New Year Weight Loss

It’s a New Year!  Many of use the hope of a new year as inspiration to make healthy lifestyle changes.

I love the inspiration and motivation that the New Year brings.  I feel like I press a reset button and hit the ground running. 

What I don’t like so much is facing the music.  As I step on the scale for the first time after the New Year, I’m forced to face the consequences of my holiday shenanigans.   While this is not always pleasant it’s important to establish a baseline of where I’m at so I can set realistic goals for the future. 

For those with a weight loss goal as one of your resolutions, I encourage you to focus on health and wellness rather than a specific number on the scale.  There are different opinions in the professional community about using weight as a health parameter.  I feel it’s important to weigh ourselves for self-accountability, but it’s also very important to realize that this number does not define our value as a person.  There are many contributors to health and wellness and weight is just one of them.   Finally, body composition is much more relevant than weight.  People who are muscular tend to have a higher weight but less body fat than those who are less muscular.

This year, I’ve decided to share my personal experience.  Though I am a healthcare professional and nutritional consultant, I too sometimes struggle with weight gain.  I’ve always been fit and healthy, but the last few years have been challenging.  Due to life stressors, hormonal fluctuations and just getting older, I managed to gain 20 pounds over a period of 5 years. 

With that said, I love helping my clients identify their personal barriers to wellness and then helping develop solutions.  I know how about the challenges associated with weight gain and feel this enhances my abilities as a nutritional consultant.  I also know quite a bit about the health consequences of weighing more than we should and remain passionate about keeping wellness and all-natural weight loss as a main part of my clinical practice. 

What is all-natural weight loss?  It’s simple.  We eat the right amounts of the right kinds of real food.  My plans involve meal planning and calculating macronutrients, then applying that to the client’s life. 

What is the right meal plan?   Even during my extensive training, there was so much conflicting information.  Paleo, Atkins, South Beach, the Zone and Weight Watchers are just a few of the popular plans.  We all know someone who lost a ton of weight on one of these plans.  Some plans work for some people.  Others don’t.  That’s because we’re all different. 

I was so excited to discover genetic testing for weight loss consulting and meal planning.  I researched many companies then decided to try Fitness Genes.   The saliva test provides an analysis of specific genes that are known to influence individual response to diet and exercise.  You then receive detailed recommendations about your nutrition and fitness needs.

 When I took the test, the results confirmed my suspicions.  I’m sensitive to carbohydrates and do better with higher protein meal plans.  I’m lactose intolerant.  I’m genetically pre-dispositioned to Vitamin D deficiency (I live in Florida and run outside getting plenty of sun, but I have low vitamin D levels). 

I upgraded to the fat loss program to get an even more detailed plan to help achieve my goals.  I’ve decided to follow the plan exactly for the next 6 weeks and I’ll share as I go.    

In upcoming blogs and videos, I’m going to show you my personalized nutrition recommendations for fat loss and share how to make a meal plan from that information. 

Here’s to your health!