Anya Garnis: From Strictly Come Dancing to Life with Sunna

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1:39Today I'm joined by someone who knows every side of me inside and out and has known me better than anyone for the last decade. Welcome, Anya. I feel welcome. Thank you. She's an incredible dancer, choreographer, producer and performer And she also happens to be my wife So today is going to be juicy We're going to get stuck in behind the scenes I get to grill you on your food habits and your past But you can also grill me So it's going to be very, very interesting And we're going to reveal all and spill the beans Yes, we will Are you ready? The truth of what it's like to live with me and what it's like to be behind the scenes of Mr.

2:24Tyke. Oh boy. Oh boy, we've only got an hour, so we'll do our best to squeeze it in. But I want to always start with the beginning. Everyone starts with the beginning. It all comes from our childhood. So start by telling us where you grew up and what was your first memory of food like?

2:45That is a great question because I think obviously as adults, We never look back and never look at the foundation of where, you know, maybe the problem is starting. But I actually always call myself a child of the world because I grew up, well, I actually was born in Eastern Europe. And then I grew up in Siberia. And then I moved to New York. So I was exposed to all sorts of, you know, culture and foods. But growing up, about food, I don't quite actually remember much. I know we were healthy and culturally we would always eat together, but it's not really. But there weren't many vegetables growing in Siberia.

3:26So what were you eating? Well, no, actually there were a lot of vegetables. I mean, very earthy, you know, carrots and potatoes, obviously, lots of potatoes, cabbage. So we would always, we would actually have a small garden and we grew it ourselves. so yeah but we never well my parents my grandparents did and then they would always made me you know go with them but it was really fascinating to see because now looking back even sauerkraut that is so fashionable now it just everyone's talking about how good it is we would do it but i didn't know the benefits of it i would always eat it back in the day as a little girl but it's just a staple traditional food you ate interesting so what was family meal times like in Siberia?

4:14In Siberia. You mentioned the occasion of bringing everyone together and what was it like? Well at minus 40 which is was happening a lot in the winter I think it was definitely a lot of hot food so we'd always eat soups and so again once again very nourishing and we always would have must-have tea post-meal and with something sweet. And so I feel like there was a lot of hot food. So even now to this day when it could be 30 Celsius outside, you know, you always make fun of me because I would always have a hot coffee. And then I would be like, oh, my gosh, I'm sweating. And yet I still have it. You still love your hot drinks.

4:59See, I didn't know. I didn't know it came from, you know, that way. actually i'm connecting the dots yeah thank you yeah yeah the hot hot drinks every time and the something sweet you love something sweet with your meals i know that you've got a bit of a sweet tooth yeah um which is look who's talking yeah yeah we'll get to it um but so then at what age did you start dancing um so i've in growing up in in russia it was just either two options either hockey or dancing i always say so i definitely would dance so i started when i was probably five um i would say um i was picked for olympic gymnastics first but that was too hard and back in the day the dance was a little bit easier more like one two three cha cha cha and um so i started with uh when i was five um and yeah it's been a long time hardcore russian training from a young age definitely I've um I've left home when I was 13 because my mom just allowed me to follow my dreams so now having kids I have no idea how the hell she actually managed to do that but she did and I'm forever grateful and what was training like as a young ballroom dancer in Russia was it intense was it hard with the days long did they look after your food and your diet or was there any consideration of that?

6:28There was never really any consideration for healthy foods, I don't think. No, unfortunately. But the schedule, obviously, and the intensity of exercises, I remember I would be more studying dance and that discipline is supposed to be at school. So it was like long days, I would say, nine, ten-hour days. We would just train all the time from, I would say, eight o 'clock in the morning to 10 you know to 10 we would always squeeze it in even before school and then absolutely right after school so yeah any free moment you had you were dancing any from the age of five yeah wow that's intense yeah is that why all the ballroom champions come from russia always yeah no i think um yeah i i think definitely the uh was there boundaries i I don't think so in a sense of now that I look back, it's definitely was a bit too much.

7:27And I think for psychologically, physically and emotionally, but at the same time, because there was no other outlets. There was literally nothing, just snow. Just snow. And I just feel that that was the outlet that was just kind of that would give us energy and that zest for life. life you talk about the kind of physicality of it the emotional side of it like was it high pressured what was it what was the environment like uh when I left home when I uh when I was 13 so as a very young girl um I had to change schools and it was from I had to fly what it was at the seven or eight hours by plane from my hometown and I lived by myself so it's kind of like a foster home with our dance coach and so the girls lived with her and the boys lived separately And that was very intense until I was about 17, 18.

8:25It was very intense. It was just, again, once again, nothing else existed. It was all about training and understanding and not having a lot of access to any of the information, obviously, prior to all the internet and social media. Plus, it was financially expensive. It's not a cheap sport to be involved in. And so what was it like from a young age having to, because they do all the makeup I've seen, like in the 10-year-old kids, they're dressed to the nines in glitter and sparkles and makeup at 10. You know, was there any consideration at a young age? What was that like? Oh, wow. There wasn't any consideration.

9:08I think we just kind of saw pictures and we're trying to look like idols and someone that we looked up to. And I remember that, oddly enough, we were traveling a lot. So my grandparents would take me away for the summer, just my grandparents. And so my mom and my dad had to work. And I remember my dad didn't see me for maybe competing or didn't actually have time to come to any of my competitions. and um I was about 12 and he came to Moscow and he passed like I was already competing and they came for like round seven or something like that and he just passed by me and I was like daddy hi he didn't recognize me he didn't recognize me because hey he's never seen me with so much makeup and then dressed up in the little dress and and I was already 12 still a little girl but still there was a lot of makeup definitely now it's much better nowadays it's much better it's more regulated yeah yeah okay but that must have put a lot of emotional strain on you going and leaving home at 13 being thrust into this spotlight this world very clear direction of this is what you know you're going to do you're going to be a ballroom champion was there you know what was the food like when you were living in this foster home in moscow yes that definitely i think would have been so much better if we would have any understanding of how to hydrate ourselves because when you hydrate and eat well because at the end of the day when you when you dance for six or seven hours even as a kid when your feet are seizing up or when you can really straighten your legs because you overdid it there were no electrolytes so back in the day and obviously there was something like it was a lot of sausages involved and sausage rolls I guess and a lot of bread like any you know teenager fill you up and off you go yeah and I tried to realize I luckily I actually always loved vegetables so no matter what I would always have fresh cucumber carrots and peppers and so I just think that was kind of my the healthiest moment you know during my rehearsals I would say everything else was substituted with lack of energy that we uh with chocolate yeah with chocolate yeah and not a good chocolate they just they had chocolate yeah everywhere yeah everywhere so because yeah for for the energy for the energy to keep you going wow yeah um yeah that's not necessarily the best way to do it but um that's fine but was there any you know thought about preparing for these competitions because you were doing competitions from a young age right was there you know weight restrictions food restrictions put into it because it's a very aesthetic sport visually

12:05there was um there was a lot of judgment on the weight that if you are um there was not a lot of understanding especially for girls i would say you know i left home at 13 and i was a little girl then over summer i became a woman basically what i look like now and uh i remember coming back and everyone looked at me differently because all of a sudden I was voluptuous and I had breasts and hips and but I would eat I would still eat the same and I yeah and it was brutal it was brutal I remember a moment where my coach you know in front of me were just saying that you know oh she looks she looks good like here but on the floor she looks fat so she would say it in front of me and I don't remember I guess I guess I remember it affecting me but not to point I just blocked it out everything was just about the passion and it she says it sounds but it was all about just the drive of the dance and but do you think that's had an impact on your relationship with food and what it means um i would say i would say so not to a point where i actually would have as a as a performer as a dancer i had to face this a lot and sadly enough it was coming from uh women and women mentors um and i remember not really changing my lifestyle because I just didn't know any better I thought I ate healthy and it wasn't anything that I would just binge on constantly and to or I would be maybe just really boring for this podcast but I feel like it just it wasn't really that I was like oh my gosh I just need to drink this coca-cola and it's so bad and I had to get off of it and it really felt You know, it wasn't anything like it, but it was something that it was not supported.

14:07And I felt that I needed a support because I couldn't understand. And then why I was gaining weight, you know, as a young girl. And maybe, obviously, maybe it is a little bit my type that I go voluptuous. But when actually you work so hard and then you compete in the biggest competition in the world. and then you you know we made the final with my dance partner Pasha a couple from Strictly so he we go way back and so I remember we came to our mentor and she said um I said but why why did we be you know why we took fifth place we were second and the first in the two previous competitions and she said oh um you know I just spoke to a few judges and one of the male judges said oh I just couldn't pass her figure.

14:57So it wasn't even about the dancing. And I think that kind of killed me a little bit. Which I actually never said it out loud. But when she said that to me, and it was at the... And you were how old? I was about 17. Ouch. 17, 18, yeah. And then she was, and that's the woman, the mentor that obviously I looked up to and was fortunate. And when, I mean, we kind of skipping because I, at some point I moved to the U.S. and that was all happening in the U.S. So. Okay. Well, let's go to the U.S. And so you, you left home at 13. So yeah, but not to the U.S. Went to Moscow to this school where you stayed till you were 17.

15:44Yeah. Yeah. And then. And then, you know, you were only a seven-hour flight from your parents. Now you wanted to make it a bit longer. So you moved to the U.S. and you went to New York. I really do love my family. No, it's, yeah, I actually, as you know, I'm very close with my parents. And, yeah, it's, again, I didn't want to go. And an opportunity presented itself. and we were invited to the US to represent the country and to work at this big dance school. And at that time, you know, I was 19 and I just was like, oh no, I'm doing well. I'm studying law and, you know, I feel like I just settled because, you know, I just reunited with my family and then I had to leave again.

16:31Wow. And so you got to New York? Yeah, for the first time I was praying, I was like, oh my God, please don't give me the visa. and then it was like here you have it go it must have been quite a shock though right because i guess the access to social media tv and stuff wasn't so great back then it wasn't there it wasn't there and then you've just been thrust into new york what was your first memory of food getting to new york we landed on the things well actually i came with pasha um and uh we landed on on a Thanksgiving day in New York, and which is obviously a day of food and feasting and all of that.

17:10And I felt like home. You felt like home? I felt like home. I felt like I've always lived in New York. I couldn't understand anything what anyone was saying. Didn't speak any English. And basically, yeah, it was quite fascinating, but it felt like I belong there. really fascinating yes so we were thrown into this thanksgiving took a dinner and it was a lot and um i remember but even back in the day i remember even having access to all this colorful food i remember that it in the back of my mind or in taste buds i would say i just it didn't feel nice and I just thought why does this food taste so flat there were there was literally no flavors like I would eat a tomato could have been you know with my eyes closed could have been anything else so I just yeah it was interesting what's your first introduction to mass-produced yes yes I had no idea but I would overlay milk tasted awful and I just yeah but you have all this like a 500 options of milk you know and in back home was only one and full fat great so and and that was the best and then when you move to the states all of a sudden all these options and choices and that didn't end well either so just obviously when you're in the dance school you were cooked for provided for you then left home when you landed in america did you have to learn to cook were you cooking for yourself or was it all provided again um yeah i think the lifestyle especially growing up it will always cook meals you know it's what we but someone cooked for you so you didn't have to cook yeah i always cooked i mean i feel like i i grew i'm the only child so a lot of the things were cooked for me but then um there were a time that i stayed by myself for almost three months when my grandpa had um a heart attack so i was by myself for three months so i I had a lot of people, friends checking in on me, but I was living by myself.

19:19And just all of my family went to Moscow to be with my grandpa. And I couldn't go. And so at that time, I learned and I just remembered, followed the examples of my parents. And yeah, so I was cooking a lot for myself. And they would just come in just to check on if I didn't burn the house down. And how old was you then? I was 11. 11? You were learning to cook? Well, I had to. Yeah, 11 because, yeah. So you're a pro. Well, not really. no but it's great that you're learning at a young age i think you should learn at a young age so when you came to america then you were able to fend for yourself a little bit you didn't lean into the mcdonald's and the well john's again no definitely uh did all of that uh because it was easier right and you think um at some point you we had to i had to transition from kind of living back at home to living totally by myself as an adult and then start working so we had to turn i had to turn a professional to be professional in order to earn money in order to work in the studio and that's when everything you know takeouts and because you don't have time you don't have time to cook for yourself so you go the easy route which is obviously the takeouts and uh which is mcdonald's cheap cheap and uh and uh but then yeah no we did indulge in a few greek restaurants that were around, but also they were not healthy.

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21:18okay so at what point then did you enter the competitions and you were u.s latin champion yeah uh we were yeah open yeah rising star champion champions finalists i don't remember it's been a while talking about my recapping but yeah it's 19 19 we came in and And we won straight away. You were 19 eating McDonald's and you won the US Latin champion. Amazing what a young body can do. It's a bit different now, I guess. Definitely. All right. And then how did that evolve? Because you then obviously entered So You Think You Can Dance in the US. Oh, gosh. Yeah. It was a long road before that. So yeah.

21:59And then we compete and then I would meet the mentors. and obviously we were competing to one of the best stages for the ballroom, biggest and well-known Blackpool Tower which is obviously a lot known with Strictly Come Dancing here and stuff and I remember being in the final and the same mentor she said, come on, you can do this and I remember being in the final, my feet had Charlie Horse because you would start at 7 o 'clock in the morning and by the time if you reach a final yeah so cramping so badly from the feet up to my calves so i couldn't even straighten my legs while i'm in the final and uh while i'm dancing and people and just i just seen angry faces of my mentors and it's like what's wrong with you and i just get off the floor because when they kind of judging you or give you the marks you have 30 seconds and i remember just saying like help my feet like i can't i can't i don't know what i understand like i couldn't understand what was happening with with my body and um and basically yeah no one was just like they're like just carry on just there was no thought to no magnesium which can relieve cramps okay well okay so you've had quite a journey but then from there from so you think you can silence you went on a world tour oh yeah so yeah and then the biggest moment of my career was a turning point was uh so you think can answer a television show and then obviously after that we went um on broadway uh was a headliner on broadway and then from the broadway we were offered to go on a 50 uh the 50 i think it was 50 cities uh national tour uh international tour sorry it was all world tour and so you what was the food like do you have memories of being on tour did you eat good or was it again just take out whatever you could find wherever you were yeah so weirdly enough you know i on on broadway when you were on broadway oh my gosh it was probably the best city to be in where again back in new york my favorite at that point actually after so you think i moved to la which is uh supposed to be so healthy and um and it was it was because um It's the lifestyle.

24:18It just doesn't allow you to go unhealthy unless you literally have to get in your car and make your way to McDonald's. But back in New York, again, everything is a little bit more in your face on the streets. And so and being abroad where you would think you can get a little bit healthier. But again, eight shows a week sometimes is so grueling. And I remember just not being not being healthy at all. because when you're a headliner, it's kind of you're on the prom. You couldn't get any bigger than be a headliner on Broadway. And then all of a sudden you think you are healthy, but then you have all the other options of late nights and people inviting you to things.

25:02But then you have eight shows a week. So it's just not enough sleep, bad food, and not a lot of healthy choices, I would say. It must have been brutal on your body, no? It was brutal. And by the end of the run, I think we were there for three and a half months. I just thought, my gosh, the more I stretch, the less flexible I get. What's wrong with me? And I remember my body speaking to me, literally saying, what are you doing? Because obviously, it's not normal if you're a dancer and stuff. But my body was literally, I couldn't do split by the end of it. So I was thinking, how am I tired? I probably should finish with a show, you know.

25:37But not even, yeah, the thought didn't cross my mind to maybe look into the food and where it all starts. Let's fast forward then. So you moved to England because you got an opportunity to dance on Strictly Come Dancing, which is obviously the biggest ballroom dancing show in the UK that everybody knows. Do you have a memory of joining that and food? I mean, again, it's so different from American food culture with fish and chips and pies. Did people like throw that at you at the beginning? What was it like? Oh gosh, yeah. It kind of felt like we went from bad to worse at the beginning. And once again, it was about 10 years ago and coming to do kind of the dream job.

26:21And I remember, again, we were all struggling. And I'm not going to call names, but there were a lot of us now well-known dancers is that we didn't have the means actually financially to go and eat well. And so we would go and just whatever the cheap choices that you would have at the beginning of it, yeah, because you have to, again, it was nothing about sustaining your energy or staying healthy. It was all about just kind of do quick takeout. Mostly it was just Indian, which is, you know, you can find some great Indian takeouts here. So that was great. And so I remember it was a lot of Indian food.

27:08Okay. Greasy takeouts. Not the best for dancing. But anyway, let's move on to the juicy bit, which I'm sure everyone's waiting for. When we met. Oh, that. That part. Yeah. Do you want to tell the story? Who is a better storyteller? Well, I am, I think. No. Well, we met on Strictly, which was crazy. um and so i think it was it was wild because that year when i actually joined the team work with the producers is supposed to be pro on the show and i think if i would have been a pro this us would never happen i would be so head in and just so focused but because i was working on the other side of things uh we you somehow got there you you can you can tell that your side but basically bumped into each other in the bar in blackpool in blackpool drinking doing all the unhealthy things drinking yeah what was i doing at the bar in blackpool well a friend of mine was aliage who's also a dancer and strictly um we'd met a couple years before became friends loved football and sport and hung out a lot together and uh i remember him calling me up on one morning going do you want to come and watch the show in blackpool i've got some extra tickets and I was like no not really I've got a football match uh and so but he was like well just come up anyway afterwards when you're done because uh there'll be a good part in my room's got a spare bed in it it's a family room I was like okay why not so finished my football match got on the train to Blackpool and just arrived as you guys I think all finished we finished and literally we were all at the bar all at the bar I turned up for the drinks and then had the party and met you I think We just bumped into each other and said, oh, I'm sorry.

28:57And then our friend just introduced us. Yeah, that was it. That's how it goes. I mean, I don't know how often that happens anymore with all Tinder and whatnot. I don't know updating culture and what that's like. I remember back from when we met, you had a very good chocolate habit. Oh. When you were doing shows and you were dancing, some of your fans would send you chocolates. Oh my gosh, lots of chocolates. Chow them down. And these were like the sweet, sweet milk chocolate with caramel inside and, you know, Belgian chocolate. And it was a lot of sugar. I remember that. And I remember you pointing out this to me.

29:37And I was like, who is this guy? I mean, have you danced? Do you know how much energy does it take to do a show? And I was trying to convince you that it was good for me. And I remember you strongly was like, no, I think you should maybe try the darker chocolate. So that's actually, that's true. You were kind of in a much healthier. I was on it a decade ago. But it's actually on the third or fourth date. I remember you, crazy, you baked that bread from seeds. And it was way before this like almond flour, fancy schmancy, you know. But I, it was, you literally, I walked in and you're like, oh, I made this bread.

30:17And it made out of seeds. I was like, what? Okay, I'll try it. I love bread. So baking is the way to get the ladies? Perhaps, yes. It worked. It worked. But you were so ahead of your time, I have to say, because that bread would just probably cost eight pounds now. Yeah, probably would, unfortunately. Yeah. Okay, so moving forward a little bit. So after we met, we'd been together for about maybe a year, I think, and you were constantly on tour touring the UK doing shows in theatres up and down the country living in premier inns essentially with no access to a kitchen for three four five months at a time and you essentially had this tour diet right you just would eat whatever was around the corner whenever you'd finished your show at 10 o 'clock at night what what was that like it was hard it was so hard the touring life the glamour and everything else that obviously comes with strictly like shows and it's one side of it but then what comes when the curtain goes down and just um it's it's hard it's a hard life we had to drive on the same night to different you know town but also hopefully eat something and uh but i remember at that point i was we had a lot of younger dancers and i remember at that point i was a little bit more healthier than them because i just knew um post broadway days that i just couldn't sustain my body couldn't sustain it to basically to eat what they eat um and there were and it was still a lot of takeouts um until a certain moment changed my life and then when basically i had to change something can you tell us what moment that was um that moment was um uh i would say it was a 2016 um yeah i start um spiraling my health started to spiral down dramatically and to a girl that just never really been sick before um it's all of a sudden um i would start gaining a lot of pains or low energy um and um the symptoms were all over the place so i couldn't pinpoint what was happening i just knew that's that i was just didn't i wasn't myself and it's uh it's hard because you're kind of in a public eye and it was pre-social media i would say well kind of with the social media but it was a very lonely process to discover that and then thank goodness you were by my side and then at the end of mid 2016 i just discovered so i had um uh all the symptoms became clear so i had uh developed also also assertive colitis ulcerative colitis you see yeah no wonder they say you see so yeah it's much better but that was pretty hectic what were the symptoms like uh the symptoms were who um it was basically it's affecting your whole body your being um emotionally physically um it was uh i had um a lot of blood coming out from my stool and then um basically couldn't eat anything felt really really hungry but then if i would eat anything it would just basically flare up my intestines my stomach i couldn't um i didn't i didn't know who to turn to where to go i just knew my body and my side just falling apart and um and i think um it was i was in the middle of the tour where i uh for the first time in my entire life i couldn't finish the finale dance and i collapsed in the wings and i think uh i was taken by an ambulance to to hospital because i was just basically at the end of it and thank goodness you were at that show because you wouldn't you know you know you couldn't come to every show but it was close enough to london that i remember you you said oh i'll rent the car and just come to watch the show because um why not and then you were at that show and i remember we were all ended up ended up in the hospital in the hospital and so you were diagnosed with ulcerative colitis and obviously i remember one thing quite clearly where you were diagnosed and we were kind of like okay great so what can we do how can we fix this and you know the doctor's response was you've got to live with it you're stuck with this for the rest of your life and as a professional dancer how was that diagnosis it wasn't even because i was a professional dancer just as an as a human being i just felt that anyone that i turned to i went to the best doctors in the uk and the states i even went to russia to to get the whole scope and and all of them all of them told me the same thing you're gonna live with this for the rest of your life and you're gonna be on steroids and um yeah and it was very hard because at some point i couldn't even felt really a lot of shame for some reason around it like it was my fault that it happened and uh that i developed that and i had no idea what you see was i had no idea and then it was related a lot has to do with food obviously and then stress and physical stress and not listening to your body and and um and uh oh my gosh is it um well i think well you saved my life i think well you don't have it anymore that's for sure where are the tissues do you have any tissues um uh no uh you you you really you really did you really saved my life and even back in the day um when no one no one knew well like at least no one we knew talked about it or knew a lot about it it's just uh it was it's just they all said the same thing and it was so frustrating well I think the thing I can remember quite clearly is you know in 2016 there wasn't much information it wasn't as a common thing as it is today sadly um and for me it was quite clear like I just refused to accept it I refused to accept that this is something you had to live with and we had to do something about it and there had to be something that made it better and you know there were really no case studies and just to be clear this isn't medical advice I'm not a doctor but it is a case study and it is a personal experience that other people can learn from and you know I speak to people a lot we've never really put this story out there publicly but I think it could give a lot of people hope that with ulcerative colitis Crohn's, IBS, all these kind of inflammatory gut diseases.

37:36There are plenty of case studies out there now where people have reversed the symptoms, have cured it, put it in remission. And, you know, fundamentally, we did that through diet, right? Fundamentally, yeah. We had to just strip everything down that we knew or didn't know. and we had to well you had to i remember i was at a point where it's it's a dark place it's a dark place to be in because i couldn't tell anybody and like you said my field i had to still dance and perform and that was a lot and um just to psychologically to put myself together and forget about physically physically i couldn't control anything it was just inflamed and And yeah, it was just really, really dark place, a really low place.

38:23So I remember I was worried financially because I worked so I can pay to all this expensive, you know, it was expensive to all the three different doctors who wouldn't tell me how to fix it just so I can maintain a little bit, you know, herbs here and not in a natural way. I wanted to do in a natural way. That's what I want to actually. um after you've discovered a few things i i thought it was important to approach it in a natural way and just to see and that's what we stripped everything away and down and just trying to understand where where it all started from yeah so i mean what i discovered through the process and we read every kind of obscure health book out there that we could find to try and identify potential causes to inflammation in the gut and i remember reading like dodgy case studies on the internet that were like blogs that looked like they were from 1995 of someone talking about how they'd approached it and what they'd done and you know there was this one message a facebook message that somehow you came across to remember i don't tell me there was one evening when it was really bad i was just in bed after the show and i literally couldn't even lift myself up and you came in and you said listen i think there is a way there's this guy who his wife had an ulcerative colitis and um he said that he was taking this ketones because she couldn't literally she couldn't eat anything and she um so he was giving her that and within four weeks she was able to eat normal food or something like that i don't quite remember but it was kind of introduced to slowly to that and not promote any diets here or keto specifically.

40:08I'm not on keto at the moment or ever after that moment. But I just feel that it's important to understand what works for your body. And we looked into it. But just because you came in this random, again, yeah, it was so very suspicious blog or Facebook message, I don't remember. I guess we were looking for hope. and we then yeah looked at this principle of essentially stripping out inflammation from the body taking away anything that could cause inflammation so I think I would define this as a good characterization of love I peeled your tomatoes for about 18 months because tomato skins are very hard to digest whereas the tomato itself is absolutely fine and easy to digest Yeah, any skin on vegetables, you know, everything had to be steamed.

40:56It wasn't eaten. No raw food. It wasn't, no, it was definitely a huge adjustment. And it's, I don't know, it's kind of, it's not a tutorial, but basically everything needed to be steamed, nothing raw, not even berries. So everything had to be pre-digested basically before. Part cooked, easy to digest. We'd stripped it all away, tried to take everything away and then put the good stuff back in that would heal your gut lining, essentially. And I think the bit I remember that was the killer that actually got us over the line. And this took this was a process, right? This isn't easy. This was about 18 months, I think, of work and changing and tweaking and, you know, listening to your body as well.

41:38When we would eat something, it would trigger it and you'd be like, oh, that doesn't work. So then stop having that food and do something different. Whereas, you know, I think a lot of people often just go, wow, it is what it is. I live with it. So I'll just carry on. But we actually were listening to your body, adjusting, refining all the time, figuring out what worked. And then the killer was the little morning aloe vera drink. My best friend, Trish. Your best friend, Trish. Can you tell us about that? Yeah. So when feeling like that, I had jobs coming in. And it was the kind of the peak of my career, or I would say I would have big opportunities.

42:15So I had to fly to LA and, um, um, again, feeling like absolute death. I just had no energy and had to project everything through, I don't know what. And she, uh, she saw me at the airport and she was like, girl, we gotta, we have to fix this. And I said, I don't know how I've tried. I'm on this diet. I have to eat so well. And I have been eating well. and it was still it wasn't consistent so it wasn't working and so she said this is the this is the juice that you've got to drink with me every single morning and then so it was the um fresh fresh like proper aloe vera leaf and um just a little quarter of it and then lime juice and then kefir or kefir water however you say it guys here um and probiotic which is um obviously is really helpful and uh raw honey raw honey and one spoon of raw honey and i would drink this um every religiously i would once or twice a day i mean it tastes delicious to be honest with you when you actually blend it so it's it's a good it's a great thing but i was you know so that helped but honestly i would do anything at that time yeah but i think that was the key because we took away all the things that were aggravating it and then put back in the aloe vera which aloe vera is very proven for skin burns externally yeah not as much research on it internally but the principles are saying your gut lining is essentially skin made from the same stuff as your skin obviously holes and yeah so then it repaired it and it healed so okay uh can i just say something before i just want i just want i don't know if you can add this anywhere in your podcast but um if we can help one person to feel better because the place that when i was sick it's such a lonely place and so find your like find people around you there are people who are looking for the same thing to um to to get better and because i had you by my side i think i got better a lot quicker and um and please don't obviously dismiss the western medicine but be your own doctor you have to be your doctor and it's just yeah it takes a bit of time but you will get there and you will get the answers yeah well hopefully we can give some people hope that there's something they can do and they can help manage their symptoms and feel a bit better i hope so well That was quite a traumatic story with food.

44:52But let's get into our household now. What's it like living with me? Oh, God. Oh, God. Telling you about the food all the time. Oh, yes. So I take full responsibility of you actually doing the whole social media thing because it was just me listening to you in the supermarket when we used to go shop together. And it was literally like, did you see this kefir? Did you see this yogurt? It's got this. I was like, can you just put it out there? Can you just talk about it? So actually help people to educate them. And you did. And you did. Yeah, it's true. You got fed up of me talking to you in the supermarket.

45:30So you told me to go. We don't shop anymore ever. So because it became a job for you. That is true. But what am I like at home? Am I relentless? What's the food like? Oh, the food. Okay. I'm just keep, have to like. uh well you are very i would say you're you're very healthy you're a very good cook thank you so just leave it at that um that was the quickest thank you ever and then um and i think you well we started there and i think because you were grew up with obviously uh the healthy like your mom you know like you've been introduced by your on with all the healthy foods so i think you always thrive to uh to to cook well i i do i do say um now that i'm studying even or learning even more about the oils you i think you putting a tad too much oil in everything um that we that we cook i like my olive oil you do love love your olive oil and um but other than that i would say you are um very consistent and uh yeah and a very yeah very good cook so at this point in the podcast we want to get into some of your healthy habits now what do you actually do so give me one thing you're proud of one good thing you do for your health one thing that's bad that you know is bad but you just do it anyway and then one super cool health hack that you're following at the moment a health hack oh my gosh okay uh well the good thing i am for the first time in my entire life athlete post-athlete whatever you want to call it i um actually educating myself sign up for this program and i'm educating myself about food and it's not about counting calories it's not about it and any of that it's just teaching me how my relationship with food my you know whether I'm snacking too much and understanding why I'm doing it or so it's it's a really cool program that I just wanted to get my strength back after having two babies and and it's really really helping so I don't know if you wanted to be more specific but it's just basically this whole program just teaching you what's one thing that's good in that program that you like well like for instance i um never always dismissed protein shakes it was like i don't know i just i eat enough meat i enough this so i was really never into that but you know you can make a protein shake that is part of your meal and actually can give you energy as opposed to just think that it's just something it drinks that you're drinking i've seen you blending frozen cauliflower and butternut squash in your protein so you're getting your veggies in which is good well there you go um what about the bad um well i would say still to this day that connection to my family kind of tribe back in siberia it's the sweet tooth it's the we do uh and it's the milk and chocolate you've been taking down for it just it's the milk and chocolate chocolate it's right sometimes it's not honey come on you know sometimes they don't have 90 you know sometimes they don't have 90 sometimes 75 75 and sometimes because of a toddler you you have something for your soul which is which is we call it what i don't even know what percentage is it well my dad says it's always for the soul it's always food for the soul sometimes you need those treats so that's all right it's all right and none of us are perfect i'm definitely not perfect so all good all right and what's one of the coolest like healthy swaps you've made on this new program oh gosh well i um the the greatest and eventually i've like toasting a sweet potato instead of the bread in toaster and that tastes really darn good with the with the egg and cheese and avocado i was like all right i where have you been all my life i remember that we were like there's no way this slice of sweet potato is going to cook in the toaster but it did it works it works it works it's proper cool all right that's a good one actually and i haven't tried it yet so you need to make that for me please um all right next section we normally challenge the guests to something different or they show me their receipt and i go through everything but because i do the shopping every week i can't really bring my own receipt that doesn't make sense so i do the weekly shop what do you hate about my weekly shop turn the tables what's in my trolley that you don't like I don't think I hate anything, but the one thing that I dislike is that it's just the same thing every week.

50:13So, and even if I ask you to get something different, you just forget. You forget, you forget, you always forget. I'm a creature of habit. But it is very healthy, but it's very consistent. And I think because we have kids, I think our life turned into more of a, like, let's just get this routine going, whatever the routine is. and um and i think it's just sometimes you wanted to mix things up a little bit you know okay like get me kimchi you know if it's one thing you'd change about my weekly shop then uh one thing uh i don't want to change anything we can maybe you can just add things just surprise me surprise you keep it exciting with all the deals that are happening Like I said, we don't get any of them when you come back home.