If you struggle to start or maintain healthy habits, start here…
Today I want to talk about 2 foundational steps that most of us skip right over, yet they’re such an important part of your healthy lifestyle - especially in this new, busy, and tiring chapter of early motherhood. These steps are really the WHY of everything you’re doing!
So Mom, do you fall into one of these buckets:
#1 You struggle to be consistent with your healthy habits, especially your diet or your exercise.
Sure you’ve had some good days, or some great weeks even. But your motivation and willpower seem to come and go, and any changes you make don’t seem to stick for too long. Maybe one day you’re ALL IN - Okay this is it, I’m gonna stick to this diet and hit the gym every day! But then the next day, you’re super tired - maybe your toddlers woke up a bunch of times last night, you’re running late so you skip your morning workout, you drag through the day, pick up some fast-food on the way home, and then lay in bed at night with desserts, wine and Netflix.
It’s so frustrating right?! And you get discouraged by how undisciplined you seem to be.
#2: You’re unsure where to even start!
You feel unhealthy - you’re heavy, or tired and weak. Maybe your stomach hurts, or you get frequent headaches. Maybe you noticed all of this getting worse after you became a mom. You know you don’t want to spend years feeling this way, and you know you probably need to get more serious about your lifestyle and make some better choices. But where the heck do you even start?!
Of course there’s tons of information out there - on social media, internet, books, podcasts. There’s endless opinions and types of diets and exercise routines and checklists and instagram how-to posts about what you should be doing to get healthier. But understanding where to start is like a whole task in itself, and that’s before you even get to all the changes you have to make and somehow maintain over time.
Maybe you think to yourself, “I don’t have endless hours to research, how do I make sense of what to do, and what to prioritize?” It feels overwhelming, and even paralyzing, that you push it all off a bit.
Maybe you relate to both buckets (I know I’ve lived inside of each at one point or another!)
Either way, I want you to know Mom... you CAN Move forward and break through what’s making you feel stuck. And the way to move forward is to actually… not move forward! Okay, I can explain…
If you’re a mom of young kiddos that you love more than life and want to raise well…
and you’re working, either outside the home or inside as a stay-at-home mom…
and you have a partner, friends, family to keep up with, or maybe you’re a single parent…
Your time time is probably limited lately.
And I can guess that maybe your energy is limited, too.
The physical and mental load of responsibilities in this chapter of life alone is a lot! Lots of stress, lack of movement, lack of quality sleep can all zap your energy. Or maybe you have a health condition that’s causing fatigue. Several years ago when I was at home with my two toddlers, there were some days I couldn’t even think straight or get off the couch, because my fatigue was so bad (which I later found out was in large part due to autoimmunity and thyroid issues at the time that I didn’t know about)
And so with the very limited time and energy that so many of us moms have, and maybe some health issues that are bogging you down even more, we want to avoid a few things:
just continuing to work harder and harder (and harder) at all the things we’ve been doing but are maybe just not working for us.
going from from 0 to 100! Thinking that to get started with your health, you have know all the things, do all the right habits, and be perfect every day
throwing the spaghetti at the wall (as much as we can, but there is always some element of experimentation)
So if you’ve been struggling to start or maintain healthy habits, you’re likely here…
—Stuck.
—Confused.
—Overwhelmed.
—Discouraged.
(And this is typically where I meet my health coaching clients. I also spent several years here, myself!)
And you probably want to be here…
—Feeling great and achieving your health goals!
and what will help you start to bridge that gap is CLARITY.
So why does clarity help?
Well, there is no one plan or cookie-cutter approach that anyone can offer you. There’s no right way to get healthy and stay healthy for everyone.
Everyone’s bodies, and minds, and circumstances, and desires, are very different. Everyone’s individual state of health is different. And from a behavior change perspective, what makes each individual change their behavior will be very different.
And so what’s going to make you motivated, your habits consistent, and your health improve? That’s what we want to figure out. It’s about building your bridge.
And in order to build your bridge, you first need to understand:
where you are standing now (where is the bridge starting?)
where you want to be (what’s on the other side of the bridge?)
We want to increase your CLARITY about these two things! Because the more clarity you have, the more focused, strategic, motivated, and confident you’ll feel, and the more progress you’ll be making.
#1 identify where you’re currently standing
The reality is that so many moms are feeling heavier, more tired, more stressed, more undisciplined, and more symptoms than they ever have before in their lives.
Unfortunately, we often push this stuff down. Maybe we’re too busy to deal with it. Maybe we don’t fully understand what’s happening, or our doctors have implied that we’re just getting older. Or maybe we’re too embarrassed to admit that we’ve been unable to fix it on our own, or that we’ve gotten here to begin with. Maybe we think we’re the only ones who can’t get our crap together.
But in order to build a healthy, sustainable lifestyle that is going to actually work with us and for us, you have to first be CLEAR on what is actually going on!
Because Mom, the reality is that many of us have:
insulin resistance and blood sugar issues
thyroid issues
autoimmune disease
chronic inflammation
chronic fatigue
developing chronic disease
nutrient deficiencies
sleep deprivation
insane stress levels
unhealthy coping strategies
I dealt with literally all of these things in my first several years of motherhood, so I get it.
The is that the things on this list - whether we know about them or not (and so many of us don’t know about them) - are affecting our ability show up for our habits and goals the way we would want to.
Because they’re making us tired! And heavier, and slower, and stressed. They’re affecting our ability to be consistent over time. They’re affecting our motivation levels and our discipline. And they’re likely stopping many of us from even getting started because, my goodness, we’re just not feeling well!
So in order to get started, and in order to become this highly motivated, highly disciplined, highly consistent version of ourselves, we have to figure out where it is we’re currently standing - what we’re going to need to build upon.
I encourage you to ask yourself some of the following questions:
What have I been through lately… this past year, or these past 3 years? 5 Years?
Did my physical and mental health change after I became a mom? After this early chapter of motherhood? In what ways, what’s different now?
When it comes to my habits, what have I tried? What has worked, and what doesn’t seem to be working
What feels just so hard to do or be disciplined with, that it almost seems like I shouldn’t be having such a hard time with?
Do I experience any of the following: acne // anger, irritability // anxiety //binge eating or drinking // bloating // brain fog // constipation // cravings // diarrhea // difficulty losing weight // emotional dysregulation // fatigue, sluggishness // frequently sick // hair loss // hanger // headaches // history of abuse/trauma // mood swings // stressed // weight gain // weight loss
We want to get you REALLY understanding what you need to work on, what you may need more help with, and where you currently exist today.
Because then, you’ll need to:
#2 Identify where exactly you’re trying to go
If you want to be able to be consistent with a healthy lifestyle and healthy habits for years and decades to come, if you want to lose the weight for good, if you want to truly improve your health and well-being - it’s not going to look like one solution, or action, or magic bullet.
It’s a process… a journey.
And when you set off on a journey, it’s typically helpful to know where the heck you’re going, right? What’s the actual destination? Are we just jumping on any plane without knowing where the plane is headed, or did we thoughtfully plan out our trip, bring our map, and know where we want to end up?
What we want to do is develop a CLEAR, thoughtful, long-term vision, that we can work backwards from. To uncover a series of steps or stages or goals that will get you moving consistently in that direction.
I invite you to think about your most ideal vision of your life - the most incredible, healthiest, and happiest version of you. Your best-case scenario:
What does this look like?
What does “healthy” mean to you?
What is it that you feel like? Do you have boundless energy, do you feel light and strong? Do you feel clear-headed, and full of joy?
What do physically look like? Do you fit into your clothes well? Are you fit?
Do you have great mental health?
Have you healed a health condition? Have you avoided a condition that runs in your family?
What are you parenting like? What amazing characteristics and habits and behaviors are you role modeling to your children?
Are you planning more family fun time, traveling, starting that dream business?
Do you feel more confident? Comfortable in your skin?
Do you feel more at peace? More content?
Do you feel empowered and in control of your life?
Now, if I asked you to bring this a little closer to home - closer to today - how would you have liked for things to change by this time next year? What would you really be disappointed if you still hadn’t started?
Mom, we’re all all on our own unique journey.
We are starting from different spots, and we’re going different places. We’re also motivated by different things!
It’s important that you tap into your own starting point, your ideal vision, your specific needs, and the things that motivate YOU.
When you think through all of this, you will be so much more likely to come up with more thoughtful goals and actions that:
actually make sense for you and your needs
brings your attention to more variables than just the scale, or just one diet, or just one workout… and opens you up to more opportunities that you maybe hadn’t considered lately
help you feel motivated and excited about what’s on the other side of your effort
ties back to a greater vision you have for yourself and your life - like you’re doing life on purpose and heading in a direction of YOUR choosing.
Here for you, Mom.
If you’re in a place where you could really use more personalized support, I encourage you to check out my Healthy Mom Kickstarter 3-month coaching program. I offer free consultation calls to see if it’s the right fit!
