Abdominal fat reduction women over 40. Client case study.
4 months progress
You don’t get results like this unless you prioritise yourself, which is something many women struggle with. We feel guilty if we do things for ourselves.
It’s important to look beyond the aesthetics, A is healthier and happier. More confident in herself, more assertive in knowing what she wants and going for it. Not worried about eating to please other people, or hiding the fact her health is important.
She’s not been on a fad diet. She eats normal healthy meals with her children and makes time in her schedule to exercise. She doesn’t react to stress by eating and knows rest, recovery and sleep are just as important, it’s all about balance.
Prioritising yourself doesn’t mean downgrading your responsibilities, it just means treating yourself with respect and as importantly as you treat everyone else, so you don’t get short changed in your own life.
The problem
Like many women in their 40s, my client A saw her body changing in a way she wasn’t happy with - despite eating healthily and exercising regularly.
So, how did she get these results?
Weight loss doesnt need to be linear
Look at her weight chart in this image, These are the ups and downs of life as a busy, perimenopausal mum; navigating half term, holidays, social weekends, illness, unexpected stress and the many curved balls that life throws at us.
All these things happened to A over the last 4 months. This is what life is like for us all, and it’s usually why we find dieting so hard and give up. We can’t cope with low energy, restriction and feeling deprived when we have to deal with so many other stressful things.
Support is essential
The real secret to her success was that she bounced back from setbacks quickly.
She learned she didn’t need to be 100% perfect to get great results, which took a whole lot of pressure of her and making everything feel easier.
By working together as a team, we tackled setbacks, created plans for holidays, birthdays, and even made things easier when she wasn’t well and couldn’t exercise
All this meant her diet became much more consistent than it had been - which is how you get great results.
Key Diet Changes
She had a good diet before, but it was too low in protein, which contributed to her needing to snack more.
She didn’t want to count calories, but was happy to work to a protein target and we focused on eating 3 filling and nutritious meals a day to stabilise her energy levels and reduce cravings.
I encouraged her to build regular snacks into her diet in a healthier way, to stop her feeling deprived or losing the motivation to stay on the plan.
Prioritising Strength Training
She was a regular exerciser, but didn’t strength train. So we switched the focus of her workouts to doing 2-3 weights sessions a week.
Fat loss was her goal, so strength training becomes a priority, as it helps protect muscle loss when dieting, and would mean she saw her muscle tone improve and become a better shape, rather than shrinking to become a smaller version of herself as she was when she started.
Consistency through Coaching
I didn’t teach my client much about nutrition or exercise. What I did do was show her how to create a system she could stick with, whatever life through at her.
I helped her let go of the idea she needed to chase perfection to get results, and shift out of the all-or-nothing mindset that keeps us stuck in yoyo dieting patterns.
I helped her bounce back quickly when she struggled.
Together, these simple things add up to consistency. 16 weeks of sticking to the basics and doing her best.
That’s the difference that working with a coach makes.
If you’re ready to start your own transformation, hit the button below and let’s start a conversation.