Losing weight can be daunting for many women, but it doesn’t have to be. With a combination of the right amount of diet, exercise, and lifestyle changes, women can achieve their weight loss goals and maintain a healthy weight for life.
The first part of losing weight is to create a healthy diet plan. This should include a variety of nutritious foods such as fruits, vegetables, lean proteins, whole grains, and healthy fats. Eating a balanced diet is essential for weight loss and overall health. Additionally, it is important to limit processed foods, added sugars, and unhealthy fats.
In addition to diet, exercise is an important part of any weight loss plan. Women should plan for at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise per week. Exercise can include walking, jogging, swimming, biking, or any other activity that increases the heart rate. Strength training is also important for maintaining muscle mass and burning calories.
Finally, lifestyle changes can help women lose weight and keep it off. This change includes getting enough sleep, managing stress, and avoiding unhealthy habits such as excessive drinking and smoking. It is important to stay motivated and set realistic goals. A healthy diet, exercise, and a healthy lifestyle are key for women to achieve and keep their weight loss goals for life. With dedication and hard work, women can be successful in their weight loss journey.
Here, we discuss with Concita Thomas, a food and fitness coach who helps women achieve sustainable weight loss on their own terms.
NourishDoc: Good morning, everyone, and happy election day for today; all the people watching us from the US, we are going to be talking about healthy ways to lose weight. We all have these extra pounds; we want to lose weight. So I’m going to do Concita Thomas, a food and fitness coach who helps women achieve sustainable weight loss on their own terms, so she should be joining me in one second; here you are, Concita; hi, hello can you see me?
Fitness Coach Concita: Hi, I can see you now; hello.
NourishDoc: Okay, great. Well, happy election day; this is a great day for people; this webinar in this country, amazing things will happen, so cross our fingers. So I was introducing you, you are a food and fitness coach, and you help women like us achieve sustainable weight loss, and what is; so what is your mantra? Let’s educate ourselves a little because we all try to lose 5-10 pounds. So what’s your mantra?
Sustainable weight loss lessons
Fitness Coach Concita: Well, what I practice and coach and teach is sustainable weight loss; it’s funny that we’re having this interview today because I had an epiphany. I think it was yesterday that, for all this time, I’ve been saying that I help women who are on a weight loss journey. I help them to achieve lasting weight loss in a way that enhances their life with a process that’s equal parts effective and enjoyable, and it dawned on me yesterday.
NourishDoc: So what I want to repeat what I heard what you’re saying is that that you want to help women lose weight that’s enjoyable, that’s sustainable, but what I can understand is that you can lose enjoyable weight without going into like strange diets like I think all of us have tried all kind of diets. You’re welcome to give us feedback on what you have done so that what she helps us do is helps women it helps them lose weight in a healthy way that’s enjoyable and sustainable because most of us, what happens is I would lose like five pounds ten pounds. Then I returned because I could not sustain my weight loss journey.
Best Way To Lose Weight For Women Over 40
I start getting all kinds of cravings, sugar, and all that; that’s what happens to me. What happens to you, you tell us, because what we are trying to do is bring experts who can help all of us in something or the other, so hopefully, Concita can join me in one second. I’m not the one who’s talking but that’s really what the intent is so let’s see if Concita can enter. However, any feedback or anything that you would like to know if you have been able to lose weight healthily or not, so share your story so let me get Concita again to join me one second she’s joining me again. We’re going to ask her some questions about how she has helped so many of her clients lose weight. So you were saying something about your client yesterday. Can you repeat that because it didn’t come out? I don’t think people could hear you.
Lifestyle changes for weight loss
Fitness Coach Concita: Yes, I said I got a text from a client who was on vacation with her husband. She was doing check-in and telling me how well it was going, particularly comparing it to the previous vacation. It dawned on me at that moment that I really help my clients curate a lifestyle that works for them and feels good. She didn’t send me a text saying oh, I did it. I was able to will power my way through dessert and not partake and not enjoy with my husband; it wasn’t that; it was more so, hey, my husband joined me on my walk, and hey, you were right; these tips did work, and this is what I did at dinner, and oh my goodness I can’t believe this works it feels so amazing it feels so good. Yeah, she’s losing weight, and that’s great and what she came for. However, the reason why it works and the reason why it’s going to stick is that she’s not just losing weight; she’s curating a lifestyle; it’s something that works whether she’s at work or on vacation or at home, and that’s the missing piece of the puzzle with so many programs and approaches to weight loss it’s all about will power your way through something that you don’t enjoy. I prefer to teach people how to take the lifestyle they want and make minor tweaks so that they can get and keep results.
NourishDoc: So when you talk about the lifestyle, explain a little bit more like but of course we know that we have to control our portions all those things but when you talk about the lifestyle, what exactly do you mean like exercise I mean just explain it a little bit more.
Fitness Coach Concita: Yeah, so when I talk about lifestyle, I’m talking about all of the things that you already know, like you already know that portion control works, you already know that movement works, but when I say the lifestyle, I mean how specifically how do you execute that, in a way that fits your life and that’s going to be different from person to person and client to client. Some people enjoy boot camp style workouts; some people despise that, but they will happily go for a walk in nature; most of my clients don’t like weighing and measuring their food, but they’ll happily fill up on veggies and proteins first and then add dessert so that it’s easier to portion control. So when I say lifestyle, I mean more so not what you have to eat, what you have to avoid, but how what habits and routines and personal policies do you put in place that you like doing that help you do the stuff that you’ve known to do for decades.
Cut refined carbs, eat more protein
NourishDoc: Got it. So what are some of the good foods for weight loss? We don’t want to go into the details but give our viewers a few just ideas.
Fitness Coach Concita: Okay, so, for instance, with food, most of us know that to lose weight and to keep it off that we need to create and maintain a calorie deficit. Most of us do that by just trying to cut back like I’m going to cut calories or measure my food. So one of the tricks or two actually of the strategies and tricks that I have my clients use is to figure out which vegetables they enjoy, which proteins they enjoy how to combine those in meals that they like because, by nature, fiber is in vegetables by nature protein is going to help you be fuller longer so how can you switch your meals so that they’re not so carbohydrate-centric so that they’re more protein and vegetable-centric without cutting out the protein notes I mean without cutting out the carbs you don’t need to cut them but how can you take them from the center of the meal and make them more of the accent of the meal. So that’s just one trick we use to make it easier to create a caloric deficit without feeling like you’re forcing it.
NourishDoc: Forcing a diet or starving yourself would be the word. So you talk a lot about five-minute meals on your website event it’s very impressive so what is the trick because all I end up cooking like I don’t know for sometimes one hour I cook I try to cook fresh foods but what is the trick of getting like five-minute fresh food? What’s your karma?
Tips & tricks for eating fresh vegetables for busy women
Fitness Coach Concita: Okay, so the big trick is buying fresh foods that are already at least partially prepared so we eat a lot of vegetables in my house, but most times, for instance, cabbage, I will buy cabbage that’s already washed and shredded; salad greens I will buy salad greens that are already washed and cut; I buy frozen vegetables often as well also because any time that I can save on cleaning and slicing and dicing cut down on time tremendously; I do the same thing with my meat and my fish individually wrapped and portioned pieces of meat so that they’re easy to thaw quickly and to cook soon that makes a big difference. So it’s not all about buying boxed foods and just popping cans open, not at all; this is fresh food but just spending a little bit of extra on the front end on getting things that are washed, things that are cut, things that are individually frozen so that they’re easier to stop and easier to prepare more quickly.
NourishDoc: Now, if you buy what you’re suggesting, they’re already in a sort of like a small package with which they are cut, so you can only take that. My next question is, how do you control your portion without measuring food or relying on willpower? I’ll tell you, all of us get strange cravings are sugar. You go, and you start eating some cookies or some weird things like that, so what are portion control tricks? I mean, that’s one of the tricks you said that are already sliced and diced. They’ll package it like that, so you make it; what other things can we do to portion control and control our measuring by relying on our willpower? How do we do that?
Don’t forget portion control to avoid over-eating
Fitness Coach Concita: Okay, so with the portion control, you’re right, so even though that was a quick cooking tip, it does help with portion control because if I’m buying like individually wrapped chicken breasts and I cook four, and there’s four of us in the family then I’m not going to be going back for any seconds because there’s nothing to go back for. But the other thing to notice too is sometimes i cook more than what is required for a day but again when i’m filling up first with vegetables and protein and i have some rice on the side that’s not usually what we overeat, so most times i’m you’re going to be complete when you eat that way and the other part of it too is a little bit of mindfulness because we’ve all before over and or stuffed ourselves past the point of being full so that is just a little bit of a practice and my clients and i we call it our personal policy always satisfied never stuffed and that just takes deciding that, that is how you’re going to live your life and it also takes just paying attention to how it feels how everything feels like if you go overboard one time and you overeat don’t beat yourself up like oh that was bad i’m not supposed to do that ask yourself how did that feel because when you connect with how it felt and when you’re like what that really didn’t feel good it’s a lot easier that next time to stop before you’re stuffed because you didn’t check out because you felt guilty you checked in and you said what that doesn’t feel good i don’t think i want to do that to myself next time because it just didn’t feel good.
So it’s a combination of tips and tricks but also paying attention and checking in and not checking out, which is another reason why it works because, with so many other approaches to weight loss, you teach yourself to check out if you’re hungry it doesn’t matter you can’t eat you’re over your portions if you want a little bit more rice or potatoes that day you can’t have it because you’re already over your macros. However, with this approach, it is about the tips and the strategies to set yourself up for success but then checking in and staying connected with how it all feels so that you can adjust accordingly and not be a slave to the rules because we’re all adults we were about you put harsh strict guidelines on us we may stick to it for a little while. However, if it does not feel good and we feel forced into it, we eventually rebel, and that’s why it’s on again and off again for so many of us.
NourishDoc: So emotional connection to the food is critical, and it is very accurate; I feel better when I eat chocolate. However, when I eat some veggies, I’m like, oh my god, it’s like the food has an emotional connection; each food, if you think about it, has an emotional connection to how we feel, whether we feel good, whether we feel depressed or whether we feel I don’t know sad or something. However, I think that’s a great tip that you are saying. What else would you like to talk about today? We can have another session on an entirely different topic; these are smaller 10-15 minute bite-sizes that we want to bring to our viewers; what else would you like to add?
Emotional connection to food
Fitness Coach Concita: I want to add that food is emotional, and we have emotional connections to food, and that is again, why this approach is so important. I’m not saying that you ignore your emotions or that you don’t honor the emotional and even cultural connections to food; in different cultures, you eat certain things at other times of the year or to celebrate various festivals and many times different approaches mainstream approaches to weight loss do not honor that type of stuff; your preferences your culture your traditions if it doesn’t fit narrowly into the box often it’s sidelined and designated for cheap meals and cheap days and how does that even feel to consider the way that you eat and live as a cheat as if something about you is against the rules.
So i think it’s important to honor those preferences to even honor the emotional connections there is specific candy that i eat and i’m not really a considerable candy eater anymore but there’s certain candy that i eat because i have fond memories of oh that was my mom’s favorite candy or we always at halloween put candy corn inside of popcorn and eat it together is it the healthiest thing no but that i can fit into a lifestyle and still get results and honor those connections absolutely and i think that’s the biggest thing just realizing that you bring your whole self to a weight loss journey and anything that requires you to cut off part of yourself in order to make it work is not a long-term solution and it’s not gonna work for the long term and so you we really can save ourselves a lot of frustration and a lot of energy by just vetting programs up front that way like okay where where do the things that i like to eat fit into this program can they fit into this program and if it only fits in as a once a week cheap that’s probably not something that’s going to last and work for you long term.
Summary
NourishDoc: That’s very beautifully said. I mean to summarize, you tailored the solution according to the lifestyle; you suggest your clients make lifestyle modifications, then you talked about buying sliced and washed vegetables so that it’s easier for people to cook then you talk about the significant portion control then you talked about the emotional connect the food has with you all of us actually for that matter try to see your feelings that’s something that you talked about and then what else did I miss anything? I want to summarize the key elements and the key steps.
Fitness Coach Concita: I think you summarize beautifully; the only thing is remembering that protein and veggies help you fill up, so again it’s not that those carbs need to be cut. That is not the solution long term; it’s just that we need to take them out of the center of the meal; they’re no longer the stars; they’re on the side. But yeah, you’ve got everything, right?
NourishDoc: Yes, thank you so much, Concita, for being with us today and giving all of our viewers a healthy way to eat and a wholesome to sustain our bait. So any questions any comments anyone has, you’re welcome to reach out to us. With that, I’d like to wrap up this session. Hopefully, by tonight, we’ll know who our president is, so we should cross our fingers that everything goes smoothly today in this country praying for that; thank you so much.