How I Lost The Baby Weight Postpartum

Welcome to the Design Your Dream Life podcast, where it’s all about helping moms live their best lives. My hope with this podcast is you’re more inspired to become the mom you are made to be. I’m Natalie, your host, a wife, boy, mom, dog lover, Chicagoan, and former lawyer turned professionally certified coach. If you’re here to grow, I can help. Let’s go.

Hello, my beautiful friend. Welcome to the podcast. Today I want to talk with you about how I lost the baby weight postpartum. I am so excited though I have to say that there are some big changes happening in my company. A complete rebrand of the program, of the podcast, of the website, of the Instagram handle. All of it is changing so that it’s easier for you to kind of use the tools that I teach and get the help that you want. So my mission here is to help you overcome challenges and live your best life.

And with that, I think having a separate podcast name and a separate program name and a separate, you know, website and Instagram handle and them all sort of being fragmented has made it a little bit confusing, or at least not that cohesive. And so I’m really excited for the start of this next year that’s upcoming because my entire business will be under one name and you will see a completely different podcast cover. Although the topics covered will be exactly the same, I think that you will find this new positioning, this new rebrand to be very reflective of how the company has been operating in the last couple of years. It’s just going to be solidified through this new name in a much more consistent way across all platforms. So that is what’s coming up on the podcast and everywhere else, and I’m just really excited about it.

So stay tuned for all of that. Today I want to talk with you about weight loss and specifically how I lost weight and continue to keep it off. And how I think how I lose weight is so different from other people in a way that you could find really useful if you want to lose weight. And I’m going to talk with you about how it’s so hard for some people to lose weight and why that is and how you can change that so it’s really not that hard. So let me back up and give you a little bit about my weight loss story. So after college, I don’t know, maybe it was a little bit before I turned 30, somewhere in between those after college years, before turning 30, I lost about 25 pounds and I kept that weight off. That was my first experience with real going after my goal weight loss.

And then when I got pregnant with my first son at 35 years old, I gained 40 pounds with that first pregnancy. And then I lost all 40 pounds within six months of being postpartum. And then with my second son, just a short 20 months later, I gained 40 pounds almost exactly again. And then I lost all 40 pounds within four months, just over four months of being postpartum. So I have lost in total over a hundred pounds. Isn’t that wild? 40 plus, 40 plus 25 is 105 pounds. I am so proud of that. On top of that, I am actually a certified weight loss coach. You may not know this about me. It is true, my friend. As part of my training, I was certified in weight loss coaching. So not only do I have the personal experience of losing weight, both in my everyday life, but also postpartum twice, I also am certified in specific tools that I can teach and specific coaching methods that I can use to help clients lose weight.

So I want to talk with you today about my specific journey, but also I want to talk with you about how it’s so different and how my journey has been kind of easy, and how yours could be easier than it is right now, and why it also often feels so hard. So weight loss has been easy for me because of the way that I think about my body, because of the way I think about food, because of the way I think about my past, because of the way I think about my future, because of the way I think about all of it. And I share this because I want you to know this is possible. I want you to learn from me. I hear other people teaching weight loss who are constantly struggling with their own weight and it’s just not helpful for you. You will learn how to permanently lose weight, how to keep it off and do it in a really simple way that dare I say, could actually be easy if you do what I teach you how to do, I promise you my friend, I got you.

I feel really passionate about this because there are other areas of my life that are harder for me to get the result that I want. The goals that I set, some of them are just harder for me. And I typically don’t teach those areas or coaching them because I will buy the stories of my clients. So if they have an excuse, I will buy that excuse. But when it comes to areas of expertise that I am really good at, I can coach at such a high level because I can call BS on the excuses and help you overcome those big, big challenges. So I really want to say confidently that weight loss is pretty dang easy for me. Not to brag in an arrogant way, but instead to be certain and confident and show you that this is possible. Not for me, there’s nothing special about me. It’s not like I’m some athlete or have been training all my life. I share that I have gained 40 pounds with each pregnancy, lost the weight, and then I had also lost 25 pounds prior to that. And I have tools that really work if you’re willing to do them.

So why then is weight loss hard for so many people? Why do you think that weight loss feels hard for you maybe? I love how weight loss dovetails so beautifully with motherhood. I think just the very nature of being a mom often requires pregnancy, which means that you gain weight. Then there are all those postpartum changes, and then there is feeding your children, feeding yourself, feeding your entire family, and the challenges that come about when you want to eat differently, maybe from your family. And then there are the constant demands of motherhood and wondering how in the world it’s possible to add in a goal, like a weight loss when you feel like you are barely staying above water. But I think that that is why weight loss is kind of the perfect growth instrument for moms because it’s about so much more than the number on the scale.

When you use the tools that I teach to help you lose weight, you change your relationship with yourself, you have more self-love and self-compassion, you treat yourself with more kindness. You ultimately change your relationship not just with yourself though, but also with your body and with food. And so you really transform the way that you see yourself and the way that you relate to food in a way that makes you unrecognizable. As an added bonus I think this impacts the way that you show up for your kids and the way you teach them about their bodies, about the food that they eat and about their health, which I think is just a beautiful thing.

So thinking about kind of where you’re at right now in your weight loss journey, where do you want to be in that journey one year from now? Think about it realistically, if you’ve tried to lose weight for years, which is many of my clients, and it’s hard for you to even think or give yourself permission to think that it’s possible in the next year, imagine a very realistic goal that you would be pretty satisfied with in the next 12 months. So if 12 months from now you lost some weight, what number would that be? And what would it be like for you to experience that? Start thinking about your future in that way. Okay, I’m digressing a little bit. I love this topic so much. Let’s circle back to why it can feel so hard. I think the main reason weight loss is hard is because of cognitive distortions.

That’s just a psychology term that describes thought errors. Your brain is constantly and continuously processing lots of information. And to do this very quickly, your brain will sometimes seek shortcuts to cut down on that mental load. So if you just think about learning a new skill and how it can sometimes feel kind of challenging. But then once you know the skill, it’s just part of your subconscious. Once it’s part of your subconscious, your brain rarely questions it. And the same is true with thoughts. So you may have memorized thoughts that are thought errors that aren’t true, but that your brain thinks are true because you’ve been practicing them for so long. And the problem with these thoughts is that they are beliefs that you carry with you that will lead to a lot of self-sabotage. So you will slow down, you will take breaks, you will stay stuck where you are, and ultimately you will give up all because of the way that you are thinking.

So I want to walk through some cognitive distortions with you to give you a sense of what this looks like and why it might be so hard for you to lose weight right now and what you can do about it. So the first is all or nothing thinking, also known as black and white thinking. Examples of this are either everything is working or nothing is working. Either I’m succeeding or I’m failing. Food is either “good or bad”. Either I’m on track or I’m a hot mess. Either I exercise all the time or not at all. Another example of a cognitive distortion with weight loss is catastrophizing. What if I never lose the weight? Or I had ice cream last night, so the entire week is ruined.

A third cognitive distortion is magnification of the negative. It’s saying, well, I ate an entire sleeve of cookies and totally ruined everything. And then the flip side is minimizing the positive. Saying something like, maintaining weight doesn’t count since I want to lose weight. Do you see how as I’m articulating these examples, they may be resonating with you in the way that you’re thinking about things. And remember your thoughts create your feelings and your feelings drive all of your actions. So if you’re struggling to take the actions required to lose weight and change your eating habits so that you can keep the weight off, it’s coming from the way that you are thinking about it. So let’s go through a few more cognitive distortions. Jumping to conclusions, an example, I haven’t lost weight after trying for decades, so it’s impossible. This is one I hear all of the time.

Another one, I haven’t lost weight in the past, so there’s no point in trying. Another one the scale isn’t moving, so I should just quit. Now, do you see how all of these are just quick thoughts that your brain thinks to save time and energy? Because thinking more deliberately would require so much more on your part. And yet in thinking this way, it doesn’t help you. It actually hurts you in so far as it doesn’t help you reach your goal. Another distortion, fortune telling, saying things like, I’m going to fail at this. That’s why I love future self work when it comes to goal setting and weight loss. Because when you train your brain to tell an amazing future story, you can do the opposite of this negative future storytelling. Another distortion, self-blame, and then blaming others. Self-blame is, this is my fault. I can’t lose weight and it’s all my fault.

Blaming others is it’s society’s fault that I can’t lose weight or it’s my parents’ fault for getting me addicted to sugar. I’ve talked about this before, but I think blame is one of the most widespread problems that I think goes unnoticed with respect to getting the results we want. We either blame ourselves or we blame others. So for example, if you’re struggling with yelling at your kids, you’re either going to blame them for fighting with each other at nighttime again and again, even after you stop or you’re going to blame yourself and think, why did I do that? Why did they do that? Why did I do that? And so back and forth of blaming either you or the other person, the same is true because it’s a thought pattern with respect to any of your goals like weight loss, you’re blaming yourself for not losing the weight or you’re blaming someone else like your parents or society or your spouse or your family.

Maybe you know the way that they eat. Just notice if you’re blaming another cognitive distortion, filtering out positive. An example would be nothing good happened at all today. So focusing on the negative when clearly there are positive things that happened, right? You got up, overgeneralizing, this is one that I see a lot. Nothing is working to lose the weight. And I’ve tried everything. And oftentimes in coaching when I’m working with a client, we find that they have tried three ways, or even if it’s like 10 ways. If you just think about all of the ways, there are hundreds of ways, and yet our brain has this thought error and thinks I’ve tried everything. And then we believe it because it’s more efficient to believe it than it is to question it.

Another cognitive distortion that makes it hard to lose weight. Labeling, I’m fat, I’m overweight. We’ve all heard the quote and I love teaching this. Those I am statements. Whatever comes after I am becomes your destiny. So if you say, I am fat or I am overweight, you are likely to live into that identity. It’s much easier to lose weight if you tell yourself positive I am statements. But they have to be statements that you believe. But something like, I’m becoming fit. I am in the process of losing weight. Something like that where it’s future focused and gives you an identity that you want to live into.

Another cognitive distortion or should, must statements, for example, I shouldn’t have eaten that. I like to say don’t should on yourself. All right my friend. Notice if you fall into the trap of thinking any of these cognitive distortions. If so, you will likely self-sabotage. Self-sabotage means you slow down, you take breaks, you stay stuck, or you quit. You won’t make changes, you won’t try a different way. You won’t pivot, you won’t keep going so you don’t succeed. And it has nothing to do with you. It has nothing to do with your body or your weight. It solely has everything to do with how you are thinking. And these distortions sort of being in the driver’s seat instead of in the backseat.

Notice how in every single one of these examples, they are thoughts. They’re not facts. The brain wants you to think that they’re facts, but they’re not. Even if they feel really true, a thought can be true and it still isn’t useful or helpful to focus on. So the solution is to manage your brain, brain management. Learn to identify and change your cognitive distortions so you can stick to your food plan and create a thought plan. Did you know that research supports positive self-talk in the face of weight gain, it is proven to help you lose weight. What? But that completely makes sense. Given what I’ve described today. Negative self-talk makes it more likely that you’re going to gain weight, positive self-talk. Changing these distortions, thinking on purpose, intentionally deciding what you want to believe is proven to help you lose weight. Isn’t that amazing?

You can notice these distortions question them, replace them with better feeling thoughts. You will get mentally stronger. You will not be so attached to these thoughts. And from there, you will think and feel in a more supportive way that helps you get the result you want. So you will keep trying. You won’t give up, you will fail, but you will fail forward and then you will get back up and you will try, try again. And guess what my friend? That is what’s required to lose the weight. You know what my thoughts are about weight loss? I’m healthy. This is working. I’m working towards my ideal weight. Weight loss can be easy. I can figure this out. And I practiced these thoughts even when I was on my journey of losing weight postpartum. It was so important for me to stay in the energy of losing weight in order to continue to take action and make progress on my goal.

I visualized myself as healthy, as fit, as thin as the version of myself that I wanted to be with the body that I wanted to have. So join my coaching membership right now and you will get the new class called Permanent Weight Loss to help you lose weight once and for all. You will also get a goal setting course called Empowered Goal Setting. You will learn how to identify and change your cognitive distortions, and you will get my strategic step-by-step process for weight loss. So you get both the mindset work and the food plan strategy work, plus all of the coaching. You get one-to-one with me. It is amazing, my friend. If you want to lose weight in the next year, join right now. I will see you inside.

Thank you for being here and listening now. Head on over to momonpurpose.com/coaching to learn more about Grow You, my membership for moms, where we take all this work to the next level.