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Half Size Me episode 602

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brought to you by the Half Size Me community. In order

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to join go to halfsizeme.com

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forward slash join.

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Hello and welcome

0:58

back to the Half Size Me show. I am your host

1:00

Heather and I am excited today

1:02

to bring to you another wonderful interview.

1:05

Today I have the pleasure of interviewing

1:08

Michelle. She is a Half Size Me community

1:10

member and she has lost her

1:12

weight again. She has lost it before.

1:15

She's lost it this time and this

1:17

time though she did it with a totally different

1:19

perspective and mindset and I think

1:21

it's really going to be helpful for you to listen to and there was

1:23

something so magical that

1:26

we discussed in this interview that I know

1:28

is going to help you. Michelle is a little bit on the more

1:30

petite side. She's a shorter lady

1:32

and her calorie level is lower

1:35

and because of that she

1:37

has changed how she thinks

1:40

about her calories. She has thought

1:42

and thought differently about okay if I make food

1:44

I enjoy the taste of and it's

1:47

got all the nutrients I need

1:49

and I'm enjoying what I'm eating. What

1:51

difference does it make how much the total

1:54

calories add up to? It's more about me

1:56

enjoying my food.

1:57

It tasting good to me. Less

2:01

what my numbers are and I think for

2:03

a lot of people who struggle with

2:05

this You're gonna get a lot of benefit

2:07

out of listening to Michelle and how she reframes

2:10

her own thinking in order to

2:12

be successful And what

2:14

she is working on in the half-size me community.

2:16

She was so awesome. She came to our last maintainers

2:19

meeting so a shout out to Michelle for being there

2:21

and She is actually trying

2:23

to figure out and you'll hear this in the interview how

2:26

to go through the different life phases birthdays

2:30

vacations celebrations and

2:33

figuring out how to make maintenance

2:35

work for her as She transitions

2:38

into these different things because keep in mind for a lot

2:40

of people when they're losing weight It's a very

2:42

fixed point, right? I'm working on losing weight

2:44

and I'm doing these things But then

2:47

as life events come up holidays

2:49

will be coming up in another couple months We

2:52

sometimes struggle like okay, so

2:54

if my maintenance or count or deficit calories

2:56

are X How do I actually

2:59

sustain that through the next several months?

3:01

So I don't gain a lot of weight or even

3:04

lose a little bit depending on what my goals are

3:06

and that is a totally different mindset

3:08

for people sometimes when they're thinking about Different

3:11

phases of the year and how they need

3:14

to approach them so this is a really good

3:16

conversation with Michelle on just kind

3:18

of how to segment out her time and Think

3:21

about it in different periods and

3:23

how she could eat differently at different

3:25

times of the month to support going

3:27

on a cruise or to support her birthday or

3:30

Going to on travels So I think there's

3:32

a lot of good nuggets in this one and I

3:35

really hope that you enjoy it and you get a lot

3:37

Of value from it and next

3:39

week for episode 603 I'll

3:42

be doing a coaching call with an amazing

3:44

woman named Melody The reason

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Melody is so very

3:49

amazing and and I was kind of blown away

3:51

by our call is Not only

3:53

has she lost a hundred pounds She

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has gone through having a stroke and

3:58

learning how to walk a again, and she

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really wants to get the rest of her weight

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off. And I just had to point out to her

4:06

in next week's show how far

4:08

she's come, how much she has

4:10

accomplished, how wonderfully

4:13

focused she is to be at the place she's

4:15

at. And we talked about some of the things that she

4:17

might need to focus on moving forward to lose

4:20

the last 30 pounds she wants to lose. So

4:22

this was a really, really awesome

4:24

call and I was kind of blown away

4:27

by Melody's story. So I really hope you will

4:29

join us and get a chance to hear that.

4:31

That's going to be episode 603 and that

4:34

will be available to podcast premium subscribers.

4:37

I just have to say a huge thank you to our podcast

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premium subscribers. Each and every

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one of you who signs up, who is

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willing to pay the small fee each

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month to get all the shows, all the extra

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content. It makes a huge world

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of difference for our family, for

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the half-size me message, for everything

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we're trying to put out in the world. We're

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not a big corporation. It's me,

5:00

my husband, a handful of other wonderful

5:02

people who are willing to help us on

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a month-to-month basis. And every

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month we're turning out content to you guys

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and I just really, really appreciate our podcast

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premium subscribers. They have really

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helped support us in such an impactful

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way. So thank you so much. That'll

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be episode 603 coming out next week.

5:21

And if you would like to become a podcast premium

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subscriber, all you have to do is go to halfsizeme.com

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forward slash fan. That's F-A-N

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and you can sign up there and you'll have immediate

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access to all 602 episodes. You'll

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get 603 next week and

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you will be able to hear all of the coaching

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series with Sarah and Carolina

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and the bonus Ask Me Anything episodes

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that go out plus other content we release.

5:46

You guys have a great week. Enjoy this

5:48

interview with Michelle and I'll talk to you soon.

5:55

All right,

5:55

lovely listeners. We have Miss

5:58

Michelle on the line with us. Michelle. Michelle has

6:00

been very gracious to take time out of her schedule.

6:03

Come on the show and share

6:05

with us your own story

6:07

around this. What prompted

6:10

you at some point to start taking your health

6:12

seriously? Why were you motivated

6:14

to lose some weight? Bring us up

6:16

to speed on how that came to be for you, Michelle.

6:19

Michelle

6:19

Bock I think I mentioned

6:22

in my email to you that this

6:24

is the third time that I lost the same 10 to 15

6:27

pounds and this time I said, this is it.

6:30

This is the last time I'm going to do it. I'm short. I'm

6:32

five two. And I have a family history

6:35

of on my dad's side, I have some

6:38

cancers, some diabetes, high

6:40

blood pressure, all that stuff. On my mom's side,

6:42

there's a variety of cancers. And so I'm

6:44

just always, particularly because of the diabetes,

6:47

it's such a horrific disease that I've

6:49

always felt like if I

6:51

let myself

6:53

really get overweight, like I'm going

6:55

to put myself in the danger zone for that. And

6:57

I just watched what it did to my grandmother

6:59

and my uncle and I said, I

7:01

just feel like that's like, that could

7:03

happen to me. So I've always

7:06

had this number in mind. Like when I get to this

7:08

number, once you go number, then I'm like,

7:10

okay, we've got to pull back. And so over the

7:12

years, like I hit that number and I've

7:15

tried some, you know, I've lost the weight, but

7:17

I've never intentionally maintained

7:19

it. I just tend to like maybe like, you

7:21

know, I happen to maintain it for a little while.

7:23

And then eventually like I gain it back

7:26

and I've approached the weight loss differently each

7:28

time. But this time I approached it with

7:30

maintenance in mind and I

7:33

feel really good about that. Although my maintenance journey

7:35

is a little rocky right now, but I

7:38

feel like I have a grip on it and I know it's going

7:40

to take time and I'm okay with that. Yeah.

7:42

Okay. So obviously you're coming

7:44

at

7:44

this from a really, in my opinion, a kind

7:47

of a positive place where you're like, okay,

7:49

I am not in a bad predicament

7:51

where I'm somebody who's carrying around an extra 50 or

7:54

a hundred pounds. I'm looking at my family

7:56

history, which to be frank, as

7:58

I wrote down everything you said.

7:59

I can get where the fear and trepidation

8:02

would come from, you know, between diabetes, all these

8:04

cancer issues, you're taking your health

8:06

super seriously. And really, you're trying

8:08

to manage what factors you can manage,

8:11

right? Yes, yes. That's always in my

8:13

mindset. Like, there's some things I know that are completely

8:15

out of like the cancer. I don't even,

8:18

we don't know, you know, but I'm like, high

8:20

blood pressure and, you know, diabetes

8:22

and all those things, I can manage, you know, my

8:25

risk level for those kind of things. Yes.

8:28

So, coming at it from that perspective,

8:29

and then this is your third round

8:32

of attempting to lose, like you had said, the same 10 to 15

8:34

pounds. And

8:36

when you look at all your previous attempts,

8:39

so I always tell people fear is not a good motivator

8:42

for long-term weight loss. Like it kind

8:44

of can jolt us into reality, but

8:47

it's not like sustainable. So now

8:49

that you've lost that weight twice, gained it back

8:51

twice, how did you

8:53

learn from those experiences and

8:56

how did you approach this time differently?

8:58

What would you say? Well,

8:59

specifically from the last

9:02

time, the first time I did Weight Watchers and

9:04

I actually ended up switching, like I was still going

9:06

to the meetings, but I realized when I calculated

9:09

the actual calories from the foods

9:11

that I was eating, it was like way low. So

9:14

I was like, wait, I need to eat more than

9:16

this because this is coming in like 1100 or something

9:19

crazy. I was like, I need to at least

9:21

eat 1200. The last time

9:23

I was very, very

9:26

structured, like overly

9:28

structured. And that's kind of like my MO, like I

9:30

love a spreadsheet. I love a database. Like I

9:32

love the numbers. So I like

9:35

had mapped out like meals

9:37

and calculated the calories for each meal,

9:39

did the meal prep. And I did like

9:42

a straight 1200 throughout

9:44

the whole week. Weight came off very

9:46

quickly, obviously doing that. But

9:48

this time I said, gosh, 12 seems so

9:50

low. I wonder if I can do more. And

9:53

then I also learned about calories. And

9:55

I said, now that is going

9:57

to be more flexible because I like to eat.

10:00

out on the weekends. I'm vegan and I

10:02

like finding new vegan restaurants, new

10:04

vegan meals to try at restaurants. Like

10:06

that's just a hobby of mine, which

10:09

is, you know, problematic sometimes. So

10:11

I said meal prep has to be core.

10:13

Like if I have my meals, I

10:15

do meal prep. So I have like four, have at least

10:18

four days that it's all prepared.

10:21

I have to do that. But I was like, I'm not going to pre-calculate

10:24

the calories for these meals. I was like, it's just too

10:26

much and I'm not going to want to keep doing that. And

10:28

then also, like I said, I bet I can

10:30

come up with a higher number. So I

10:32

did the meal prep this time and

10:35

whatever it ended up being is what it ended up being.

10:37

And I would just, you know, fill out the day with, you

10:39

know, some snacks. And I gave myself

10:41

like 2000 on Saturday and

10:44

it just was easy. It just felt

10:46

easy and not stressful this time.

10:49

I was able to work in treats.

10:52

I get a, I have a vegan pizzelle

10:54

monthly subscription. And

10:56

so when that box comes, most of the time

10:59

they're have been sometimes when I eat the whole dozen cookies

11:01

and that's challenging. But when I

11:04

push them out and write the grams

11:06

on there and put them in my car and then I just

11:08

pull one out each day, that's worked

11:10

really well. So I've been able to enjoy treats, enjoy

11:13

going out to eat and still hit my category. And I

11:15

was able to do, I did 1400 with my average because

11:18

I work on the average for the week and

11:20

that just felt totally sustainable and doable.

11:22

I love this so, so

11:24

much. And there's so much here I really want to unpack.

11:26

So one, as I hear

11:29

you talking about those

11:29

two previous attempts, what I kind of heard

11:32

was you went back to those two

11:34

past experiences and you evaluated two things

11:36

that didn't work for you. One was

11:38

an extremely low calorie amount like 1100. You were

11:40

like, okay, I'm baseline one 1200. But then even after that, you're

11:45

like, okay, maybe that's not going to work for me. Maybe

11:47

I need to bump it up. And you acknowledge the

11:49

fact that being extremely strict

11:52

and rigid with how you were planning everything

11:54

out day to day didn't feel long term sustainable

11:57

because you knew you wanted to eat on the weekends.

12:00

you wanted to go have these experiences. So I

12:02

hear that you learned from those two previous

12:05

attempts and you modified everything and

12:07

was there ever a voice

12:10

in your head that was saying to you, well you

12:12

lost weight so much faster doing it the

12:14

other way, let's go back to

12:16

doing that. Was there ever any of that

12:19

conflict going on in your head? I

12:21

think I maybe in the beginning

12:23

like I thought that but I said to myself, you

12:26

know,

12:27

slow is better. So as long

12:29

as I

12:30

see a downward trend after

12:32

like a couple of weeks, then I'm okay.

12:35

As long as it's going down and

12:37

it was it was like maybe like a half a pound a week,

12:39

maybe, you know, it depended like it would just kind of

12:41

fluctuate but the trend was going

12:44

down. It took me about three months to lose the 13

12:47

pounds in time. But I was like, I'm okay

12:49

with that. Like I said kind of in the beginning, like if it

12:51

takes me three, four months, then it takes three or four

12:53

months. But if I can do it this way

12:56

and eat more and enjoy

12:58

food more without stressing

13:01

every week about all the numbers, then

13:03

it's fine. Like I was like, this is long term.

13:05

Like I want to lose it this last time and

13:08

and not have to lose it again. So I

13:10

was okay with that. But I did, I was like, okay,

13:13

I know this drop is going to be a lot slower. But

13:15

as long as it's moving in the right direction, then I'm okay

13:18

with it. I love that. Now, one of the things

13:20

I definitely want to highlight here

13:22

is something that you said at the very beginning, you said you're five

13:24

foot two. And I have definitely

13:27

noticed that women five foot two

13:28

and shorter usually somewhere in that,

13:30

you know, five foot to five foot two range or even

13:33

four nine or four 10. They always

13:35

seem to have to be at lower calorie

13:37

amount and that can create, they might

13:40

listen to regular podcasts that talk about

13:42

eating 1500 1600 1800. And they tend to feel

13:47

very like it's a comparison trap

13:50

where you're like, well, why are they eating all

13:52

of that? And I can't. And on a

13:54

basic DNA genetic basis,

13:56

you could be next to another woman who's five

13:58

foot two and there could be a 500 calorie

14:00

discrepancy between the two of you just based on

14:03

your genetic makeup, like how you were made.

14:05

So how did you as a more

14:07

petite person, how did

14:09

you deal with those thoughts

14:12

if they showed up for you at all? Because

14:14

I'm sure you were looking at other women saying, well, she's

14:16

eating 1800 and I can't do

14:18

much more than this, right? How did you

14:20

make peace with that? And then how

14:23

do you kind of maybe change

14:25

your, how have you changed your thinking about that?

14:27

Has that happened at all for you?

14:29

That's a good question. I was, I

14:31

would see some of that kind of dialogue

14:34

in the petite fitness Reddit,

14:36

subreddit. And I finally just got out of that because

14:38

there were some other things that I saw and I'm like, this is not helpful

14:41

at all. Yeah. I

14:43

mean, I just, I think I just accepted it. I'm

14:45

just, I'm five two. I don't, I'm trying

14:48

to start strength training again, but my consistency

14:50

is, it's hard because it's painful

14:53

and I don't enjoy it, but I know

14:55

it's important just as a woman and getting

14:57

older. I'm 48 on Thursday. So

15:00

I know it's important for me to do the strength

15:02

training, but I just kind of accept it. But

15:05

I do, like when I do the calculator, even

15:07

though I always put in sedentary, I'm not really sedentary.

15:10

I typically get in, you know, walk every day.

15:13

So I feel like I have a little bit more wiggle room, but

15:15

I just kind of accept it. It's just, I'm just

15:17

like, I'm short and, and I'm not a curvy woman.

15:20

So I don't, when I gain weight, it's

15:23

not to me in an attractive

15:25

way. It causes problems with, you know,

15:27

the pants and you know, all of that.

15:29

And I feel like I gain visceral fat.

15:32

So it's nice and solid belly

15:34

fat, you know, and I just, I'm like, I know that's like

15:36

the dangerous kind and I've just

15:38

accepted this is, this is the body I have. So

15:40

I've got to work with it. But like I said, as long

15:42

as I get to play a little on the weekends and still eat

15:45

out, like it doesn't feel restrictive. And

15:47

as long as I make food that I really enjoy,

15:50

then it doesn't feel restrictive.

15:53

I love this so much. So what I heard in

15:55

what you just said was you

15:57

stopped bringing in content that wasn't helping

15:59

you.

15:59

you stopped focusing on those things that

16:02

maybe made you feel like it was a problem

16:05

or people might be complaining about it and

16:07

you kind of backed off and said, okay, that's not helping

16:09

me. And then you kind of came to this place

16:11

of acceptance. Like you're not going to miraculously

16:13

grow two inches overnight at 48, right? Like

16:16

that's not going to happen. So it's either

16:18

I work with what I've got, or

16:21

I just kind of keep cruising

16:23

through life and hoping things work out. And

16:26

you chose to do that. And then what

16:29

I'm curious about, and this is what I tried to tell people, and

16:31

I've done various videos on this, but

16:33

I tell people if we took away the number calories,

16:36

like if we use, we stopped using the word calories

16:38

and we all of a sudden started talking in a new language

16:41

where we're talking about jujus

16:43

or, you know, candy canes or

16:45

whatever, it doesn't matter. Just some other form

16:48

of measurement. And I were to say, okay,

16:50

you get 50 candy canes every day. And

16:52

she gets 75. All of a sudden, if we

16:55

change the metric of measurement, it's

16:57

not important. Just like if I have a lady

16:59

who switches from pounds to kilograms

17:02

on her scale, all of a sudden she has to start

17:04

doing math in her head. Guess what? There's

17:06

not as much thinking about her weight anymore because

17:08

she's having to calculate. So what

17:11

I tell people though, and I would love for you to speak to this,

17:14

you are eating a lesser amount of calories

17:17

than maybe another woman your same age who's

17:19

taller and larger. But when

17:22

you eat those calories, especially eating to

17:24

your maintenance, because I know you're going to talk about your maintenance

17:26

journey here. Do you physically feel

17:28

satiated? Because I often tell people your body

17:31

needs what your body needs. And even though

17:33

you're looking at all these other people for comparison,

17:36

if your body really needs 1600

17:38

to feel good at maintenance, then if you eat 1600

17:40

of good food, you should

17:43

feel content at the end of the day.

17:44

So kind of tell us like on a feeling

17:47

level, how does that look for you

17:49

when you eat appropriately? Oh,

17:51

it feels good. And I attribute

17:53

that to just

17:55

me being conscious and I have

17:57

a cookbook. And so like I test recipes.

18:00

and always playing around in the kitchen. And

18:02

so as long as I create well-balanced

18:04

meals, I had a friend always always telling me, I was like,

18:07

the number has nothing to do with how

18:09

satiating that meal is. It's all

18:11

about the composition. If you

18:14

got your fiber and some vegetables,

18:16

and I'm big into making sure

18:18

that my plates or my meals have

18:20

a certain level of volume to it because like

18:23

mentally, like seeing more food makes

18:27

me feel satiated. So, you know, load up

18:29

on the veggies and just making sure that it

18:32

tastes good. Like if as long as it

18:34

tastes good, then I feel good. And like I said,

18:36

as long as there's enough fiber, then

18:38

yeah,

18:39

I haven't had any problems. I

18:41

love that. And can I just caveat? Cause what I

18:44

just heard in there was, and this is so true, if

18:46

I can eat say 2,200 calories to maintain and

18:49

say you're eating, if you have 1,700 to maintain, if

18:53

I'm eating 2,200 of, we'll just use the word fun food. If

18:57

I'm grabbing a Pop-Tart for breakfast and

18:59

I'm having cereal for lunch, and

19:01

I'm eating all these foods that are low in fiber,

19:04

low in water, you know, not

19:06

filling up my plate. It really doesn't

19:09

matter if I'm eating 2,200 calories or 17, I'm

19:11

gonna probably be hungry by the end of the day. But

19:14

if I am eating like what you're saying, high

19:16

volume, high fiber, balanced

19:19

plate meals, then your

19:21

body, if you're not gaining weight and you're

19:23

not losing weight, you're at maintenance, regardless

19:25

of the number that's attached to it, you

19:27

should be feeling really good because you're

19:29

prioritizing that nutrition. I

19:32

love that. And it's funny, I seldom think about that

19:34

on the higher calorie perspective, but

19:36

it's so true. Like if that's all your day is

19:38

comprised of, chocolate bars, you

19:40

know, whatever, you're not gonna

19:42

feel satiated. You're still gonna be real ravenously hungry

19:45

at the end of the day.

19:46

Yeah, I definitely learned that. And also,

19:48

like I said, the flavor component, cause there've been a couple

19:50

of weeks where I made something, I was like, this doesn't

19:53

taste good and I don't want it. And so now I'm like

19:55

scavenging and, you know, trying to find

19:57

other stuff to eat. And it, you know, it threw me off.

20:00

It's really important that I take the time

20:02

to make really tasty food that's

20:04

also healthy. Then it's easy

20:06

because it's already in there. So I take that

20:08

thinking out of at least the majority of

20:10

the week where I don't have to think. I

20:13

feel like I do probably need to do a little bit more planning on the weekend

20:15

and not make it a complete free-for-all. I

20:18

did that better when I was losing

20:20

the weight, kind of let the foot off the pedal a

20:23

little bit too much. But even still,

20:25

even on Fridays when I was losing the weight,

20:27

I would make my own, I own

20:30

fun Friday meal. I would get vegan

20:32

fried chicken and get

20:35

some sweet potato waffle fries and

20:37

have my own fun meal. But I can control

20:39

the calories because I know what's

20:41

there. So I could still get that feeling

20:44

of, oh, this is a fun Friday meal without

20:46

blowing the bank of the

20:48

calories. So love that.

20:50

So let me ask you this. So basically, third time

20:52

around, about 1,400 average calories

20:54

took you about three months to lose the weight. Couple

20:57

of things I was curious about, you didn't have

21:00

any of those issues going on, the

21:02

diabetes, I'm assuming you didn't, the diabetes,

21:04

the hypertension, anything like that. I

21:06

do have high cholesterol though. Oh, okay. So that's

21:08

what I was going to ask you. So did losing that 13 pounds,

21:11

did that improve any of your medical markers?

21:14

Did you notice?

21:15

No. I have

21:17

improved that cholesterol number in

21:19

the past by eating really clean,

21:22

not eating out, not eating

21:24

any sweets, just like really like strict

21:26

whole food plant based diet. But I just realized that

21:29

that's not sustainable for me long term because

21:31

I enjoy fun foods too much. But

21:33

what I did do is I heard about, what

21:36

is it called? It's some kind of scan.

21:37

It's a heart scan. It's

21:39

the name of it. Like maybe something like a,

21:41

some kind of channel scan. I forget the name of

21:43

it. But I asked my doctor about

21:45

that because I told us, I'm pretty sure this

21:48

is like a hereditary issue. I

21:50

do sometimes indulge into many baked

21:52

goods, which are high in saturated fat. But

21:55

even when I don't, like I feel like that number, like

21:57

I feel like I have to go to drastic measures to get

21:59

that number. down. So she wrote

22:01

me an order to get that, it's like

22:03

some kind of calcium channel scan. Maybe

22:06

it's, yes, I actually think I do know

22:08

it's a deeper dive into the whole cholesterol

22:10

thing. Yes. They, yep. They do a scan

22:13

of your heart to see like if there are any blockages.

22:15

And so I was like, if I, I would like to

22:17

do that so that I can see, do I

22:19

have a problem? You know, like, is

22:21

there something I need to be worried about? And if there is, go

22:24

ahead and put me on whatever you need to put me on. Like I used

22:26

to be really resistant to it, but I'm like, you know what, I've

22:28

got to eat in a way that's like sustainable

22:31

for like the rest of my life. Like I can't

22:33

just, you know, go to an extreme. It's just not going

22:35

to work. I could do a short term, but that's, that

22:37

doesn't make sense. So that came out

22:39

perfect. Like there were no blockages because I've been vegan

22:41

for maybe 13, 14 years.

22:45

And yeah, most of my saturated fat is

22:47

from baked goods, which I don't eat every day. So

22:50

it was completely clear. And so she

22:52

wasn't worried and I'm not afraid. I'm like, as long as

22:54

there are no blockages, then I

22:56

can live with a higher number than I ideally

22:59

would like as far as the cholesterol, but yeah, nothing,

23:02

nothing else ever shows up. Yeah.

23:04

I know. Perfect. And most of what you're doing is preventative

23:06

anyway, but I was just curious about that. Like I have

23:09

one client, she has high blood pressure. She's reducing

23:11

sodium and stress and doing all these things. And

23:13

then I have other people who are doing different things. And so

23:15

I was just curious to see if the 13

23:18

pounds has shifted anything, but it sounds like

23:20

overall most of what you're trying to do

23:22

is prevent things from happening. Yeah.

23:25

Yeah. It didn't, it didn't do anything. Like I said, I have

23:27

moved that number significantly in the past,

23:29

but it just took too much sacrifice.

23:32

Yeah. I know. And I, can I just tell you breath

23:34

of fresh air? I love the fact, because I mean, going

23:36

back to fear is not a good motivator, right? Like

23:38

you just said, I mean, you want to live a seemingly

23:41

normal life as much as we can call it that

23:43

where you're getting to have some baked goods and go out

23:45

to eat on the weekends. And you don't want

23:47

to feel like, you know, you're, there's

23:49

a balance between healthy

23:51

body and healthy mind in life. And

23:54

if we're kind of one slanted one

23:56

way, the other one often isn't

23:58

as well taken care of.

23:59

So it's finding balance in all areas.

24:02

So then you've got the weight off. Now

24:04

you mentioned transitioning to maintenance. So how

24:06

long would you say you've kind of been more on the maintenance

24:09

side of things? Well, my

24:11

original goal was to come down like a few

24:14

pounds below where I was. So

24:16

I would have a little bit more wiggle room, but

24:19

I never made it because I think I just, I was petered

24:21

out because I have unintentionally

24:24

maintained

24:25

since I guess I see August,

24:27

September, October was the weight loss.

24:30

I have unintentionally maintained like

24:32

through, I guess, May, maybe

24:35

the end of April, that weight,

24:37

but it's, it was weird because I was really,

24:39

I

24:39

really wanted to lose just two more pounds.

24:42

But like, I think that once I hit my goal, my

24:44

brain was like, okay, we're done. I just can't.

24:47

And so they always probably like sabotaging myself during.

24:50

So I was maintaining though, but again,

24:53

unintentionally. So I decide I was going

24:55

to join the Have Size community

24:57

so that I could do the maintenance challenge.

25:00

So I ended, I started with the maintenance

25:02

challenge and I've just continued since then, but

25:04

I've overshot my maintenance calories. So

25:07

I've got to bring it back. And I know one of the things that

25:09

I did, I think it's just

25:11

like the numbers. I'm like, Oh

25:13

no, I have more calories. I need to eat them even

25:16

if I'm not hungry. And so

25:19

doing that, I removed like some cushion

25:21

that I could have had, I could have created in the week

25:24

to like meet my calorie goal.

25:26

So once I stopped doing that, that was helpful,

25:28

but I've just, and this, this week

25:30

was like vacation for me, even though I was home

25:33

because it was my birthday and I just, I

25:35

was a little out of control. Yeah. Well,

25:38

happy belated birthday. And so let's do this. So I

25:40

want to go back to that. So you did the maintenance break challenge

25:42

and one of the things, one of the parts of that challenge

25:44

was kind of like planning out your week, which it sounds

25:46

like from your weight loss, you

25:49

were already being mindful of that. You were like, okay,

25:51

I'm going to eat at this calorie amount during the week.

25:53

I'm going to have 2000 calories on Saturday.

25:56

So

25:56

when you attempted that and you were trying to

25:58

figure it out, how did you go

26:00

about that process? Did you look to,

26:02

I think I am hearing you right, you

26:04

look to bumping up the week and day calories,

26:07

but maybe keeping the 2000 on Saturday,

26:09

but then you realize that you had

26:12

overshot your calorie target. Is that what you were

26:14

saying?

26:15

Yeah, I overshot it. And I would have to look

26:17

at my numbers. I have these databases in

26:19

notion. So

26:21

I like I have second like see like

26:23

the week's average and the month's

26:25

average.

26:27

But I think I was because I was bumping up the

26:29

like

26:30

I was in I was filling it.

26:32

I wasn't because I just make whatever meals

26:34

that I make. So I was adding more snacks

26:37

to add extra calories, but I think I would have

26:39

been better off just leaving the

26:41

first four days the same. And

26:43

this may be adding a hot giving myself

26:45

more on Friday. And

26:48

yeah, I think I just have

26:50

adjusted on the wrong end. But I

26:52

just I kept saying like, Oh, but no, I

26:54

have more. So I should eat more.

26:56

I shouldn't eat at my deficit number.

26:59

Then at the end of the week, I'm,

27:01

you know, enjoying more snacks. And

27:03

like I just I threw it all out of

27:06

whack. Yeah. And I think this is a great

27:08

conversation. And I hope all maintainers

27:10

are actually listening to this conversation

27:12

because I often have my clients

27:14

do repetitive attempts at maintenance breaks.

27:16

And we really work

27:18

on this because usually the first

27:20

couple times people attempt it, they usually

27:22

do things that end up

27:24

not working. They're either still being too

27:26

restrictive. And so they're never really

27:28

bumping up their calories, or they're doing kind of like what

27:31

you did. They have this mindset of what I can't eat

27:33

at a deficit, I should be eating at maintenance.

27:35

And so they kind of either bump up all the

27:37

days, or they kind of just somehow end up overaging.

27:41

And it usually goes like a teeter totter. It's

27:43

either like one extreme or the other. And it takes

27:45

a lot of refining to really find your

27:47

maintenance calories. It's not something you're just

27:49

going to do overnight. And the one that

27:51

you just said, I hear that often, which

27:53

is say somebody was eating 1200 Monday

27:56

through Friday, but then they had two higher days on

27:58

the weekend and it averages out. to 14. You

28:01

might be a maintainer and you're

28:03

still eating at deficit calories a couple

28:06

days out of the week, but when we average

28:09

it out for the month, not

28:11

the day, not the week, but the month,

28:13

and you figure a vacation in that month,

28:16

maybe several restaurant meals in that

28:18

month, you might notice, oh,

28:20

and I'm just using this as a guest for you,

28:22

that might be like 1650 or 1700

28:25

for you. But when I look at the month, I

28:27

hit that number, but there's a lot

28:29

of days where

28:29

I'm eating the 1200 or whatever calories.

28:32

Is that what you're going to think into? Yeah,

28:34

and I think I didn't realize that I could

28:37

do that. I think in the beginning, I just needed

28:40

to bump everything up, but I didn't give myself

28:42

wiggle room for like, oh, I want to

28:45

go out to this restaurant, I want to go out to eat

28:47

twice a week or whatever. I didn't give

28:50

myself that wiggle room. Even though I've been working

28:53

on the averages for the week, I've been hearing

28:55

you say in the podcast about taking

28:57

the month into consideration. I was like, oh, I need

29:02

to pull up another level because

29:04

then I can

29:05

maybe work in even not more treats,

29:08

but I

29:08

can give myself a little bit more flexibility

29:11

because I was talking to one of my girlfriends yesterday,

29:13

we went out for soft serve because

29:15

I'm continuing to celebrate my birthday week. I

29:21

said, you know what, I feel like this, even

29:23

though I work in treats,

29:25

I felt like maybe I need to work

29:27

in more throughout a month or two months

29:29

because I had pancakes twice this week

29:32

because I love pancakes and I haven't

29:34

had pancakes. I

29:36

was like, I should probably work in pancakes

29:38

more than

29:39

once every four months so that

29:41

I don't feel the urge to like, oh

29:44

my God, I need more pancakes because I

29:46

just haven't had them. I was telling her

29:48

because I think of calories sometimes like money, I'm

29:50

like, but I don't want to spend that much money

29:52

on pancakes,

29:55

but I really love the pancakes. I was like, I should probably

29:58

eat pancakes every other month so that like.

29:59

Like two times a year, I don't, you know,

30:02

go crazy and have to have the pancakes

30:05

twice in a week. Well, and what I love

30:07

about talking to you, your maintenance journey

30:09

is just like your weight loss journey. You

30:11

had those first two go rounds where you learned

30:13

a lot and then you tweaked it for the third time.

30:16

And that's kind of what the same process you're applying

30:19

now. And what's amazing listening to you is you

30:21

have a great learner's

30:23

mindset. Like you are saying

30:25

you're not like, you're not sitting here going, Oh my God, I'm going to fail

30:27

at this. I'm going to gain it all back. I'm never going

30:30

to get this right. You're like, okay, cool. I'm

30:32

now seeing maybe I need to look at this through a month's

30:35

context and maybe I need to plan these treats

30:37

and I enjoy more often so I don't feel so

30:39

deprived and want to kind of cluster them all together.

30:42

Like you're still learning. And I think if

30:44

I were to like tell anybody what

30:46

is the mission of this journey, it's not to lose the

30:48

weight and be done because you're never really done.

30:51

That's like such a misconception because

30:53

you're 48.

30:54

I'm sure you noticed your body

30:56

is starting to change. Have you noticed that or

30:59

no?

30:59

Yeah, definitely changed. But

31:01

I feel like I've, I always tell people I'm in a,

31:04

not maintenance. What do I say? I'm in a preservation

31:06

mode. I'm

31:09

like, it can go downhill. You know,

31:11

it's like, I'm just trying to keep it together with,

31:13

you know, as much as I can here

31:16

on out. But yeah, it's not

31:18

the same. It's not the same at all. Yeah. And

31:20

I know a lot of times we don't like to talk about this as women,

31:23

but in your 40s, whether

31:25

you realize it or not, whether you're having any

31:27

extreme symptoms or not, based

31:30

on where your age is, you're starting the

31:32

process of perimenobot. Oh yeah.

31:34

I definitely have the night sweats. Those

31:36

are here and they are not consistent,

31:38

but enough.

31:40

Yeah. Yeah. And that's a sign

31:42

that you're not a hundred percent in charge. Like

31:45

no, you're kind of along for the ride. Mother

31:48

nature is kind of doing its thing and

31:50

you know, you don't get a vote to say,

31:53

well, you know, this is a really inconvenient

31:55

time for me to be going through this. Can

31:57

we kick this out another five years? And

32:00

that's when I say that this job is never done.

32:02

And men on the flip side, right? I don't want men to feel

32:05

left out of this. Men have their own

32:07

version of it that they go through. And

32:09

that's, I think, the most important thing we can realize,

32:12

there's no way a process can be done

32:14

when parts of the process are continually

32:17

changing. Our life circumstance

32:19

change. Like, I'm sure one day you'll retire and

32:22

you'll want to do something else. There might be

32:24

a phase of your life where you're getting married,

32:26

you're getting divorced, you're having children, you're

32:28

having grandchildren. Somebody you

32:30

love is passing away. Like, life is

32:32

continually changing. Your

32:35

body is continually changing.

32:37

And we're constantly acquiring new

32:40

information. So how

32:42

can we ever really be done with this process?

32:45

Does that make sense? Yes, yes, so

32:47

much sense. Yeah, okay, so

32:49

tell me where you are in the process. You went through the

32:51

maintenance break challenge. You are

32:53

continuing to learn you're coming off your birthday week.

32:56

So where are you at with all this?

32:58

Are you still trying to nail down your

32:59

maintenance calories at this point, would you say?

33:02

I think I know what they are. Like I said, I have the Notion

33:04

database. And so I can see like

33:07

month to month.

33:08

And I was like, I think the upper range is 1700. Okay.

33:12

I think that's the top. But I think I might just try

33:14

to do 16. Cause I think that's probably

33:16

like a safe, cause I've been doing

33:18

like 17, 18 close to 2000. And

33:22

so I'm just like, let's do, see what a 16 looks

33:24

like. So I just need to look and

33:26

see like what that would look like. But

33:29

I think I'm going to go back to whatever I was doing

33:31

during the week before and then just

33:33

bump it up for the weekends. But doing

33:35

some planning for that pre-planning like

33:38

wherever it is I want to go, like figuring

33:40

that out. But I did, I went to my grocery

33:42

store this morning and I'm going to do

33:44

my meal prep. I've been, I didn't do meal prep

33:47

last Sunday. Cause I was like, I'm going to be eating out.

33:49

I don't want to waste any food. But I did buy

33:51

some stuff. Cause I was thinking, oh, well in between

33:53

my fun meals I'm going to eat salad. I did

33:55

not. But

33:59

so I still have that. but it hasn't been open, I think it's good.

34:01

So I'm gonna prep a salad and then like

34:03

I have some cabbage and I'm gonna make

34:05

some more seitan. And so like, I

34:07

feel like I'm about to get on track and I'm not

34:10

worried about the scale weight. It's definitely

34:12

up, but I know that a lot

34:14

of it's water and what's not water is

34:16

fine. It'll move when

34:18

I kind of get back on track and

34:21

just

34:22

do some regular eating. Yeah,

34:24

and actually that brings up another good question. So

34:26

now that you're in the community, you've

34:29

been listening to what we're talking about, have

34:31

you thought about maybe, because I know

34:33

you mentioned there's a weight that you kind of don't want to

34:35

cross the threshold of, have you

34:37

thought about really designing

34:40

kind of a maintenance range for yourself so

34:42

that way you don't find yourself getting

34:45

to that problematic weight again, or what

34:47

are your thoughts on a range for yourself? Well,

34:51

I know I've heard you talk about

34:52

like a 10 pound range but I can't, 10 like

34:55

takes me out of my clothes. Right. I

34:59

love being able to just put on everything

35:01

in my closet and it fits and not having to

35:03

like, I can't wear this

35:06

and I need to wear a looser top because these pants

35:08

are a little snug. I love being wearing my

35:10

clothes. So I'm kind of at the

35:12

top of this range, but like I said, I never

35:14

got below it to really give myself the full

35:17

cushion. But I kind of feel like if

35:19

I eat

35:20

at a regular rate and

35:23

don't just add calories to be adding calories

35:25

and things like that, I think I can maintain it. I

35:27

think I came up with like 118 to 122. Okay.

35:31

And so I know it's not like a big range

35:33

but I feel like I can probably do

35:35

it as long as I don't like, you

35:38

know, do weird snacking and things

35:40

like that. Yeah, and I usually

35:42

tell my more petite people

35:44

that you know, are in the same area you are,

35:46

five pounds might be a better range for

35:48

you because to your point,

35:50

when you're that petite, 10 pounds

35:52

can easily put you outside of a clothing size.

35:54

The taller you are, usually

35:57

you can kind of go a little larger. I've even

35:59

had some people who. did a 20 pound range, which

36:01

is totally fine. But for me, 20 pounds

36:03

would put me outside of my clothes as well.

36:05

So you kind of... Okay, that's good to know.

36:08

Yeah. I think you should pick a range that

36:10

allows you to still be

36:13

in, you know, clothing that you have and stuff

36:15

like that. But there is usually a range

36:17

and some people it's five pounds, some people it's seven pounds,

36:19

some people it's 10 pounds. You need to kind of decide

36:21

that for yourself. So it sounds like

36:24

you're working on nailing it down. You think you know your

36:26

maintenance calories, which sounds like it's somewhere between 17 and 1600.

36:28

And one thought I did

36:30

want to throw at you, just something to

36:32

consider, you could also

36:35

look... And I'm not saying you have to like calculate

36:37

this out, but look at your life through

36:39

an annual lens and say, okay,

36:41

are there times of the year that

36:44

maybe due to my birthday, maybe due

36:46

to holidays or vacations

36:48

and trips that I know I'm going to have higher

36:50

calorie months? Because then

36:53

like what you're saying, you're kind of used to eating

36:55

at 1400 for weight loss, but

36:57

you might find that those other months, 1500, 1600 would

37:00

actually be smarter because you

37:03

do know you're going to have some months where maybe

37:05

the average is 1700,

37:08

1800 because you've got a trip to Hawaii

37:10

or you've got big family reunion

37:12

you're going to. And there's going to at least

37:14

be a week or so out of that month where the

37:17

calorie content would be a lot higher.

37:19

So since you're somebody who loves spreadsheets, you like

37:21

to kind of think that way, you're

37:23

really looking at this from a big picture

37:26

perspective first. If I

37:28

know I've got these times of the

37:29

year where the calories are going to be way higher

37:32

on these months, it may actually serve

37:34

me through the course of the whole year

37:37

to have months where I'm actually seemingly losing

37:39

a little bit or at least staying at that lower

37:41

end so I can offset those higher

37:44

months that I might have. I love that. I love

37:46

that idea. Yeah, and I had not considered

37:48

that because I kind of ran into that. I guess because I finished

37:51

losing in October and then November was Thanksgiving.

37:53

And although I didn't go to visit family, I

37:56

still made my own Thanksgiving

37:58

dinner and was you know,

37:59

know, making other food throughout the month. And

38:02

so that would be a month like November,

38:05

where I would want to give myself a little bit more

38:07

wiggle room. I like that idea. I like that

38:09

a lot. Yeah. So as you're kind of constructing

38:11

this for yourself, because keep in mind, and

38:13

I tell this to people at time, maintenance isn't about a

38:15

day. So it's like you don't have to ever hit your

38:18

maintenance calories on any specific day. Heck,

38:20

you may never hit them at all. Like you might be eating

38:22

Monday through Friday, and I'm going to use you as an example

38:25

at 1200 calories. But then on

38:27

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, you're eating at 17, 2000 and something

38:31

else. But when you average it over the

38:33

course of the week, then you're hitting your maintenance

38:36

calories. Exactly. And yep. But

38:38

day to day, it's like I'm way under. And

38:40

then there's other days I'm way over, but I'm

38:42

actually never eating 1700. Which

38:45

is kind of

38:47

mind blowing, because we all talk about

38:49

this idea of getting your maintenance calories,

38:51

but we're not looking at it daily.

38:54

We're looking at it weekly, monthly,

38:56

yearly. You're looking at it big picture context.

38:59

Yeah. Yeah.

39:00

I like zooming out even more. Yeah,

39:03

definitely. Yeah. Because I always like to

39:05

just play for my birthday week. So

39:08

even if I had managed the month differently,

39:10

so that I would have given myself

39:13

more calories this week overall, but then

39:15

managed it throughout the month. So yeah, I'm going to zoom

39:17

out and kind of look at the months and see.

39:20

Yeah.

39:20

Absolutely. You got a good number to work with.

39:22

So now you just have to figure out what

39:24

does that look like through the court. And you have

39:26

to go so crazy as to feel like you have to budget that

39:29

out for the whole year. But just kind of having

39:31

ideas, yeah, this is probably going to be a little bit of a higher

39:33

month. This would be a little higher of a month. And

39:35

so then maybe I need to have some months that are a little

39:37

bit lower to help offset that with my food

39:40

intake. So what would you

39:42

say as far as this go around?

39:45

Because compared to the other two times you did

39:47

gain the weight back. How do you

39:49

see this time post dieting

39:51

as being different? What was your mindset

39:53

like back then? And how did you

39:56

kind of stop doing the thing that caused

39:58

you to lose the weight?

39:59

and regain it, what's your thoughts on that?

40:02

I think that, I guess there

40:04

are a few things. One, I went

40:06

into it this time saying, okay, I'm gonna

40:08

continue to pay attention. Like I think I've

40:10

always like, I think ever since I

40:12

gained the weight that very first time and wasn't

40:15

even aware that I had gained it until after I gained

40:17

all the weight, I was like, I need to weigh myself on

40:19

a regular basis so that I can just see the data

40:21

and just be aware. Even if it's going up,

40:24

I just need to be aware because it completely

40:26

caught me off guard that first time. And I was like, I'm never

40:28

gonna let this happen to me again. I'm gonna at least know. And

40:32

so

40:32

I think meal prep for me,

40:34

I think is a keystone habit.

40:37

If I like prepping, cause

40:39

I think I just threw everything away. Like I was doing

40:42

everything I needed to do to lose it and then I just stopped

40:44

doing everything. So meal prep,

40:46

continuing to meal prep, I think is gonna

40:48

be key and just realizing

40:51

that I just have to do that and

40:53

I don't dislike it. I just know

40:55

that I have to do it so that I have tasty

40:58

reasonably good meals that

41:00

I can just grab out the fridge throughout

41:02

the majority of the week and not

41:04

just do free falls. Yeah, so would

41:06

you say that maybe after the last two,

41:09

the Weight Watchers and then the superstructure

41:11

thing that you did with the spreadsheet, would

41:13

you say that maybe post those

41:16

when you were no longer focusing on those two

41:18

items, it was kind of just like,

41:21

I don't worry about any of it. Was that kind of what

41:23

you saw yourself do it? Yeah, even

41:25

I think the last time I've been tracking,

41:28

I've been using lose it since the last time that

41:30

I, like I started, I was

41:32

doing the spreadsheet and I think maybe at the end

41:35

I started using lose it. So

41:37

I've been tracking, but I haven't really

41:39

like use the data to guide

41:41

my behavior. But now I'm

41:43

kind of looking at it more holistically

41:46

and definitely like I said, have the notion database. So

41:48

I'm like seeing my trends week to week. And

41:51

so I have the data to course correct, but

41:53

yeah, I just stopped doing everything. I just stopped

41:56

doing everything and I realized, okay, no, you

41:58

gotta do the meal prep. Like.

41:59

Like you've got to like make it easy for

42:02

yourself and take out some of the

42:04

thinking on a day-to-day basis

42:07

and just know that, okay, I have these snacks

42:09

ready and these meals and I can just

42:11

grab it and eat it and I'm going to enjoy it and

42:13

be satiated and it's easy. Okay.

42:16

So I think what I heard is, and would you

42:18

say to this last time, so

42:20

obviously you had heard something on the show

42:23

that resonated with you because you joined the community,

42:25

but would you say this concept of maintenance was

42:28

more on your radar than it had been

42:29

the previous two times? Yes. I

42:32

hadn't even thought about it the last time. I do remember the first time because

42:34

I was also working out with a trainer and

42:36

I do remember asking him, so what

42:39

am I going to do once we're

42:41

done with this whatever 12-week program, whatever

42:43

it was I signed up for? And he was like, oh,

42:45

well you come in and I'll tell

42:47

you what to do. But that did not sit

42:49

well with me because I was like, I need to be able to do this on my own.

42:52

So like I said, I just happened to maintain

42:54

for a while, but then it felt a part because I didn't have a maintenance

42:57

plan. So yeah, I didn't, I

42:59

never thought about maintenance, even though it was

43:02

like, you know, not the first time I lost the weight,

43:05

it just wasn't on my radar, but that was in the forefront

43:07

of my mind going into this

43:09

weight loss phase this time. Yeah,

43:11

I'm so excited about this. So you had new knowledge

43:14

that you didn't have prior going back to the whole

43:16

thing we just had a second ago where we talked about

43:18

how this process can never be done

43:20

because you're acquiring new information, your body's

43:22

changing. So there's proof of that right there. And

43:25

then I love it because you wanted to have some autonomy

43:28

over your own journey. And

43:31

I'm a coach too, but one of the things I

43:33

always tell people when I bring them on, I don't

43:35

want to go to the grave with you. Like that's not, that's

43:38

not my agenda. I love helping

43:40

people. I like to get them unhooked. I like to get

43:42

them moving forward, but I want them

43:45

to be the one that does it. I want them

43:47

to not need me at the end of the day.

43:49

Like come back and ask me a question. Sure. But

43:52

you don't need me to stay there and hold your hand every

43:54

day all the time. But there are people

43:56

that in this industry or like that, they want you

43:59

to be dependent on them for meal plans to

44:01

figure all this out for you all the time. And

44:03

I think that's just not our nature. I think

44:05

our nature is we want autonomy. We want to

44:07

be the ones in charge of ourselves. So you took

44:10

that ownership role, so you sought

44:12

out information. You're like, huh, so

44:14

this maintenance thing is what you do after the weight

44:17

loss. Pretty cool. And it

44:19

sounds like now you're kind of working out the

44:21

rough edges of what we'll call your maintenance

44:24

plan. Is that right?

44:25

Yes, yes. And I've been listening to you. I think I

44:27

started listening to you. I can't

44:29

remember. It's been years off and on. But

44:32

when

44:33

I was drawn to the maintenance message, like,

44:35

yeah, that's it. Because the goal is

44:37

not to lose, but to maintain

44:40

the weight loss long term. And I was

44:42

like, okay, it just really stuck with me and just

44:44

kind of stayed in my brain. I was like, when I

44:46

do because I took me a while to like, get

44:48

myself on track to like, really

44:51

commit to losing it this last time. Like I was

44:53

watching the scale go up and I was like, oh, boy, Michelle,

44:55

you hitting that number. Oh, what

44:58

are you gonna do? But I was just like, I can't do what I

45:00

did last time. It was too restrictive.

45:02

But I knew that when I did it when I buckled down

45:05

and got it together, that I wanted

45:07

to do it slowly, so

45:09

that

45:10

the maintenance would be as easy.

45:12

Yeah, absolutely. And what I think I see

45:15

for you, like, if I imagine this as

45:17

being a trial and error thing, over

45:19

time, I think what you're going to do is you're going to solidify

45:22

your maintenance calories by proving

45:24

it to yourself, right? So if it's 1650 1700. But what I see this looking

45:29

like for you is really paying attention to

45:32

months that you like we said, have higher

45:34

calorie needs and lower calorie

45:36

needs, and then figuring out

45:38

the amount of indulging you can

45:40

do versus eating those

45:43

meals that you prep at home. And there's usually

45:45

a ratio for most people, it's like, so

45:48

many of those can be out and be indulgent.

45:50

And then so many of them need to be at home and kind of be

45:52

boring, basic meals that you like that

45:55

you're willing to eat on repeat.

45:56

Yeah. And even like I said, even

45:58

I have been and like

46:01

I make fun meals for myself, you know, like

46:03

I'll experiment and try some stuff.

46:05

So they're not necessarily boring,

46:08

but I do need to put some thought into it. I've got to think and

46:10

that's it. That's one of the things that I realized that

46:12

I had to do as far as the meal prep. I was like, okay,

46:14

so in order for me to meal prep on Sunday,

46:16

and I feel like heard you say something, but in order for

46:18

me to meal prep on Sunday, I've got to

46:21

know what I'm going to make. So that means that I've got to go to

46:23

the grocery store on Saturday. And

46:25

that means that on Friday, I need to figure

46:27

out what I want to eat next week. And so I realized

46:30

I had to back up the process so

46:32

that I

46:33

do my planning on Friday so

46:35

that I go to the store on Saturday and then Sunday

46:37

I have what I need. So I just realized

46:39

that I just have to do that because it makes things

46:42

so much easier. Yes, a hundred percent.

46:44

There has to be like a master plan. It has to be something that

46:46

flows into this course of your normal life. And

46:48

if it doesn't, then it's not going to work.

46:50

So you kind of have to be intentional, put

46:53

stuff on your schedule, plan it in, be able

46:55

to tell other people no, because you got these

46:57

other obligations or move those obligations

46:59

around to support your social life, right?

47:02

You have to be very mindful

47:03

of it. It doesn't have to be like a drudge,

47:06

but it is something that requires on a level

47:08

of attention and focus. I always tell people you don't

47:10

maintain on accident. Like you

47:12

can gain weight really easily on accident.

47:18

Losing and maintaining

47:20

both take a high level of attention to

47:22

detail. The only difference is maintaining

47:24

is maybe two to 500 calories more

47:27

than what you were eating to lose, but you're still

47:29

doing all the same practices and behaviors.

47:31

Nothing else changes. Yes.

47:33

Yeah. That's what I've been hearing you say that. And I'm like,

47:35

she's right. Yeah. She's

47:38

right. Yeah. I was, I remember wondering

47:40

and then I heard you say it, the two to five. And I was like,

47:42

okay, it's not that much. It's not

47:44

that big a difference. And so I don't need to make

47:47

major changes. Right.

47:49

Right. And like I said, you have an awesome foundation

47:52

because you figured something out that worked for you to

47:54

lose. Now it's just

47:57

taking that template, that outline

47:59

and say,

47:59

okay, if my goal for 12 months was

48:02

to hit this calorie amount, and I kind of look at

48:04

this through a big scope, how

48:06

does that look kind of on a monthly basis?

48:08

What would that need to look like on a weekly basis?

48:10

And then what would it need to look like on a daily basis

48:13

and kind of looking at it through those lenses?

48:15

So that way, because honestly, one of the big

48:18

things I have seen with maintainers is they'll

48:20

get excited, they go, they switch to their maintenance

48:22

calories, and let's just say they are 1700. They're

48:25

striving every day to hit that 1700, but then they

48:27

go for a cruise for

48:30

a week, and then they go for a holiday.

48:33

And what they're not realizing is those calories

48:35

of 1700 that they've been

48:37

eating every day was right at the

48:39

cusp of maintenance. So now everything

48:42

extra they're having on the cruise and everything

48:45

extra that they're having at those holidays is

48:47

actually causing their average to exceed

48:50

their maintenance calories, not keep them at

48:52

it. So that's why this is why this part

48:54

of the journey requires so much work because

48:58

losing weight is anywhere from zero calories

49:01

to about 200 below maintenance.

49:03

So that's a huge range

49:05

of calories. Not that

49:07

I would encourage you to go down to zero, but I'm just saying,

49:09

but like, if we're looking at that on a graph, it's zero

49:12

to 200 sub maintenance. To

49:15

maintain is a much shorter

49:17

margin for most people. It's usually like a one

49:19

to 200 calorie spread somewhere in this ballpark

49:22

to maintain. But when you look at it

49:24

in the context of your life, you've

49:26

got to kind of think like, how do I balance

49:29

the checkbook at the end of the month with all

49:31

these things coming and going? And

49:33

when you've got a small margin of error, and

49:35

when you've got a lot of life variances,

49:38

you have to see this thing in a different way

49:41

versus weight loss. It starts to become

49:43

a lot more detail heavy.

49:46

Yeah. Yeah. And I think I did

49:48

not appreciate that because I

49:50

just was like, oh, I'm done. But

49:52

I was like, Oh no, to hit these numbers,

49:54

I've got to be more intentional. And I've got

49:57

to give myself a little bit more wiggle

49:59

room. So that means that I do need

50:02

to probably eat, you know, at a lower level during

50:04

the week so that I can do more

50:07

on the weekends if that's what I want to do. Yeah.

50:09

Perfect. And you have inspired me. I'm

50:11

actually going to do a video for YouTube now

50:14

about this idea of never needing to eat your maintenance

50:16

calories daily because I

50:18

see that as being something that trips so many people

50:20

up that's striving to hit their

50:22

maintenance calories on a daily basis.

50:25

But that's really not what you're trying to do. You're trying

50:27

to hit your average maintenance calories

50:30

for the month. And if that mentality

50:32

is what's driving you to your point,

50:34

there's going to be days you probably force yourself to eat more

50:36

than you wanted. But then on the weekend when

50:38

you're at the vegan restaurant,

50:39

they offer you this cute little hors d'oeuvre

50:41

that you wouldn't have normally had. And that itself

50:44

is 400 calories. Exactly.

50:47

Like I'd rather have had the hors d'oeuvre. Yes.

50:50

Yeah. Yeah. I'm

50:52

not giving myself the options that I want

50:54

to have at the end of the week if I like, you know,

50:56

yeah, so creating the buffer. Yes.

50:58

Yeah, I totally. Yeah. Cause I was like, I

51:00

just remember I was like, Oh no, I have 1600.

51:03

I need to eat some

51:05

more food today so that I can hit this

51:07

number. And then like I'm through myself out

51:09

of the maintenance range about the end of the week. I'm like,

51:12

wait a minute. Yes. Well, I

51:14

was going to tell you in our maintainers webinars,

51:16

which I have, you had a chance to attend one live yet.

51:19

Yes. I've attended, I think one

51:21

live and I've listened to one recording,

51:23

but I'm available for the next one. I'm

51:26

planning on attending that one live. Yeah. So

51:28

my prescription to you would be go back

51:30

and prioritize listening to the maintainers

51:33

webinars. They, they have their own database

51:36

that they go into because all

51:38

of those are going to be extremely helpful for you for what

51:40

we're talking about today. But then the next

51:42

thing I would say is if you can attend the live

51:44

ones, which you can actually do is give us a monthly

51:47

update where you give us

51:49

like kind of how you're strategizing the month,

51:51

kind of what you're doing. And that way one,

51:53

it's accountability for you, but two,

51:56

it's a place for you to share and kind of work

51:58

out your process to where.

51:59

you're not doing it all on your own. Do you

52:02

see what I mean?

52:02

That's a good idea. I always a little, well,

52:05

at least for the Facebook group, I'm like, I don't go

52:07

in. I mean, I get the notifications, I'm in there,

52:09

but I don't post and stuff. Sometimes I

52:11

just feel like I'm just too private and I just wanna

52:14

figure it out. And I just, I

52:16

don't know. I don't wanna, I don't know. There's

52:18

something about me and like groups around

52:21

problems and challenges, like I don't wanna, because

52:23

sometimes the challenges that people have,

52:26

I don't want it to like,

52:28

I don't know, this might sound bad, but I don't

52:30

want it to get me down. Like I need to manage

52:33

my energy and my attitude and

52:35

I don't wanna have too

52:37

much negativity feeding into my

52:40

brain space that I'm really working hard to like,

52:43

keep it a certain level so I can move forward.

52:46

So I just trying to manage what I take in on

52:48

that level. But I do like the idea of

52:50

reporting during the webinars. I

52:53

like that idea a lot. Yeah, and the reason I feel

52:55

like that's productive because it's people

52:57

coming on and saying, and we've had a lot

52:59

of people do this in the maintainers group. They're

53:01

like, hey, month one, they share

53:03

with us what they're trying to do. They check back

53:05

in the following month. They're like, this is how it went.

53:08

And what's cool is you can see this evolution

53:10

of a process starting for them where they're

53:12

starting to maybe figure out how to go from points

53:14

to calories and then they're figuring out how to disperse

53:17

those calories to their maintenance range.

53:20

And so I've seen a lot of really interesting

53:22

transitions happen through those maintainer

53:25

webinars because people

53:28

are trying to figure this out and they're sharing as

53:30

they process month to month. So that

53:32

might be a really good outlet for you. And

53:34

like I said, prioritize listening to those

53:37

specifically because you'll get to

53:39

hear other people who have

53:40

done what I'm telling you to do and you

53:42

can maybe glean some knowledge from what they've

53:44

gone through and use it for yourself. Yes,

53:47

definitely. I get something out of all of the webinars

53:50

and all the podcasts. I definitely, I wanna

53:52

practice the 10 minute break because

53:55

I do sometimes have moments where I'm like, I

53:57

just wanna eat something, cause it tastes good.

53:59

I don't know.

53:59

what my lower brain is saying other than we want something

54:02

that tastes good. Yeah, absolutely.

54:05

So like I want to start implementing that 10 minute

54:07

break because sometimes there's some weird snacking

54:09

that I do that will throw me out too. And I'm like,

54:12

what was that? What happened? Because

54:14

it doesn't happen all the time. And so when it happens,

54:17

it like catches me off guard and I'm like,

54:19

what is going on? And why did I just eat all

54:22

that rice? Yeah. And

54:24

why was it rice out of all the things I could have

54:26

eaten? Well, because I put soy sauce

54:28

and agave nectar

54:29

in it and so it didn't taste really good. That

54:32

does sound delicious. Yes. Then

54:34

I was like, but Michelle, like you're not hungry.

54:36

What are you doing? So I want to do the 10 minute

54:39

break. I love it. So let me ask you

54:41

this. If I could put you in a time machine

54:43

and I could send you back to maybe the

54:45

first you that was attempting weight

54:47

loss and you were starting, I think it

54:50

was like Weight Watchers at the time, if I could send

54:52

you back to her with the knowledge

54:54

and the perspective and what you've taken

54:57

in and you were to take a message back to

54:59

her to help

54:59

her out, what would you tell her? I would

55:02

probably tell her that this

55:04

is not the end. Like

55:07

you lost this weight and your body looks amazing because

55:09

you've been working with this trainer. But

55:11

if you want to keep this and

55:13

not have to do this all over again,

55:16

because I hate like the whole, like

55:18

even though it was more manageable this time, it's still

55:20

not fun to have to lose weight.

55:23

Like too much work. You

55:26

have to do that. So I would just tell her like,

55:28

this is not the end. You're going to have to do this again.

55:31

If this trainer won't give you a workout plan

55:34

so that you

55:34

can maintain this physique that you

55:37

work so hard for, then you need to find somebody else

55:39

who's going to give you one so that you can

55:41

continue that. Because I think if I

55:43

could stuck with it, then it would be easier now.

55:45

But I just keep falling off the strength training

55:48

bandwagon. But yeah, I think I would just

55:50

tell her like, you've got to kind of

55:52

continue to do what you've been doing in order to keep

55:54

this weight off. Otherwise, you're going to have to do this

55:56

over and over again over

55:58

the next several and

56:01

you don't want to have to do that. Absolutely.

56:03

And that probably would have been a good message

56:05

for her based on where you said your thinking

56:07

was at the time, which was, if I'm not

56:09

focusing on this, then I'm just not doing anything.

56:11

So that would have been a good bug to put

56:13

in her ear just to kind of make her aware of that.

56:16

And for a woman who might be listening

56:18

to this discussion today, who

56:20

say is a little bit on the smaller side,

56:23

and maybe she does have seemingly lower

56:25

calories than somebody else and finds

56:27

herself in that comparison trap, or

56:30

maybe just feels

56:31

like, okay, I'm going through this life transition

56:33

into perimenopause, and it's going to be too difficult.

56:35

Well, obviously, you dealt with both of those. So

56:38

what might you say to them to kind of give them

56:40

a sense of, you know, something

56:42

positive, something that might help them

56:45

reframe their thinking, or might make

56:47

them feel a little bit more hopeful about that phase

56:49

of the journey, being shorter and struggling

56:52

with the perimenopause? Well, we

56:54

should be thankful to even get to this point

56:56

in our lives. Like, you know,

56:58

the alternative is not being here at all. So

57:00

like,

57:01

those changes are going to happen. But you know, it's

57:03

in a way, it's a good thing. It's not always pleasant.

57:05

But you know, it's good that we're here and we continue

57:07

to, to change and grow and mature

57:10

and all that stuff. I think that one

57:12

of the things that I see people

57:15

commenting, not in your community, but

57:17

I feel like people automatically

57:20

associate lower calories

57:22

with

57:24

food that doesn't taste good, not a lot of food,

57:27

and that you just can't be satisfied on that number

57:29

of calories. Like, they attach weird

57:31

things to the number. It

57:33

doesn't have to be that way. Like, I can eat,

57:36

like people, I've seen people on Reddit say, you

57:38

know, 1400 calories, 1200 calories,

57:41

that's not even any food. But I could put

57:43

together a meal for you, a day for you, and you

57:46

would see, no,

57:46

this is a completely satisfying,

57:49

enjoyable day of eating. The

57:51

number doesn't have to dictate the

57:54

enjoyment of the food. Like, you can

57:56

eat like good food, a decent

57:58

amount of food, be satisfied.

57:59

and all that,

58:02

you just have to focus on the composition. Yeah.

58:04

You know, it's interesting as I was listening

58:07

to you and I totally love your attitude, by

58:09

the way. It's one of like, okay, I'm gonna make this

58:11

positive. We're gonna do this thing. We're

58:13

gonna focus on what's positive here as opposed

58:15

to what's negative. But it reminds me

58:17

a lot of the science and research

58:19

that's been done around people's

58:22

happiness with life based

58:24

on income. So like you would think,

58:26

okay, the more and more money, the more and more things

58:29

I acquire, my happiness has

58:31

to go up. But I think they capped

58:34

it at $70,000 a year. Yeah,

58:37

something like that. Yeah, like if you hit around a

58:39

certain number, that becomes

58:41

a point at which no longer are

58:43

you probably struggling to make ends meet.

58:46

You know, you've got all your needs are met and everything,

58:48

but you're also not making, you know, $1 million

58:51

a year or anything like that. But your happiness

58:54

quotient doesn't change based on the fact

58:56

you're now making more than $70,000 a year. There's

58:59

not a drastic increase in happiness and

59:01

contentment. That looks very much

59:03

like what you're saying with the calories. If you were

59:05

to say, okay, this is the budget

59:07

that I have, how can I

59:09

maximize it for taste, satisfaction,

59:13

volume? I could

59:15

make 12 or 1400 calories really

59:17

kick butt and amazing. Or

59:20

I could just say, I feel gypped

59:22

here and I'm just gonna scoot through and just

59:24

eat whatever and probably- Oh, I love the way you

59:26

frame that. I love that, yes. And just not

59:28

feel good about it. But you're saying,

59:30

you know, this is what I got. This is the money

59:33

that's been bestowed to me. I'm gonna make

59:35

the best use of that money. And

59:37

when I do, I'm fine. So

59:40

it's really real, because that goes back to that question

59:42

I asked you earlier. If you were really

59:44

eating, say 1600 calories every day

59:47

of foods, the way that it sounds like you prepare

59:49

them and make them, you in theory, if that's what

59:51

your body needs, you should feel

59:54

satisfied.

59:54

Not stuffed, not

59:57

starving, satisfied. But

59:59

if it was a- a bunch of empty calories,

1:00:02

by the end of the day, you might still hear growling in

1:00:04

your stomach and feel hunger, because you haven't

1:00:06

maximized. And that's what I'm seeing.

1:00:08

It's very much similar to that. Take the budget

1:00:10

you got and maximize it for

1:00:13

enjoyment factor. Yes, I love the way

1:00:15

you worded that. Yep, that's the key. That's the

1:00:17

key right there. You know, like whether it's 13,

1:00:19

14, whatever, whatever

1:00:21

you happen, your lot in life, based

1:00:24

on, you know, your height and everything. Yeah,

1:00:26

you can make the most of that. You can

1:00:28

do amazing things with that

1:00:29

number. Love this. Oh,

1:00:32

this is so much fun. All right, so now

1:00:34

I meant to ask you, for somebody who's listening

1:00:36

to this, if they're not a community

1:00:38

member, because I know community members could reach

1:00:41

out to you through the forums or Facebook,

1:00:44

but is there like a Instagram

1:00:46

or Facebook or anything that you would

1:00:48

want somebody listening to the show to reach

1:00:50

out to you, or would you want them to email me

1:00:53

and reference this podcast number and for

1:00:55

me to send it to you? What would you prefer?

1:00:58

They can reach out to me on Instagram

1:01:00

and I just joined Threads, so it's the same

1:01:02

username for both, although you

1:01:04

can't do DMs on Threads yet. So

1:01:06

it's vegan.foodie.michellewith2l's.

1:01:10

Oh,

1:01:13

vegan foodie. Yes, clearly

1:01:16

I do have a slight obsession with like food, but

1:01:21

I can make it work, it works. Yeah, so vegan.foodie.michellewith2l's

1:01:26

on Instagram and now Threads. Awesome,

1:01:29

all right, so you heard it here. If you wanna go check

1:01:31

out her delicious food, which it sounds like you

1:01:33

do a lot with it, so I

1:01:36

give you some serious props and I hope to see you at

1:01:38

our next live webinar, sound good? I will be there,

1:01:40

it's on my calendar. All right, my dear, thank

1:01:42

you so much for your time. I really appreciate it. Thank

1:01:45

you, Heather, I appreciate

1:01:46

you. Thank you for listening. Be

1:01:48

sure to visit halfsizeme.com. Check

1:01:51

back often for your daily dose of inspiration

1:01:54

because you are worth

1:01:55

it. The information you hear on this podcast

1:01:57

is for informational purposes only. is

1:02:00

not a medical professional. You should always

1:02:02

consult with your doctor, nurse or other

1:02:04

certified health professional before beginning any

1:02:06

diet or fitness program.