dabney! We loved learning more about you and your daily life! Don’t forget to follow along with Dabney in our #RRTakeover Series on our Instagram stories.
The Top 5 Reasons to Go Organic
With all the tricky marketing littering the grocery aisles, even the purest desire to grab the healthiest product on the shelf can often be unknowingly swayed. To avoid this all together, we encourage you to shop outside the aisles for whole foods without the catch-phrases. But even then, the scene can cause pause. To help break it down, we’ve included a summary of organic vs. conventional, which meats, fish, eggs and produce you should buy organic, as well as a basic understanding of local vs. organic.
With all the tricky marketing littering the grocery aisles, even the purest desire to grab the healthiest product on the shelf can often be unknowingly swayed. To avoid this all together, we encourage you to shop outside the aisles for whole foods without the catch-phrases.
But even then, the scene can cause pause.
Do I endure the up-charge for the seemingly feebler organic apple versus his shinier, conventionally grown cousin-once-removed? Why is this conventional broccoli head so much prettier and greener? Are my eyes playing tricks on me or are these onions larger than my 18 month old’s head? Wait what…? Do I want locally grown or organic? Wild-caught fish? Grass-fed beef? Cage-free eggs or free-range eggs?
And on and on.
To help break it down, we’ve included a summary of organic vs. conventional, which meats, fish, eggs and produce you should buy organic, as well as a basic understanding of local vs. organic.
Organic vs. Conventional
Bad News First...
At the risk of sounding alarmist, the loose regulations on conventionally grown foods allow for antibiotics, pesticides and hormones to make their way into our food. To achieve the now-familiar USDA Organic seal, one must prove to avoid all pesticides, antibiotics, GMOs (genetically modified organisms) and growth hormones. They also must prove lower levels of environmental pollution and adherence to animal welfare requirements, inclusive of enabling cows to pasture for pasture season.
One study showed the removal of GMOs from a study group’s diet over an extended period of time revealed improvements in every single one of the following issues: digestive issues, fatigue, obesity, brain fog, mood/anxiety/depression, food allergies, food sensitivities, memory and concentration, joint pain, seasonal allergies and insomnia.
Further, close contact with pesticides has been linked to short-term, acute health issues such as stinging of eyes, skin irritation, rashes, blisters, blindness, dizziness and diarrhea. More alarmingly, long-term effects include various cancers, infertility, hormone and endocrine disruption. While these examples reveal direct contact with the pesticides, one must deduce repeated exposure through consumption does not agree with our bodies and our systems.
Lastly, Medical News Today reports “the use of antibiotics in animals may raise the risk of transmitting drug-resistant bacteria to humans.” According to an investigative report by The Atlantic, “...additional studies were conducted by other government agencies and non-governmental organizations during the 1990s, all of which generally supported FDA's concerns regarding the public health threat posed by antimicrobial resistance."
At R+R, we firmly believe in the importance of gut health in its relation to your overall well-being. With the Vagus Nerve running from your gut to your brain, the correlation cannot be denied. Countless studies have shown the havoc antibiotics wreak on our gut biome by ridding it of good bacteria to maintain the homeostasis necessary for your health. While we do believe there is a time and place for antibiotics, the overuse found in animals and by many general practitioners and pediatricians causes great concern.
The Good News…
Now that that’s out of the way, science has backed going organic as a huge boost to your overall health for many reasons.
The top 5 Reasons to Go Organic
You’re avoiding all the yucky side effects and risks associated with the GMOs, antibiotics, pesticides and growth hormones in the above detail
You’ll be consuming more nutrient-dense fruits and vegetables
You will lower your chemical exposure
You’ll consume higher levels of omega-3 fatty acids
You’re simultaneously supporting our environment
While conventionally grown food may appear bigger, shinier, prettier… there’s a reason for that. As with anything in life, looks can be deceiving! Hand over fist, we choose to stick to the more normal looking, more nutrient-dense organic food for the health of it.
Pro tip: Unless you see the USDA Organic seal, the marketing buzzwords all-natural, natural, green, etc. mean nothing. Also, no matter where you see the USDA seal, be it Wal-Mart or Whole Foods, the standards are the same.
Fruits + Veggies
While the antibiotics mentioned above typically only affect conventionally raised animals, pesticides and hormones most definitely affect our vegetation population. With this data in mind, we would encourage you to purchase everything organic, but we realize this isn’t feasible for most of us. Instead, we like to stick to the rule of thumb: If you’re eating the skin, buy organic. But even this can get dicey and vary from growing season to growing season, so we’ve sourced 2020’s Dirty Dozen Fruits + Vegetables from The Environmental Working Group (EWG). We strongly encourage you to buy organic when it comes to these twelve:
Apples
Celery
Cherries
Kale
Grapes
Nectarines
Peaches
Pears
Potatoes
Strawberries
Spinach
Tomatoes
The EWG also encourages buying organic when it comes to hot peppers (again, when in doubt, if you’re eating the skin… go organic).
Meat, Fish + Eggs
Beyond looking for the USDA Organic seal on all meat, chicken and pork products, we encourage you to buy grass-fed, organic whenever possible. When it comes to fish, buy wild-caught and avoid farm-raised for both nutritional and environmental reasons. For any canned or packaged fish such as tuna, look for brands like Safe Catch Elite who test each batch for mercury levels.
For eggs, buyer beware. The meaningless marketing buzzwords abound when it comes to these little guys. The best rule of thumb, on top of going organic, is to look for “pasture-raised” eggs. Passionate chicken farmers created this code word that is stringently regulated to allow for ample roaming green space for the chickens. This was created internally to outsmart those touting “cage-free, free-range and/or natural eggs”... which essentially don’t mean anything.
Local vs. Organic
It’s no secret that at R+R we #lovelocal. More often than not, the reason local produce is not dubbed USDA Organic is because the farm simply is not large enough to endure the financial load associated with the regulations to attain the seal of approval. They likely do adhere to the requirements and there’s something to be said about the incredibly limited change of hands when buying from a local farmer, but we recommend doing your research if you’re not sure!
New Year, New You!
Overwhelmed by the fads? We feel you. Before you jump on the diet du jour bandwagon to accompany your New Year’s Resolutions, we urge you to consider our sustainable approach to reach your goals in a lasting way. Our Certified Nutritionists Dabney Poorter and Pam Packer tout a combined 30 years of experience and are well-versed in decoding the overwhelm.
Keto! Whole30! Paleo! Vegan! Intermittent Fasting! Get fit in 5 days!
Overwhelmed by the fads? We feel you. Before you jump on the diet du jour bandwagon to accompany your New Year’s Resolutions, we urge you to consider our sustainable approach to reach your goals in a lasting way. Our Certified Nutritionists Dabney Poorter and Pam Packer tout a combined 30 years of experience and are well-versed in decoding the overwhelm.
You might already be annoyed with where you sense this is going... “Yeah yeah yeah diet + exercise, but I want results NOW!” You’re not alone in this desire, and we totally understand the motivation of the new year’s clean slate to jumpstart a routine. That said, the quick-fix equation of restriction + immediate results + more restriction + burnout + complete abandonment and sabotage = leaving you right back where you started physically and even further down the rabbit hole emotionally.
Beyond this self-sabotage cycle, the diet trend of choice’s focus becomes the number on the scale, not the nutrients going into your body. To truly accomplish a new year, new you - complete with all your quirks and darling imperfections because we don’t want those going anywhere - the process starts at a cellular level. We encourage whole foods high in nutrient-density to give your body what it needs to detoxify and rid itself of harmful toxins clinging to your insides and to encourage cell turnover to literally become a new you from the inside out. In addition to losing sight of invaluable nutrient-density when we jump on food trends, the hyper-focus becomes what we cannot eat rather than what we can. In this thought process, we reach a state of overwhelm with the constant behind-the-eyes buzzing of you can’t eat that. It’s exhausting.
In light of all this, let’s get off the hamster wheel, whadya say?
At R+R, we believe there is no one-size-fits-all approach to nutrition, and our guidance will be individualized by considering your unique physical makeup as well as your lifestyle. If you’re a mom of picky-eating littles, we’ve got you. If you work long hours and need something nutritious without a lot of prep-time to spare, we understand. If you feel constrained by allergies or food sensitivities, we can help expand your menu-planning repertoire. If you have an intense workout regimen or train for various races and events, we know how to optimize your diet. Lastly, if you’re lacking skills in the grocery shopping and meal prep department, we take the time to educate and fully equip you - or we can give you a more palatable route excluding these skills.
As mentioned above, high-quality, nutrient dense whole foods top our list of recommended foods. We always encourage you to eat the rainbow (not skittles ;), and this is because the more intense the color, the greater the amount of antioxidants and fiber. By filling up on nutrient-dense foods and understanding how to correctly pair your macros, you eat to feel satisfied and to keep your cells happy. And it all really boils down to this: when your cells are happy, everything functions better, and you cannot help but feel better!
Hold up. Pairing your macros? Say what?!
When you look at a nutrition label, you see itemized content of fat, carbohydrates and protein, correct? Fats, carbohydrates and protein = macros. See, you know what a macro is, you just didn’t know you did! We will help you understand how and when to pair a carbohydrate (ex: carrot sticks) with a fat (ex: guacamole) to create fulfilling snacks and mealtime plates with the most bang for your buck.
Speaking of nutrition labels, while we encourage shopping the perimeter of the grocery store (think fresh produce, fish market, meat counter), we empower our clients to fully understand how to read nutrition labels and the importance of doing so! Understanding the source of the food you eat plays a huge role as well. At R+R, we will help you understand why buying organic matters and which foods are especially important to make the switch. Ideally, we encourage organic and grass-fed meat and chicken as well as sustainably and wild-caught fish to ensure the highest-quality sources.
Within our nutrient-dense whole foods approach, we strive to make your diet and nutrition fit into your lifestyle and to become second nature. By learning to listen to your body and truly hear it tell you what feels good and what doesn’t, you are more likely to make the choices helping it function at its best! All of this said, we know you’ve got to live. Celebrations call for cake and champagne and visiting company calls for yummy cheese boards and cocktails. We get it! At R+R, we will help you incorporate what we call “sometimes” foods into your new lifestyle diet so you do not feel deprived and inevitably tempted to self-sabotage.
This life is meant to be enjoyed, and we believe nutrition plays a vital role in lasting health to help you live and enjoy it to the fullest. During our individualized nutrition consultations, we take the time to get to know you, your family history, medical history, symptoms, weight and dieting history, and your feelings about food and body image. After reviewing food preferences, likes, dislikes, schedule, knowledge and skills, we will walk alongside you as we construct a plan inclusive of your overall health and diet with helpful steps to reach your goals. Our optional ZYTO scans will further the vital information to individualize your plan.
If you’re not ready or able to commit to a nutrition consultation, or perhaps you already have a working nutrition knowledge and simply need a reset, we recommend our meal plan option to give you a blueprint for success! For only $100, you will receive a week’s worth of meals to help you understand how and when to pair particular food groups for lasting energy and results-driven habits. We would love to work with you in 2020 to help you improve an already beautiful canvas!