Busy Moms Need This Valuable Piece Of Info For the best Weight Loss results
Are you frustrated because you can’t reach your weight loss goals? Have you tried everything under the sun but no matter what you do you get further and further away from your goals? What if I told you that you are struggling with your weight and your health because you’re not listening to your body?
A few years ago one of my clients, Erin, shared with me one of her biggest ah-ha moments from my program. And I have to share it with you today because when she told me this it choked me up and helped me realize one of the biggest reasons women struggle with weight loss.
Erin told me that during our time together one of the biggest things she learned how to do was listen to her body.
She told me about two experiences she had.
Four years before we started working together, she had gone on vacation and like usual, she ate and drank and had the time of her life. As she should, right? Vacations should be fun!
But when she got back home she had gained seven pounds. And after spending months before her vacation trying to lose weight she got frustrated, said screw it! And went back to her unhealthy eating patterns.
Until she got frustrated enough to look for a new program to help her lose weight.
That’s when she found me and my program, Macros Made Easy.
While she was in Macros Made Easy, she worked so hard. She planned her meals ahead of time, she stuck to her goals and she started seeing results.
While she was in my program, she was invited to a last-minute party and she realized she had two choices. She could say “screw it!” go to the party and eat whatever sounded good, or she could use the tools she’d been learning and go to the party but still be mindful of what she ate.
She chose the second option and she didn’t miss out on anything! She was able to go to the party, enjoy herself and not take five steps backward like she would have done in the past
But she learned an even bigger lesson that day. She learned how to understand her body’s needs and to listen to it while still enjoying her life.
Mama, have you taken the time to listen and understand your body?
Most people haven’t. So don’t feel bad if you’re in that camp. But if you’ve been stuck in your health and weight loss for a while, then it’s worth taking some time and considering what your body is trying to tell you.
To lose weight and find peace in your body, you need to unravel some of the bad habits you’ve learned and replace them with new habits that serve your goals.
Why you’ve been stuck
As little kids, we were actually pretty good at listening to our bodies. When something hurt we stopped and listened. When we were hungry, we ate. When we were thirsty, we drank. Listening to our bodies was encouraged, we even received praise for it!
But as we get older, we were taught to ignore some of our body’s messages. We started to talk bad about our bodies. We started thinking that we knew better than our bodies.
Our culture taught us that we should ignore hunger cues in order to be more productive.
Someone told us that carbs were bad for us, so we took away our body's main energy source and then blamed her for not being able to do it all.
We looked at pictures in a magazine and thought we should look like that. We poked at her and told her she was too fluffy, too big, too…whatever. We criticized her over and over again and then got upset that she kept failing to meet our expectations.
We restricted her food, even when she was starving, and then got upset that she wouldn’t lose weight.
We become serious mean girls and our bodies were our victims.
And Mama, that mean girl mentality is keeping you stuck now!
I’ve talked to hundreds of women who have been fighting their bodies since they were kids. And it’s left them broken, frustrated and disconnected, but they don’t know how to fix it.
The first step is to start appreciating your body again. Fill that girl up with love and positivity!
Self-love is like a snowball rolling down the mountain, it starts small but as you continue to encourage, appreciate and pour into yourself, it builds up into a snowball that can’t be stopped! It gains momentum and becomes powerful, vibrant, and unstoppable.
I was reading The High 5 Habit by Mel Robbins this week, and this message stuck out to me.
“Here's the profound insight I gained that I want you to hear: When you think you've messed something up, you start to hate yourself. When you hate yourself, you inevitably do things you hate. Your thoughts create a downward spiral.
I've also learned the opposite is true: When you love yourself, you inevitably do things you love. When you treat yourself with respect, you do respectable things. And when you celebrate your-
self, you do things worth celebrating.”
The better you talk about yourself the more you’ll value yourself. The more you value yourself the more you’ll listen to your body. The more you listen, the better relationship you’ll create. And soon you’ll be working together toward a common goal rather than fighting against each other.
Ways your body talks to you
Now that you want to start listening to and appreciating your body, you need to learn how your body talks to you!
Unfortunately, our bodies don’t talk to us in ways that we easily understand. Your body doesn’t say, “Hey Mama! I could use some protein. Will you eat some chicken for me? Instead, it talks to us through symptoms - things we think we need to suppress.
Your body talks to you by
Gaining weight or inches
Mood changes
Headaches
Bloating
Aches and pains
Because we view these things as irritants or annoying problems, we don’t recognize what our bodies are saying to us! And a lot of time we just try to cover up the symptoms so we don’t feel bad.
When what we need to do is slow down and listen to the signals our body is sending out, and start asking questions.
Say you’re feeling especially run down, what should you start examining?
Did you stay up too late and not get a full night’s sleep?
Did you forget to drink water and now you’re dealing with dehydration?
Are you eating too few carbs?
Popping a pill, or drinking a bucket of coffee doesn’t fix the problem, as much as we want it to. It’s another way we’re ignoring our body’s efforts at communication!
If you want to lose weight and feel good in your body, start recognizing these symptoms and look for the root cause. Then, you can look for the right solution.
How to listen to your body so the weight drops off faster
The only way you’re going to learn to listen to your body is by becoming aware. Awareness is how we change everything. The quickest way to become aware of how your body is talking to you is by tracking your symptoms and habits!
In my Macros Made Easy Program, all of my clients have a spreadsheet where they can track food, water, sleep, exercise, menstrual cycles and jot down other symptoms they experience.
As we see entries about bloating, headaches, exhaustion etc., we look at the food journal, sleep habits, exercise, and try to connect the dots.
For example, if you wake up with a headache it could mean a few things. Did you drink enough water? Did you sleep long enough? Did you eat something that bothered you? Where are you at in your menstrual cycle?
Maybe you only drank one cup of water but had four cups of coffee. Well, duh you woke up with a headache! Your body is so dehydrated and over-caffeinated! Knowing this will help you make better decisions in the future so you don’t have to keep getting dehydration headaches!
Sometimes the issue isn’t as clear as “drink more water.” Sometimes we’ve ignored an issue for so long that it takes time to unravel and understand it so that we can even become aware.
This is where mindset work comes into play. If you can’t pinpoint an action that is causing bloating, pain, etc, it might not be your food, sleep or exercise that’s the issue. It might be something more along the lines of stress, anxiety, and overwhelm.
All of those things can hinder your weight loss, so you must dive deeper into them and figure out what your body is trying to say.
As you learn to listen to your body and change your habits weight loss will come quicker. The longer you hold onto those habits that aren’t serving you, the longer your mind tries to fight your body, the longer you’ll stay stuck!
You don’t have to feel lost and alone on your health journey. A coach can help you move through these issues and give you another perspective on why you’re struggling to lose weight.
I can help you learn how to listen to your body so that you can lose weight and find peace with your body and mind. If you’re ready to make that shift, schedule a free Healthy Mama Blueprint Call and we’ll talk through where you’re at and where you want to go.
