Dieting From The Inside Out

Jan 16, 2023

A Busy Mom's Guide to Weight Loss with Coach Sydnee | DFIO Ep.251

About Today’s Episode:

Today, I wanted to do an episode for all the busy moms out there who are trying to make their goals happen—trying to lose weight, juggle family life, and feel better—but are struggling with how to make it all happen.

Because mom-life is chaotic.

The majority of our client base are busy moms, so I wanted to bring in our newest coach, Coach Sydnee—who is a busy mom herself—for this episode.

Sydnee has been crushing it since she joined us and she’s got a lot of insight for busy moms out there because she has firsthand experience going through this.

She used to be upwards of 300 lbs, she has 3 kids, and now she’s a fitness professional, helping people transform their lives.

I’m REALLY excited for you all to hear this episode, so let’s get into it!

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 Intro

00:26 About Today’s Episode

02:28 Sponsors

04:45 Sydnee’s Story

09:21 Did You See Yourself Becoming a Coach

11:12 Where Busy Moms Go Wrong with Their Weight Loss

13:00 Dealing with Mom Guilt

19:23 Finding Middle Ground

25:21 Getting Started with Exercise

31:40 Goals When You Have a Bad Day

41:20 Other Advice for Busy Moms

43:19 Loving Yourself

51:05 Jared’s outro and how to apply for coaching

Transcript (click to expand)

Sydnee’s Story:

Sydnee lives in Arizona with her three kids. Growing up, she was always a bigger kid—and developed a lot faster than her peers—which made her self-conscious.

Sydnee’s mom was always dieting and, as she got older, she found herself trying many crash diets, like the South Beach Diet, Hollywood Miracle, and simply not eating.

Once she got into high school, she started dancing, finished maturing, and lost a lot of weight naturally.

Later, after getting married, Sydnee gained a ton of weight. After having her first child, she was nearly 300 lbs.

She lost about 80 lbs during an office weight loss competition. Her boss purchased a beach body on-demand subscription for the competition, so Sydnee decided to start exercising—because focusing on moving her body seemed like the easiest approach for her.

For a time, she was restricting her calories and would be so hungry by the time she got home that she ended up binging. Once she was introduced to macro-tracking, however, she came to understand that she could eat all the foods she enjoyed while still staying within calorie and macronutrient targets.

Unfortunately, Sydnee fell into being overly strict with her macros—sometimes doing things like eating a spoonful of coconut oil if she needed a few more grams of fat to hit her target.

She was weighing and tracking everything without flexibility.

Did You See Yourself Becoming a Coach?:

Initially, Sydnee did not see herself going from a fad diet follower to a fitness coach.

Weight loss always seemed like an impossible thing to her. Many of her family members still struggle with their weight. However, she now understands that those hyper-restrictive diets are neither sustainable nor enjoyable.

It was about a year ago that Sydnee realized that she could share her story and help others who are in a similar situation to the one she was in.

As a coach, Sydnee can help people navigate their transformations more effectively than she did on her own because of her knowledge and experience.

Where Busy Moms Go Wrong with Their Weight Loss:

Jared has found that many people—like Sydnee for a time—struggle to find that “middle ground” and fall into one extreme of either being a slave to binging, over-eating, etc., or a slave to calorie tracking and the food scale.

Sydnee believes that moms, in particular, struggle with mom-guilt—they spend all their time focusing on taking care of their kids and don’t take any time for themselves.

As Sydnee puts it, “if you spend all your time giving from your bucket and never take the time to refill, you’ll run out of things to give.”

Sydnee, herself, struggled at first even taking just an hour away from her kids or husband to do something for herself—and get healthier.

Dealing with Mom Guilt:

For Sydnee, her mindset transformation started when her work hired a consultant who dealt with switching false beliefs.

She learned that it was okay to take time for herself.

During this time, there was a lot of self-talk where Sydnee would remind herself that stopping and taking care of herself was best for her family—and that in the long run, she needed to take care of herself.

Jared often sees guilt haunting people as they struggle to lose weight—and recently on a call was discussing guilt and letting it go.

Sydnee mostly approaches dealing with guilt logically.

She knows that she can show up and do way more as a mom, partner, and friend, as well as be more patient and more kind when she is taking care of herself versus when she allows herself to get run down.

She has also experienced guilt over the thing she “should be doing, but isn’t,” but recognizes that telling yourself, “you should be doing X,” is just another trap.

Sydnee and Jared believe that social media also plays a role in guilt—especially when you’re looking at “fitspo moms” who, through Instagram, appear to have their lives together, when the reality is always less than perfect.

Sydnee has found that people often have help, as well—like a nanny—but that isn’t the case for herself and many other moms out.

Finding Middle Ground:

To find the middle ground between overeating/binging and being hyper-restrictive, first, Sydnee advises moms to take a moment and recognize what is actually going on—and to not live in a state of “ignorance is bliss.”

It takes a lot of self-talk and reminding yourself that consistency is better than perfection.

She also believes that finding the right support—talking to people or hiring a coach—is important to keep yourself on track.

Then, clean up your social media feeds.

If you are following a lot of people who make you feel like garbage because their life looks perfect—stop.

Sydnee has done this herself. If what someone is doing or saying doesn’t resonate with you, unfollow them.

Jared does this himself because sometimes people’s messaging changes.

He has also been unfollowed because someone may have liked his content from 3 years ago but doesn’t resonate with the message he delivers now.

Jared finds that most people overestimate what they need to do to lose weight—for example: tracking everything.

Sydnee agrees that you don’t need to go from never tracking a calorie in your life to tracking every single calorie and step.

For her, it was easier to simply add movement at first, because she recognized that food was going to be much more difficult to deal with.

Again, you need to be aware of where you are, what you’re struggling with, and what you can reasonably do to keep moving forward.

Jared finds that most people fail to approach weight loss in this logical fashion and that finding that intersection of return on investment and low friction—like Sydnee did—is not something that is often utilized.

Many people want to look at what others did, but what will get you started is highly individualized.

Sydnee believes that you need to embrace your own body and your own self, because you are not “Sally down the street,” and what works for one person may not be the solution for another.

Jared agrees that what works and is sustainable for one person won’t be the same for another, because genetics and lifestyle are different.

Getting Started with Exercise:

Sydnee likes strength training, but thinks that getting started with something simple, like walking, is better than doing nothing.

Sydnee, herself, started with walking—then started doing Beachbody on-demand, started lifting at home, and eventually got a gym membership.

She started at a Planet Fitness, but eventually outgrew it and started going to a new gym.

Going to the gym at first as well as starting at her new gym were both intimidating for her, but the important thing is to keep showing up and to realize that the other people at the gym are not focused on you.

Jared, too, has had the experience of being concerned about other people at the gym.

For example, he once was doing bent over rows and overheard someone talking about how they were, “getting ready for a Worlds event, so it was a light day.”

This person was doing 600 lb deadlifts.

Jared had the thought that he didn’t want the deadlifter to see him doing his 50 lb rows, but realized that the guy was focused on himself and his upcoming competition.

Jared believes that the big takeaway from Sydnee’s story is that, even if it wasn’t perfect, she was doing what was right for her.

If someone had told Sydnee when she was just getting started walking that she needed to go to a commercial gym to make progress, she wouldn’t have listened to them because she was doing what was right for her.

Again, you need to find the easiest first step for you and you will evolve from there.

Another example from Jared: when he was in high school, he started doing P90X—and got pretty good results—but he was very self-conscious about going to the gym and was unsure of what to do.

He covered his P90X book in duct tape and brought it to the gym to reference. If, in the book, they were doing push-ups, he would do chest presses, and things like that.

He was both intimidated and embarrassed, but over time he got more comfortable.

Sydnee believes that you will feel it when you are ready for the next step and that you don’t have to do things you don’t enjoy.

If you don’t want to just do cardio, you don’t have to go to the gym and beat yourself up on the treadmill.

Jared finds that many fitness and diet-culture myths are still extremely prevalent even in 2023—like the belief that carbs store fat or that weight lifting will make women look like Mr. Olympia… Or that you have to do cardio to burn fat.

Determining what is a positive first step and a positive next step is necessary for success.

Goals When You Have a Bad Day:

Sydnee believes that allowing yourself to adapt is necessary. You may have an ideal you want to meet, but doing the best you can every day is more important than that perfect day.

Realizing that a single day is not going to make or break your goals is also vital.

If you find yourself off-track one day, you can get right back to it.

If you have a day that is chaotic and at the end of the day you still haven’t done your workout, something is better than nothing—and sometimes nothing is okay.

You just have to get back on track and keep going.

Jared finds that oftentimes we look at things through the lens of the terrible day, but in reality, nothing bad happened. Another good day will come around.

Sydnee compares it to having a baby—some days are very difficult, but over time that baby learns and grows. When you are trying to lose weight, you just have to keep going.

Jared finds that people often lose sight of what’s in their control, especially when they have several bad days or difficult situations at once.

Sydnee agrees that just focusing on and doing what you can is important. If you can’t get to the gym, but you can journal—then do that.

If you go out to eat, make a conscious choice about what you are eating and realize it’s okay.

Jared finds that, for everyone, we need to let loose some of the pressure.

Sydnee finds that lowering your expectations and standards can be very positive if you are letting go of perfectionism.

Jared believes that we need to stop striving for perfection and strive for making progress in the most sustainable way possible.

For Sydnee, a “perfectionist” is in reality an “im-perfectionist,” because you aren’t focusing on the wins—you are only focusing on shortcomings.

She believes that you need to intentionally think about your wins because it’s harder to think of the good and the wins than it is to think about the bad.

Other Advice for Busy Moms:

Sydnee wants the moms—and people out there trying to lose weight—to simply remind yourself that you're awesome and that you CAN do it.

She likes to ask her clients why they are awesome and the answer can be something as simple as “I didn’t snooze my alarm today.”

Take the time to find those little reasons and love yourself where you’re at.

Loving Yourself:

If you don’t love yourself, Sydnee suggests consciously finding things you do like about yourself.

Maybe you don’t like your body, but you have beautiful eyes—or you like the way someone thinks of you.

It takes a lot of self-talk and a lot of effort.

Jared thinks that part of the reason people struggle with weight loss is that they think that they are just body fat and muscle.

If a person has 40 lbs they want to lose, they equate that to being a terrible person. But just because you have weight you want to lose—or you don’t love the way your body looks yet—doesn’t mean you need to throw everything out the window.

He finds that people forget that it’s okay to love yourself AND want to work on yourself at the same time. You need to teach your brain to love your body.

In closing, Jared and Sydnee acknowledge that it's hard—and awkward—at first to find those little things, feel different feelings, consciously appreciate yourself, and get in that good space—but getting out of your comfort zone is necessary for change.

For busy moms, specifically—know you can do it and that it’s okay to take time for yourself.